A hundred years young
HAD Ibi Collins not fled an increasingly hostile and anti-Semitic Europe in 1939, she may not have even made it to the age of 30.
HAD Ibi Collins not fled an increasingly hostile and anti-Semitic Europe in 1939, she may not have even made it to the age of 30.
Last week, Ibi celebrated her one hundredth birthday surrounded by family and friends at a special birthday party in Sydney’s northern suburbs.
“It’s wonderful,” she told The AJN. “It’s really, really wonderful to see all these friends I didn’t see for quite a while. Some of them came from all different parts of Australia just to celebrate with me.”
Although she said it’s not easy to be a hundred – “if anybody says that it’s easy, it’s not” – Ibi said there is no secret to her longevity.
“I think there are two very important things in life,” she said.
“To love and be loved, and the other is to overcome the difficulties. Everybody has difficulties and to have the willpower to overcome and help people wherever you think that they [are in] need, that gives you a lot of satisfaction.
“That is really important, and I was really very fortunate all my life, I had people who were very nice to me, and I don’t think it’s one way traffic.”
Ibi was 25 when she came to Australia with her late husband Paul in 1939.
“We decided that with the anti-Semitism in Hungary, and by that time we knew all about what was happening in Germany, and we thought that we will be in time to bring out other people … but six years later they all were gone,” ‘she said.
“I lost 43 members of my family and I lost my father in Auschwitz. My mother and my sister were saved and so they survived. And they came out after the war, we were very lucky.”
Ibi initially worked in a glove factory while Paul worked in intelligence as a translator for the Australian Army.
After the war they established their own business, “Collins Gloves”, which became a supplier to David Jones. Ibi later designed tennis and lawn bowls attire.
After she retired she took up painting and has enjoyed it ever since, having held three solo exhibitions and also hand-painting the invitations to her 100th birthday party.
Her adoring family surrounded her in droves at the celebration. “I am very lucky to have such a very devoted family. My two granddaughters, their husbands and families, they are very good to me.”
GARETH NARUNSKY
Ibi Collins with her extended family.
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