The studies lasted three years. During that time we befriended many people, especially from the Union of Polish Patriots and one lady who had married a Russian man in Moscow. The Russian man was not very healthy and had trouble with his family. He was in the late stages of tuberculosis, which finally took his life. Before his death, probably in our second year or beginning of the third, Helena invited them to our room in the dormitory although it wasn’t large. They stayed with us for quite a time but he was mostly in bed. Then they had to go back because they couldn’t stay with us all the time.During the studies I organized an experimental field in one of the kolkhozes close to Moscow. I went back to my research, bringing samples to the lab and doing various investigations in the field and in the lab. The lab was headed by a Russian lady with whom we became very friendly. She was nice and helpful, but it was a hard time and we always had trouble with chemicals and apparatus. Somehow we managed to do the work.In the third year of studies, sometime in the early spring or autumn of 1947 or 1948, a delegation of Polish professors came to visit. I talked with them, especially with the one who headed the Institute of Plant Breeding and Seed Production. I told her that after I finished I had no intention of coming back to Poland. She said she would be waiting for me and had a position for me. I didn’t know if it was just talk or reality, but I accepted it as a good omen.We continued our studies. In 1948 suddenly Helena told me she was not feeling well and didn’t know what it was. She went to the doctor and came back very unhappy. The doctor said she had a serious heart problem and might die in three months. She decided that if she had only three months she would not finish her thesis because it would be too much effort.I had a very hard time convincing her that I didn’t believe she was that sick and that she should finish her thesis anyway. After long talks for many days she finally decided to go back to writing the thesis. I was also writing mine and helped her, being very careful that she did it well.In the meantime we applied to the embassy for entry visas to Poland, for restoring our citizenship, and for repatriation. Sometime in May we defended our theses. It was quite a difficult task, at least for me. Helena had fewer questions. We both defended successfully and were given the title that the Timiryazev Academy was giving at that time.We also got the repatriation papers and were assigned a day to leave. We didn’t get our diplomas yet but got excerpts and decided to go back to Poland with the excerpts and try to get the diplomas later.Another story developed. Sometime very shortly — three or four days — before we were leaving, Helena told me that her passport had expired and she had forgotten to extend it. It was almost time to leave. I went to the authorities in Moscow to have it extended but they decided not to extend it and took it away.I was in trouble and had to go to the Polish embassy to retrieve the passport and get it extended. It took more than two days but the embassy managed to retrieve it with an extension.Finally the day came when we had to leave. At the beginning everything went right and we took a train from Moscow to Warsaw. Of course the train had to change because the railroad gauge in Poland was European and in the Soviet Union it was wider. On the way to Poland we came to Minsk and I had to go out to buy something to eat or drink. While walking through the lines I fell and hit my nose, lips and eyes. I was in terrible shape, bleeding quite a lot. I got some help at the station but arrived in Poland in very bad shape, heavily bandaged.I didn’t mention earlier that before we left we found out Helena was pregnant. That was why she was sick, not because of heart failure.We had been married in 1939 in Poland but we didn’t believe any documents remained, so we also got a second marriage certificate in Moscow. This showed we were married in 1948 while actually we had been married in 1939.So now we were back in Poland and there would be a new chapter in our life. We didn’t know what to expect but we were glad we were out of the Soviet Union and back on old territory which was both known and unknown to us — known as it was before the war and unknown as it was after the war.For the first days we went from Warsaw to Grudziądz because we didn’t have any place in Warsaw yet and I didn’t want to start asking around while I was bandaged and wanted to rest a bit. We also informed our friends that we had returned. I had seen three of them who had come back to Poland before us. One was the lady from the Soviet Union, and another was a friend from the university in Poland who had come back from England where he served in the English army. He came back with an English wife from a grand family of dukes and princes. His former girlfriend was also back and lived in one of the apartments in Poland. She was alone at that time but had been married and had a child.We went to reach one of Helena’s aunts. At that time she was married to a former soldier who had come back from the army and settled in Grudziądz. He worked somewhere in Warsaw. He was a very pleasant and likable person. They both were likable but they had a child with Down syndrome which made life very difficult. She cared for the girl very much and the girl survived quite a long time.After a few days I ventured out to the lady who was the director of the institute I had told you about — the one who visited our department in Moscow. She immediately offered me work as an agronomist. I accepted but I had to have acceptance from the Ministry of Agriculture. I went to the ministry and talked to one of the deputy ministers. He suggested that before starting work I should change our names. So I went back to Grudziądz and we changed our names there.Then after some time I went back to Warsaw (Helena was still in Grudziądz) to ask for a place to stay. They arranged a small place for us in one of the houses in midtown on Poznańska Street. We moved to this place as long as our son wasn’t born. We started working and the place was quite satisfactory but it was too small once we had to start a family. I was promised a larger apartment later because one was being built and we had to wait until it was finished.

At the same time when Helena came back to Warsaw she met our friend from Moscow who worked in a publishing house. She arranged contact for me to translate a book of my professor from Russian to Polish and some work for Helena as an editor for the time being. So we both started working and living in this place.