I found this yesterday. It brought back memories of my cousin Gustaw who died a few weeks ago in Poland.

I met him for the first time when I was eleven, in 1965, in Częstochowa, Poland. My father had taken me by car and generally the trip was quite gruelling for me, partly because everyone treated me as a child and I had been used to be treated in a more grown up way in England. The worst culprits I’m afraid were my father’s brother Waldi, and his wife Wanda. Of course they did not mean to hurt my feelings, and of course I was a child, but I was completely out of my comfort zone – first time abroad, alone with my father’s brother, in the oppressive greys of communist Poland. This was exactly twenty years after the end of the war, and the subject was still the main topic of conversation. I think, looking back, I was actually very frightened that war would break out again. 60 years later I realize that fear has never left me.

Anyway we were staying in my uncle’s flat, which was very compact to put it mildly. His wife Wanda was extremely hospitable and practical, though she bemoaned the fact that there were real food shortages because of all the pilgrimages that were arriving in Czestochowa for the feast of the Assumption. Thousands of young people with identifying kerchiefs round their necks. We watched them marching in their scout formations through the town. Shops really were empty though, and freezers were few. So Wanda had a great store of jarred and pickled and preserved foods. The one thing I particularly remember was a great big Kilmer jars of preserved lemons in a white powder. Now was that salt? I remember thinking it may have been flour -it certainly wasn’t sugar – but I really don’t know. But the worst thing was that they wouldn’t let me drink coffee instead they tried to palm me off with some sort of grain powder which may have looked like instant coffee but was no substitute for a connoisseur of Nescafé like me!

Wanda and Waldo’s daughter was also there. She’s four years older than me I think and she did her best to entertain me. We didn’t have a lot in common, but she introduced me to some of her friends and that was nice. But it was her big brother who made the best impression on me.

He was doing his national service at the time – I think he must have been nineteen, and by then I was already very susceptible to good looking males. And my goodness, was he handsome? He had come over for the afternoon, clandestinely,

to visit his parents and check out his “English” family – he wasn’t supposed to leave his barracks at the time – yet he took me for a walk around the town. I was enraptured! He was funny and interesting and madly in love with his girlfriend whom he later married. A couple of hours in his company and we kept in touch forever. Later his wife used to write to me more. They had a great hobby – making penpals around the world. It was difficult for ordinary people to travel beyond the confines of the communist bloc, but nothing stopped correspondence. Czesia and Gustaw taught themselves to read and write enough English – and possibly other languages – so they could maintain relationships around the world. No internet or anything, so they would write about Poland and send presents of folk art to their correspondents and receive all sorts of interesting things in return.

I was fascinated by this and I believe they kept it up for some years.

A few years later Gustaw came to England to stay with my father for a few weeks. I saw a lot of him then which was great and I also went to visit him and his wife and little son in Poland. That was some journey involving buses and trains and taxis which he reminded me of when I went with my son after forty odd years in 2017.

That was quite a journey too. But unfortunately that was the last time I saw him. When Andrzej and I were there he and his wife showed us a lot of family papers all meticulously filed and labelled. Quite put me to shame! They gave us a lot of photocopies which have now proved to be very useful in my quest for Polish citizenship.

Over the years we kept up an email correspondence. Not as exciting as getting a letter, looking at the stamp and then trying to read the handwriting, but welcome anyway.

But now he is gone. My oldest cousin.

But back to the edelweiss. He gave it to me after we came back from that first walk. I’d never seen one before. Or since. I couldn’t believe it was a real flower – it felt soft and furry. apparently it grows in the mountains of Poland. I believe it is a protected species now.

I remember I treasured it throughout our time in Poland and when I came back my father bought me the frame and I took it everywhere with me. I had it at school and university and in all our places after I married. And then the glass of the frame broke and so I put it away. Yesterday I found it and it brought back all these memories. RIP Gustaw.