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Yeah, I had the chance:
1) My grandfather fought with the German Army in the Luftwaffenhelfer (AA personnel of German Air Force) but he rarely talked about that.
2) Never had the chance to talk to my great-grandfathers who fought against Russians, one got captured in 1916 and made a trip all around the globe to go home, the other shot on his toe just 4 days before the war ended.
3) I met this guy in his 90s who was drafted to compulsorily work for Wehrmacht and once he was going home he almost got strafed by a Stuka and another time risked to be blown up by American bombardiers.
4)I met some Alpini (Italian Elite Mountain Troops) who fought in Russia. One of them was captured at Nikolajewka (end of January 1943) and was released in 1953. His weight was, reportedly, 39 kg.
5) I only saw Amedeo Guillet (who recently passed away, may God bless his soul) , a legendary Italian cavalry commander who fought in Eastern Africa, captured, fled, put a guerrilla campaign and then helped Allies preventing Germans from sabotaging half of Italian industries.
An anecdotal is that, when he was the Italian ambassador in India, he met an Indian diplomat, who stated that during the war he had seen an insanely brave Italian cavalry commander charging a line of tanks in order to allow the withdrawal of the most part of the army.
Amedeo Guillet came in and said:"It's a pleasure to meet you, I am that crazy man".
Xander I guess you are from the Tyrol region. Have you heard of a Herman Valentine von der Gehrm? RAI liaison officer with the Luftwaffe? Also from the Tyrol region
Xander I guess you are from the Tyrol region. Have you heard of a Herman Valentine von der Gehrm? RAI liaison officer with the Luftwaffe? Also from the Tyrol region
You guessed it right Felix.
Nope, never heard of him, sorry.
About ten years ago I met socially a former Soviet submariner. After comparing notes, we found out that we had been in the same ocean, in the same part of the world, at the same time. Had the then Cold War gone hot, we would have been trying to kill each other. After a few polite insults and barbs tossed at each other about how easy it would have been to sink the other, his sub and my destroyer, we got along fine, and enjoyed comparing notes. Russians seem to have pretty good senses of humor, just a bit strange at times. He warned me to never marry a Russian woman, for example, because they cheat and are rarely faithful. Was he kidding or not?
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Was he kidding or not? 
