The author (1943); Alexanderhausen: heroes' memorial and church (1960)

Alexanderhausen is the German name of my native village in the plains of the Banat. To the Hungarians, it was Sandorhaza; to the Romanians it is Sandra.  It is situated about 35 km north-west of the regional capital Temeschburg/Temesvar/Timisoara, in the middle of the fertile Banat heath. Settled around 1833 by Banat Swabians from the surrounding villages, it provided a homeland for its settlers and their descendants, as well as for a few Hungarian, Romanian, and gipsy families, for almost a hundred and fifty years. Economic and political pressures following World War II led to a gradual abandonment of their homeland by virtually all Swabian families. Today, these emigrants and their children can be found in many countries, on several continents. What follows is the short story of one man, whose fate led him from Alexanderhausen to the capital city of Canada.

In the village of Alexanderhausen, street names were not used, but houses were numbered sequentially, from 1 to about 500. Our house initially carried the number 187, which was later changed to 255 when a new numbering system was adopted. To return home from school, I had to cross main street to the church, walk between two rows of chestnut trees, along main street to Wirtshaus Hektor (the local pub, later renamed the ‘House of Culture’ by the communists), cross over to the left, and pass another five houses.

I can still recall some enchanted summer nights in the early nineteen hundred forties. My parents and grandparents were sitting on benches placed in front of the house, while I was running around with the other children. The air was warm and fragrant and the sounds of summer were everywhere. The neighbors were passing by and stopping to talk; everybody appeared friendly, contented, in harmony with himself, with his neighbors and with the universe itself.

I would find out soon enough that such a state of perfection is not a normal condition for us ordinary humans. In 1942, sickness struck my grandfather. He died soon after getting sick, in the firm belief that victory was being won in far-away Russia. In 1943 my father was called up to his regiment somewhere in Old Romania. He packed his suitcase and took the train to Temeschburg, on the way to his regiment. After several weeks, a postcard arrived – from a military training camp in Germany. I saw him one more time, on a short leave from the German army. Who could have imagined at the time that our next meeting would be in Canada, eighteen years later.

I started Kindergarten and then elementary school in our village. The language of instruction was German, as it had always been. The third school year started with new teachers, and the language of instruction was Romanian, a language that was new and unknown to us children. By the time we graduated from grade school, we had also mastered a new language. The experience turned out to be helpful in later years, when we had to learn a few other languages. I will never forget our grade school class singing German folksongs – with the lyrics translated into Romanian!

The years after 1945 were not easy on the villagers. The government of the day seemed tireless in inventing new ways to make sure of that: deportation to the USSR; nationalization and expropriation of their land, houses and even household articles and domestic animals; deportation of some people to the steppes of the Baragan; sharing their houses with colonists from other parts of the country; and shortages of all kind. My grandmother, Katharina Lukas, née Beitz, was a talented seamstress and kept us going by working day and night on her sewing machine and by selling those household articles that were not absolutely essential.

The end of the war found my father, Titus Tullius, as a prisoner to British troops. He volunteered for casual work in England, and later emigrated to Canada. He sent us the occasional parcel from both countries, but the customs duty charged by the Romanian authorities made these transactions practically unaffordable.

During the next five years, I experienced the various dormitories and cafeterias of our faculty. The food was often insufficient, and there were bedbugs at some dormitories, but we were young and able to endure it all. I will always remember the student revolt of 1956, inspired by the Hungarian revolt of the same year.

In the fall of 1957, fate had another surprise in store: The sudden death of my grandmother. This event came closer to derailing my life than any of those that that came before it. As always, life had to go on, and in 1958 I graduated from the Polytechnikum. This was a positive event: I was now the first Polytechnikum graduate born in Alexanderhausen. Since I had some academic merits, but no social (read: political) ones, I could not get a job in Temeswar and had to take one in Arad. A net disadvantage of this was that it slightly complicated the logistics of my planned emigration to Canada. I rented a room in Neuarad, handed in my visa application in Großsanktnikolaus, and continued my day-to-day work in Arad.

A strong first impression of Canada was the absence of bureaucratic zeal in dealing with my personal documents. I ignored the Romanian spelling of my first name, as shown in my travel certificate, and just used the original German version in my landing card. Nobody objected! I was even more impressed when I found out that personal identification documents were nonexistent in Canada, and people’s places of residence were not registered with the police or any other authority.

I also remember watching my first hockey game on TV. It was late in the evening, I was alone in the room, and a real fight broke out among the hockey players. It really frightened me! A few days later, I was walking down Ste. Catherine Street in downtown Montreal, when a man came running out of a supermarket, followed by two policemen with drawn guns. The thought that went through my mind was: My god, this is really the Wild West! It took a few years to find out that Canadian cities may be somewhat less safe than European cities, but they are considerably safer than American cities of comparable sizes. No wonder that many Americans spend their vacations in Canada: they know the language, they feel safe, and an American dollar is worth about one-and-a-half Canadian dollars.

I remember a car trip to a wedding in southern Ontario with Joseph Bitto (originally from Alexanderhausen) driving. Highway 401 was still under construction; traveling the country roads made it appear to be a very long trip. We visited my uncle Nikolaus Lukas on his farm near Kitchener. My aunt Katharina (née Tilger) and my cousin Heidrun had arrived in Canada from Lowrin a couple of years before me. We also visited the other people from Alexanderhausen now living in this part of Ontario. I remember well the farm of the Kilcher and Koreck families, and the beautiful homes of the Packi, Beisser und Lammert families in and around Kitchener. The trip certainly gave me an initial feeling for the immensity of this country. This feeling was confirmed a few years later, when I took the train from Montreal to Vancouver. It took me one week to get there, and another week to return, crossing the immense Canadian Prairie Provinces and the incredibly beautiful Rocky Mountains.

Besides us and the already-mentioned family of Joseph Bitto, there were several other families from Alexanderhausen living in Montreal. There was Anton Sauer, the caretaker of our church in Alexanderhausen, with his wife. Their son, Peter Sauer, also lived there with his wife and three children. There was the other Anton Sauer, stepfather of Joseph Bitto, and his wife Juliana. Then there was Dr. Kutschera with his wife, sons Tristan and Erhardt, and daughter Isolde. They all lived scattered over several parts of the city and its suburbs, and often met only on occasions such as the yearly picnic of the German catholic church. It appeared that work played a much larger role here in the New World than socializing.

In August 1961 I found my first job, with a small company designing and building small emergency power generators. Most of my coworkers were immigrants. I signed on for the pitiful salary of 200 dollars a month, out of which I contributed 100 dollars for room and board. Three months later I was offered a job by a branch of an American company building industrial installations in Labrador. The fact that the salary was over 600 dollars a month certainly helped me with the decision making. Our offices were in Montreal, but I had the chance to spend a few weeks in the far north, in the middle of winter. After taking the bus to work for almost a year, I bought my first car: a brand new 1963 Chevrolet Impala. Being a newcomer, I paid the price of 3000 dollars in cash, not having embraced the local custom of taking out a car loan (if only our politicians had used a similar approach over the years, Canada would not be saddled with its horrendous national debt!). By 1964 the Canadian economy had recovered, and the job market for engineers had improved considerably. I accepted an offer from Nortel Networks (then called Northern Electric; later Northern Telecom) and continued to work there for some 36 years, until my retirement in 2000. In the summer of 1964 I booked a trip to Germany, Italy, Switzerland and England. There was so much to see, after being caged in Romania for the first 25 years of my life. The circumstances were favorable all around and the Canadian dollar was worth four Deutschmarks. I took two more trips to Europe, in 1967 and in 1970.

In the early- and mid-nineteen sixties, Montreal was a very lively and cosmopolitan city. The attempts to make it a more French city came later. I remember a number of parties that took place in the downtown apartments of friends and acquaintances. New people kept coming in, while others were leaving, so that about 25 to 30 persons were present at any given time. Nobody knew everybody, but some appeared to know several people. Everybody brought either a bottle of wine, a case of beer, or some soft drinks. People sat on chairs, on couches, or on the floor. A radio or record player played in one room; a few people were dancing. As the evening went on, and the drinking continued, the noise level got louder and louder. Invariably, some neighbor called the police. They showed up, asked us very politely to quiet down, and left after being reassured that we would keep it really quiet for the rest of the night. Some time after midnight, we broke it up into small groups and headed for the discos that remained open until 3 AM.

During those years I sometimes wondered how strong relationships and connection with friends and relatives in the old homeland became weaker and weaker. It was obvious that a correspondence by mailed letters was inadequate. Whenever a letter went missing, the flow of exchange was interrupted. It also became clear in my mind that some visits would be required to re-establish and strengthen these relationships. I often contemplated to extend my trips to Germany and Austria, and visit the Banat. Why is it that I could never go through with these plans? The best explanation is probably given by a dream, really a nightmare, that kept coming back over many years. I dreamed that I was "back home", I wanted to leave, and was held back by force. The question that woke me up from the dream was always the same: You had decided that you would never take such a risk; why did you do it? In retrospect, the risk does not look as bad, but it would lead nowhere to speculate about what could have been or what could not have been…

The year 1967 strands out for two reasons: the world exhibition Expo67 took place in Montreal, and I met my future wife. Looking back, Life in the late sixties and early seventies was easy and threatening at the same time. The same science that gave us trains and boats, cars and airplanes, electricity and computers, had also created the weapons that enabled mankind to self-destruct. Was it a good idea to establish a family under these conditions? Or were the hippies right, living from one day to the next, without a care in the world? Even today, when I look at the photographs from those years, at the long hair and seemingly carefree and happy expressions, I feel a little nostalgic. For one brief moment, there was a glimmer of new thinking, of a new direction.

Maybe not, but it had become clear to me that in the course of its history, the world had come close to disaster many times before, and had always managed to survive. To continue living on this earth, we humans need to have the confidence that life on earth will go on, that mankind has a future.

In 1976 I accepted another company transfer, back to Montreal as manager of a local design group. I completed my two years in that position and hurried back to Ottawa before our son started school. The idea that the government of Quebec could tell us what school our children can or cannot attend was just not palatable. I initiated a company transfer back to Ottawa and we moved to Kanata, a western suburb of Ottawa. At the time (1978), Kanata had about 17 000 inhabitants. Today, over 60 000 people live in Kanata, which has been amalgamated with the city of Ottawa. Our immediate community maintains many ‘green spaces’: parks, meadows, portions of the original bush landscape, etc. We also have a large arena – the Corel Centre – where over 18 000 people can watch the hockey games of the Ottawa Senators. It is true that we can no longer put on our cross country skis in our own driveway and take off from there, but it takes only five minutes by car to reach the cross country trails. And, while I was still working, it took me only ten minutes to drive to my office at Nortel, and I did not take any highway. We can get to almost any destination in Ottawa in 20 to 25 minutes. The trip from our house to the Ottawa International Airport takes about half an hour. Given our geographic location, our winters are long and cold, we get lots of snow and the occasional ice storm. What we do not get are earthquakes, floods, hurricanes, and other natural catastrophes.

Over the years, some of these advantages have been lost and others have been diminished. The reason is primarily overspending by the various governments (federal, provincial, and municipal). For many years, many of our governments spent more than they collected through taxation.  The deficits accumulated year after year by our federal government resulted in Canada having a rather large national debt. As a result, we now have high taxes and the Canadian dollar is worth significantly less than its American counterpart.

Canada still has universal medical insurance (Medicare), but the country is not sure that it can afford it. There are shortages doctors and nurses, hospital beds and diagnostic tools. And there are waiting periods for many procedures. Medications (unless you are over 65), dental care, and eye glasses are not covered by general Medicare. I am fortunate to have residual coverage for 80 percent of the cost for these items, as part of the insurance provided by my company. Our politicians claim that everybody is treated equal, but nobody can prevent those who can afford it from getting treatment in private USA facilities.

In addition to paying personal income tax, working Canadians pay into the Canada Pension Plan and into an ‘Employment Insurance’ plan. I am pleased to report that in my 40 working years I never had to make use of employment insurance. I am receiving a government pension, but a portion of it is clawed back because my total income (mainly my private company pension) exceeds the threshold set by the government.

We have an interesting system for pricing nonfood merchandise, that may be unique to Canada. An object in a store window, with a price tag of $100, will actually cost you $115, because the cashier will add 7 percent general sales tax (a value-added tax) and 8 percent provincial sales tax.  I remember that many Europeans did not distinguish between Canadians and Americans. Space does not permit a description of the complex relationship between Canada and the USA. They are each other’s largest trading partner, and they share many things, including a common language and a very long common border, but there are also many differences. It is always a good idea to remember that the US is about ten times larger than Canada (not in territory, but in population and industrial capacity, not to mention military might). As an example, our cable TV carries virtually all American channels, but I never saw a single Canadian channel in any US city. I think it is fair to say that there are both advantages and disadvantages to living next to the only superpower, but the advantages prevail.

During my working years I made many trips to the USA on behalf of my company. I got to see many US cities and made many friends. The company also paid other travel, taking me from Australia to Austria, from Kyoto in Japan to Sao Paulo in Brazil, from Europe to Hawaii. In the last few years, my wife came along and we often added some days or weeks of vacation. We have traveled more after my retirement and are hoping to continue to do so.

Perhaps a few words about Germans in Canada are of interest to the reader. Until fairly recently, every census indicated that people of German ethnic origin represented the third largest group within the population of Canada, placing them right behind those of English and French origins. In recent years, with the increase of immigration from Asia, it is possible that some Asian group may have taken that position. Ethnic Germans comprise people from Germany, Austria, Switzerland, the Banat, Transylvania, Russia, etc. Each group tends to have its own organizations. There are local clubs of Danube Swabians, Transylvanian Saxons, Lieblinger (from the village of Liebling in the Banat), and many others. The German-Canadian Congress is the umbrella organization for all these groups. German language schools exist in many cities and are usually open Saturday morning. Our sons attended the one in Ottawa for seven or eight years. As far as the day-to-day life of German Canadians is concerned, the situation is a lot more complex. They are scattered throughout the cities, often reducing their social contacts down to little more than meeting once a year at a new year’s eve celebration. The language of communication, at least in public, is often English. The contribution of German Canadians to the economic, political and cultural development of Canada is often underrated, if not suppressed, and their image has suffered because of the two World Wars. For those readers interested in this topic, I would recommend the book "The German Canadians 1750 – 1937" by Lehmann and Bassler (Jesperson Press, 1986).

The arrival of the twenty-first century also brought my retirement from full-time work. Our older son graduated from law school and is working at a law firm in Los Angeles. Our younger son obtained his bachelor of computer science degree, joined a high-technology company, and was ‘down-sized’ when the steam went out of hi-tech. We continue to live in our house in suburban Ottawa. There is time to read, time to write little stories (such as the one you are about to finish reading), and time to travel for as long as we remain reasonably healthy.