András Kun (Pater Kun)

Marianne Kiss (née Schwarzman) was born in 1935 into a Jewish family in Budapesten. His father was a shoemaker and provided for his wife and two children. From 1942 on he was taken to forced labor. After the German occupation in March 1944 the family was forced to leave their apartment as it was assigned to a German officer. First they moved to Marianne’s maternal grandparents who lived in Pest and then they moved to a yellow-star building. After the Arrow Cross takeover in October, 1944, her mother and grandfather were deported. Her mother could escape but the grandfather who had been deported to Dachau was murdered there. Marianne, her sibling, and her mother moved from the yellow-star building to a protected house in the hope of safety. However, they were raided by the Arrow Cross multiple times there as well. The family last heard about the father from Bor. He never returned. After the war Marianne studied in an art school. She failed to realize her dream to become a fashion designer, and became a graphic designer instead. In 1957 she married a former class-mate. The couple had two daughters. The interview was taken in Budapest in 2000.

Hanna Bokor (née: Szegő) was born in 1925 in Budapest into a non-religious Jewish family. She graduated in the Veres Pálné Girls’ High School in 1943. In 1944 she stayed in a yellow star house, in a protected house and then in the Városmajor Arrow Cross building and the Budapest ghetto too. She was liberated in the ghetto by Soviet troops. Hanna at this time was over 8-month-pregnant and gave birth to a healthy baby girl a few weeks later. She lost her parents and her husband in the Holocaust. After the war she studied at Pázmány Péter University where she earned her degree in law in 1949. She became a well-known professional in international law. In 1947 she remarried and another daughter was born. Hanna Bokor died in 2006. The interview was taken in 1999 in Budapest.