The war was over, what happened cannot be changed, yet impossible to forget, I had to accept it and learn how to live with the scars. I was only a small child but felt like a veteran fighter, fighter for my own life. As I wrote: “I had began to grasp the difference between good and evil in an all-too-real way”, all I wanted now was happiness. It felt like I had spent an eternity among elderly during the plight, nobody paid attention to me or my needs during the track when I was trying so desperately to move away from the arsenal that stole my happy childhood; now I wanted to have friends, real friends, at my own age, go to school, play the piano and be really happy. My parents, I and thirty-eight other refugees lived in a temporary refugee compound in Aarhus, Denmark. Many times I secretly walked away and aimlessly kept walking through the city. I loved to look at the buildings, there were no ruins anywhere, I loved to listen to people laugh, will I be able to laugh? Nobody was screaming or crying, carefree children playing in the parks; nobody was really noticing me. I wanted to shout as loud as I could: ” I am here, I am here, can I join you?” I did not know how to make them understand, I spoke only Latvian, German and Russian and not a word in Danish. It took me a few months to learn the language. I met some children, made friends who also loved music; that was really lucky, because I was invited to their home and asked to play for them. I have always been a story-teller as a child. They loved my funny stories that I wrote and wanted me to read for them; we laughed, shared cookies and we were so happy. At that time I had managed to learn Danish quite well, so well that the children did not know that I was a refugee child. The Danish Red Cross had given me lovely dresses and shoes. Oh yes, the shoes! They were made of fish leather and had think wooden soles, a bit clumsy, but far nicer than my worn, blood-stained boots, that I had worn during my plight. I thought that I was the luckiest girl on earth. I really must have been. We sang and danced. I was filled with gratitude. I had found a loving home away from my childhood home, caring people who helped me to follow my dream.
