given by an Austrian private named Franz, despite some
heated objections by housemate Çerkes Mehmet. In the
meantime, word comes that Karl Franz Joseph has become
the Austrian Emperor.//
26 November 1916
Sunday
The weather is
completely clear today. Sunny. It’s hot, too. The Russian
newspapers write that Karl Franz Joseph
has become the Austrian
Emperor. Franz gave us a German lesson tonight. We chatted…went
to
bed.
27 November 1916
Monday
The weather is
somewhat overcast. Not very cold though. Another
incident in our house: Çerkes Mehmet was talking
loudly in his room.
I was curious so I went there. The problem: the servant giving the
lessons
in the evening and lessons being taken in the house. There
was quite a
discussion. Çerkes Mehmet was
completely wrong and
he proved it but since he’s a stupid bigot, a worthless haughty fool,
he
always thinks he’s in the right. And he’s threatening to tell the
worthless
little Command about it.
Anyway, without listening to
much more we came back to our room. I summoned Franz to come
for
the lesson but he excused himself, saying he couldn’t come. I
pressed him on
this and understood
that Çerkes Mehmet had warned
them and that if they didn’t heed the warning he would send them to
the main barracks. This made me very angry. I won’t have anything
to do with this fool. Who are
he and Salah to scream and shout and
prevent me from learning! No!
Impertinence! I couldn’t work on
lessons at night because of this annoyance.
28 November 1916
Tuesday
The weather is
still overcast. The cold increased toward evening. We
drank morning tea. We
heard that Lieutenant
Colonel Saffet from the
other house would come to visit someone. We gathered, he came and
entered our room. After greetings we began to talk. He recommended
this to us:
we must always get
along with each other pleasantly and
harmoniously in captivity and in the
country of a foreign
enemy. Even
if so inclined, we must not allow a tumult to erupt. We understood
that
Çerkes Mehmet had
told him about yesterday’s incident, what kind of
man Çerkes Mehmet is and how he had
overstepped his boundaries in
dealing with us. Even though Çerkes objected to
this no one agreed
with
him. In the end it was decided that Çerkes will not interfere with
anything,
that he will say
whatever he has to say directly to all of us or
individually and that
everything will be explained in a
pleasant way.
The Lieutenant Colonel left. We couldn’t work on German today.
Conversation, bed.
29 November 2011
Wednesday
The weather is
cloudy. But the bitter cold is gone. The dense snow
cover is melting, none of
it is left. Our army has
come to within three
hours of Van. They’re attacking from the Kifi side. The Romanians are
being crushed. Our allies have come to a point ten kilometers from
Bucharest. The Romanians’
situation is grave…today Salah spoke to
Çerkes about the servants with measured language. He
agreed. At night
we were busy with German. Harun and Salah were appointed to
represent us to
the Lieutenant Colonel.
30 November 2011
Thursday
Our forces are on
the attack. Van is in our hands and fighting continues
at Manastir. The
Russians are under
pressure. The weather is overcast.
Not very cold. We worked on German a bit at
night. We got our laundry
today and changed it. Again today I thought about the future, my
situation. A lot of things
became clear to me. I felt a bit down.
1 December 2011
Friday
The weather is
cloudy but it’s not all that cold outside. News: our army
is on the attack in
Van. We worked on
German at night. Franz wrote a
letter to the German committee here asking that a German
grammar
book be sent to us. This was written only for us. We chatted a bit and
went to bed.
2 December 1916
Saturday
The weather is
overcast but it’s not cold. In the afternoon ten of us
went to the other
houses. I went to the
Avilfinski house with three other
fellows. We stayed for more than an hour. I translated two
short
German stories using a German dictionary until the evening and I had
Hakkı correct
them. Then we visited another room. We
chatted a bit
with Cavalryman Tevfik and we got a German
containing short
sentences and a notebook from Yusuf. We then went to the Malaşova
house and after staying there a while we returned. We heard some
news when we got back:
the Russians are discharging fifth-class
soldiers. Peace is being talked about in the municipal
council. A
Russian policeman confirmed this to us. Van is in Turkish hands.
Russian soldiers
are deserting, saying ‘we don’t want war’. We
worked a little on German at night because
Franz was giving a lesson
to Süleyman. We chatted at night, then we went to bed. The Vetluga
River is completely frozen. Carts and other things are passing over it.
//END of PART LV//
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