JOURNEYS Mennonite Stories of Faith and Survival in Stalins Russia, John B. Toews, 1998

d more grain of the disenfranchised and larger deliver¬ ies of meat, milk, eggs. No excuses or explanations were accepted. We understood the system all too well, but where might we go? 156 JOURNEYS Inwardly I was resdess and so left for Memrik before the harvest. At this time many people traveled day and night in search of a secure livelihood. At Memrik many of our brethren found work at a dam site. Here I met the elder of the Suvorovka Mennonite Church, a pious and learned man. He was much older than I, but we greeted each other warmly. He took the afternoon off and showed me around, and pointed out the resettled villages which would soon be at the bottom of the lake. I asked his advice as to what I might do. He advised me to stay home as long as possible. Though he and others had found temporary shelter and sustenance, they were still home¬ less. It was difficult to adjust to a new order, namely life in the bar¬ racks, a communal kitchen and working on Sundays. During the winter of 1937 he was the first person in his concentration camp to be carried out to the taiga (subarctic, evergreen forest) for burial. I went home and began to work in the harvest. The yield was higher than expected. We hauled the grain directly from the thresh¬ ing machine to the state granary and managed to completely fulfill our quota. We sold some of the surplus, paid off all our debts to the state and had enough left over for our own needs. We even managed to obtain some potatoes. I applied for a permit to have my grain ground at the mill, a privilege only granted to those who had fulfilled their quota. There was enough flour and bread for the winter and there was every reason to be content, yet everything turned out differ¬ ently. Several times I was called to the local committee whose task was to make sure that the plan quota for the entire village was fulfilled. Each time I was given a new assessment and so delivered more grain than legally required. We felt increasingly uneasy about this and other happenings. On Saturday evening, the last day of October, we were finishing the last of the weekly chores. I was summoned to the school to once again meet with the local committee. They expressed their satisfaction that I had exceeded my quota. If only all the other citi¬ zens were as conscientious I would not always have to come back to the committee. Unfortunately they still required more grain to fulfill the plan and, for the last time, needed to ask for my help. A sackful of any grain would do. My signature confirmed my promise and I was free to leave. Just as I left the building I heard my name being called. I turned around to find our village chairperson, a former schoolmate of mine. “Your signature is quite useless,” he informed me. “Its you they are after and if you are not gone from here by morning they will send you back where you came from.” MEMOIRS OF ARON WARKENTIN 157 He disappeared as quickly as he