Reprise Post: Advent Carol: "Czekam na Ciebie"

 Today's reposting is a fourth edit of the original 2013 kolęda post.  The third edit, in 2020, had some nice comments.

 

Czekam na Ciebie,  "I wait for You," expresses longing and yearning for the arrival of the Savior.  The Liturgical Season of Advent is prime time for these feelings.

 

The four candles in the Advent Wreath are lit on successive Sundays of Advent. The First Sunday of Advent - the beginning of each new Liturgical Year - calls to mind the longing of the Gentiles for four thousand years to have the Commandments and the promise of Salvation extended to them. So, naturally, the First Sunday of Advent has the maximum quotient of yearning and is the most bleak. I have started out at full bleak this year, kind of stark in fact, aiming for maximum contrast S1 to S4. What do you think?

Well, at least the candle is making light! - as in the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness grasps it not. 

How does this hymn sound? In minor mode, it sounds yearning. Like this, sung by a church organist with an affecting baritone. And like this, performed in the style of a quiet folk tune.

From Nuty Religijne we can obtain the score with Polish lyrics. Click to enlarge.

  

Source for the Polish lyric is teksty.org:

Czekam na Ciebie, Jezu mój mały,
ciche błaganie, ku niebu śle.
Twojego przyjścia, czeka świat cały.
Sercem gorącym przyzywa Cię.

          I wait for You, my little Jesus,
          Silent supplication to the sky send.
          For your advent, the whole world is waiting.
          Fervent hearts call You.

 

Spójrz, tęskniony na tej ziemi,
przyjdź, o Jezu, pociesz nas!
Szczerze kochać Cię będziemy.
Przyjdź, o Jezu, bo już czas.

          Look upon this Earth with its longing,
          Come, O Jesus, comfort us!
          Truly we will love You.
          Come, O Jesus, because it is already time. 

 

Usłysz Maryjo głos Twoich dzieci,
Tyś naszą Matką na każdy dzień.
O daj nam Słońce, które rozświeci,
grzechu i błędu straszliwy cień.

          Hear, Mary, the voice of your children.
          Thou art our Mother, every day.
          Give to us the Sun, that its light
          Will enshadow sin and terrible error.

 

Spójrz teskniony na tej ziemi,
daj nam Zbawcę, Dziecię Twe.
My dla Niego żyć pragniemy,
Jemu damy serca swe.

          Look upon this Earth with its longing,

          Give to us the Savior, your Son.

          We for Him to be living crave,

          To Him we will give our hearts.

 

 

The Benedictines are still composing Songs of Advent, Pieśni Adwentowe. Here is a compilation of eight of them, the first being  Przyjdź, Panie, w Ciemność Mojego Domu, "Come, Lord, into the Darkness of My Home."  If you "Show More" of the first entry you will see the complete list. The original site is named Duchowa Przystań, "Spiritual Haven."

 

 

  

 

 

Mission Writeup in Saturday Evening Post, 1946, Part 1

Now is the point in our narrative to read Cyr's article in the Saturday Evening Post of March 23, 1946.  An earlier post on this article includes the remarkable and intriguing cover art, rendered by a skilled human being! As well, there is a brief description of the contents of the issue. It was a magazine written for and read by Americans in all walks of life - before we became, somehow, compartmentalized, and hence less familiar with each other. 

First we have the Editor's blurb, in the front of the magazine, page 4. This blurb is very blurby, jollying up the reader to be super excited about the wonderful article in this wonderful magazine. We'll see if that tone bleeds over into the article itself; we will have to distinguish author from editor as we read. 

Cyr, like Robichaud/"Frenchie," served in Europe first, then deployed to China.

 

Well, then, let us turn to page 18 and begin.

This background on Cyr, and these events occuring in the first airdrop into Hsin-Hsiang, are the subject of pages 47-66 of OSS Special Operations in China, our "MMB."  The list on page 47 of personnel in the inital drop includes a fifth man: Robichaud.

The team diary excerpt, on pages 55-66 of MMB, was written by Zarembo, who was not in the initial drop. Zarembo was part of the second drop. 

Previous posts on this subject:

Just the Right Issue of the Saturday Evening Post

OSS CBI Photobook 20 - Jump into Action 

OSS CBI Photobook 20, continued - Jump into Action, continued 

OSS CBI Photobook 21 - Hanging Out While Paul Cyr Meets with the Local Commander in Hsian

OSS CBI Photobook 22 - OSS Field Base near Hsian

We will continue the story!

Julie 

  

 

 

 

OSS CBI Photobook 22 - OSS Field Base near Hsian

 Here is the upper portion of Page 22. It looks like illustration the Field Base for the 30 six-man teams under command of Major Mills, with the base itself under command of Major Gus Krause.  This base, a walled compound formerly home to a Seventh Day Adventist mission, was located a few miles from the walled city of Hsian, as was an airfield of the 14th Army Air Force.  This Field Base is described in MMB pages 29, 30, 38, and 40.

The 200 men were flown in, from Kunming or wherever, to the airfield by transport plane. So this page is arranged to show the base compound where they prepared for team missions and trained Chinese. The team missions required transport from the airfield to a drop zone. Like his brother John said in his funeral oration, for our EJZ and his Field Photo buddies it was a matter of jumping out of an airplane and taking pictures all the way down. How many guys do you see in this photo? I see three in the air. I see one on the ground as a black dot next to his spread-out parachute.  Maybe two.

 

The two guards below carry curved hooks. Are they ready to drag open or shut a pair of large, heavy, fortified doors? This is classic guardhouse and gate design, with the narrow passageway controllable by guards at either end.

Looks like Dad. They're not eating too well. Mills describes how they found local cooks who snagged local pheasant to round out the menus. Good thing.
 

The local Chinese military commander in Hsian city provided troops. Many would then transfer to the OSS compound for training. Some Chinese troops a pictured below in the lower portion of Phtobook Page 22.

  

 

Berent Friele again, working on stuff.

 

The dark parachutes, below, were the red ones such as those pictured on the back of the jacket of MMB.

 This initial drop, May 22 1945, was to an area south of Hsin-Hsiang near the Yellow River. Map and details are to be found in the post Jump into Action.

OSS CBI Photobook 21 - Hanging Out While Paul Cyr Meets with the Local Commander in Hsian

 

Pages 21 and 22 show us Hsian, I surmise, with many scenes of hanging around, spying on stuff, trying to figure out who is who at least for the moment, being unavoidably conspicuous, and taking pictures. They must have had a lot of film. Above is the top part of Page 21.

I would say that the man in the photo above is Berent Friele. In MMB his photo is on p. 52. We saw him on Photobook Page 17 ; the photo from that post is below.

 Now, what about the lady in the photo with Friele? Is that Julia Child? If so, the location would have been back southwest, in Kunming. Elizabeth McIntosh in her book Sisterhood of Spies describes the Kunming billet for the OSS ladies as bungalows surrounded by flower gardens. In that photo, I see flowers and foliage, not dust like you see in Hsian.  Below are two photos of Julia Child from Kunming time:

 The photo below is from the wonderful site Pacific Paratrooper.

 So, what say you, dear readers? Is that Julia McWilliams, later Child, hanging out with Berent Friele in Kunming? with the photo somehow sliding over to Photobook Page 21 set in Hsian?

 

  

From the jump plane, a photo of the P-51 Mustang fighter escort in close formation.

 

Chu and Friele, above.

Paul Cyr, above.

Eugene Zdrojewski, above, catching some rays. 

Bottom part of Page 21, with the crazy-quilt style of photomontage continuing. It was a popular style at the time; I first noticed it in Mom's Kensington High yearbooks. Mom put this book together in 1946-47.

The wall above could well be that of Hsian. MMB 31-32 describes Hsian as surrounded by an ancient, massive stone bastion similar to sections of the Great Wall to the north. The wall is 30 feet high, 20 feet wide and is so wide and solid that good-sized trucks could be driven on top.  It formed a rectangle two miles wide and three miles long around the city . . . 

 

Above and below we see recruits for the local unit of Chinese who hated the Japanese invaders and so would fight them with the Americans.

Yep, Dad, it's a long way from Catalina, not to mention the University of Chicago and the Lake shore.

OSS CBI Photobook 20, continued - Jump into Action, continued

 

 The second half of Page 20 includes several portraits and a jump shot.

 

Boris Chu? That's my guess. He was among the four JACKALs in the first sendoff from Hsian to near Hsin-Hsiang. MMB page 47 specifically mentions him as interpreter for that subgroup, or "echelon." The photo MMB page 52 shows them in the C-47, and "Interpreter" is second from left. Sure looks like him, 'stache and all.

Boris Chu is also described on MMB page 60 as donning a uniform of the Puppet Army to guard the closed cart sneaking Paul Cyr into and then back out of Hsin-Hsiang for that meeting with General Sun.

 Now, who are these men?

 

 

 

 

In the previous post, we referenced MMB Chapter 2 with its listing of the second echelon consisting of Zarembo, Jackson, Eisenberg, Zdrojewski. Now let's move on to MMB Chapter 3, page 87, with a different listing: 

 

Zarembo

Robichaud

Zdrojewski

Sung Cho-ching

Hsu Teh-chung

Tien San-Shang.

 

Hypothesis: Eisenberg was switched out at the last minute and Robichaud switched in. Those last three names are names of three of the men in the photos above, and in this one from the previous post:

 

 

Our EJZ writes in his JACKAL Diary, or Team Log, that The first three were the remainder of Team JACKAL. Zdrojewski came as Jerry Welo's replacement. The three Chinese officers were from the First War Area and were to work with Team JACKAL.

 

The original Team Log is in a drawer somewhere in the National Archives. Col. Mills asked the staff there for a photocopy to use as source material when writing his book with Dr. Brunner. Robert Mills has very kindly sent to us the bound copy of the Team Log. 

 

We will see more of it as we try to correlate it with the book and the photo collection, plus other things that are stacked up around here.