Eva Cigler - March 17, 1982
Beregszász
What happened when you went home?
We went home, we went back to our house and the house, every piece of furniture was out. Just the paper stayed on the ground for uh, from school. We couldn't find nothing there. And uh, the grass was so high, just like somebody is dead all around there. And I stayed uh, where my husband has uh, his place, because in his house there already the people took it over.
Mm-hm.
Uh, who was living uh, uh, in his house because they had three houses next to each other so in the first house where they lived, the Christians people who stayed there, they moved in uh, their house. So uh, he, that place I went. I never went back in that street again.
You never went back into your home again.
No. Because...
You found nothing.
Nothing. And even they was looking for gold or, or, or what. They took all the tiles uh, not tiles you know what uh, how you call it...
The wood, the planks.
The wood, yeah, the plank. And uh, they even took the woods, everything out from the house.
They were looking for things.
Yeah. And then they was digging because we see some uh, holes, deep holes in there. So I don't know if they was looking for something or every houses who was uh, like this, because I didn't met nobody at houses. So uh, that was...
Did you stay in Bereg...Beregszász with your husband?
We stayed a, a week in Beregszász. And after that uh, because he was in the Czech army, so he have to go--come back to Prague because he just took a week uh, off. Uh, and then we came back uh, to Prague. Uh, before we was coming back to Prague, the Russia already closed the border.
Oh.
And they left him to come with the regular train. But they said I have to stay there. Now we all stuck again, we start all over again and he didn't want to let me to stay there. So in a black market place there was a guy who knows the route uh, from uh, the border to come out. So at night we was coming out from the border. From, uh...
From...
I...from Hungary. But that time already the Russia took it over...
Mm-hm.
after the war. They call it Zakarpatska Ukraine in that place.
Oh.
And uh, and then we give the guy a, we didn't have too much money so I have to give him my ring...
Your ring.
my husband wedding band and he took us out from uh, Russia. And then we took that train in uh, in uh, finally we reached the border and we uh, already in the Czechoslovakia side.
Mm-hm.
And they said you'd better move away from here because the Russia going to took over this uh, part of town tomorrow. So at night you could imagine we have to move again to the other town. And finally he see--they see uh, Czech soldiers so they let us to stay in the place with uh, out paying anything.
Oh.
And the next day he said you better move. So finally we reach uh, Prague again.
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