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| Wojtek getting attention from female soldiers. His remarkable life has now been turned into a movie (AFP Photo/Handout) |
Warsaw (AFP) - During World War II, Wojciech Narebski and his fellow Polish servicemen had to lift crate after heavy metal crate of artillery. Fortunately for them, one of the soldiers had superhuman strength: Corporal Wojtek, a Syrian brown bear.
"When
he saw that we were struggling, he'd want to help... He'd come over, grab a
crate and carry it to the truck," Narebski, now 93, told AFP of his days
with Wojtek in the 22nd Artillery Supply Company.
This can be
heavy work, even for a bear. When Wojtek got tired, he would simply stack one
crate on top of the other, "which also helped us, because we didn't have
to lift the crate off the ground," recounted the veteran who spent two and
a half years with the friendly giant he considered a brother.
"Of
course he got a reward. Honey, marmalade. That was his favourite."
Wojtek the
Bear also liked to drink beer and smoke (or rather eat) cigarettes, take
showers, snuggle with his handler at night, and wrestle with his comrades.
When an
opponent lost, Wojtek would lick their face in apology.
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'Corporal'
Wojtek the bear helps carry a tree trunk in Castrocaro, Italy on March 22,
1945. His comrades rewarded Wojtek for his efforts with honey, marmalade, beer,
and snuggles (AFP Photo/Handout)
|
Old photos
show the bulky beast -- who grew to be over 1.8 metres (six feet) tall and
weighed about 220 kilogrammes (490 pounds) -- giving bear hugs, opening his
toothy jaw wide for food, and enjoying a day at the beach with smiling
soldiers.
The
unbelievable true story of the orphaned cub, which was found by Polish troops
in Persia and then travelled through Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, Italy and
Scotland as a morale-booster, is now being turned into an animated movie.
The
British-Polish filmmakers hope to release the family-friendly "A Bear
Named Wojtek" in 2020 on the 75th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day.
But the
film's British producer, Iain Harvey, was skeptical when Scottish animator Iain
Gardner first approached him.
"To be
honest I thought, 'This man has had too many whiskys'," Harvey said,
before he realised that: "For once the magic is real."
 |
In this
undated handout provided by the Polish Institute and the Sikorski museum,
Wojtek is surrounded by soldiers in then Persia as a cub. He later got his own
army paybook and rations (AFP Photo/Handout)
|
Real-life
fairytale
"When
you actually find a story that is almost like a fairytale but is real, and
documented and true, it just opens up so many more emotions I think," he
told AFP.
"You
know, that humanity can have magic and that things can happen that you wouldn't
normally think are rational," he went on.
Not that
all the lore is true.
Wojtek
probably did not visit the Sphinx in Egypt, as recounted by some storytellers.
Nor did the Nazis necessarily know they had a special animal enemy and bombard
his positions.
Sometimes
truth is stranger than fiction, however.
Docile
Wojtek was an enlisted soldier, with his own paybook, rations, and rank -- a
status he needed to sail from Egypt to Italy with his comrades in arms.
 |
Wojtek was
orphaned as a cub and brought up by soldiers, coming to believe
he was human
(AFP Photo/Handout)
|
"The
port authority is being difficult about the bear and monkey," reads a 1944
entry in the company's journal.
"Only
after consulting the British High Command in Cairo does the port authority
allow them to board the ship."
Yes, there
was a monkey too.
In fact
there were hundreds of non-humans milling about during the war, according to
wartime Polish refugee Krystyna Ivell, who herself had a chameleon in
Palestine.
"You
have no mother, you have no sisters, you have no father, you're all alone, you
might die, so of course you find something to love," said the 83-year-old,
who put together a London exhibition and compiled a book: "Wojtek
Album", with photos and anecdotes about the bear.
"Stray
dogs. Foxes. Horses. You name it. Everybody wanted a pet... I remember a bloke
who had a ferret, and used to have it under his khaki shirt and the head would
appear," she told AFP.
'Polish
soul'
What was
special about Wojtek, according to Narebski, was that he seemed to believe he
was human.
 |
Wojtek
getting attention from female soldiers. His remarkable life
has now been turned
into a movie (AFP Photo/Handout)
|
"Because
he was brought up from a cub among people, he acquired human traits... In a
bear's body there was a Polish soul," said Narebski, who was known as
"Little Wojtek" and the bear as "Big Wojtek".
He recalled
an occasion in Italy, along the Adriatic Sea, when the hairy Corporal Wojtek
managed to break away from the men and make a beeline for the water, giving
beachgoers a fright.
"Well
he didn't pay them any attention... it was hot and he swam around a bit, shook
himself off, and then came right back."
This
docility is what Gardner, the animator, finds interesting about the imagery of
a bear in a human conflict.
"The
most common kind of cultural shared image that we have of a bear is that it's a
savage animal. You know, it's a beast," Gardner said.
"And
yet you put it in the context of the Second World War and you have to ask, 'Who
are the animals?'"
After the
war, Wojtek ended up at Edinburgh Zoo in Scotland, where he died at the age of
21 in 1963.
At the
time, the BBC announced "with regret the death of a famous Polish
soldier."
VIDEO: An animated film due for release in 2020 will tell the remarkable true story of an orphaned bear, found by Polish troops in Iran during WWII before travelling with them across the Middle East to Italy and then Scotland. #Wojtek 📹 @DSimonart pic.twitter.com/EJah1F5yEc
— AFP news agency (@AFP) January 13, 2019
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