Tag #116812 - Interview #78642 (Ferenc Leicht)

When I started to work at the Beloiannisz they started with giving me a voucher to the Balaton, to Szantod-Koroshegy [see SZOT-holiday vouchers][17]. The Beloiannisz had a summer house there. Laci was 2 and a half years old at that time, and we went together with the family for nickels. From then on we went camping. We were in Surany, we pitched a tent on the beach, and we were there for 10 days, a week, we were in Balatonoszod, where now there is a government summer resort, there was a nice camping at that time. We always went with borrowed tents, we didn’t have our own tent. We regularly took Laci along, too. At the Beloiannisz they also organized trips, the factory had a bus, which took us to a point of the a blue walk, to Paradfurdo, Kekesteto for example, we set off from there, the bus left and waited for us at another agreed point. By the time we got there we were very tired, because the trip was usually about 25 kilometers, and we were so happy to arrive that we wreathed the bus with the wild flowers which we picked on the way. And Laci always came with us there, too. [Editor’s note: The touring of the Blue Path, which runs across all Hungary was announced by the tourist section of the Budapest Lokomotiv Sports Association in 1952. This hiker path is called blue walk.] We went to many places, but on a real holiday, especially because of Gyuri and because of financial reasons, too, we only went to Noszvaj and Balatonszabadi-Sosto.

We were in Czechoslovakia, in Prague for the first time abroad in the 1970s. That was possible, because a round trip plane ticket cost 1500 forint. And with the help of the Jewish community in Prague we got a quite cheap accommodation and we ate at the Jewish community. As soon as we arrived with Vera we looked for the Jewish district where I went to the kosher canteen and told them that we had come from Budapest and that we only had a little money and we were looking for an accommodation. Then an old women volunteered and we lived at her place and ate at the kosher canteen. We were in Italy, in Venice the same way, where, because we arrived on Sunday and the synagogue was closed I went in to the Jewish museum near the synagogue where I found a young man who spoke Hebrew. I told him that we had just arrived and were looking for accommodation, and he  walked the town with us until we found a cheap place. While I paid for the accommodation the young man disappeared so I could never thank him for his help. This is why people say that Jews stick together. In my opinion not the Jews stick together, but men do. I went there, they saw that I had a problem, so they helped. That’s it. Otherwise I also did others favors, I arranged accommodation many times, or if there wasn’t room I accommodated people and they never paid me for it. We have been in Greece, too, but on an organized trip.