Text 20395, 239 rader
Skriven 2005-12-29 23:46:00 av Michiel van der Vlist (2:280/5555)
Kommentar till text 20329 av Carol Shenkenberger (6:757/1)
Ärende: Lack of Gratitude
=========================
Hello Carol,
MvdV>> Yes, I noticed. And I suppose you noticed the swipe about "just
MvdV>> a radio operator who lets other does the dirty work"....
> Not fully, I have taken to just rapid scanning most of this topic.
The don't bother to look for it. You'll have plenty more opportunity to read
insults from Roy. ;-)
> The 'Radio operator' on a ship runs the communications
> and is hardly an unimportant position.
Of course it isn't.
> I've only heard of Radio being evacuated once and I was there.
> We had a toxic gas leak but were still in cell phone range.
[..]
O boy, that's nasty...
MvdV>>> I just reread my aunt's diary. She lived in Oosterbeek during t
MvdV>>> of Arnhem. In September 1944 she was right in the middle of a w
>> I'd love some excerpts from that if you would be willing?
MvdV>> I'd be willing. Actually my plan is to put the whole ting on my web si
MvdV>> but there are a few problems to overcome. The original is in Dutch and
> <snip but interesting!>. Ah thats ok, I was just curious if
> you could give some info on what she had to say but dont want
> to cause some copywrite problems or anything.
Publishing snippets would not violate any copyrights, but I still would have to
digitize the English version before I could cut and paste from it. The Dutch
text would not be of much use to you. Well, I could only digitize the snippets,
but I'd rather do the digitizing in one piece as otherwise I might end up doing
unneeded extra work. So have a bit of patience. I think I will talk ny sister
into giving permission eventually, but it takes a bit of time...
>> I beleive you've made reference to starving folks, possibly
>> eating tulip bulbs to stay alive?
MvdV>> Yes, people ate everything that was at all edible and that they
MvdV>> could get their hands on. Tulip bulbs were indeed eaten. Not in
MvdV>> Oosterbeek but my other grandparents who lived in The Hague have
MvdV>> indeed eaten tulip bulbs during the winter of 1944.
> It sounds so very odd but if edible, definately something
> people would have to do. I didnt know you could eat them
> before I saw that reference some years back to it.
Tulip bulbs are very much like onions and yes they are edible. They don't taste
very good but they do have nutritional value.
Something else they ate was sugar beet. And acorns.
>> God has graced my life in that I've never been in any real
>> hardship.
MvdV>> Neither have I. I did have some health problems in my youth due to the
MvdV>> shortage of certain foods after the war.
> Milk and calcium lacks possibly?
Yes, plus lack of vitamins.
[..]
>> I hear you and agree. I see no reason why you should feel 'grateful'
>> to me because my father fought in the battle of the bulge
It isn't the "gratefulness" itself that I have a problem with, the serious
problems arise when people try to blackmail me into supportimg something that I
disagree with "because I should be grateful". That's when I dig my heels in the
sand.
>> (Born of german parents on Parris Island just after
>> crossing, fluent german, radio operator who translated what
>> the germans were saying for the US troops). Why should you?
>> He was just one of many people who were doing as they were
>> told, and as he thought best.
MvdV>> Now, when you tell it like that, I can't help feeling
MvdV>> *respect* for your (your father).
> Yeah, he was a good guy overall. Radio operator also as you'll note ;-)
Yep. ;-) Nothing wrong with being a radio op.
> Army though, not Navy like me and the other fellow in that post
> I barely scanned (sorry, might have been your family?
No, not my family. Björn (Fortsrom) IIRC.
MvdV>> Just like the people here. Those who were there don't very
MvdV>> much like to talk about it.
> Yes, Dad was like that.
And unlike what Frank suggests, it has nothing to do with shame.
> I havent mentioned my husband very often in sysop echos. Don
> is retired Navy who also spent a tour in Vietnam (he's a bit
> older than me). He has PTSD (Post Tramatic Stress Syndrome).
> He never speaks of Vietnam much but when it comes up he gets
> all 'shell shocky looking'.
Understandable. People do not voluntarily relive shocking experiences.
> In our early days, he used to still have problems with
> flashbacks. 2 weeks ago at our Xmas party (ship party,
> probably 500 people and kids there) he _had_ to leave.
That's bad. Must be hard on the both of you..
> Just too many people and noise for him to handle. He
> *hates* the 4th of July with a passion and i used
> to have to take leave then to be sure he wasnt alone. He's
> better about that now but then, the fireworks are well away
> from where we live and just pretty so he grits his teeth and
> will take Charlotte downstairs to see them if i am not at
> home. I recal our first 4th of July. He literally hid under
> the bed and wouldnt come out for 2 hours.
I don't know what to say to that. He must have been in some very nasty
situations if it still gets to him after all these years. Anyway, you are among
those who understand why most people who have been in a war situation prfere
not to talk about it.
MvdV>>> of the future.
>> Exactly. It's over. While I would be curious to know what my
>> father enountered, it is too late. (Rest in Peace Dad, 2001).
MvdV>> Same here. My father died nearly two years ago. He once told me
MvdV>> how after the failure of the battle of Arnhem he tried to cross the ri
MvdV>> Rhine to get to the liberated southern part but failed. And that's all
MvdV>> he ever said about it. My mother who lived in the Hauge was a bit more
MvdV>> talkative. She told me about the tulip bulbs and all the other things
> I remember. I also remember some IDIOT posted a flame at you
> at just the wrong moment and a bunch of us jumped all over
> him. Some really ugly thing about your Dad and all that.
Sadly enough, it didn't really hurt me. FidoNet is a wonderful medium but it
can also be very cruel at times. It wasn't the first time someone exploited a
personal loss to take a swipe at me. I have learned to wear my helmet and
asbestos underware at all times in FidoNet. I also learned not to be too
revealing about my moments of weakness in personal life. But someone was very
nasty to me when nine years ago my wife died at age 47 of sudden cardiac
arrest. That was in a Ducth echo btw.
>> used by Hitler at one stage and is now a supermarket (bulding
>> demolished long ago).
MvdV>> Interesting indeed....
> Yeah and the money came in handy <g>. I was told it was a
> very famous hotel just on the other side of the line in
> Berlin. Some memory fragment about the Russians also using it
> so maybe the 'russian quarter' but I dont have an address or
> anything like that.
Should not be too hard to track. Ah, well what's the use, it's history......
MvdV>>> those feelings. We should not burden the next generation with t
MvdV>>> of the past. They have their own future to make.
>> Correct. Charlotte knows a bit of this history, as far as it
>> goes but as you can tell, there is no 'angst' passed on with it.
MvdV>> Very good.
> Smile, no point in it. History can teach us valid lessons
I think this "learn from history" is highly overrated. yes, there are lessons
to be learned from the mistakes of others, but only up to a point. After that
comes the point that one has to learn from one's own mistakes.
> but teaching a child to perpetuate 'hate' over long ago things is
> just wrong.
Indeed and I am very glad my parents did not saddle me with hate for the
Germans. They had reason enough...
MvdV>> Frank is 80+ years old. At the end of WWII he was past schoolgoing age
MvdV>> So wherever he learned of WWII history, it was not at school.
> True, but he saw in real life, only that slice afforded to
> him. He would have been with a big army unit so from his POV,
> there were Americans all over the place liberating things.
Frank was never in Europe during WWII.
> The US Press would have concentrated on 'feel good' stories as
> well (and they did, old articles show this clearly). The USA
> didnt really have a 'Propaganda Ministry' but the effect of
> the newspapers and other things were slanted to us looking
> good and for all to add to the war effort.
Of course. The first victim of war is always the truth.
> He hasnt brought up how the USA took the Japanese Americans
> (most of them citizens of the 3rd or futher generation) and
> put them in concentration camps of our own. That and the
> Germans may have gotten their own ideas of Auswitz from our
> own past history of Andersonville (Civil war place, horrendous
> but the only thing they lacked was a Doctor Mendele and a gas
> chamber).
> If you havent run into Andersonville,
I have never heard of it.
> it's a truely sad part of American history that we'd all like
There never was much attention for American History at school. Not that I
remember anyway. Well, history never was my favorite and I have forgotten most
of it, so I am an unreliable wittnes.
> to forget ever happened and have done so well, that probably
> most of the Z1 posters here have no clue what I am talking about.
> Photography was in it's infancy then but there are pictures of
> people so skeletal, you cant believe they were still breathing.
Every country has its dark pages in the history books. Mine not excluded. I am
not paricularly proud of the role of what may have been my ancestors in the
slave transports a couple of centuries ago. But then, that was even longer
before I was born than WWII.
Chers, Michiel
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