Our father spent most of his time in the house for the first few days due to the danger of being picked up and deported by the Russians. But then, we wanted to know whether my mother’s parents and her sister had survived. To get there, we had to travel through the city centre and areas where fighting was still taking place days after our occupation. It was a warm spring, and there were lilac bushes everywhere in Berlin. The lilac was already blooming. The sweet scent stayed with us on the way to our family with adventurous climbs across blown-up bridges but got mixed with the sweet smell of the corpses lying around everywhere and the stench of burning vehicles and houses. Grandma, grandpa and aunt had survived everything well. When they pointed out that many supplies were still stored at the West harbour, we went there. We were lucky and found what we were looking for inside the first warehouse. Everything was full of cans of so-called “iron rations” for the military – it was fatty pork. We packed as much as our backpacks could hold. Then, we took care of the grandparents and spent the night there.
On the way home, we dragged ourselves tired through the streets. In front of us walked a woman we had seen before in the neighbourhood. Despite the scarce food and regular starvation at that time, she was shapelessly fat – she was probably sick. Still, she literally threw her massive body forward with every step when it happened. The devil knows what she had eaten the day before! In any case, she had to fart very loud with every step she took, and we couldn’t help laughing out loud. That woman never looked at us again after that.