Ludgarda Plačková

“The store owner Karel Vitásek was accused of selling goods to the Germans at wartime. But it was a completely logical thing that when they came to the store he sold it to them. What else could he do? So they brought Vitásek to the post office and there they tortured him. The hanged him upside down and tore off nails from his feet. These were policemen and some locals from Hať.”

“Karlík’s veins around his heart were clogged with sand. My mum saw it at the roentgen picture. It was fine sand from the Sahara desert. They said they could operate him only a year later. But Karlík didn’t make it that far. Several sand grains got loose, went into his heart and he sustained a heart attack. Our Karlíček had died. That was a blow. We thought we’d all die. Such a young boy. I witnessed him dying in my mum’s arms. Our father was working at the field. I ran to fetch him but he didn’t make it in time. He came running to the yard, chased the horses to the stable and rushed after Karlík. But Karlík was dead already, he wasn’t with us anymore. So we lost a boy. The damned Africa was to blame.”

“In the prison there was a bishop from Nitra who also worked as a male nurse. He used to go to our dad, pray with him and encouraged him to hold up. ‘You have to want to return home. You have to want to live. You mustn’t give up,’ he told dad. In the evening he used to go to the cellar where sauerkraut was stored and brought dad the liquid so that he could drink it. Because my father had fever. This way our dad survived three years - on sauerkraut water and prayers.”