Věra Johanidesová

"Those were wonderful years of hope for us, that everything would go as it should, that we would not be locked in a cage, that we would be able to travel. We also went to Paris soon after the New Year, for example. One night there, we walked around during the day - we even went into the Louvre and saw the famous things. We were the only ones on the bus, the others said it wasn't worth paying to get in. It was worth it for us. We travelled fast - Bulgaria with the kids, then Greece, I love Holland, I don't know why... We wanted to show everything to the kids and also to see for ourselves the big world that had been forbidden to us. Yes, the sixties were a great time of happiness and joy for us."

"When the war that came hit Kolín very hard, I remember very clearly how we were standing by the church - we had rented a house by the church - and how the local neighbours were watching and someone said, 'Kolín is taking it!' In first [grade] I thought, how can the city take anything away? Because the notion of someone taking something away for something or doing something, etc., was not entirely familiar to me. But I saw, like everybody else, how it was smoking - it was five kilometres away - how it was awfully close. We had to leave the flat when the sirens were blaring, and we walked through the garden to the ravine - it was called Solkova Ravine - where we survived the Cologne bombing. I still remember clearly that the so-called low flying bombers flew there, it was really terrible how low they were flying. You could see the pilot's head and you didn't know if he was aiming at it either. It was also quite an unusual experience."