FEBRUARY 1972: Wood is falling off our trailer while driving. I cross the road to pick it up and I am hit by a car in the face, miraculously bruising only my lips.

MARCH 1972: I am amazed that my new-born brother has already been to the hairdresser's.

APRIL 1972: Easter Sunday in Rio de Janeiro at a restaurant on Ipanema beach. Suddenly my father leans over me. I think he is trying to pick something up off the floor between the chairs. I look at my mother and her eyes, full of panic and pain reveal to me that something bad has happened. She helps me to lay him down on the floor. My father dies of a heart attack.

NOVEMBER 1972: After falling out with my partner I return to Switzerland. My son is born.

NOVEMBER 1972: At Cologne airport we pick up our second daughter Inka Maria. She is a six month old foundling from Ambato, Ecuador, whom we have adopted.

DECEMBER 1972: I sit under the Christmas tree and put plastic letters together to make words – proud that I can already write. My uncle looks at me and says: "You're not as stupid as you look."