How a lost watch strengthened a Yukon woman's connection to her Hungarian grandmother

The slim gold watch Petra Szekeres holds was once stashed in a rubber boot, as her grandmother — fearing looters — weathered the Hungarian Revolution of 1956.

It's one of Szekeres' connections to her grandmother, Anikó, who died when she was 10. In the decades since, it's been lost for a second time (for a much less dramatic reason, having slipped off when Szekeres was rummaging through a box) and, recently, found again, to Szekeres' delight and relief.

"It's sort of like a homage to me and my grandmother and our relationship," Szekeres told CBC News.

"It's more of a story of enduring love of people who are really close to you. It doesn't matter how long they were in your life, and then how long they're not in your life — it's just that they still feel super close and super special. For me, with this connection with my grandma, I get to do that by wearing the jewellery that was special to her."

Szekeres said that she had an extremely strong bond with her grandmother.

"She was sort of my best friend growing up," she recalled. 

"After my mom moved to Canada, I spent all of my summers in Hungary because her parents, the Hungarians were sort of like, 'OK, our grandchildren aren't going to be strangers to us,' and so they paid for my brother and I to go there."

Szekeres said she isn't entirely sure how her grandmother got the watch in the first place, but thinks it was probably gifted to her.

"It's a very fancy looking gold Omega watch," she said. "She even went to get it checked out and the jeweller was like, 'Oh my gosh, this is worth quite a bit."

Then the Hungarian Revolution hit.

The revolution, an attempt ot overthrow the Hungarian People's Republic, began in Budapest, where Anikó lived. Over 12 days, thousand of people died and hundreds of thousands more fled the country.

"My grandparents lived right down the street from Parliament," Szekeres said.

Szekeres said it was a very tense time and her grandmother was afraid that at any time looters could break into her home, so she decided to hide her valuables, which included her watch.

Decades later, the watch would be found in an unusual place.