fourth child arrived they announced: "Its a boy." The baby was dressed in blue, and given the masculine name of Dalcus.
For 25 years Dalcus Jupi wore men's clothes and lived as a man. But in fact, Dalcus really was a girl. Now the story of why she posed as a boy has been told!
Her parents who lived in the backward village of Bosnia, in central Yugoslavia, feared that their house would be "damned" unless they could produce a boy.
When their second daughter was born their friends and neighbors avoided the house. When the third girl was born even their relatives stopped calling. So Mr. and Mrs. Jupi decided that whatever happened their next child would be a boy.
Little Dalcus lived a sheltered life. She was never allowed outside the house. But one day when she was eight, she escaped and played with the other children in the street. Her father was enraged. He took her home, gathered his family together, explained the secret, and threatened to kill anyone who revealed it. On his deathbed he called Dalcus and made her swear not to tell anyone she was a girl, at least while her mother lived.
Years went by, and in 1944, Dalcus, still wearing trousers, was called to serve Tito's forces. She marched and fought with the other soldiers. When the war ended she stayed in the army and became a cook. No one had discovered her secret!
But then Dalcus fell in lovewith a fellow soldier named Aslan Aslani, who lived in the village next to hers. But she hid her feelings and kept her secret. One day she fell ill and after several days collapsed and was taken to the hospital unconscious. There her
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secret was discovered, and when she woke she found herself in the women's ward surrounded by people waiting impatiently to hear how a man who had seen active service in the army could turn out to be a woman.
She explained, and was straightaway released from the army. Then she went home and told poor Aslan that she really was a girl and that she loved him. Dalcus has since changed her name to Fatima and married Aslan, but because of her oath to her father, she never told her mother who continued to believe the family secret safe until her death two years later.
LETTER FROM MUNICH
An American student in Germany has taken exception to the impression we gave that there is not as much freedom in that country as there is here in the U.S. He writes in part, "My experience in the current scene is that there is here much more personal freedom, although you may not recognize it as that. The thing is that the general public does not want to hear about homosexuality, or see it on the newsstands.
"Take the bars for example. There are over 11 gay bars in Munich and most have been operating for several years. Bars are not closed by the police or licenses revoked by state commissions just because of homosexual patronage. One delightful little bar is right around the corner from a police precinct station in the center of town. One time, at another bar, a policeman came in to check the I.D. of two very young-looking patrons he had seen through the window. As he passed a group of fellows one asked, 'Hey, officer, how about a kiss?' Would anyone dare to say that to a policeman in the States? [We should hope not]
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