We learned the meaning of the new idea quickly: Nationalize!
First the huge utility companies came under government control. By the first months of 1948 the large factories, chain stores, and the transportation were all nationalized. Everybody hoped, that it will stop here!
The small factories, stores and other private enterprises were safe - so we thought. We had no clue how the real communist government operates. We were still convinced that our small factory would remain in our hands. We were proven wrong! One Monday morning in the summer - I was at home yet - four men came through the door and shut down the operation. They ordered Andy to stop all the machines, send the workers home for the day and hand over all the keys, papers, orders, etc. to them. We were locked out of our own company. Neither of us could come back and set foot there anymore. It was overwhelming, that's how we felt!
In one minute we lost everything we worked so hard for! We have to start all over again?! How many times we will be able to do it?
They restarted the operation within a week with a new manager - a Communist Party member of course. This was the procedure for all the privately-owned small factories, workshops, stores, beauty parlors and even the small shoe repair and dressmaking shops.
We became a communist country with total government control by the end of the year. By the middle of 1949 even the doctors had to give up their private practices (the hospitals were already nationalized) and had to join groups of doctors under Party supervision.
The last group to be nationalized was the civil engineers. The government created institutions for designing and building the ruined bridges, roads, highways, railways. The heads of these institutions were all Communist Party members, ignorant uneducated Party elites who had no idea what the 3-4.000 engineers were doing in the building or how the country will be rebuilt from ruins.
After we recovered from the shock of losing our nice creation and our livelihood, Andy started to look for a job. Soon he started to work in a huge telephone system factory, a British company called Standard Electric. He was going to evening school in the University and this job was the best thing for him, it helped in his studies and helped him gain practical knowledge in electronics,while at the same time enabling him to earn a fair salary.
I was home with my precious baby. who was running around, talking since he was nine month old, smart, funny, beautiful... I was happy to be home for a few more months. It was the new rule, that all mothers had to join the workforce after their babies' third birthdays. My time was almost up and I learned to cherish every moment before I become a week-end mother.
Since my parents lived with us in the same house, they took care of Gabe (Gabika) when I had to start working. I didn't have to worry about finding a day-care center, where hundreds of other children were taken care of in an almost military fashion.
In the middle of summer 1949 I started to work in one of those engineering institutions. I was hired as an accountant but soon learned that accounting under communist rules is different from everything I learned. We were at the beginning of the "5 Year Plan," a communist invention for managing the whole country. It was mostly useless statistics, playing with numbers, creating an ever-growing bureaucracy. It took me a short time to realize that I was more interested in working with the civil engineers - those creative, intelligent victims of nationalization. They had to learn to work within the institution and still be productive. The new cost-estimation department was a perfect fit for me, and in a short time I became the head of the department and worked there until we left the country.
Copyright 2008 - Gabe Dalmath Foundation
