Isa Timmers-Vliegenthart *1934
I was almost 11 years old and stood for hours at the Berlage bridge, waiting for the Canadians, together with my two girl friends, nearby my house.
It buzzed from the rumors: ‘ they are already in Diemen!!’, but we saw nothing. When we heard that they would come the next day to the Dam we decided to go, secretly, because our parents forbid us.
When we arrived, we saw an excited and elated crowd, singing and dancing, the barrel organ played. We found it a bit risky to mingle into the crowd, it seems us better to stand at the pavement of the Palace, and watch behind one of the columns, it has been our rescue.
Suddenly we heard the ratel of a machine-gun, we saw people falling down, from everywhere screaming and crying, panic!! As a war child you were quite used to it, but this was scary and we didn’t understood it: ’ why was there a shooting, the war was over ?’ When the shooting stopped we ran in the direction of the Munt, never in my life I ran so fast. We stood still at the Munt, shaken and out of breath.
Going home, my parents were already informed about the drama, by a neighbor who had seen me, they were very angry at me.
Afterwards I realized that their anger was a result of the fact that I survived.
March 2017