Šarlota Olšáková

* 1933

  • “When I got married, my husband, as a former political prisoner, was very persecuted. You know people like that, they didn't even let priests or sisters into their jobs. He had a high school diploma and had to work as a boilerman. But it was very hard work. Not like now, he pushes a button and smokes. He had to pull coal and stuff like that. When we already had one child, we lived in one room for three years. In Komárno, they wondered why I pretended to be him when he was a political prisoner. But we loved each other. We corresponded for two years, that was good. We lived together for fifty-five years. And I've been a widow for seven years. The husband died. But in addition to being a former political prisoner, he was also the chairman of political prisoners In Poprad for many years.”

  • “At that time, after the war, those who claimed to be Hungarians had moved to Hungary. My uncle had a beautiful family house, he built it himself. He was also such a master. And he had children, and they removed them to Békescsaba. They didn't give them anything for it. And in Békescsaba they lived in a cottage where the earth was. They no longer had a house in their lives. Aunt too. I don't even know where. The father's sister, she had a son, was a widow, and they were evicted. My father, I don't know which way, because he was probably a good master and they needed a master, so we stayed in Komárno. After 1945, when it was already the Czech-Slovak Republic, who claimed to be Hungarian, they were evicted. People from Békescsaba came to the beautiful family house that my uncle had and got the house for free.”

  • “I'm like a little one, such a third - fourth of a folk school, we didn't have a school, we went to different buildings. It was a bombing, they preached that when I heard that planes were already flying, it was necessary to lie on the ground against the wall and not move. I was like eight - nine years old. We lived in a small alley in a small family house, I saw bombs fall into my street. When it was after the bombing, I went to look and the three houses opposite were bombed. A rich owner who had a mill, a shop, a beautiful house and instead just a pit. I saw that. And he lay on the ground, that is, asphalt roads, but also dusty. I got there first and he went crazy, the foam came out of his mouth. That was terrible. And the wall from the living room fell out of our house. Then we didn't have long. There was such misery. And because my father was at war, they communicated with my mother in such a way that my father wrote "give to vaccinate a dog", which meant that my mother with children had to leave Komárno, because the Russians are coming and they are so dangerous. So they agreed. Many people also took to Austria so that we would not be in Komárno.”

  • Celé nahrávky
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    Košice, 20.02.2021

    (audio)
    délka: 57:54
    nahrávka pořízena v rámci projektu Stories of the 20th century
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“Šarlota Olšáková: she experienced bombing, refugee life and as a wife of a political prisoner also injures graves of the communist regime.”

Šarlota as bridesmaid
Šarlota as bridesmaid
zdroj: Witnesses archive

Šarlota Olšáková, as a single Hallerová, was born on July 9, 1933 in Petržalka, Bratislava, where she lived with her family until she was seven years old. She had a sister two years younger and a brother five years younger. In 1939 she moved with her family to Komárno, where she survived her youth. She attended a Hungarian primary school in Komárno. From the age of twelve, she went to a Slovak burgher in Komárno for four years. Then she entered the Secondary Vocational School of Economics in Nové Zámky. After school she started working as an accountant, she was a member and official of ROH. In 1960, she married František Olšák, originally from Šaštín. After the wedding, she moved to Poprad with her husband. They had a daughter, then a son. She started working as the head of the financial accounting department at the veterinary clinic in Poprad, where she remained for another thirty years. Prior to retirement, she worked as an accountant and economist at her son‘s company. She retired after 1989. In 2014 she became a widow and in 2018 she moved to Košice.