Tag #124264 - Interview #78113 (Louiza Vecsler)

My mother also planted cucumbers for pickles. And one season, after a strong rain, there were so many cucumbers, that we filled two huge baskets. My mother didn't know what to do, she didn't have jars for all of them. There was a Jewish merchant living next door, Mr. Iossl, and my mother went to him and asked him, 'Do you want to buy cucumbers? I have fresh cucumbers'. 'Yes, bring them', he said. This merchant also lived across the street from the power station and close to the railway station, and all the workers came to him and bought merchandise on credit, and they paid for it when they got their salaries. Mr. Iossl had a big, five kilo empty khalva box, and everyone who bought something on credit wrote his name down on a piece of paper, what he bought and how much he would pay for it, and put the paper in that box. Mr. Iossl knew how to make his business work. And so, all our cucumbers were gone in an hour. I remember he had a lot of cereals, too.

Our family bought things from him as well, because his house was exactly next to ours. If we needed a liter of oil or a kilo of sugar, we would go to Mr. Iossl. We, the kids, loved to eat salad in summer, and it sometimes happened that the oil bottle was empty; then we would go to Mr. Iossl and ask him for some oil: he measured the oil, put down a note, and my mother paid for it when she got home.