A special stop for the Mennonite buses is at the home of the former Rita Pankratz.
Her story is one that I'm not entirely certain of, but my remembrance is that she
was evacuated to Germany at the end of World War II, but ended up being repatriated to the
Soviet Union as part of the agreement that Churchill and Roosevelt made with Stalin.
Those Mennonite refugees, about 23,000, were dumped in Siberia and Kazakhstan.
 Rita made
her way back to Alexanderkrone, and several years back, the Mennonite tourists found a
Low-German-speaking woman. She is now a regular stop on the tour and loves having
visitors. Our bus was the first to come this year, so she was not prepared as she
was for later buses, with food and drink.After several people had conversations with
her and Marina Unger delivered gifts, we sang together a German favorite, Gott ist die
Liebe (God is Love). |
