That’s a fascinating story. Maybe you should write a book about it.
My dad's friends used to say that to him. But his was a common story for Europeans of his generation.
He had a lot of Polish and Hungarian friends who had similar stories. As a kid, I was amazed by the fact that people could live through war and go on to lead normal lives.
To add one more funny story. One of my English uncles was one of the kids shipped out of London to live on a farm during the blitz. He hated the family that he was staying with. He said he especially hated the food. So at age five or six, he decided to walk home, following the train tracks home. He was about 100 miles from London. Somebody found him, my grandmother found out about it, and had him come home.
I talked to him recently, and he said that at his age, he was more afraid of my mother, who was about 18, than the Germans. 8-)