Age does not cap rage

Jan 20, 2000
By Blake Lambert

The eyes of 96-year-old Anna Karcevska pierce through her physical
frailty and weakening body to energize her soul.

They serve as reminders of the past and the unfinished business that
have colored the present.

She remembers more than most people will ever be able to forget: the
death of her husband, her deportations to Siberia, and the story of
her house.

It was bought by her father, after World War I, on the day Latvia
became independent on Nov. 18, 1918.

It is a day given special attention each year, but few remain, like
Anna, who were alive at that time.

The house is cold, perhaps because of the chill outside, and sparsely
furnished; cats lick at each other, away from Anna's smile.

Using her hands for emphasis, she speaks softly of her two deportations.

Anna, along with her husband, Janis Karcevskis, was shipped off to
Siberia in 1941 after being arrested.

Janis was a policeman in the Jelgava region; according to Anna, he
said he understood why he was arrested.

"My husband asked why I had to go away," says Anna.

"The officer answered that Soviet law doesn't allow for separation of
the family. They told us, in nice words, they would keep our families
together."

Instead, she says, families were only sent to Jelgava together before
the men were kept in one car and women in another.

Anna was sent to Krasnoyarsk, where people were split up into groups
of 25 and put on a farm.

She stayed there for five or six years before returning to her town,
only to be deported again.

"I came back too early. That's what they said," says Anna.

Upon her return from Siberia, she noticed Jelgava was Russified after
World War II; it was the biggest change, she says.

An aging body has diminished her rage towards the Soviet Union, but
her mind contains a mixture of venom and supreme sadness.

"The best people were sent to Siberia. They were deported," says
Anna, thinking of a teacher, a "good man", who was deported twice.

In Siberia, as her incredibly active eyes start to tear, she says the
men were treated terribly.

They were hit and beaten and Janis, her husband, died after a year.

Nevertheless, Anna received a document that he was freed from
Siberia, even though he was already dead.

"All these people who deported people to Siberia, they have to be
convicted. Not for me, a woman, but they sent out families with
little children."

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