Piroska Hamos with her larger family

Piroska Hamos with her larger family

This picture was taken in Matyasfold on a Sunday. It must have been around April or May, because there are already leaves on the trees. I think it must have been taken in 1933, because I'm in the same outfit here, as I was in another picture with my husband and my daughter Marika, as an infant. This is me in the flowery dress (the second from the right) the one cuddling up to me is my step sister, Magda; next to her is Juliska, the daughter of Aunty Linka, my step-mother's sister. This is Jozsef Schneller, Etel's husband (second right at top.) Next to him is Etel. To the right of Jozsef is my dad, Armin Schultz. My mother-in-law is on the far right. Next to her is Magda, the eldest daughter of my mother's twin sister, Aunty Netka, who died in America last year. Next to her is my husband Imre Hahn. When I was a young woman, we played cards every Sunday. Many people came: my sisters-in-law, Klari and Iren, my step-mother's relatives, and my cousins, uncle Naci's sons. Although when we got married, my husband said, "There are no (close connections with) the relatives?, it wasn't like that at all. We moved there in 1929 and in 1930, my natural mother's eldest brother, uncle Naci, built a house in Matyasfold, and they lived there with their three sons. The two houses were close by, five minutes apart. My cousins were friends with my husband - relatives and friends as well. I liked them very much, they were intelligent, well-educated, well-read people. They graduated from secondary school. Back then, it was a big thing if someone graduated from secondary school. We also went over to uncle Naci's place a lot. They liked us - especially uncle Naci. Auntie Lina was a strange woman. She liked to put on airs, although she was uneducated. We'd go over after dinner, especially before we had children, and later our children and Andor's son were very close. We were a very hospitable household. People like to be at our place very much. Many times people came already for lunch, many times they brought lunch with them, and many times we cooked together. The card games continued even after we had the children. The family of my sister-in-law, Klari, also came, although their children were a good few years older than mine. They really enjoyed being here. My sister-in-law's family even spent the summer holiday in Matyasfold. Not at our place, but they rented a flat and my mother-in-law cooked for them. Klari and I met up almost every week. My children really like her children; it was a very strong relationship. When I was 24, I had an operation to remove kidney stones and while I was recovering, Klari took care of my two children. My husband lived at their place with the children, while I was in Hospital. Before the war, we used to go to the theatre and the cinema, but not very often. I went to the opera house for the first time as a young married woman; I went to the opera with my husband. In Matyasfold, the IKARUSZ company had a gym and once a week they showed movies in there. We also went to Budapest many times; we went to large cinemas. In Lajos Kossuth Street, there is a cinema that used to be called The Forum; that's where I saw the first talking movie. Many times we took up a whole row, because uncle Naci and his family, and my sister-in-law's family all came along with us. I think we usually went to later shows. Of course all this was before I had children. But it happened that we asked Klari to come over and mind our young kids, but this didn't happen very often.
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