My Three Countries by Melgaard Anna;Ard Alice;Fredericks Ellen;Melgaard Mandy;

Author:Melgaard, Anna;Ard, Alice;Fredericks, Ellen;Melgaard, Mandy;
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781543935196
Publisher: BookBaby
Published: 2018-12-21T16:32:27+00:00

Harvesting

Sometimes our supervisors had us harvest other crops in addition to the ones we cared for. I remember harvesting watermelons and getting so sticky! Another time, we loaded cucumbers into a truck headed for town. We rode on top of the pile and ate them like apples.

Sick Days

I worked in the wheat harvest once, turning the wheel on a grindstone to sharpen sickles. However, I had boils on my hands and arms and the dust made them worse. The brigadiers wouldn’t let me off unless I had a fever. They didn’t like people lying around. Finally, after I complained hard and showed them my boils, they let me stay in the barracks for a couple of days. I spent the whole time in my bunk.

One day, a male brigadier told us that when we finished moving a large pile of grain from one storage shed to another, we could go home for the day. We worked very fast and finished much sooner than he expected. When we started to leave, he gave us another job. By that time, we’d had enough and made a break for the barracks, running, knowing that he was too old to catch us. Instead, he sent a few Ukrainian boys after us. We kept running, up a hill, but the boys gained on us. One by one, the workers dropped off. Remembering a story my Grandmother had once told me about a girl who fainted to get out of a difficult situation, I pretend to faint. The boys were scared when they saw me lying on the ground and talked amongst themselves, trying to decide if I was sick or faking it. It had been a long, up-hill run, so I just rested and let them talk for a while. Then I came to, holding my chest. “I’m sick,” I said. One of the boys knew me, from when I had worked with his mother. He said, “Let her go!” and they did. All the others had to go back to work.

Another time, a lump formed on my wrist. I showed it to the guard and told him I was sick; I couldn’t shovel the dirt or manure for the hot beds. So, he gave me a break. My wrist didn’t really hurt, but he didn’t need to know that! We did what we had to.

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