Posted by BDM Historian

Chapter 4
New Acquaintances

The first thing Irm heard the next morning as the sound of an accordion. Oh, that was the song, "And the morning freshness, that is our time..." Who was playing and where was she at, anyway? Sleepily, she opened her eyes and her first glance fell onto the large window at the foot end of her bed. She saw green twigs and leaves and above that, a piece of clear blue sky. Heidersdorf! Jungmaedel camp! Happiness came over her so strongly that she could feel her heart beating inside her chest.

With a big leap she jumped from the bed and ran to the window. Below, Kathrin walked along the side of the building. She wore her sports clothing and the buttons on her accordion gleamed in the sun. Tramp jumped around here in big circles; you could tell right away that he was happy too.

"Formation for morning sports is in five minutes!" Kathrin called up to the window. She had to hurry now! Irm rushed into her sports clothing. The others were in a hurry as well, and there was little time to wish each other a good morning. Only Shorty gave her a quick, friendly poke as she ran past: "Are you this excited, too?"

Then came the morning run through the dewy meadow, through a barbed wire fence into the woods, across logs and through bushes. Everywhere, birds were chirping, a cuckoo called from far away, and above everything lay the gleaming sunshine, much brighter than it did in Berlin. It was beautiful in Heidersdorf. Irm wanted to just scream with joy. But you didn't do that, of course.

After fifteen minutes they were standing in front of the youth hostel again. "Breakfast will be at 8:30", said Kathrin. "By then you will need to have washed up, dressed, and made your beds."

Oh, that was still a long time away! While everyone else pushed their way to the bathroom laughing and talking, Irm went back upstairs to the bedroom. She would make her bed first, maybe it was even better than if everyone was running around the bedroom later on. She shook up her blankets and folded her sleeping bag.

Then she saw Inge's harmonica on the window sill. Carefully, she put the small instrument to her lips: "And the morning freshness..." she tried to play. But the right sounds just didn't want to come. Well, no big deal. "Now the gate of the night has fallen before the joy, the joy, it has burst," sang Irm while she jumped down several steps at once.

There was much excitement downstairs in the bathroom. Kathrin had been there and she had been less than excited about the Jungmaedel's idea of washing up. "Elli kept her sports clothes on. She said, otherwise, she'd get cold," said Inge. "You should have seen Kathrin! We're at Jungmaedel Camp, and not in a pig stay. It wouldn't be washing if only face, neck and hands are getting washed. You should brush your hands, wash your feet, and the ears inside and out. She's going to check all ears, and hands, and feet later, she said."

"It's all show," Ellie complained. "The leaders are always all show." - "Why show?" Irm said and rubbed herself with a rough washcloth until she turned lobster red. It would've been horrible to be counted among the "pigs". But Ellie grumbled on. "I would like to know if Kathrin always washes herself. Today she was probably not in here, and how about yesterday evening - we don't know if she did or not because she was the last one to go to bed."

Irm shook her head. "Kathrin isn't all show, you can believe that," she said convinced. But she still had to laugh when someone in the corner next to the window suggested they should take Kathrin's toiletry bag and hide it. "It's on the third hook here. Then she can't wash. And at breakfast, we'll ask her, and if she says yes, then we know how it is with the leaders and that they're really all show." - "Good," said Shorty and Elli hid the toiletry bag in her sweat pants.

When Liese and the kitchen duty group put the steaming milk soup onto the table, everyone was already seated full of expectation and unusually quiet around the table. Liese was a member of the BDM as well. She had even once led a Jungmaedel group. But now she was here and helped the den mother. This was called the "female service year" and Liese said that she liked Heidersdorf so much, she would rather not leave again. Everyone would probably get along well with her.

Then Kathrin entered. In a choir, everyone asked, "Did - you - wash - yourself - today?" - At first Kathrin made a confused face. Then she said loudly: "Not very thoroughly, because I couldn't find my toiletry bag. Do you know...?"

"There it is!" Ellie yelled, and among the general howling Kathrin could just say, "What a horrible band of thieves you are!" - She couldn't even guess what an important test she had just passed, and that the Jungmaedel would now believe everything she'd tell them to the word, no matter what she said. But the Jungmaedel knew and it was great for them...

Irm could hardly wait for breakfast to end. What would be on next? "We explore Heidersdorf," said the camp schedule that hung in the entry way next to a large fireplace. That would be a lot of fun, even though nobody quite knew how to start.

Later on, Kathrin explained exactly what was meant. The Jungmaedel were to go by themselves or in small groups around the village and ask what there was to see and do; about the history of the village, about the farmers and their work, about sagas and fairy tales of the area. Maybe there was an especially pretty farm house or an old fountain or something. They were to ask lots of questions and look around. They were given the whole morning.

"Oh, fun!" Inge was excited. "I'm going up to the manor. The den mother told me that it used to be an old knight's palace. Maybe there's a secret passageway or something. Do you want to come along?" - But Irm thought it was better to go by herself. After all, only one girl could ask a question at a time, and she didn't just want to stand around.

She took the small trail to the left of the main town road, which went out to a singular farm, two small sheds, and then into an open field. Certainly none of the others would be going this way.

In the grassy yard of the farm house, a young woman was hanging up the laundry. Irm said hello and the young woman laughed back. "You must be one of the Berlin Jungmaedel from the hostel," she said, and when Irm nodded, she asked whether she liked it there, even though she came from the big Berlin with it's sky-high buildings, the electric trams, and the many cars. She wanted to know a lot more and Irm had to keep going: about Potsdam Place with the many lighted advertisements that are so bright, you can't even see the stars in the sky. About the rail triangle where so many different rails ran together you couldn't even count them anymore, and about Alexander Place where five different trams cross.

"There's quite something going on in Berlin," said the woman sighing and shook out a wet sheet so that the drops sprayed in all directions. "I'd like to live there, too, and not here, at the end of the world."

Irm looked confused. She had never thought that the S-trains and the high rises were something special. They were actually quite boring, but especially the underground trains where you rode in the dark all the time. The advertising slogans of "Bullrich Salt" and "Oleo-Sasso" were something you quickly knew by heart, and nothing else there was worth looking at. Heidersdorf was a lot more fun.

Irm told this to the woman, but she shook her head. "Good grief, you only say that because this is all new to you. But you wait, in three or four years, my husband and I are going to sell this dreary little rat hole and then we'll move to Berlin. Our children will have it better than us."

"What could be better?" Irm though and looked at the little boy who was rolling in the grass with a shaggy brown dog next to the laundry basket. She felt that there was something not right and she didn't really like the young woman. But she was just a Jungmaedel. What could she tell a grown up. She was happy when the woman took her laundry basket and went inside: "My soup will get burnt otherwise. Have fun in Heidersdorf."

Irm went on with her head hanging low. She had wanted to ask about the village, and instead she had spent her time talking about Berlin. She absentmindedly picked up a switch from the side of the path and beat at the air with it so that it whistled. It was so horrible what the woman had told her, oh, so horrible!

She hardly watched where she was going so that she startled when she found herself in the middle of a honking flock of geese. Hissing, the geese started in on her. "Get away!" Irm yelled energetically and hit the gander so that he honked and flapped his wings getting away. Behind a large golden willow, someone laughed. Then a blonde boy's head with tousled hair appeared between the branches. "You're not scared at all - much braver than our village girls!" With this, he crawled out entirely and now stood before Irm, barefoot and tanned.

"Scared? Of a Gander? - Nope! - Takes more to scare me." Irm thought it didn't hurt to put herself into a better light in front of boys. The result showed immediately, too. The boy was definitely willing to make further conversation. "I'm Goose-August's Karli," he said. "What's your name, and what are you doing here?"

Irm told him about the Jungmaedel and the exploration trip to the village. Maybe Karli would know something? A funny story or the like? Karli thought for a minute, then spat on the ground. Then he said, "When Schulze's Emil comes home from the Jug, he's always drunk. He zigzags across the road. He'll bump into the telegraph pole, then he'll bump into a garden fence. Then he'll stop dead in the middle of the road, looks real stupid, and says, "Oh, oh, take it easy now. Young horses cost money." Then we stumble and zigzag along behind him and yell, "Oh! Oh! Take it easy now!" Then he turns around and throws rocks at us. But he never hits us because he's too drunk to aim. That's pretty funny."

Irm shook her head. Karli's stories were pretty useless. So she changed the subject. "Who lives in those two little houses?" - "In the house on the right lives the old broom maker woman, but she's coo-coo" - he tapped his forehead. "She tells everyone about her Hannes and that tomorrow, the mailman will bring a letter from him. But Hannes has been in the city for 25 years and he's never written yet. Yeah, go there, you can laugh about her, too."

"Thanks," said Irm. She didn't want to insult Karli but she also didn't want to go back to the woman with the laundry. But she would, of course, make a big beeline around the house with the broom maker woman.

But when she came near, a grey figure straightened up behind the garden gate: "Hey, li'l girl, c'mon over here for a mo'." Irm turned around. There was nothing else nearby, so obviously she was meant. A little hesitant, she drew closer. That must be the broom maker woman. Irm didn't want anything to do with people who weren't quite right. They were eerie.

"Do you know how to write?" said the old woman. "Yes." Irm was surprised. There were people who didn't know how? - "Then please write something down for me. I've long forgotten that old school stuff." With that, she laughed a little and Irm thought that she wasn't that eerie after all. Maybe she wasn't even the broom maker woman after all.

"Look there," said the old woman and pointed to a wooden letterbox mounted to the garden fence, the door of which was wide open. "In there's a pair of sparrows. They want to make it a nest. They're only sparrows but if they really want to be there, they might as well stay." Irm looked at the old woman's face. What would come next?

"You should write me a notice to warn the mail carrier not to throw the letter from my Hannes in there tomorrow, so he won't scare away the birds." - It was the broom maker woman after all! Irm was so alarmed she would've liked to just run away. But now it was too late. "Does Hannes write often?" she said just to say something.

"Yes," said the old woman mysteriously. "Tomorrow. He will come back. It's what the earth wants. The good Lord has given her great power. Who doesn't bow to her will be damned, and his children and grandchildren will be damned, so wills the Lord. But Hannes comes back." Irm swallowed. Why had she chosen not to go to the manor with Inge? But now she had to finish what she had started. "What should I write?" she asked, and her own voice sounded strange to her.

"Well, so..." the old woman touched her forehead as if she wanted to change her mind. "Did I scare you, li'l girl? The old broom maker woman doesn't always know quite what she's talking about anymore. Don't take it quite seriously, li'l girl." With this, she had the same gleam in her eyes as she had talking about the birds.

"Here's a piece of paper and a pencil. Now write: 'Mister Postman! There are young birds inside the letterbox. Do not put the letter inside.'" Irm made an effort to write as pretty and evenly as possible. "That will do," said the old woman. "And now I'll give you something, too." With this, she limped into the garden and soon came back with a small bouquet of lavender. "There," she said. "Give this to your mother to put into the laundry closet. It'll smell like summer all year long."

Irm thanked her with a proper curtsy. The old broom maker woman wasn't so bad after all, but Irm was still glad when she got back to the main village road among people. Only she couldn't understand why Goose-August's Karli could laugh about the old broom maker woman.

In the afternoon, everyone recounted their exploration trips. Most were really proud of their adventures, and especially Inge was acting very secretive. She had something really great, but what it is, she wasn't going to tell. Kathrin had told her it would have to wait until a special social evening.

When it was Irm's turn, she said: "It's nothing great, really, and it's not really about the history of the village, but I want to tell you about it anyway." Then she told them about the broom maker woman and the woman with the laundry basket.

When she had finished, Liese nodded. "That was part of it after all," she said. "You have to know that even in the villages not everything is as it should be. There are many who think, they can only get places in the city. Maybe it's good that us city girls are sent to the country to help. Not just because the work needs to get done, but so the people in the country also realize that us girls in the service year or the land service or the labor service do this work willingly and like it. I'm really happy I get to be a part of it."

At those words, Liese looked very proud and happy and Irm thought: "Later on, when I've finished school, I'll go to the country to work, too. There can't be anything better!"