Far away from Brescia, Lulzim, fifteen,
fell in love with the Turkish eyes of Altna, who was not yet thirteen.
Altna's father was a harsh and cruel man, and Bajram's family had to give
money and gold for his daughter.
Altna has five sisters and eight brothers,
she does not know how to read or to count beyond thirty-nine. She laughs
and jokes and lifts her children up into the air and bares her breast without
any embarassment to feed them. She makes bread, cooks food and nourishes
the world.
Lulzim does countless jobs. At the age of
twelve, he started as bricklayer, a shepherd, a butcher, a factory worker.
The Serbs told him to stay with the Albanians, the Albanians to stay with
the Serbs, until one day he asked his boss to help; and his boss found
him a job as a telephone operator at the dormitory of the Serb students
at Prishtina, where fist blows and bottles of arak would fly during the
night.
While his father went around the world with
little Reska, Lulzim took care of his mother and of the house. Before the
storm broke out, here is Lulzim at home, seated on carpets and cushions,
drinking beer with his friends. Lulzim is cutting the neck of a lamb and
letting the blood flow out. Lulzim working hard, Altna at twenty is mother
to three children:
Emir, fair hair and an expression which seems
to challenge the world .
Anela, with her mother's pretty and mysterious
face.
Xhevrija, in honour of grandmother Xhevrija,
a small, dark spot.
With them is Beçir, skin like dark,
curly parchment, a lonely tooth and a big smile. Beçir understands
nothing and understands everything, and while you speak in any language,
he imitates you. Not your gestures, but with his own gestures, he tells
the others what is in your heart.
Beçir and Anela
Beçir, the brother of mother Xhevrija,
was inherited together with the house, in a complicated story of land and
jealousy. And he is now going to share the fate of the family.
Lulzim never wanted to go to Italy, even
for a short visit to his relatives. Until one day the skies opened wide.
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