We got up in the morning and the leaves on the trees were burnt
Stáhnout obrázek
Her grandparents came to Mala Zubovčina near Zhytomyr during the time of Tsarist Russia, where Žeňa Gabrielová, née Čermáková, was born on 26 April 1935. Her father Jaroslav Čermák enlisted in the Red Army and was killed at Königsberg in 1935. Due to the post-war living situation in Ukraine, Žeňa had to work in the local kolkhoz at the age of 15. She took care of her sick mother Vera Čermáková and her sister, who was six years younger. She was paid only in kind. At the age of 18 she married another descendant of Czech immigrants, Alexander Gabriel. Together they had two sons. After the accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power plant on 26 April 1986, Malá Zubovčina was affected by radioactive fallout. The family stayed in the village, but they were not allowed to eat the local produce or drink the local water. In 1991, Žeňa and her family took the opportunity to move to Bohemia. They chose České Velenice as their new home, where her sons found work. The grandchildren spoke Czech at such a level that they had no language difficulties in Czech primary school. In 1996 she took her last look at her native village, which had already been devastated by the residence of prisoners. At the time of recording in 2025, Žeňa Gabrielová was living in the Home for the Elderly in České Velenice.
