Vera Gissing - April 22, 2006
Memories
Is it a daily occurrence--something comes into your mind that...
No, definitely not a daily occurrence. Look, I mean, I had the chance, which very few people have, of keeping my parents alive through my books, right. And, and it makes me proud that I can do it, and so glad that I can bring understanding to the younger generation, you know, through the book--or through the books really. Because, because they can identify with me as the little girl I was then with my--and growing up. You know, and in the--these extreme circumstances we had to grow up.
So you were grown up at age eleven.
Hm?
You grew up at age eleven.
Really, yes.
You--oh...
To a big, to a big extent.
Do you have a kind of reaction getting on a train?
No, I do when I am in Czecho. You know, if I go to my hometown, which is outside Prague, they still use exactly the same train as when I was, you know, ten years old. And they still--you don't have a platform, you know, you're just stuck out in the middle of nowhere and you make sure that there's nothing coming either way and, you know, you run across. And that's always--I can almost smell uh, how they were and also the seats are hard as they were in 19...uh, uh, when was it, 1939?
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