Information About R. Roos

Memories

Memories are based on documents, family lore or personal experiences. They give more information about a person, but are not necessarilly complete or correct.

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My mother was the second of nine children. They were not rich, but not very poor either. My mother, as the oldest daughter, always had to help a lot in the household, with the household tasks like doing the laundry, but also taking care of the younger brothers and sisters.

When she finished school, she worked as a household help with a farmer’s family in the village in Duivendrecht (Duivendrecht was really a village where you had farms at the time) and she also worked as a help in a pharmacy shop for a while .

My father lived in Amsterdam East at the time, and I believe they had all kinds of clubs and things in Watergraafsmeer, which was a relatively newer neighborhood. From Duivendrecht, that was possibly the “place to go out.” I think my parents may have met each other there.

She may have worked briefly after her marriage, but not after I was born.

When my parents got married, they first had a room in Louis Bothastraat in Amsterdam, with grandpa and grandma Smits. Just before I was born they moved to the Govert Flinckstraat, and just before Rudo was born they to the Rustenburgerstraat, possibly at number 282. Shortly after Catry was born in 1972 we moved to Bovenkarspel. I can still remember that everyone was working hard in Bovenkarspel to get the house ready. My father’s sister, Ina, was helping and said she would come and help clean, but only if my mother would get a bottle of “Andy” detergent. Which my mother promptly did, she was glad to get the help.

My parents lived for more than 30 years at Keizerskroonweg 37 in Bovenkarspel, then somewhere between 2004 and 2006 they moved a few blocks to the Gezinspaviljoen 15, and in 2016 they moved from Bovenkarspel to Gieten.