Csaba Sik (Judit Kinszki’s husband) and a friend

My husband and I used to attend the same university. We were of the same age; he was born in '34 as well. His name is Cs. S. It was Schilling before. It was a German (Swabian) family from Celldomolk.

[We got married in 1957. We rented a flat.]  The tenant was consumptive; we were scared that our child would get infected. The flat was full of bed bugs, and we protected ourselves against them in vain, as they came in everywhere. [With help] we got some temporary accommodation. It was a loft facing towards the yard. You can't imagine the happiness we felt at getting a flat of our own. We didn't have a kitchen, only a bathroom and toilet. It had one window, which the child got; a curtain separated her room. The caretaker was very skilled, he shelved in the whole entrance-hall, as we already had lots of books then; Cs. worked at a publishing house and got copies from there, and he got them from the writers as well. There was a tile stove, but it had always gone cold by the morning, and the toilets were horribly cold. It leaked all the time, the child got a chronic ear infection, because the flat was wet and mouldy. So life was not easy, but it was our own flat. We lived there till '70. Csaba was very busy and he only came home at night. When he got home, the child was always sleeping; I don't really know if she knew she had a father. I raised her completely alone. When we moved to the temporary accommodation Cs. worked at home, but the child disturbed him. So I took the child away all the time. We visited all the museums of Budapest.

Photos from this interviewee