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Three children came of that marriage. The oldest son was called Laci – Laszlo. The middle daughter was named Ildiko, the youngest Eniko. Their father, my mother’s cousin, fell ill as a result of his wounding in World War I. Apparently he suffered from Parkinson’s disease. He suffered for a relatively long time, he even survived the Holocaust. After the war one aunt took care of him until the end. After the coming of Communism his wife tried to escape the country across the Morava River. His wife and the middle daughter Ildiko were on a different boat than the son with the youngest daughter, Eniko. Ildiko and her mother ended up in jail, because they caught them. The son Laci with the youngest daughter Eniko were on another boat. They managed to escape and got to the other side. When they released the countess and Ildiko from jail, they again tried to escape. This time they also succeeded.
Today the entire family lives in America. I don’t have any contact with them, I know only very little about them. My cousin, Albert Yisrael Pick has some sort of connection with Laci. When my son needed an immunology textbook, it was Laci who found it for him. He had our address from Albert Yisrael. I thanked him for it, and thought that we’d stay in contact, but that was the end of it. He didn’t show any interest. I know that Laci married a Slovak woman from Povazska Bystrica. In America he worked his way up to being a professor of mathematics, he developed one very unusual mathematical theory, so he did very well there. His wife is a painter, she’s quite respected. The middle daughter, Ildiko, had already started to study chemistry in Czechoslovakia. She married very well; her husband was the European representative of one large company. The youngest, Eniko, supposedly got married in Mexico and has these little Mexican children with narrow eyes. This much I know about them, and nothing more. In the meantime, their mother died. After 1989 she stayed here for a time.
There’s an interesting story tied to her time here. After the revolution she wanted to reclaim two portraits of her parents. Likely they were from a known artist and probably also had interesting frames. During Communism the pictures were confiscated, and I don’t know whether they maybe belonged to the collection of some gallery. She submitted a request for their return, but she didn’t manage to get them back.
Today the entire family lives in America. I don’t have any contact with them, I know only very little about them. My cousin, Albert Yisrael Pick has some sort of connection with Laci. When my son needed an immunology textbook, it was Laci who found it for him. He had our address from Albert Yisrael. I thanked him for it, and thought that we’d stay in contact, but that was the end of it. He didn’t show any interest. I know that Laci married a Slovak woman from Povazska Bystrica. In America he worked his way up to being a professor of mathematics, he developed one very unusual mathematical theory, so he did very well there. His wife is a painter, she’s quite respected. The middle daughter, Ildiko, had already started to study chemistry in Czechoslovakia. She married very well; her husband was the European representative of one large company. The youngest, Eniko, supposedly got married in Mexico and has these little Mexican children with narrow eyes. This much I know about them, and nothing more. In the meantime, their mother died. After 1989 she stayed here for a time.
There’s an interesting story tied to her time here. After the revolution she wanted to reclaim two portraits of her parents. Likely they were from a known artist and probably also had interesting frames. During Communism the pictures were confiscated, and I don’t know whether they maybe belonged to the collection of some gallery. She submitted a request for their return, but she didn’t manage to get them back.
Location
Slovakia
Interview
Judita Schvalbova