This is my sister Helena Kovanicova, nee Munkova, at the age of five. The picture was taken in 1929.
I was one of three siblings, and my sister Helena was the oldest one of us. She was born in 1924. In adolescence she was very pretty. She was said to be one of the prettiest girls in Brandys. She turned a lot of boys' heads. I remember that back then before the war, young people used to go on dates to Stara Boleslav, where there was a confectionery named U Horacku. Once, I don't know on what occasion, I saw my sister there with some boy, and he bought me some ice cream so that I wouldn't tell when I got home. I think that my sister didn't take advantage of her assets. Our mother probably gave her a bit of a complex, because she used to say to her, 'Don't think that you're going to be some sort of beauty.' And she, despite being pretty, was all miserable because she had freckles.
