Mária Bors

* 1933

  • "I used to remember the saying, 'Help yourself, man, God will help you.' If I do not help myself, the Lord God will not help me and vice versa. I have always tried to do my job honestly, both at home and at work. And so the years passed. I am slowly coming to an end… I am happy with my life, we finally got a pension. You can make a living from it if you pay a little attention to money. We have not become rich, but we live. So I live. Surrounded by grandchildren, I can live in my own house. Does a person need more? I do not think so."

  • "We had a hard time getting used about it. Hamuliakovo, Kalinkovo, it is a plain, the hills were not even visible from there, only when we looked towards Bratislava. In Barranya Couty there was only hills. So it was very difficult for us. Very. We found it difficult to get used to it. My dear father always believed we would get back home. "They'll take us back home, you'll see. We're going home. In Mohács they will load us to the ship and take us back home. ” Until his death, he believed we would return home to Hamuliakovo. But he wasn't right. We were not allowed to return. We had to stay there. We had to get used to it. There was nothing that could be done. ”

  • "Nobody wanted to leave willingly. In Kalinkov, they began to gather the first people they were to take to the Sudety. I don't know if I'm saying these Sudety well, but that's how we heard it then. They were the ones who got loaded into the truck, but they were the ones who defended. There was a woman who was put on the truck by the soldiers, but she jumped of. They tried to load her again, she jumped of again. They tied her. This truck then passed through our village and everyone saw this truck with the people and the bound woman heading to Šamorín, where they were then loaded into wagons. At that time, many inhabitants of Hamuliakovo decided that they would rather run away to Rajka. It was a key moment. Maybe if people didn't see this bound woman, they wouldn't run to Rajka, but they would be taken to the Czechia, where they were to be taken. Well, at least I think, that is what inhabitants of Hamuliakovo was thinking about it. Therefore, they began to run away across the Danube. True, one person was killed this way. The soldiers tried to prevent the escape and fired at the boats that sailed across the Danube to turn around. However, the boats did not want to turn around and once it happened that one person was hit by such a bullet. He died on the spot. The boat turned. The others may have crossed the Danube in the end, but this man was buried in Hamuliakovo because he was shot. "

  • Full recordings
  • 1

    Mosonymagyaróvár, 21.07.2021

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    duration: 01:10:07
    media recorded in project Inconvenient Mobility
  • 2

    Nitra, 16.08.2021

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    duration: 11:26
    media recorded in project Inconvenient Mobility
  • 3

    Nitra, 16.08.2021

    (audio)
    duration: 49:46
    media recorded in project Inconvenient Mobility
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Help yourself and God will help you!

The first year of the Pammer family in their new house in Hungary. Mária at the top right. year 1947, Nagynyárád
The first year of the Pammer family in their new house in Hungary. Mária at the top right. year 1947, Nagynyárád
photo: Witnesses archive

Mária Bors, née Pammer, was born on 19th July 1933 in the village of Gútor, today Hamuliakovo, Southern Slovakia, into a Hungarian family. Her parents József a Terézia were both farmers from Hamuliakovo. In 1944 and 1945 the Pammers helped a Jewish family by hiding them in their barn. From 1945 to 1947 Mária witnessed deportation of her Hungarian neighbours form Gútor to the Czech lands, as well as the escapes of some across the Danube into the close border village of Rajka (Hungary). In 1947 the Pammers received the so called “white card”, meaning they had to leave for Hungary. The family packed all the possesions they could take with them and on 17th November 1947 they left by train for Hungary, without knowing where exactly they went. After seven days, they ended up in the village of Nagynyárád, close to Mohács, Southern Hungary. There they received a house vacated by a German family that was expelled to Germany. The Pammer family had difficulties getting used to new conditions. During the socialist regime, they had to give a substantial part of their farming products to the state. In 1950, at the age of 17, Mária married Antal Bors, a childhood friend whose family was also expelled from Slovakia. In 1954 they used the opprotunity to move to Mosonymagyaróvár, a city close to Rajka and Hamuliakovo. Throuout her live, she did many manual jobs. Today she lives in Mosonymagyaróvár with her grandchildren.