In any case,
reading now became my salvation in
the long weeks and months spent in
that little hut of ours. I fondly
remember the books written by Karl
May whose novels were set in the
American West - cowboys and
Indians! These were popular in
every German speaking area of
Europe. I read these page-turners
with a voracious appetite. Indeed,
the endless Austrian winter was
ideal for such a welcome
distraction.
My grandmother
put up with my reading habit at
first, but as spring approached her
patience waned. She had other plans
for my free time. We had to build a
pigpen and a vegetable garden. She
also wanted to construct a chicken
enclosure since we had some extra
space. She said she needed no less
than ten hens and a rooster for this
new undertaking.
Our
farmer/landlord, Herr Neissl, wasn’t
really pleased with this news and he
warned of the foxes and hawks that
preyed on such creatures.
Grossmutter had her own ideas about
such predators and said that should
they endanger our chickens they
would be in for a big surprise. It
slowly occurred to me that my
grandmother could not be scared by
the well intentioned farmer into
believing this plan of hers wasn’t a
good idea. One morning I heard the
voices of my Grossmutter and the
farmer having a heated discussion.
Finally, Herr Neissl said in an
exasperated manner, “Go ahead, Susi
(my Oma’s name was Susanna), do what
you want so I can have some peace
and quiet. No more than ten hens
and one rooster however.”
This of course
meant that I would be very busy
constructing the chicken enclosure,
further reducing my already precious
free time. The plan was carried out
rather quickly and soon we had a
fenced in area with nest-beds for
egg laying. The idea was to keep
them inside at night and let them
loose in a fenced-in section of the
yard during the day.
Of course my
grandmother had more than ten hens!
She reasoned that some might die or
that there might be more than one
rooster so the number of hens had to
keep pace. The poor farmer looked
on in dismay but said nothing.
Slowly the months
passed and our chickens grew in
size. Some spent the night in the
trees while others stayed inside the
stall. Our small home became
livelier and livelier. The pigs,
chickens and rooster gave our tiny
patch of land a unique and
interesting quality all its own.
Things were happening and none of
our relatives had anything
comparable. They lived too close to
the farm so it just wasn’t possible
for them to do what we did.
And so my
grandmother’s goal was realized and
we now had our own little
enterprise. We had valuable fresh
eggs and we had two pigs, one for us
and one to be sold to a relative in
nearby Salzburg. Things were looking
up!
My uncle Toni
Mack and a bunch of other relatives
helped butcher the pig late in the
year. Uncle Toni knew all the ins
and outs of sausage making and meat
cutting. He set the tone and
everyone in the group followed his
instructions. Even my sister and I
were expected to help along. It was
a real Donauschwaben undertaking:
there was drinking of fruit wine,
occasional swearing in Croatian or
Hungarian, and later, when the men
had a enough wine (called
Most),
there was the singing of melodious
Croatian songs. It was just like at
home in Bukin, Yugoslavia, and I
loved it.
It was, however,
quite different from what the local
farmers in Austria did. They didn’t
spend nearly as much time doing the
work and the event was far less
festive. For instance, when our
farmer/landlord Mr. Neissl
slaughtered a pig he sent for Mr.
Pfaffinger from the village of
Haigermoos. Mr. Pfaffinger was the
village barber, the church
administrator, the priest’s
assistant and acolyte, as well as a
small-scale farmer. He also had a
store that served as a gathering
place for the entire area.
Anyway, Mr.
Pffafinger had his own system when
it came to slaughtering pigs.
Unlike the Donauschwaben, no
sausages or head cheese (Schwartenmagen)
would be produced. Even the killing
of the pig was done differently.
The Austrian would first stun the
pig with a heavy hammer blow before
“bleeding” the animal with a knife
and killing it. Uncle Toni, on the
other hand, would simply use a sharp
knife to take the life of the
hapless pig, bleeding it at the same
time. This difference in
dispatching the animal and a few
other disparities in handling the
meat convinced both my grandmother
and uncle Toni that the
Donauschwaben way was a far better
way. Naturally opinions varied but
my Grossmutter told everyone the
Austrians didn’t know what they were
doing. It sure didn’t make her many
friends among our hosts!
As the excitement
of the Schlachtfest subsided, winter
was once again upon us. Falling
snow signaled the beginning of a
period of rest for the farmers.
Card games would be played and we
would all listen to radio broadcasts
in the farmer’s parlor. It was a
time of relaxation ahead of the busy
spring season just a few months
away.
To be
continued......
Adam Martini
[Published at www.dvhh.org,
22 Feb 2008]
