Herbert Meinl

“When I was young, I didn’t care for my old homeland at all. I didn’t feel like I had anything to do with it. I was six when we were forced to leave, I was interested in completely different things. When we had visitors and there was talk of the old country, I thought to myself, what are blathering on about again, we’re here now – I didn’t understand them at all back then. But it all changed abruptly twenty years ago. At the time, I packed a rucksack, but on my hiking boots, and set out for Nejdek. I traversed the town in the late afternoon. I’m a mountaineer, I always know my bearings. The next day I went up to Tellerer [a nearby settlement in the forest – trans.]. I vaguely remembered where my granddad’s house had stood – it’s thick undergrowth there now. To wipe out the memories, the Czechs let the forest grow over the place. A tangled, deep wood. Suddenly I stood before the house. It was as though I was struck by lightning. That was the house. That wall. The past came rising up, having hidden for sixty years. That is where the kitchen was, that was the dunghill, the drain still worked, you could start farming again. It knocked me breathless. This is where my father was born, all thirteen children. I wasn’t able to take it all in. I pushed through the undergrowth, I almost had to climb. The wall pillars still stood, it was all there bar the wood. It was an extraordinarily powerful experience. The next day I visited the graveyard in Nejdek. I was walking through it when I unexpectedly came upon several German graves. There were actually still in good shape. And suddenly I stood before the tombstone of my granddad from Tellerer. I hadn’t counted on that. I was overcome with emotions once more. For the first time in my life I had a feeling of home, a feeling of homeland, a feeling that I belong somewhere. I had never felt anything like it in my life. A lone wolf who traverses the world but is empty inside. When I stood before my granddad’s tombstone, I felt that the empty space in my soul was finally filled up. I belong here. I am home here.”

“Our house was right next to the railroad from Karlovy Vary to Johanngeorgenstadt. It was being refurbished in 1940, and the work was being done by POWs. They were supervised by two armed soldiers. My mother regularly pretended to have some work of her own to do in the vicinity of the track. But in actual fact, she’d bring the captives food when no one was looking. The captives may have noticed that the young woman was growing rounder every day. Then she didn’t come at all for some time, but when she appeared again, she was as slim as she used to be, and she prepared food for them again at the usual place. The men understood that she had given birth to a child. The next day they prepared a bouquet of flowers for her.”