Who changed the world?

Life´s an endless chain of moments and it´s not these moments, which define us on the way it´s the people. My English teacher once asked me, whom I consider to be the one person who changed the world. I´d like to take my answer back. Because who changed the world really? I´m sure a lot would not hesitate to answer that with "Barack Obama" and he for sure did. Some might answer "Mahatma Gandhi", "Anne Frank", or even their favorite singers, boxers, football players. There are probably very few people who´d respond with very famous historical figures like Cleopatra or Leonardo da Vinci.

The question was simply whom I´d consider to be the one person who changed the world, but somehow nobody ever questioned whether this person had to have changed the world for the better or worse. So, with that said, that one person could have also been Mussolini, Idi Amin or simply Hitler.

All the above are people everybody knows. That makes me think, how we could oversee those people who have such a direct and powerful impact on our endless chain of moments and what we manage to do with those. How can we ignore the change people we meet every day, cause without even giving them a thought? Shakespeare once wrote:

"All the world´s a stage. And all the men and women merely players. They have their exits and their entrances and one man in his time plays many parts […]"

Explaining in the following lines how one changes throughout one´s life. So, who changed the world? Doesn´t anyone have an impact on the world, no matter if it´s a major or an insignificant one? My grand aunt started asking herself those questions over 80 years ago at the age of 9.

15th of July 2011

"Aunt Cecillia, can I ask you a question?"

"Please do!"

"Whom would you consider to be the one person, who changed the world?"

June 1938

I had just turned 9 in last year’s November and had time off from school on account of excessively hot weather, so I helped at the Mayer family´s farm, doing everything concerning children and household. I had waited to finally finish school, with anticipation about seeing my family again. I was lucky, considering I had my twin sister Katharina by my side. Meanwhile, my older sister Aloisia was sent somewhere alone.

One week ago, I received a letter in my mother´s handwriting, telling me to come home as soon as possible. She had two sons in my absence. With the men getting more and more engaged in political matters, she needed as much helping hands at the farm as possible. Katharina and I were more than happy to return home earlier than planned.

August 1938

Finally back at my fathers´ farm I met my youngest brothers and started handling the household and sometimes even work the fields, when my father and brothers were otherwise engaged. Still my main duty was, helping my mother take care of my younger siblings.

18th of September 1938

It was a Sunday, for me always the best day of the week. After praying and feeding the livestock, I was allowed to put on my best clothes. I remember how proud I was about that plain grey dress.

As we made our way to the closest church, our neighbors started to join us one by one. That was one of the things I liked most about Sundays, simply meeting people and playing games with the other children.

After the service, all my siblings got one Reichsmark each, which paid for a lot more than those two Schillings which we had gotten in the years before. Most Sundays, I bought myself a bun at the baker´s shop and saved the rest of the money for worse times. Sometimes I´d buy a second one and give it to a friend, whose family was, like many others, less privileged than mine, which had enough to give that kind of money to each of their children.

After that we´d run back home and prepare a big breakfast. From time to time there´d be some grapes or even oranges, but not today. My father, Johann, had to leave, like so often in recent days, to meet with the men to discuss political matters. Regardless of my many attempts to accompany my father, I was never allowed to come.

Since it had been a beautiful day for me, I said an especially long prayer. Little did I know how it all would only get worse from there on.

16th of November 1939

I stood outside of our house on the street and admired the masses of snow that piled up next to the frozen pond opposite our house. It was my 11th birthday, so I got to play with my siblings on the street. We saw 12 Austrian soldiers marching towards us, to the same rhythm. All of them wore a grey-green mottled uniform and not one of them showed even a single sign of emotion. The men, all between 15 and 25, stopped directly in front of me, staring stiff straight ahead. It was the most dreadful view for a girl my age, although they didn´t even pay attention to me. All the more relived was I when my father came rushed out of the house and hurried to send all us children in.

Later that day I crawled out of my old, wooden bed, trying not to wake Aloisia, Katharina and Elise, with whom I´d share my tiny bedroom. Let´s just say the bed I shared with my twin sister wasn´t a great help, considering the antiquing, ramshackle wood, would crunch with every minor movement. As I finally got out, I tiptoed down the stairs and heard my father´s loud voice, which reminded me that I was not supposed to leave my bedroom past curfew. Suddenly I was so afraid he´d catch me and even more about what he´d do if he did. I was already on the brink of turning back as I heard my father saying something concerning the soldiers from earlier that day. I tried to get as close as I could to the living room.

"I told you, we should have sent them away. I knew that would happen one day. How could you let it come to that?"

"He merely asked me if we’d have any young man capable of fighting on the farm."

"What did you tell him?"

"The truth of course."

"And what are we to do if they come back? Johann, have you even considered that? In two months, Johannes will turn 15 and he´ll be old enough then."

"I already told you I am not sending anyone away. He stays. I´ll simply..."

I could hear my father’s footsteps getting closer to the door. My heart started beating so fast, I was afraid he´d hear it. So, I ran back as fast as I could. This time without thinking about it twice.

3rd of May 1943

Life in our little village had changed a lot over the last few years. Fathers’ weekly meetings in political matters tripled and every time, he´d take some sort of package wrapped in brown paper with him. He never told me what it was only that they needed it for some sort of resistance. Whenever another group of soldiers past through my oldest brothers would hide in the cellar. Mother started to save food and we had less and less to eat. What I missed the most of all was the joy we shared on the way to church. Now everyone seemed to have something on their mind, something that had crushed all sense of laughter they had left. What was left was just one big excruciatingly quiet crowd of people on their way to ask for help.

In the afternoon of that day my mother asked me to bring some of the meat, from the bull my father butchered last week to the Holzer´s. Martin Holzer thanked me for the meat and gave me some honey from their apiculture.

On my way back I walked past a house with a big pear tree and some red tulips beneath it. I think I could even see a yellow marigold flower shine through the grass. A friend used to live there. She was one of the most beautiful girls of the whole class, as she was the only one who had long dark hair and although she never came along to church, we became good friends. The teacher never seemed to like Esther very much though. Maybe that´s why she moved away.

19th of October 1944

Feeding the horses was one of my favorite pursuits of all times. There was something about these majestic animals that made you feel safe. They were always calm and still. If they sensed any form of danger, they´d warn you, long before any human being could even remotely suspect anything.

I´d just fed the horses as they started to act unsettled. I followed my first instinct and hid behind a haystack. I caught a glimpse at three men in blue uniforms, each armed running into the inner courtyard, yelling something I didn´t understand, over and over. As I watched I noticed one of the men was carrying another who was bleeding. A few moments later my father stormed out of the house with a bucket and some towels. I managed to sneak out of my hiding spot unnoticed and ran back to the house.

In the evening my father announced that he gave those men, who turned out to be French soldiers, green light on staying in the hay barn and we were to help them and provide them with food and water. In return they´d offer protection.

I had wondered how my father could understand the soldiers, since he´d never been to France, let alone had learned the language. So, I assumed one of them had to know how to speak German. As I brought them some food, one of them did indeed thank me in perfectly good German and offered to help me carry water buckets from the house. I accepted the friendly offer and asked him to follow me. As we entered the inner courtyard he stopped talking and we went up to the house in mutual silence. He carried two buckets, while I only had one in my left hand. The boy stopped to thank me again, telling me he´d never come across a family as kind as ours. It was then when I noticed he looked only about three years older than me, so I asked him how he learned to speak my language. He told me his mother grew up in Germany and used to teach him some.

Out of nowhere I heard a deafening bang. I anxiously looked around. It took me a few moments to see the blue uniform of the man in front of me turning red and at the same moment I noticed the same grey-green mottled uniform that I had never forgotten since I first came across it on my eleventh birthday. As soon as the paralysis wore off, I ran as fast as my feet could take me and all I heard was two metal containers fall and burst against the cold, concrete ground behind me.

15th of July 2011

"To answer your question: I don´t think there is anyone in particular who simply changed the world. I didn´t even know the name of that French soldier and he´d changed my life forever. So, if you want a specific name you´d have to ask another. I believe that anyone you meet if only for a moment in your endless chain of moments will change your life forever."