TDN Weekend December 2016 Issue 9
Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/1087484
"We were granted permission by the government to visit Yugoslavia, also a communist country, for a vacation, and our plan was to 'become lost' on a hike. We left our car at the bottom of the mountains and, to be consistent with our story if we were caught, we took nothing but our dog, a small bag of food, water, and a $100 bill folded as tiny as possible," said Nygaard. "We hiked up the pretty Yugo- slavian side of the mountain and then climbed, slid, and stumbled our way down the Austrian side, where we were placed in a prison for three days – a jail cell with a hole in the ground as a bathroom and inedible food – and then in a refugee processing facility where they went through our passports and decided if our intentions were genuine or if we were Communists trying to spy on the West." After 10 days in the holding facility, Nygaard, her moth- er, and their dog were released into a more permanent refugee camp in Vienna, Austria, where they stayed for months until they were granted immigration into Canada. "There's nothing to compare to the feeling of being held in that jail before being shipped off to the refugee camp, treated like prisoners by guards who did not know, or care, about our situation," said Nygaard. "The refugee process- ing facility was better, but still tough. There was much ten- sion between the Albanians and Romanians housed in the camp, and we saw or heard about people fighting, being killed or raped often. Experiencing this side of humanity as a teenager shaped me into the person I am today and drives how I treat and interact with others, both humans and animals."