Ingrid Petříková

„I remember it all very well, when the Russians came. In Vratislavice we have a pharmacy, a church, the House of freedom. That´s a kind of a main street. When the Russians came I had a pink bag and they gave me some chocolate and some sweets. Brother was two years older and he jumped up their tank and went almost to Jablonec with them and marched back on foot. That´s how I remember the event. It was jolly, the tanks and Russians. Mummy then cooked and helped around. There were Poles and Russians here.“

„So the people went to Germany, where my brother was living in Essen. He said: ,I had mummy, Inka and Pavel and Jenda, and we all lived in Vratislavice, but now I have no one in the whole world as they all died.‘ They said: ,How did they died? Mrs. Stará is there, Inka and Pavel as well.‘ –, That´s not possible, I write them letters and they keep coming back saying they´re dead. So I stopped sending them.‘ So the people took an address and gave it to mummy, then we made contact and so did he. When I was sixteen we went to the station and met up after a long time. And ever since then we kept visiting each other.“

„Mum was quite a pretty lady, a temperamental one and next to us there was a widower, Jaroslav Starý. He already fancied mummy and was sorry that we ought to get displaced and he´d stay here. So he went to the committee to marry her, because he liked her. Hence we could stay here as he was Czech. So we did. He had a high position as a communist and so we could stay here.“