In Belgium, I had applied for immigration to Canada. Then, when I was in Holland I received a message saying that I had to go to the Canadian Embassy in Antwerp for an interview. At the Embassy I was asked what I wanted to do in Canada, and what experience I had. At that time Canada was accepting people who had $40,000 in cash and wanted to start a business, or people who would work on farms. I had no money at that time, so I immediately became an experienced laborer willing to work on a farm!... I told them that I used to work on a farm in my country (a white lie, of course…). That led to another meeting when I was asked some technical questions related to my extensive farming experience... The man asked me how we used to feed the cows, and since we had one (only one!) cow at our property in Hranice, I had some clues about it - though I had a very restricted experience with real cattle. Another question was, how many cows can you milk in one hour? Well, that was a killer question because I had no experience with that. My answer was that it depended on the type of cows we would milk, that each cow is different from each other and it is impossible to estimate it. My answers convinced the interviewer, and I felt I was now on my way to Canada!
It all looked good, I had the assurance from the interviewer that I would get the authorization to go to Canada. As I was leaving his office, he accompanied me on my way out to the street. When the biggest coincidence in my life happened. As we were shaking hands, on the street, suddenly someone talked to us. It was Mr. Goldsmith, a person who used to be our customer in Ostrava, who bought some hunting rifles from us once in a while. He was so happy to see me and started asking questions like, “What are you doing here so far from home?” , and “Where is your family?” Then the Canadian interviewer asked Mr. Goldsmith if he knew me, to which he answered, “Of course I know him, I bought from him the best hunting rifles I ever had, and they used to fix all my shotguns when they were bad.”
Well, that was not the best thing that happened to me that day. Why right there, at that very decisive moment? I was panicking. The Canadian asked me to come back to his office so that we could talk more... So we went back to his office, and he asked for an explanation of that situation. I said that my father had a business in Ostrava, and I was working on the family’s farm. But in the Winter, there was nothing to do on the farm so I went to Ostrava to help in the store - which was the time when they were busy the most.
Later on I learned from a friend of mine who was in Canada and worked for a government office related to immigration, that they received a positive recommendation to accept me for immigration, saying that although it seemed that I was not totally truthful during my interview I was the type of person that met the requirements for immigration. Some time later I received a message saying that I could go to Canada. However, the immigration to Canada could happen only during the Spring and Summer, so that people would not arrive there during the cold months which made it much difficult to start their life - especially for those who intended to work on ... a farm!…
There were still difficulties bringing my family into Holland. They were still waiting at the border at that time. I went to the German office to obtain a visa for one day so that I could go to Germany to meet them. I called my wife and told her to come to the neutral zone that was demarcated between Holland and Germany, which belonged to both countries. She came driving her car and we finally met. There was a small restaurant in that neutral zone, where we stayed for a few hours thinking about how to resolve the problem.
From that restaurant we could see the small station where the checkpoint was between the two countries. Suddenly I noticed that the crew was leaving on their bicycles, and the other crew would take over. We jumped in the car and drove quickly to that check point as we drove back toward Holland. The officer took my passport and then I noticed that the chief of the prior crew was coming back directly to the place where we were. I was very scared at that moment, especially when I noticed him coming to talk to me. He came and asked me, “and what happened to that person who came with you to Germany, did he stay in Germany then?” I just answered yes to it, and he left. He certainly confused me with someone else, because nobody was with me at the time I got into that neutral zone. The officer who was checking documents then just gave me back my passport without even checking anything and very soon we were out of there and on our way back to Belgium - very fast, believe me...
Before I left Belgium to get my family, I was no longer living with Just. I had rented a small room where we were supposed to live temporarily after coming back from Holland. It was only a very simple place, and the only furniture I had was a small table, a bed, and a chair. I was very concerned with the whole situation, because of course my wife and the children were there illegally. But we were happy having at least a place to stay. The next day after our arrival, at 9:00 am, suddenly someone knocked on the door and to my surprise, it was the police. They started questioning me about who I was, and also wanted to know who was a certain individual that, according to them, was living there with me, the man with a beard. There was nobody living with me, I told them. Only later on I remembered that before I left for Holland I cleaned up the place I was staying at and there was a man who lived up on the hills, relatively close to my place, who like Just was also a 7th-day Adventist and had come to help me with the cleaning. I explained it all to the police, and they went to check the man out. After confirming all the details of what I told them, they just left. It was the first time I was called a spy! During war everyone becomes afraid of everyone and we, being foreigners, would bring all kinds of suspiciousness against us from people in the neighborhood - just because…
One day I was sitting on a bench in a park, reading a letter I had received from a friend, and was replying to it. A couple of days later I received a note from the police station asking me to appear at their office. When I got there one officer started to interview me saying, “Sir, you are a spy, aren’t you?” I told him right away, “you don’t believe it yourself, because if you believed it you would aollow me time enough to catch the whole team and not just me” He agreed to that and let me go. But when I was leaving I made a joke, I told him, “I must confess to you that yes, I am a spy. My task was to inform the Germans how many Belgian soldiers had a mustache and how many didn’t…” Of course he became furious and told me to disappear fast unless I wanted to be actually incarcerated. What had happened is that when I was sitting in that park there was an army division training close to the place and they thought that I was taking notes about their activities and how many they were, etc…
Well, at least now we were reunited again and had place to stay; it was a very small and modest place, but there were no Germans around to threat us. We were ready to restart our life.”
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