Horst Hofmann

"It went strudel, everyone had a pram or a wheelchair. It had 25 kilos on it, per person, we only had my pram or my sister's pram, and we had all the equipment in it, otherwise everything had to be left in the flat. And I still remember one thing. When the looting guards came, as the older ones called it, I had toys, and the toys were put in this sports bag. And the gentleman in question told me that I couldn't take it. Well, of course, when he says that to a six-year-old, well, I was so horrified, but really, I had to spill it. He just picked out the German books for me, the German folding books, but as far as [...] I had some blocks and a little car, there weren't many toys, I had to leave it all in the flat. So that affected me a little bit as a boy too. I always think about it now and I'm joking around with the guys like that, I say I'm going to have to ask for that wooden duck sometime anyway."

"So we grew up like that and now the school years have come when I was supposed to start school. But because we were German, we could only go to school from the age of seven. Of course, I couldn't even speak Czech [because we spoke German at home]. And so it was kind of difficult too when we came to that school, those German boys or even girls. And so we had difficult years, of course, nobody could teach me much at home. And my sister, she was nine years older, so she was an adult now, and she kind of slipped out of the house and they put her somewhere to work. So then she ended up settling down in Polica in a dairy factory, it was called, I think, Laktos, and that's where she spent most of her [time]. And then she went to work at Stark's at this dairy branch. Well, what else can I say about that? Those school years were cruel because we didn't know any Czech, so we had to learn, of course. But nobody helped me with anything at home, it was a struggle. And all the children were not friendly to us either. Even though we were children, we played, but there were certain [...] For some people we were 'Hitlerites' and that was it."