He was just 20 and she 16 when their paths crossed in a small Eastern European town in the mid-1950s.
Mate spotted Gizela strolling along with a posse of girlfriends, and didn’t let her walk on by without making sure she was attending a dance being held that week.
Their chance meeting that day in 1954 was the beginning of a lifelong romance that was celebrated on Sunday when they marked 60 years since they wed.
After a church service at Sacred Heart in St Albans, the couple’s only child, Rose, surprised her parents with a small lunch with their closest family and friends.
Lunch wasn’t their first surprise of the day however. Rose had also arranged to have Father John O’Reilly call Mr and Mrs Pakos up to the altar that morning to have their wedding vowels renewed.
“I just wanted to make them feel special,” Rose said.
The couple moved to Australia in January, 1970, in search of a better life for their daughter. They first moved to Elsternwick, before saving enough money to buy a house in St Kilda. But when Rose moved to St Albans with her own young family, her parents followed.
