Vasiliki Veličková

“I had good marks at school, but I was not even sixteen years old and I had to work, because I didn’t get admitted to a higher-level school. I wanted to study a nursing school, to become a nurse. It was my dream job. Above all, I wanted to work with children. My hobby was combing and cutting hair. My parents saw that I had an inclination to this, and they wanted me study a school for hairdressers at least. I remember that my mom knelt in front of the principal, begging him at least to admit me to a hairdressers’ school. But I was so ashamed of her, I grabbed my Mom and told her: ´Mom, why are you humiliating yourself, in front of him? I am proud to be what I am, I can go to work if need be, but I will not beg anyone.´”

“In 1985 or even since the 1970s they began offering the Greeks the opportunity to return, enabling them to come back. My Dad was… But the soldiers began luring him talks about bonuses he was entitled to, and so on. Thus in 1985 our Daddy got crazy, as we say, and they left. I am sure they would have still liked it here if they had stayed.”

“Sometimes the Greeks treated the true communists badly, too. They were turncoats, as they were called. Dad always used to tell them, especially to this one man: ´You had put on woman’s clothes to avoid fighting. We had to flee and fight, and you had a good time, back then and now.´ There were disputes. I remember that there was a meeting of the Greek community in the Silesian House, and Daddy took me and Mom with him. It was nasty. The true communists were arguing with the false communists. One man wanted to beat my Dad, but he should have done it, because so many people jumped in to Dad’s help.”

“We would always go to wait for Dad. He was so happy. Every day he would have some bonbons ready for us in his pocket. When he got off, we would jump at him, and he would give us the bonbons. He was so happy when he could hold hands with both of us. He was a man who loved children. This is missing so much today. When one hears how people mistreat children… And the best thing was when we came home. We had already eaten our lunch, but we would always sit with Daddy. And we liked dinners best. We would all sit around the table, waiting for all to finish eating, and Dad would then start telling us his stories from the war. We were often crying when we were listening o him. Then, Dad told us to go to bed. We didn’t want to and begged him for one more story. This was every evening, he would always sit down with us and tell us stories. It was wonderful. Thanks to this I know his story, too.”