Mariana Farkas with a friend

This is me with a friend of mine at the time, I don?t remember his name, in Miercurea Ciuc, in 1947. It wasn?t a special occasion, we just wanted to have a photo together.

After the war ended we didn't think of emigrating, back then it wasn't possible yet. It was very hard to obtain this permission. It wasn't possible to do it in another country either, if you didn't have relatives who would pay the communist state. One could only get a passport - but hardly, that was a problem, too - for a trip, leave and not come back. But in that case the family one left behind would suffer repercussions.

I continued high school in Miercurea Ciuc, because I had already finished four classes of high school in Budapest, out of eight, like the system was back then. After high school I worked for a year, I think, as a secretary for the Town Hospital in Miercurea Ciuc in 1949. I studied at the technical design school from 1948 to 1951, in Miercurea Ciuc as well, while I was working.

I was glad when I heard about the birth of the state of Israel, like everybody else. I have no relatives in Israel, so the wars didn't affect me directly. I've never been to Israel because I had no one to go to, my friends who were there forgot about me, they simply cut all relations with me, they didn't send a postcard or a letter after they left.