Memories about our Dutch Friends

History, Life in Australia, Old Age 1 Minute

I want to write about our friends Nick Tap and Nell Tap. They were both of Dutch origin. Nell died in January 2013. I have no idea what happened to Nick. He had major health problems. There were widespread family members, including three sons.

Nick and Nell were both born ln 1933. They suffered a lot under the German occupation in World War Two. The food that the Dutch people did grow ended up on German tables. For the Dutch population there was hardly anything to eat. The children suffered severe starvation.

As I said in the previous post Peter and I liked to visit the Taps. I remember how they told us about the scarcity of food. Once a German soldier very secretly had given Nick a piece of bread. This soldier could have been severely punished for this!

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Published by auntyuta

Auntie, Sister. Grandmother, Great-Grandmother, Mother and Wife of German Descent I've lived in Australia since 1959 together with my husband Peter. We have four children, eight grandchildren and two great-grandchildren. I started blogging because I wanted to publish some of my childhood memories. I am blogging now also some of my other memories. I like to publish some photos too as well as a little bit of a diary from the present time. Occasionally I publish a story with a bit of fiction in it. Peter, my husband, is publishing some of his stories under berlioz1935.wordpress.com

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5 thoughts on “Memories about our Dutch Friends”

  1. I had both Dutch and German friends when I was a student in Aix-en-Provence many years ago. Some got along well together, but I remember one young man who was traumatised at having to share a room with a German lad in the students’ hostel. My Dutch roommate told me that in desperation her mother had made soups from tulip bulbs. It was a very hard time.

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    1. In Berlin after the War, I had some very good contacts with a number of people from other countries who were glad that the war was over. We were so happy to be friends with each other. There were shortages of a lot of things after the war. It was great when we did get some food from Canada and the US.

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