These are my German Grandpa (with da big ears) and Grandma. They had a shop in the village of pilgrimage Kevelaer. Rosaries, images of the Virgin Mary and stuff like that. I never saw my Grandma, because she died rather young. I was named after my German Grandpa Christian. He died in 1954 at the age of 84.

My Dutch grandparents lived in Apeldoorn, where they had a grocery. I never saw my Granddad (I got my middle name from him): he died during World War II. My Dutch grandma died in 1958 at the age of 80.

My mother was born in 1905 in Kevelaer, Germany. She had one older brother, who died after WW I. She wanted to be a teacher, but she was not allowed to study and had to help her parents in the house and the shop. This picture was taken when I was two years old. My mother was 92 when she died on Mother's Day in 1997.

My father was born in 1908 in Apeldoorn. He had two brother and five sisters. He wanted to be a schoolteacher too, but he had to help out in the grocery after his eldest brother died. Later on he became a nurse. This picture was taken at the rear side of the hospital where he worked. The little boy is me at the age of three. My father died in 1981 at the age of 72.

How they met? Well, thanks to the pilgrimage and music! My father played in a music band that accompanied the pilgrimage to Kevelaer once a year. The pilgrimage took two days and he stayed the night at the butchers house, just oposite my mothers place. Thats how! They married in 1932 and had to wait 13 years before I came into their lives, just after World War II...

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