Ivan Kamenský

* 1941

  • As to anti-Semitism, I didn't have problems in the workplace. I didn't talk about it, so for a long time I thought they didn't know it. The name Kamenský, in Bystrica, one assistant was called Kamenský and he persuaded me that we are a family. I really had no problem with that in Košice. Except for one colleague, but it wasn't a problem, it was like an honor. Because she told me after a few years that Ivan, you weren't called Kamenský all your life, right.. And why do you think that? But you know, during the First Republic, in Slovakia Kamenský could not be a dentist. It made sense. It was also a peasant name, yes, a village name, Kamenský. One branch, then I studied where it came from. One is the Lučenec branch and the other is the Prešov branch. So when someone reported, I asked and you're from where, from Lučenec. Then, I'm from the Prešov branch. So I've always been from the opposite branch, well.

  • The Gestapo was told that there were two Jewish families, so they would come for us. Well, it was decided that all the other men who were alone would disappear from there. They run away. They left us there, the two families. So there was nothing we could do, there was nowhere to go. So, I say, it was in the deep forest and the snow was deep, and the cold was terrible. Well, they just didn't know where they could go. We would be frozen there. And what was interesting, because I was, when my father talked about it. That's why I know it in such detail, because after the war, he told it to the rest of the family who remained and also acquaintances. He was such a storyteller type and I always sat down with him and listened to it. It was an adventure for me. The five-year-old, six-year-old boy experienced something he doesn't remember, but I was there, so I felt like a hero, sporadically.

  • My mom told me that she was very lucky that I have never said I was hungry, I didn't eat. And this rejection of food, it was very interesting, because I still had it after the war. It persisted until, maybe the 19th year of my life. At that time, I was one hundred and seventy-one centimetre tall and weighed less than fifty-two kilos. I didn't eat, I have never been hungry. You didn't feel a hunger. I did not feel hungry, I did not feel hungry, and it was the same at the boardinghouse. So, If I was eating,it's just that it's time to eat and something needs to be eaten. And that summer, when I reached nineteen years old, so during holidays, July and August, I gained fifteen kilograms. This weight has remained with me for the rest of my life. I have a little less now, well.

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    Kino Úsmev, Košice, 15.07.2020

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I was a six-year-old boy, who experienced something, but he doesn’t remember, but I was there, so I felt like a hero, sporadically

Ivan Kamenský was born at the end of August 1941, in the village Lubeník. He was born just before the agreement of the Jewish Code, it means that he spent much of his childhood illegally. His father was one of sixteen siblings and before the wedding, he lived and worked in Banská Bystrica, where he had a dental clinic. Unlike his strongly believing wife, his father felt Jewish, but he has never believed in religion. Ivan’s mother came from a very orthodox family from Lubeník. After the war, she found out that more than fifty members of her family had been lost in the concentration camps. At the beginning, Ivan Kamenský, as a little boy, hid together with his parents in Chyžné. Later, he was hidden by an evangelical pastor. After returning due to persistent pressure in the village, Ivan’s father, in February 1944, decided to apply for a displacement to Slavošovice, as a local dentist. Subsequently, they were evacuated to the shelter Kohút, but the shelter was disclosed and they were taken away by the Gestapo. The end of the war was approaching, the Germans did not catch out to transport them to the camps, and so they were rescued by the Red Army. The war affected the health of his entire family. After being released from the hospital, they decided to move to Tornaľa. After multiple non-acceptance to university, due to the then political regime, he finally successfully completed two universities. He became a teacher and psychologist. Currently, he is married for the second time and he has one daughter and grandson.