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I remember when my grandparents used to tell me stories from ww2 when they were little kids.
My paternal grandma used to tell me that when the Axis declared war on Greece, school teachers were trying to explain to the kids the meaning of war and how to be safe but they couldn't understand....until the first Stuka planes appeared with their nightmarish sirens....I remember her saying that the Italians were nicer towards them but they would flirt and sometimes "harass" the Greek women while the Germans were keeping the feelings for themselves and had a colder character. The Germans also helped in eradicating the lice and bed bugs that plagued her town. The nightmare wouldn't stop there since her hometown was a target for the future communist guerrillas who used to bomb the town with their mortars. (one of the rockets hit the court of her school killing many students who were outside for the break.
My paternal grandpa lost his mother when he was only 2 years old. His father was a very poor farmer and it was impossible to feed him so he resulted living temporarily in an orphanage. When the war was declared, he was around 12 and the orphanages had to close. He and other kids from his hometown took an adventurous and very dangerous road back to their village. The trip was 2-4 days long since they were walking in the forests and mountains of Pindus. In one occasion he and his companions almost died from the Italian bombers(I remember him crying whenever he was narrating that scene.) After a very long journey, he was finally out of his village and as soon as he came closer, he recognized his father and he run as fast as he could towards him, since he hadn't seen him for 5 years.
Im pretty sure many other Greeks will have similar stories to tell or share since we faced WW2, famine, and a bloody civil war.
Those are my "white privileged" ancestors that people like Sanders and other ignorant liberal Americans have the nerve to talk about.....
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