James Vyver

And I forget what it was, to be honest with you.

I don't think we ended up buying it.

But we went there.

It was this very sweet couple, perhaps in their 60s, something like that.

And they'd been clearing out this house.

And...

They said, oh, we keep finding these bags of money, like of $1 coins and $2 coins because mum and dad used to love playing the pokies at the Hungarian club.

Anyway, we got chatting and they were a Hungarian family too.

And they'd all be in much less amounts of money, to be fair.

We're talking about, you know, maybe 50 bucks or 100.

Yeah.

And I thought, God, isn't it funny how things work out?

And just that week I'd been reading about the story, the statement of facts and trying to get myself across it and work out what to do.

And so, you know, it's not uncommon even in Canberra.

Lots of people who have spoken to me have said, oh, yeah, my nan used to do it.

My pop used to do it.

We've had colleagues here talk to us about stashing money here, there and everywhere.

And I sort of tend to agree, really, that if you had led with Svetlana, that if you have left post-World War I or moreover post-World War II, Central, Eastern Europe, when you look at what was happening in Hungary when Irma and Gregor left in the mid-1950s, I wouldn't trust institutions.

I mean, the horrors that were part of World War II.

So no wonder they stashed money.