As the lift door opened my father rushed out and shoved two plastic ‘bags for life’ towards us – one each for my sister and me. “You must smuggle these out of here” he said, before rushing off across the lobby. Did he mean out of this hotel, or out of this unspecified eastern bloc country?

Glancing into the bag I saw bundles of crisp banknotes and quickly closed the bag again. Before I had time to ask what this meant, a dozen security men in sunglasses and suits started chasing towards us. We stepped into the lift and began an exhilarating game of hide and seek in which we hid in shower cubicles, at the back of wardrobes and under beds.

Eventually, however, it became clear that I would need to abandon the money if we were to escape across the border. Having arrived in Switzerland, I began to have suspicions about my sister. Was that a corner of a ‘bag for life’ tucked into her waistband? Had she smuggled out the money so she could keep it all for herself?