MILOS JAKOV NOVAK

My name is Milos Jakov Kovak. I was born on 21 August 1982 in Vukovar, Croatia. When the war began in 1990 I was 8 years old. I still remember when the Serbians came into the city in their tanks, and on foot with guns. When I was just 8 years old, I was seeing the beginning of something terrible.

On November 14^th 1991, my city was attacked by the Serbian Ĉetniks. They began bombing the city early one morning. My family was planning to flee the city, but the Ĉetniks were shooting all people who tried to flee, despite what the Yugoslav National Army had told people.

I ran into the forest near my house which ran along the river, after my parents told me to hide from the soldiers and to not be seen by anyone. They told me that they would come later to find me and to not be scared, they would find me soon, and together we would leave the city and find refuge. That was the last time I ever saw them again.

One week later, the US Marines came into Vukovar to help with martial order with the NATO. That is when I was found by a US Marine who "hired" me to help him and his team to learn about Croatia and all the local area. They had set up camp around the area which I was hiding. I remember that he asked me, on the first day where my parents were and when the last time was that I ate. I told him "I don’t know" to both in very broken English. For the next few weeks he and his team took care of me until they could get me out of the city, until I was taken by the local Catholic church and put into an orphanage. That Marine promised me he would find me again, that everything would be ok, in very broken Croatian.

About one month later, in the orphanage, the NATO came in and began moving children out of the orphanage to go live outside of the country where they said we would be safe. One of the priests who lived in my village, Fr. Simiæ came and told me that when he left the city of Vukovar, he found my parents, outside the church which had been bombed by the Ĉetniks. He told me they had died. I was all alone, I had no one.

All the children were being loaded into the buses, and many of us were being sent to different locations, some of us went to new orphanages, some of us went to Austria, Hungary, Italy and some I don’t know where they went. Many children had lived in orphanages for all their lives, but for me this was so new. I was alone, and very very sacred.

As I was leaving out of the church, I heard a familiar voice, it was the American Marine. He asked me where I was being sent to. I told him I wasn’t sure and asked him if I could stay with him. He told me that He couldn’t keep me around because it was too dangerous and that the church would take care of me.

So I said goodbye and I was loaded into the bus, with tears in my eyes and only the crucifix that my papa had given me that year for my communion around my neck.

Our bus was headed to a NATO complex for orphans and refugees in Trieste, just outside of the Croatian borders. We arrived on 22 November 1990.

I lived there for one year before they found somewhere else for me to go. It was exactly one year later, 22 November 1991, I and some of the other children were again being loaded into the trains headed for new orphanage. The US were on they’re way out of the Balkans... And that’s when I met the same Marine again. He kept his promise, he saw me again. He told me to stay put and that he would be right back... He went and talked to the man who ran the NATO complex, I remember seeing them talking there, pointing at me and continued talking. Then, they started walking in my direction. The NATO man knelt down and began talking to me in Croatian, he asked me: "Poznajete me ovaj covjek?", "Da." That’s all I said. The man picked up the one small bag I had with some clothes in it that the Red Cross delivered to all the orphans in the orphanage, took me by the hand, and walked me to the marine. He bent down, and asked me: "Would it be okay with you of you came and lived in the states?" I looked up at him, and smiled. "Da!" That’s all I said. That same night, I was taken from Trieste with the Marine.

The night we left was his first night on leave and was heading back to the United States. But first he had to fill out forms and other papers stating his intentions of adopting me and taking me back to the States. After a week and few days of meeting with the orphanage directors and interim government officials, I finally had someone... Someone I knew would take care of me.

I now live in Florida, I am 23 years old, and I work for my dad at a company he owns in the local area.