Motria Batum

Story

My Mother Motria (pronounced Motya) was living in the Ukraine in the 30’s when the communists annexed the country. The starvation of the Ukraine killed millions including both her parents. She was taken from the town of Uman north to Kiev to a state run orphanage. While in the orphanage she noticed that those who were good at sports received better food & treatment. Although small in size she excelled at cross country skiing & shooting, winning at the local and regional level. When old enough she left the orphanage to work in a bakery. When the Germans invaded the Ukraine the Russian army fled Kiev. Most of those in Kiev hated the communists because of Stalin’s oppression & heralded the Germans as liberators. They weren’t. Needing labour back home the Germans herded the youth into stock carriages to ship them west. Mum was billeted to a farmer in Salzburg. At first the farmer’s treatment was rather harsh. This began to change after the defeat of the Germans at Stalingrad. The farmer’s chicks & ducklings were constantly being taken by eagles despite his best effort to shoot them. Mum asked if she could try and brought them down with two shots. The farmer snatched back the gun & she never saw it again. Luckily, Salzburg was in the American sector at the end of the war. The Russians harshly treated anyone who helped the Germans, even unwillingly. This meant Siberia or death. Mum met Dad Ivan after the war. His story requires several times 4500 characters, except to say that he was also taken from the Ukraine. They lived & worked with the now good farmer & my brother Boris was born. Eventually the Austrians wanted all foreigners out of their country. Going back home was not an option, so they were shipped by the Yanks to an Italian embarkation camp.This is where their name was incorrectly recorded as Batum, not Batun. They didn’t want to make a fuss so the new spelling stayed. In the camp they were offered options of countries that were accepting Europe’s refugees, based on skills. From the choices available they picked Brazil. Luckily my brother had scarlet fever & they were not allowed to sail. While waiting for the next intake of refugees they heard bad rumours of Brazil. They heard of the large numbers of sheep (therefore meat) in Australia. They switched their choice.

The journey to Australia was a horror for mum as she was again pregnant & very seasick. She lost so much weight that it was life threatening. She was singled out for special attention. They landed in Melbourne in 1949. The authorities provided a sumptuous meal on arrival, but because of the previous minimal plain meals most of the passengers over-ate & were sick at both ends. The family was moved to Scheyville army barracks outside Sydney. Dad had signed a two year contract to work for the railway & my sister Maria was born. The migrants were encouraged to save for a deposit on a house. After a few years my folks found an affordable, perfect little farm (with stock) on the southern side of Eastern Creek a mile from Riverstone. While we were there it flooded three times, so much for the perfect farm. I, Peter was born in 55. I remember two floods. In the 61 flood I was sent to Stewart House (run through teachers) for a month while my parents cleaned up. What a truly remarkable organisation. After the 61 flood my folks scraped enough money together for a deposit on a block of land in Riverstone. Another flood occurred in 65 while our new house was being built. We moved in two months later. Dad worked in the railway workshops at Clydeburn until retirement. Mum worked at various cleaning jobs during the day. One of these long term jobs was for a Mrs Beresford. I remember a story Mum told me about her silly teenage son who spent all his time with cameras when he should be studying for something useful. He turned out to be the now famous director Bruce Beresford. Every evening for as long as I can remember Mum left home at 4 returning at 10 to wash dishes in a chinese restaurant in Windsor. As we had no car the journey involved a walk to Riverstone station, a train ride to Windsor and a walk of 1 miles to the restaurant. She was a remarkably fit woman. Riverstone was a tough working class town on the outskirts of Sydney with a huge meat works. In the 50’s & 60’s there was a large influx of migrants (like my parents) from all over Europe. This melting pot of a town, in hindsight, seemed like an unintentional social experiment. In high school a curious teacher once asked how many of the class’s parents were born overseas, the result was a 50/50 split. Well, the experiment worked pretty successfully. Maybe it was because there was no one dominant group of migrants but a smattering from everywhere. Maybe the hardworking locals respected the hardwork.

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