Boy From the Woods

[For The Kids]

I have seen references to Ray remembering his birth date in this thread, but not the date itself. It is June 20th, 1994 according to this article - maybe that means something to someone?

I think the key to finding out who he is is his language, and I also think that authorities are very aware of that. Probably they are already pursuing this lead, but will not release anything before results are clear. There are language scientists who can find out the background of a person precisely, just by listening to their way of speaking, words used, melody of sentences, flection, things like that.

I think the whole thing with his father saying "english is a very important language" already tells us that english is not his first language. The linguists would be able to tell his first language, even if he does not remember it (or does not want to remember it).

For me, the names in this case have a very literary sound. "Ray", "Ryan", "Doreen" - those are names I as a writer would use for people to make clear where they come from, without explicitly writing it (as opposed to names that are used in different languages with the same or very similar spelling).

Theories I have:

1. - There is no dead father in the Czech woods. The boy ran from either a family or a foster home in some eastern country. Many people there speak english fluently and with less accent than german people, because movies and tv series are sent in original language (with subtitles). With a tv in your home, you have a steady stream of native english speakers, which gives a great advantage when learning a language.

2. - The story he tells is mostly correct, but the reason for his father to take him away and to the woods is different. What if he (the father) was a fighter in one of the local wars (Yugoslavia, Chechnia, etc) or a rebel from one of the many countries with internal problems in the region? He might have been traumatized in fight and fled his inner deamons, or even have a very good real reason to leave their home and hide with his son for years.

3, - It's all a big hoax, and the boy is really from somewhere just around the corner. That was my first thought, but I think if it was that way, someone would be looking for him and asking questions - even if the sketch is not very accurate.

I don't think his behaviour points entirely towards the 3rd theory, though. Even if he was taken to the woods not 5, but ten years ago, he still would remember how to shower, watch tv, and probably even bowl. And, as others have pointed out, "living in the woods" does not mean no contact with civilization at all.

I personally wouldnt say that Ray Ryan and Doreen are the names of anyone from an Eastern European Country...

Also my husband is 100% English and told his daughter when she was very young that English was one of the main languages you need to know..so the boy saying that doesnt mean hes not English. Personally if those names are legit..i would have thought he came from Britain or Ireland or did at one point at least.

 

[For The Kids]

I am not sure if it is a hoax or not. It is possible to type Doreen and Ryan into the British register of births, marriages and deaths and also to type Ray with mother Doreen. Ray is a perfectly acceptable English name though Doreen tends to feel a bit old fashioned - there are still plenty of people around called Ryan, Ray and Doreen. Ryan is also perfectly acceptable. I know a Ray who lives up the road from me and have known a Doreen and would not think it odd if someone said they were called Ryan. I tried this morning to see what would come up on free BMD but nothing does. That may just mean the family is not transcribed - there are other search engines you can pay for that might bring up something.

I do think living in the woods is something some people may do because a lot of people were doing it about 12 years ago as new age travellers here. However most looked thin and unkempt.

I don't think this is Andrew Gosden. I wish to God it was, or Ben Needham. I think that maybe the boy was not wandering as long as it felt he was and is traumatised by the death of his Father (if it is really his Father.)

My guess is that the accident with the Mother had the Father scared of the authorities wherever he was for some reason and they went on the run, but that they were not always in the forest. Perhaps they had no relatives who would be bothered where they were and that made the running easy.

What we are not hearing, however is how clean, how well nourished, how hungry or otherwise the boy was when he turned up. I would guess that those things were already looked at and that is why the police think he is possibly telling the truth. I am sure they are watching the boy's responses to how he handles the new environment. That also might tell a lot.

Jacky

Not everyone is registered yet online for this service. I know last year my dad died and we needed his m arriage certificate for some reason and you can get them online..but his wasnt on there yet. I think its kind of volunteers who put this data on so its as and when they can get people to do it i guess/

 

[andrea]

I personally wouldnt say that Ray Ryan and Doreen are the names of anyone from an Eastern European Country...

Definitely not! I tried to say that I would use names like these in a story, to imply english-speaking background.

Also my husband is 100% English and told his daughter when she was very young that English was one of the main languages you need to know..so the boy saying that doesnt mean hes not English. Personally if those names are legit..i would have thought he came from Britain or Ireland or did at one point at least.

Maybe you are right, and I am thinking way too complicated. I don't know. I just have a feeling that the whole story sounds "made up". As I said earlier, there may be good reasons, to act like this, and also bad reasons. We don't know. And of course, it could still be all true.

(sorry, cant get the first quote to render as a quote, not sure what I'm doing wrong)

 

[~n/t~]

So, let's see....let's say he is indeed a Czech and, like many, has learned English as a lingua franca - a second language, taught in many schools. He has no reason to learn German as he's not German, and German is not English - a language one learns in order to communicate widely with others for whom it is also a second language. How to escape his bleak existence, have adventure, see the world? What about walking to Germany - not that far - and, somehow (he thinks), use what he does know - his English - in order eventually to obtain a still prestigious British passport, his ticket to travel and adventure? He gives the whole thing a fascinating backstory as he is a clever young man and knows this will draw attention, and that something - something good - just might happen for him.

I agree. I don't think English is his mother tongue (first language). I believe he learned it in school hence his father's alleged comment that English is an important language. This boy is not British, imo

Could he be Chechnyan? Did he and his dad escape the war?

In lieu of the devastated economic structure, kidnapping emerged as the principal source of income countrywide, procuring over $200 million during the three year independence of the chaotic fledgling state,[21] although victims were rarely killed.[

or

5 years ago:

In 2006 Human Rights Watch reported that pro-Moscow Chechen forces under the command, in effect, of President Ramzan Kadyrov, as well as federal police personnel, used torture to get information about separatist forces. "If you are detained in Chechnya, you face a real and immediate risk of torture. And there is little chance that your torturer will be held accountable," said Holly Cartner, Director Europe and Central Asia division of HRW.

Chechnya - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia


Don't ask how I ended up in Chechnya. :crazy:

 

[Trino]

Chechnya is not the Czech Republic. The Czech Republic borders Germany, which could be a logical place where he lived in the woods. Chechnya is much too far from Germany to be considered.

 

[~n/t~]

Doreen is an Irish name.
Doreen is a Irish girl name. The meaning of the name is `sullen`.
http://www.i-am-pregnant.com/names/girls/Doreen

Ray is a Scottish name.
http://www.i-am-pregnant.com/names/boys/Ray


Ryen is a Irish boy name. The meaning of the name is `Kingly.`.

http://www.i-am-pregnant.com/names/boys/Ryen

 

[Cymro]

This may have been mentioned elsewhere, but Ray and Doreen are names that would have been common in native English speakers probably no later than the mid-20th century. Ryan is an Irish surname that became popular as a first name from around 1970 onwards, at least in mainstream English-speaking communities. So the boy and his mother have quite "old" first names whereas his father's is quite "young."

One possible explanation is that the boy is from the Irish "traveler" community - according to Wikipedia "are a traditionally nomadic people of ethnic Irish origin, who maintain a separate language and set of traditions."

This might explain the lack of a connected missing persons report and the odd set of names in the family.

Incidentally, Andrea and others, Tschechien in German translates to "The Czech Republic" in English. I do think that the non-EU boy who's wandered across the border and wants to settle is also plausible. I'd love to hear the boy speak; this would help pinpoint his origins although it wouldn't necessarily be conclusive.

 

[~n/t~]

Chechnya is not the Czech Republic. The Czech Republic borders Germany, which could be a logical place where he lived in the woods. Chechnya is much too far from Germany to be considered.

I realize that but if they escaped war or torture...could be why they've been living in the woods for 5 years? Could he have witnessed his mom being tortured or killed in the war causing his memory loss?

Why would they leave Czech Republic to live in the woods? One would think family members would be looking for them for 5 years?

Or maybe it's all a big hoax and I'm travelling the world but hey I'm learning a lot. Been to places I've never been to before. LOL

Did you know Czech Republic has 250,000 Romani people?

 

[Nova]

People in New England, especially Massachusetts, have an accent as well as New York, Texas, North Dakota, and Canada.

Everybody has an accent. Period. (Or "full stop" as the Brits would say.)

Some languages designate a specific accent as the "standard." In the U.S., Standard American Speech was based on the accent used in a specific county in the Midwest (Ohio, I believe), but that choice was largely arbitrary.

Modern linguists don't put a lot of stock in the idea of a "standard" form of any language. And given the way we all move around, I'm sure I'm not the only one who speaks with elements of Midwestern (where my parents were from), Southern (where I grew up), New York (where I spent my 20s) and Western (where I've lived for almost 30 years) "accents".

 

[Nova]

Yeah that is weird. And to tell him how to get help, yet tell him to go so far away to get that help.

I just had a thought. The statements that English is an important language, and to be so paranoid as to tell him that the only place to get help was Berlin reminds me of something. Is it possible that the father was schizophrenic?

I don't know about that (though it seems possible).

But your post does suggest an interesting possibility: perhaps German WAS the father's native tongue, but only speaking English to the boy was another way of isolating the kid and insuring he wouldn't run off to mingle with German society.

 

[Nova]

Not sure how accurate it is but on Google maps, two weeks walking North would have started him around Greece?

Was he told to walk North until he got to Berlin? Maybe he didn't find anyone along the way who spoke English?

It's 1,100 miles between Athens and Berlin. To walk that distance in 2 weeks, one would have to walk almost 80 miles per day.

20 miles per day is probably the maximum distance a trained walker can achieve day after day. (And that assumes a well-equipped walker who doesn't have to spend time to foraging for food and water.)

http://walking.about.com/b/2007/03/19/how-far-can-a-healthy-person-walk.htm

 

[andrea]

This may have been mentioned elsewhere, but Ray and Doreen are names that would have been common in native English speakers probably no later than the mid-20th century. Ryan is an Irish surname that became popular as a first name from around 1970 onwards, at least in mainstream English-speaking communities. So the boy and his mother have quite "old" first names whereas his father's is quite "young."

One possible explanation is that the boy is from the Irish "traveler" community - according to Wikipedia "are a traditionally nomadic people of ethnic Irish origin, who maintain a separate language and set of traditions."

This might explain the lack of a connected missing persons report and the odd set of names in the family.

Incidentally, Andrea and others, Tschechien in German translates to "The Czech Republic" in English. I do think that the non-EU boy who's wandered across the border and wants to settle is also plausible. I'd love to hear the boy speak; this would help pinpoint his origins although it wouldn't necessarily be conclusive.

Very interesting idea here, I have never heard of the Irish traveler community before. Thanks for the pointer!

Also, I didn't mean to be unrespectful by using "Czechia". I thought it was a valid shortcut, like "Tschechien" in German (where "Tschechische Republik" would be the full name of the nation).

 

[Nova]

Do they speak English in Czech Republic?

The majority of Czechs speak Czech, of course, but English is spoken all over Europe. Not by everyone, of course, but he could have found somebody who spoke English in any city, town or village.

The same is true of Germany (except the majority speaks German, obviously).

 

[andrea]

I realize that but if they escaped war or torture...could be why they've been living in the woods for 5 years? Could he have witnessed his mom being tortured or killed in the war causing his memory loss?

Why would they leave Czech Republic to live in the woods? One would think family members would be looking for them for 5 years?

Or maybe it's all a big hoax and I'm travelling the world but hey I'm learning a lot. Been to places I've never been to before. LOL

Did you know Czech Republic has 250,000 Romani people?

The Chechnya connection was my second thought (after the hoax thought). I hope you are wrong about the torture scenario, though. It's just too sad to think about, even in a time like this.

I haven't thought about Romani people yet, but it could be a clue. On the other hand, the Romani I know have very strong family connections, and it would be hard to imagine someone gone for five years without major inquiries. But after a big fallout, maybe, yes.

 

[Nova]

Can anybody map this to get an approximate distance he would have had to travel? I wonder how many miles per day he would have had to cover to accomplish this feat?

Prague in the Czech Republic is 174 miles from Berlin. (Prague is a little farther than the Ore Mountain region where the boy is now said to have lived, but I'm using Prague for simplicity's sake and because a few extra miles helps to account for the rough terrain where the boy allegedly lived.)

That makes a two-week walk just a bit more than 12 miles per day. Quite doable for a healthy 17-year-old who was used to living in the woods.

ETA Belimom got this answer before I did. Credit where credit is due.

 

[Lera213]

http://ie.missingkids.com/missingki...&caseNum=MK12&orgPrefix=IRGS&searchLang=en_IE

The age could be wrong, just looking to see who it could or might be. Note the picture of Ray is a computer composite

 

[wfgodot]

Good Independent article just up:

Did a boy live in the woods for five years?

The German woodland where an English-speaking "forest boy" claims to have spent the past five years living rough is a landscape of tree-covered hills rising to 3,000 feet with valleys dotted with fields and cut by rushing streams.
---
But the sensation of being alone was cut short every 20 minutes or so by the crunch of hikers' boots on forest paths and the clack of their aluminium walking sticks. Jens Nixdorf, an Ore mountain forester for more than 30 years who knows the region like the back of his hand, doubted that anyone could live rough and undetected for long periods of time in the forests.

"If there are not hikers in the woods there are hunters. They would notice anyone camping out in the wild very quickly and I, or one of my colleagues, would be informed about it," he told The Independent yesterday.
---
Mr Nixdorf said that there was a slim possibility of being able to live rough and undetected on the Czech side of the Ore mountains which lost most of its original German-speaking population after the Second World War and has since been only sparsely repopulated with Czechs. "The Czech side is just as forested but there are less people living there. There is just a remote possibility of being able to camp out there without being seen, but it is really remote," he said.

much more at link above

 

[Nova]

I have seen references to Ray remembering his birth date in this thread, but not the date itself. It is June 20th, 1994 according to this article - maybe that means something to someone?

I think the key to finding out who he is is his language, and I also think that authorities are very aware of that. Probably they are already pursuing this lead, but will not release anything before results are clear. There are language scientists who can find out the background of a person precisely, just by listening to their way of speaking, words used, melody of sentences, flection, things like that.

I think the whole thing with his father saying "english is a very important language" already tells us that english is not his first language. The linguists would be able to tell his first language, even if he does not remember it (or does not want to remember it).

For me, the names in this case have a very literary sound. "Ray", "Ryan", "Doreen" - those are names I as a writer would use for people to make clear where they come from, without explicitly writing it (as opposed to names that are used in different languages with the same or very similar spelling).

Theories I have:

1. - There is no dead father in the Czech woods. The boy ran from either a family or a foster home in some eastern country. Many people there speak english fluently and with less accent than german people, because movies and tv series are sent in original language (with subtitles). With a tv in your home, you have a steady stream of native english speakers, which gives a great advantage when learning a language.

2. - The story he tells is mostly correct, but the reason for his father to take him away and to the woods is different. What if he (the father) was a fighter in one of the local wars (Yugoslavia, Chechnia, etc) or a rebel from one of the many countries with internal problems in the region? He might have been traumatized in fight and fled his inner deamons, or even have a very good real reason to leave their home and hide with his son for years.

3, - It's all a big hoax, and the boy is really from somewhere just around the corner. That was my first thought, but I think if it was that way, someone would be looking for him and asking questions - even if the sketch is not very accurate.

I don't think his behaviour points entirely towards the 3rd theory, though. Even if he was taken to the woods not 5, but ten years ago, he still would remember how to shower, watch tv, and probably even bowl. And, as others have pointed out, "living in the woods" does not mean no contact with civilization at all.

BBM: I am not picking on Andrea, because she is by no means the first to posit a soldier gone AWOL from the "local wars." However, the former Yugoslavia was 600 miles from Berlin; Chechnya is well over 1,000 miles from Berlin.

There have been no "local wars" anywhere near Berlin in the past 20 years. Officially, Germany hasn't been at war since 1945 (though there were military intrusions by the Soviets into East Germany and Prague and Hungary in the 1950s and 1960s).

So while an AWOL father isn't impossible, he didn't come from a "local" war.

ETA I SEE NOW THAT ANDREA IS FROM VIENNA, AUSTRIA. SHE CERTAINLY KNOWS CENTRAL EUROPEAN GEOGRAPHY BETTER THAN I! I now suspect she did not mean "local to Berlin" by the term "local war." She was more likely using a European expression in which a "local war" is distinguished from a "continental war" or "world war." She certain knows the Germans and Czechs haven't been fighting for some time.

ETA2 andrea explains below that she meant "local" to Europeans and therefore "distant" to Americans. Perfectly clear English now that I realize where she is posting.

 

[Nova]

So, let's see....let's say he is indeed a Czech and, like many, has learned English as a lingua franca - a second language, taught in many schools. He has no reason to learn German as he's not German, and German is not English - a language one learns in order to communicate widely with others for whom it is also a second language. How to escape his bleak existence, have adventure, see the world? What about walking to Germany - not that far - and, somehow (he thinks), use what he does know - his English - in order eventually to obtain a still prestigious British passport, his ticket to travel and adventure? He gives the whole thing a fascinating backstory as he is a clever young man and knows this will draw attention, and that something - something good - just might happen for him.

And he doesn't even have to walk. We know from Rudy Guede of the Amanda Knox case that it is possible for a reasonably clever young man to ride European trains without buying tickets.

 

[For The Kids]

Doreen is an Irish name.
Doreen is a Irish girl name. The meaning of the name is `sullen`.
http://www.i-am-pregnant.com/names/girls/Doreen

Ray is a Scottish name.
http://www.i-am-pregnant.com/names/boys/Ray


Ryen is a Irish boy name. The meaning of the name is `Kingly.`.

http://www.i-am-pregnant.com/names/boys/Ryen

You may be right but all three names are VERY common names here in England