Destine Literare nr. 23 - septembrie - decembrie 2012 - Scriitorii ...

estine iterare
D L
married, and my interest in Military was from zero to minus infinity. Around that time we decided to leave the
“Communist Paradise” and there was no way to be able to, unless they had my physical presence for sixteen
months. Well, they turned into twenty after all, because when my time came to be discharged, it was full blown
Fall harvest season for the agriculture and one of the main duty of the Military was to work the fields on the state
farms.
So, when I finally got my orders I had to show up at the designated place to join other hundreds of young
people in their new Military careers...
The recruiting center where I had to report was almost downtown. Every day, except for the time of reporting
for the draft, the place was totally invisible to anyone. Just another government building, located into an old
house, the residence of a “bourgeois” of the past, which probably was confiscated and its owner died in prison...
Actually it was a nice old building with a lot of roses in the garden. It was enclosed by an impressive wrought
iron fence, and it had a big gate.
That particular morning it was a lot of crowding around the building. Families of the young people leaving for
the Military. Some were bringing food, some were bringing bottles of booze which of course were smuggled in,
because drinking was against regulation. But part of the ritual was to drink your brains out and to celebrate the
last few minutes of “freedom”.
None of the young men there were happy to turn into soldiers. Some of them were resigned to the idea as
something troublesome, not pleasant that had to be done; some others totally rejected it openly, but those were
the ones rejecting anything as a matter of principle; some, very few like me, hated it, but I knew that it was the
price I had to pay to leave the country.
I stepped in the yard and joined the group the guard at the gate told me to join. There were usually two
officers, at least one lieutenant and a sergeant major holding rosters of our names. After I checked in, I was
advised to put my piece of luggage down and to seat on it until further orders. And there was my first problem.
My piece of luggage was a regular, off the shelf item. Most of those present, had some wooden cases shaped
like traveling cases on which they could seat... Traditionally every recruit had to have one of those, however
they were not sold in stores, and unless you knew somebody who could make one for your, or who was in the
Military and had no use for it, there was not way to get one. I found out later that the most important asset of
the wooden case was the padlock that could be attached to secure it. Mine was easy to open, and there were
a few times, when people helped themselves from whatever I had in it.
In spite of the fact that we were to report at 7:30 am, some still showed up around ten. They were so drunk
that it was useless for the officers to argue with them. Once they were checked in, they were promised some
disciplinary action when they arrived on the camp.
Now, the general question was, where were the camps? Nobody knew. We were not supposed to know it. It
was a military secret that had to be very well kept. There were spies of the foreign powers prowling among the
population and they were chasing information. Where the recruits were going was a highly classified secret.
One could ask, but one would never get an answer.
I did not see anyone I knew there. As I said my time for the military was late, and all people around me, in
spite of the fact that we could have been neighbors, did not know each other, mainly because the generation gap.
The sun was getting higher on the skies, the temperature was raising, and the lack of shed in the yard started
to take its toll, especially on those who had more alcohol in their circulatory system than blood...
Around noon or so, we were told to get ready to move. There were some buses outside the gates, waiting
to take us someplace. Obviously it was at the train station. They would not take us by bus to the camp, nor were
they going to take us to the airport... Knowing that the station was the destination, was not too much help to us,
because there were three major train stations in the city and any one of them could have been a candidate for
us.
At that point, I was not sure if the reason for secrecy was the foreign powers on the look out for intelligence,
or the family members whose numbers grew in geometrical progression in front of the gates, and who started
to cause traffic problems, and disturbance in the streets. It was hard to determine who was drunker, the recruits,
or the families outside the fence. In spite of the strict orders, after a while, it was hard to separate the two
different crowds. The fences were not really a stop in keeping the family members outside...
Finally, around four in the afternoon, we were loaded in the buses, and the destinations were already known.
Darn it, no one can keep military secrets when civilians were involved. The buses were chartered, the drivers
were civilians and it did not take them too long to divulge their itinerary...
After a while the outside crowds started to get smaller and smaller. Knowing where the destinations were,
they all ran to the train station to wait for us there.
To be continued...
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