'My father was only 13 years old when he went to work on the farm'

'The photo shows my parents and three 'refugees' from Germany/Austria. My father had picked them up from the station in Delft. At the end of 1950, beginning of the 1960s, children from Germany and Austria came to the Netherlands for a six-week holiday. I think it was through the church. One of them, the girl, came to stay with us. My mother had given her the doll she was holding as a welcome gift.

Our family already consisted of six children, but according to the coordinator, children thrived best in a large family. I was eleven years old and loved playing with them. My parents didn't speak a word of German, but my sister, who was in secondary school, got out her dictionary and could translate.

My father himself came from a family of twelve children. After he had completed seven grades of primary school, he went to work for a farmer. The farmer wanted him to start at 4 in the morning, but his mother said: "He is only thirteen." The farmer agreed that he should start at 5. But the following year he had to start at 4. My father actually wanted to be a farmer, but it became a market garden.

My mother came from a family of ten children. She was a girl of fourteen when she went to work as a servant at a grocer's. She worked from 7 in the morning until 19:00 at night. On Monday mornings she helped at home with the washing, which was already hanging outside before she went to work. On Sundays she was a teacher at the Sunday school.

After her marriage she was a housewife and had three children in a short time, later she had three more. At that time she did not have access to appliances such as a washing machine and vacuum cleaner. In addition to the household, she also helped sort tomatoes in the nursery in the morning, so that everything was ready in time for the auction. She was also active in church work for years. It was a stable family that I think back on with a warm feeling.”