About this and that from times long gone by
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There was a time when only unpacked food was sold in the shops. Behind the counter was a cupboard with lots of drawers whose signs informed about the contents: flour, sugar, semolina, lentils and so on. After being weighed in scales with pams, the food was put into paper cones which hung, in different sizes, on hooks. I remember a huge, closed glass standing on the counter, filled with big red raspberry sweeties. As they were very hard, they were a kind of long lasting lollipop in the mouth. Several years later, already during the war, we kids made our own lollipops, buying ammoniacal pills and sticking them, with spit and in the shape of a star, on the back of our hand.
The milk was bought at the dairy, where people went with milk cans.
As the milk wasn´t still treated, it clotted in a few days when put into a flat bowl. This “thick milk“ , taken with sugar and cinnemon, was quite appreciated by young and old, a predecessor of the yoghurt, which didn´t enter German kitchens before the late sixties, still sold in small, thick glasses.
Nappies and sanitary towels were still made of cloth – just imagine the time spent in cleaning them!! There were no leggings nor panties. We kids wore stockings, fastened to a kind of bodice and which very often were itching, especially the back of the knees.
Before ending my little stories, just a few words about babies, who in those times were brought by the stork, in Spain from Paris, in Germany from nowhere.As I wanted a little brother, I was told to put a piece of sugar on the sill, every evening before going to bed, as the stork was very fond of sweeties. Every morning the piece of sugar had disappeared, and after a while the stork brought the little brother – quite a good guess of my parents in times when ultrasound scanes were still far away.
By the way, the stork wasn´t always nice. When I visited my former nanny who had got a baby, and when I got shocked about her bandaged legs, I was told the stork had bitten them.
Several years later, when I was about ten, I had a discussion with my 3 years elder cousin about where the babies left the mother´s belly. One of us was convinced they came out of the breast while the other preferred the navel. There would still pass several years before we got informed.
And that´s the end of my little stories about times long gone by. I hope you enjoy reading them.
There was a time when only unpacked food was sold in the shops. Behind the counter was a cupboard with lots of drawers whose signs informed about the contents: flour, sugar, semolina, lentils and so on. After being weighed in scales with pams, the food was put into paper cones which hung, in different sizes, on hooks. I remember a huge, closed glass standing on the counter, filled with big red raspberry sweeties. As they were very hard, they were a kind of long lasting lollipop in the mouth. Several years later, already during the war, we kids made our own lollipops, buying ammoniacal pills and sticking them, with spit and in the shape of a star, on the back of our hand.
The milk was bought at the dairy, where people went with milk cans.
As the milk wasn´t still treated, it clotted in a few days when put into a flat bowl. This “thick milk“ , taken with sugar and cinnemon, was quite appreciated by young and old, a predecessor of the yoghurt, which didn´t enter German kitchens before the late sixties, still sold in small, thick glasses.
Nappies and sanitary towels were still made of cloth – just imagine the time spent in cleaning them!! There were no leggings nor panties. We kids wore stockings, fastened to a kind of bodice and which very often were itching, especially the back of the knees.
Before ending my little stories, just a few words about babies, who in those times were brought by the stork, in Spain from Paris, in Germany from nowhere.As I wanted a little brother, I was told to put a piece of sugar on the sill, every evening before going to bed, as the stork was very fond of sweeties. Every morning the piece of sugar had disappeared, and after a while the stork brought the little brother – quite a good guess of my parents in times when ultrasound scanes were still far away.
By the way, the stork wasn´t always nice. When I visited my former nanny who had got a baby, and when I got shocked about her bandaged legs, I was told the stork had bitten them.
Several years later, when I was about ten, I had a discussion with my 3 years elder cousin about where the babies left the mother´s belly. One of us was convinced they came out of the breast while the other preferred the navel. There would still pass several years before we got informed.
And that´s the end of my little stories about times long gone by. I hope you enjoy reading them.
