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My brother and I skated and swam in the ice-cold water. It was my brother’s task to teach me everything. He threw me into the middle of the pool and I somehow floundered out, then he threw me in again, and that’s how I slowly learned to swim. It went the same way with skating. He took me in the middle and left me there, I cried and just stood there for a while, then I toddled out somehow, he took me in again. Within an hour I skated happily. There were rough winters here; there was a skating rink at the corner of Columbus Street.
We always spent our summer in Nogradveroce. There was a family of teachers, the Szilagyis, who had a little wooden house in their garden. My parents rented it at 500 pengos for a whole season. When school was over we went down there.
A dray would come, they’d put the bedding on it in baskets, and we’d take everything down there and stay there until school started. My father was on holiday – for at least three weeks for sure – and would come down. When he wasn’t on holiday, he came down every day by train. And when I was older I used to meet him every day at the station.
At Nogradveroce there were great trips up to the mountains by narrow-gauge railway. We went there many times. Even the year after I was born there is already a picture of me down there. This lasted until the very hard times of the war came.
We always spent our summer in Nogradveroce. There was a family of teachers, the Szilagyis, who had a little wooden house in their garden. My parents rented it at 500 pengos for a whole season. When school was over we went down there.
A dray would come, they’d put the bedding on it in baskets, and we’d take everything down there and stay there until school started. My father was on holiday – for at least three weeks for sure – and would come down. When he wasn’t on holiday, he came down every day by train. And when I was older I used to meet him every day at the station.
At Nogradveroce there were great trips up to the mountains by narrow-gauge railway. We went there many times. Even the year after I was born there is already a picture of me down there. This lasted until the very hard times of the war came.
Period
Location
Hungary
Interview
Judit Kinszki