Piroska Hamos on vacation

We were on a Sunday excursion, to the Ministry of Health's Holiday Camp. I am sitting on the left, in the middle are my daughter Marika and her husband Laci, and the others are my colleagues. This picture was taken in the 1950's, and this is Lake Balaton. We took a holiday in Balatonlelle. In the 1950s I hadn't been on officially organized holidays. After that I went many times, though. These were trade union workers' holidays. It wasn't free, but it was very cheap, even considering the wages back then. Everybody could apply for them, but usually there were more applicants than places. The trade union committee decided who could go. They considered work performance and social circumstances. But most people did get these holidays. I've been to almost all of the most beautiful holiday camps in the country: Galyateto, Kekes, Matrafured, Matrahaza, Sopron, Koszeg. I never applied for summer holidays, because when I was already working at the ministry, I always said that since I had no school-age children who would need to have holidays in the summertime, autumn holidays would do for me. They were always easier to get. I went a great many times. [At the beginning,] I used to go for two weeks, but after a while, two weeks were too much, and usually after ten days, I just got myself together and came home. After the war, I used to go the theatre a lot, two or three times a month, because when I was working already, there was usually a cultural organizer. The children were already bigger, so I also took them with me sometimes. We had a season ticket for the opera too; I used to go to concerts a lot. I went to all of the school concerts which were in the mornings, at the music academy, and with all three of my grandchildren, it was I who took them to concerts. Later, Marika and I had a season ticket for the music academy.

Photos from this interviewee