Contents
“The Czechs no longer fear their
own past”
says Pavel Žáček, Director of the
Institute for the Study of Totalitarian
Regimes
pages 4 – 7
Editorial
Dear Readers,
The contents of this year’s fifth issue
of Heart of Europe transcend the
Czech Republic. It is as though we
were ascending higher and higher
above the little world of Prague and
seeing into the distance, shedding our
petty manifestations of pseudo-pride
and self-centred concern. The authors
of the articles in this issue are all
related, perhaps even share the same
blood type, and I am very pleased to
be able to say that most of them are
my friends. Two in particular I would
like to point out, Luboš Palata and
Petra Procházková. Both are journalists, both have the capacity to view
the Czech scene from the field of
vision of international observers, and
both have firm, settled views on security guarantees for this country. They
share a professional interest in the
Caucasus and have an expert knowledge of the region, something reflected quite clearly in the interview with
Petra. In recent weeks both have written a great deal about the conflict
between Georgia and Russia. Neither
of them has the slightest doubt that
the idea of shared blame – that is, that
Moscow and Tbilisi are equally responsible for the current situation –
is an artificially created myth. So far
Putin, Medvedev and Lukin are winning the information war, based on the
great lie of a “treacherous Georgia
that did not hesitate to shell a quiet
town in its sleep, murdering 2,000 civilians and committing genocide against
the Ossetian people”. But these two
Czech journalists call a spade a spade:
they speak openly of Russian aggression and do not allow themselves to be
misled by the kinds of efforts to salve
one’s conscience that are increasingly evident in the corridors of power
in Brussels.
Both are quite capable of referring
to Russia’s imperial character, both
speak the same language as Czech
Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg:
the aggression of the Russian Federation against the sovereign Georgia
Republic is unacceptable and a violation of international law. All three
of them taken together, so to speak,
serve as a strong trio helping to shape
public opinion. Thanks to Palata’s and
Procházková’s dispatches and commentaries, the Caucasian conflicts are
coming to be regarded as events with
a direct effect on the heart of Europe.
In themselves they explain why we are
in such great need of the radar station
at Brdy, the subject of Luboš Palata’s
contribution in this issue.
A Radar and 250 Yanks
– the American military base at Brdy:
a historic step, and not only for the Czechs
pages 8 – 11
Czech Footprints in Space
– astronauts of Czech origin coming
here in search of their roots
pages 12 – 15
Temelín
– a symbol in Europe for the debate over
nuclear energy
pages 16 – 19
Gallery
– the Roma in Czech photography
pages 20 – 21
Olga Sommerová’s Seven Lights
– On Yom Ha’Shoa day, Jews light seven
candles in memory of the victims of the
Second World War.
pages 22 – 25
I’m Vasyl, a Czech Worker
– as many as 150,000 Ukrainians
working in the Czech Republic,
two-thirds of them illegally
pages 26 – 29
“I enjoy great dramas,”
– says the war correspondent
Petra Procházková.
pages 30 – 33
Mosaic
– interesting people and events
in summer 2008
pages 34 – 35
“So bark! You’re a dog!” or,
A Reporter in Female Dress
– a portrait of Olga Fastrová, the first
Czech female journalist
pages 36 – 38
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a picture of life in the Czech Republic. The views expressed
in the articles are those of their authors and do not necessarily
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Editor-in-chief: Pavel Šmíd, Art editor: Karel Nedvěd
Chairman of the Editorial Board: Zuzana Opletalová, Director
of the Press Section of the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs
and spokesman for the Minister of Foreign Affairs
Members of the Editorial Board: Libuše Bautzová, Pavel
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Senator
3
Mirek Topolánek on a visit to the newly established
Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes
“The Czechs no
longer fear their
own past”
says Pavel Žáček, Director of the Institute
for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes
The Czech Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes was created after a long
and stormy public and political debate. With
a mandate for research, publishing and education in the spirit of a professional reckoning
with the totalitarian past, the institution was
finally established by a special law in 2007.
Also falling under the institute is the Security
Services Archives, which placed the archives
of the Communist secret police (the StB) under
one roof. We asked Pavel Žáček, the man who
created the archives from the ground up and
became its Director on 1 January 2008, about
the reasons for founding it.
You’ve said that for the purposes of your
institute, it would be ideal to work with
agents and members of the Communist
secret police, Czechoslovak Communist
Party functionaries and others.
Yes. I wanted to call for this at a press conference on the day the Institute for the Study
of Totalitarian Regimes was founded, as part
of an appeal for reconciliation. As often happens, however, under the pressure of the day
and the flood of questions the idea got lost.
Not only that, I was misunderstood in the first
4
place, because the reporters were more interested in asking whether my intention was to remove 10,000 police officers from service by fulfilling the “lustration” law to the letter. I had
to explain that this is nonsense. The institute
isn’t a stick with which to beat one’s political
opponents or an instrument for wreaking vengeance upon the people of the past regime.
That is, provided you don’t regard the truth,
or rather its objective interpretation, which
lies in the archives, as revenge.
What we want is an impartial, objective
evaluation of the former regime. In the archives
we’ll find massive evidence of the web of power
that knit the regime together. But we lack information about what went on outside this –
behind-the-scenes – how agents informed on
one another, and so on. These things can be
filled out with personal testimony. I’ve interviewed nearly one hundred members of the
state security forces. They spoke about their
relationships, their Soviet advisors, but almost
never about themselves. At the moment we also
have political prisoners among us; their generation is fading away and we need them to tell
us what it was like so we can fill in the blank
areas, for example the period when the Communist regime was just being established.
State Security photos of “targets of interest”, shot with a hidden camera
Legacy
Those who do not know their
own past are condemned to repeat it.
George Santayana
(1863-1952)
Philosopher and author
from the book The Life of Reason
Motto of the Institute for the Study
of Totalitarian Regimes
mer employees can put it all
together. It often happens that
we’re looking for a key file and
it’s not there. Sometimes you
find it later, somewhere else,
completely by chance. So we’re
putting a lot of effort into a plan
for digitalizing the archives.
This will make clear the contents of each file. After digitalization we won’t be dependent
any more on organization according to title, a system that’s
a legacy of State Security. It’ll
be possible to search in the archives according to key words.
You’ve said that studying the
archives would bring to light
new national heroes. Have
you found your own personal
hero there?
More than heroes, I’m interested in the people with power.
Who they were, and why and
how they sold themselves out.
We’re preparing a conference to
take place in April of next year,
under the auspices of the Czech
Prime Minister. Its topic will
be resistance to the Communist
regime (even armed resistance).
We’re inviting colleagues from
Poland, from the Baltic states.
In those countries they don’t argue about
whether people who defended themselves by
armed force (like the Czech Mašín brothers)
were opponents of the regime or simply murderers. Not only partisan groups, but literally whole villages resisted totalitarian power.
We have a lot of heroes in the archives. Just
like there are anti-heroes, or those who were
heroes for a while and then weren’t. We must
inform the Czech public about many issues
and many stories. Comparing these stories
will lead to some interesting conclusions.
Your archives contain some ten million
pages of various documents. How many of
them have still never been examined?
It’s a giant puzzle. Conspiracy penetrated
their documents system, too. Only their for-
After the fall of the Communist regime in Czechoslovakia, “lustration” laws were
adopted. They forbade members
of the former ruling elite and
armed forces from holding
selected positions in the public
sphere, in the civil service and
in the armed forces. The key to
determining someone’s ties to
the former regime is the information found in the State Security’s documents, now administered by the Security Services
Archives.
You’ve said that the Communist ideology could be overcome by publishing the maximum information possible
on what things looked like in practice. Is
that the real purpose of your archives?
We should make maximum use of the Western experience with democracy. And this is
difficult, because such experience has to be
personal. It could be done through young
people, who bring this experience back with
them from abroad. Just like I came back in
1996 from a year’s stay in the USA, and couldn’t
explain to Czech society that what I’d learned
I wanted to apply for everyone’s benefit. For
me it was like skipping five grades at school,
and I wanted to pass my experience along.
We lack the experience to reach the degree
of democracy that our society had before
1938. We’ll get it either by dealing with our
5
Pavel Žáček (left) with Prime Ministr Mirek Topolánek, in front of a panel for an exhibition entitled “Lest it happen again”,
dedicated to the history of K 231, a citizens’ organization that the Communists broke up after 1968
own stupidity, with the remnants of totalitarian thinking, over the long term, or by what we
absorb from foreigners who live here and
from those who come from abroad to pass
along their democratic know-how.
What kind of ties does your institute have
to similar institutions in other countries?
We communicate from Germany to Romania; people from the Baltic region came to
Journalist and historian Pavel Žáček (born 1969) heads
the Institute for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes, which
also oversees the Security Services Archives. He is a leading
figure in that part of Czech society that is attempting to come
to terms with the Communist past and provide an objective
interpretation of the archives left behind by the former state.
Previously he was Editor-in-chief of Studentské listy (a
student publication), head of documentation and Deputy
Director of the Institute for the Documentation and
Investigation of the Crimes of Communism and a member of
the Czech Television Council. He helped to found the
Slovak Institute of National Memory. He studied in the USA
under a Fulbright scholarship. He has published widely on
the topic of the secret police services in Czechoslovakia.
State Security photos of “targets of interest”,
shot with a hidden camera
visit us recently in person. We’ll launch our
agreement-based cooperation in September
with the international conference I mentioned
earlier; in November we’ll be putting on a big
international seminar on the KGB.
As part of the Czech Presidency of the
European Union we want to foster interest
in this topic from a position of leadership.
During this period we’d like our politicians
to declare their support for an international
institution that would map the functioning
of totalitarian regimes from Portugal to
Greece and the Baltic countries. These
activities could be accompanied by the
founding of a European museum of totalitarianism, a grant programme and other
such initiatives.
6
The post-Communist countries have a hard
time convincing their western neighbors of the
fact that Communism was the same as Nazism. This voice is strongest in Poland and
the Baltic countries, where the majority of the
victims of totalitarianism were victims of the
Communists. Europe simply must recognize
the residue of totalitarian thought and its unresolved issues. France is only now discovering the Vichy regime and its share in the Holocaust; likewise in Italy, Portugal and Spain.
For me personally Romania was a pleasant
surprise. There they experienced a very brutal
model of Communism. Whole villages fell victim to persecution; hundreds of liquidation
camps were in operation. Today they have an
office for the documentation and investigation
of the crimes of Communism and a well-functioning system of lustration. And above all the
Sighet Memorial, commemorating the victims
of Communism, for which funding was
obtained from the European Union but also
from Romania. It was donated by the descendants of political prisoners, among others,
who are today business people. When I made
a short report in Romania about the situation
in the Czech Republic, it was met with enthusiastic applause. Not only the Romanians but
all of the post-Communist countries need to
feel they are supported by the others.
Couldn’t the ties between similar offices
and institutions in Europe guarantee their
stability? Your institution is in danger; if
Obviously you know who he was – a prewar Secretary of the Red Trade Unions! Yes,
we’re trying to have the street name changed.
Generally, though, it’s a matter of changing the approach. Young people are coming
on who have a new perspective; we’re carrying out exchanges with Germany, Poland and
the USA. We’re preparing fruitful cooperation with the Baltic countries, a conference in
Washington, and many other things.
The institute needs to put down roots and
justify its role. Political prisoners, most of
whom are old now, no longer expect much
from the state. The work of the institute is a
Pavel Žáček participating in a ceremony of
remembrance held in Prague-Ďáblice for the victims
of the Communist regime
examine what the FBI or CIA did during a
particular time period, for example. They
aren’t afraid to look into the dark closets of
the democratic system. They open up problematic periods, “air out the laundry” in
front of the whole nation, and go on from
there. And we have a problem with “sensitive
information” twenty years after the fall of
totalitarianism? Why, when we could have
“aired out the laundry” ten years ago?
Democracy needs this.
One more thing. Your offices are on
Havelka Street. Who was Havelka?
great satisfaction for them. Our role is
democratization of the milieu, and this is
reflected positively in society. People are less
fearful of the past. I’m not talking just about
political prisoners, who are more willing to
speak about what happened to them. Even
Communists, whether they want to or not, are
starting to come to terms with the past.
Thank you for your time.
The editors
Photos: Jiří Reichl, archives of the Institute
for the Study of Totalitarian Regimes,
the editors
the opposition wins the elections there will
be pressure to close it.
One direction that such pressure can come
from is political. Slovakia is an example.
After the death of Ján Lángoš (founder of the
Institute of National Memory) voices were
raising calling for the files to be handed over
to the National Security Office. And this is an
institution for keeping things secret, not for
releasing them.
Our field of interest and action ends with
1990. Whatever legacy from Communism has
been brought into the new era by the new
authorities, that is up to them. But we should
take an example from the United States,
where after a certain period it is possible to
Pavel Žáček speaking at the grave of Milada Horáková, a victim of the Communist show trials in 1950
7
A Radar and 250 Yanks
The American Army Base in Brdy – A Historic
Step, and Not Only for the Czechs
In the deep forest around Brdy one border with Germany before World
The reason for having an American
won’t even notice it. The abandoned mi- War II by the Czechoslovak Army, army base in Brdy, in the hilly uplands
litary base will become host to a little then one of the best on the continent.
south of Prague, is an anti-missile devillage, with a population
fence radar station that will
limited to two hundred and
guard the security of the
fifty. The small installation
United States and a large
to be built here will be the
part of Europe. Thanks to
most important, and acthe radar, the Czech Recording to some commenpublic has become an imtators the most courageportant player in internaous, act by Czech polititional diplomacy.
cians in their effort to
assure the security of the
or every journalist
Czech Republic. Its signiinterested in the Czech
ficance is comparable to
Republic, the signing on
the creation of the Little En8 July of the first and
tente, the alliances formed
most important of two
with France and Soviet
Czech-American treaties
Russia between the wars
has made the radar station
and the building of the line
Czech Minister of Defence Vlasta Parkanová in negotiations with General Henry
in Brdy a topic every bit as
of fortifications along the
Obering, Director of the Missile Defence Agency
F
8
View of the radar station on Kwajalein Atoll, which is the same as the one planned for the Czech Republic. It was also visited by Czech scientists,
who studied the possible effect of the facility on the human organism.
The armed forces
Radar antenna array, earmarked for Brdy
For Us a Fortress – for the Enemy a Barrier
(Motto from Czechoslovak
army standard, 1929)
absorbing as Czech beer,
Prague Castle, Václav Havel and Prague taxi drivers. During the past year
not a week has gone by
without the telephone ringing in the office of the Prague daily Lidové noviny,
with some Belgian, Australian or Portuguese reporter
at the other end of the line
desperately trying to find someone to
talk to on the subject of radar.
Czech diplomats have increasingly
found themselves at the centre of
world politics, of sudden interest to
Berlin, Paris and London as well as to
Russia and China. And of course, first
and foremost, to the United States.
Extraordinary times require extraordinary people, and I dare say that at this
historical moment Czech diplomacy
has them. Minister of Foreign Affairs
Karel Schwarzenberg, Deputy Prime
Minister Alexander Vondra and the
main Czech negotiator, Tomáš Pojar,
as well as Czech Ambassador to the
USA Petr Kolář are the finest to come
out of Czech diplomacy since 1990.
At a time when the path to money
and success is found elsewhere than
Minister of Defence Vlasta Parkanová in the operations
centre of the GMD anti-missile defence system site
at Fort Greely, Alaska
in government, it is a minor miracle
that these people have remained in the
public service.
To be Important.
For the Americans
The fundamental thing about the
“American radar” in Brdy is of course
the privileged position that participation in this, the most important defence project of the beginning of the
twenty-first century, will bring to the
Czech Republic’s relationship with
the United States. Until now these relations have suffered from the natural
asymmetry between a superpower and
a small or perhaps mediumsized country; moreover,
they are far apart geographically. The Unites States
has of course been a prime
ally for every Czech government, but the Czech Republic was just one of
many countries in the North
Atlantic Treaty Organization
and the European Union;
naturally it was less important than
other important allies such as Great
Britain, Germany or even Poland.
Even in the context of Central Europe, the Czechs were overshadowed
not only by Poland, which sent the
third largest military contingent to
Iraq, but even by Hungary, which
attracted Washington’s attention in
the 1990s by allowing a temporary
American military base in Taszár.
Under the Social Democratic governments in 1998-2006 the Czechs
showed themselves to be hesitant
allies: though not openly criticizing
American policy (for example when
the Americans bombed Yugoslavia),
they offered little support. Czech assistance in Iraq was negligible, in
Afghanistan somewhat greater, but
9
The American radar station on Kwajalein Atoll was judged to have no negative effects on health
by a group of Czech experts
still by no means impressive. Even
when it comes to its own army, the
Czech Republic has behaved like a
“typical Western European country”;
that is, it did not and still does not fulfil its NATO commitment, spending
less than two percent of its gross
national product on the military budget of its small and obsolete army.
In the area of defence, the agreement
concerning the American radar in
Brdy is a small repayment of the
Czech “debt”.
T
he Czech Republic has not become a key country for American investment. Moreover, the era at the beginning of the 1990s, when Prague was
a second Paris for tens of thousands
of young, creative Americans, quickly
ended, producing no new Hemingway.
In other words, without the radar
there would be no reason for any “special relationship” between the Czech
Republic and the USA.
The role of the USA
in Czech history
In the modern Czech historical tradition, on the other hand, the role of
the United States in Central Europe
has been of crucial importance for the
very existence of the Czech state. It
was American President Woodrow
Wilson who, with his peace conditions
of 1918, foreshadowed the creation
of Czechoslovakia. The Pittsburgh
Agreement, the first and foundational
agreement between Czechs and Slovaks for the founding of an independent state, was signed in the
United States and negotiated by Czech
and Slovak immigrants in America
together with the future first Czechoslovak President, T. G. Masaryk.
And in fact Masaryk’s wife Charlotte
Garrigue was American, which also
had an influence on the course of
development.
After the First World War the United
States withdrew from the European
scene, sinking back into neutrality.
This proved catastrophic, for Czechoslovakia and for others. But it was
again the United States that helped to
determine the outcome of the Second
World War, at the very end actually
liberating western Bohemia. American
soldiers (honouring an agreement
made with the Soviets at Yalta) did not
10
Demonstration against the construction of the radar base in Brdy organized by the “No to bases!”
initiative in Prague’s Wenceslas Square
the anti-missile defence system. This
is why the Czechs did not “haggle”
like the Poles over their role in the
anti-missile defence system. “There’re
no trade-offs when in come to security,” was the motto of the Czech government and its negotiators.
For Topolánek and the majority of
the centre-right government, the radar
and the American military presence
in the Czech Republic are the most
reliable guarantee of security and
democracy. This does not imply a lack
of faith in NATO or scepticism toward
the European Union, but is rather a
reflection of the historical experience
of a country located between Germany and Russia.
At an event entitled “The Letna Plain without
Communists”, representatives of the PRO initiative
collect signatures for a petition in support
of the construction of the American radar base
in the Czech Republic.
the Marshall Plan, only to withdraw
under pressure from Moscow. Then
came the Communist putsch in 1948
and forty years of totalitarianism.
When meeting with Secretary of
State Condoleeza Rice at the Kramář
Villa in Prague, Czech Prime Minister
Mirek Topolánek, Chairman of the
centre-right Civic Democratic Party,
compared the American radar in Brdy
to the Marshall Plan. “We made a mistake then that we can’t afford to repeat,” said Topolánek.
In Topolánek’s view it would be a
mistake not to accept the American
offer, to turn down the base in the
Czech Republic and not take part in
go on to liberate Prague – which many
Czechs to this day regard as the crucial
moment that cast Czechoslovakia into
the clutches of Moscow.
On the other hand, the presence of
the American army after the Second
World War did give Czechoslovakia
the chance to take a democratic and
pro-Western path. Free and democratic elections were held in 1946;
moreover, Czechoslovakia was the
only Central European country from
which the Soviet army had to pull
out soon after the end of the war.
However, it was the Communists that
emerged from the 1946 elections as
the strongest party, and so the country
gradually slipped into the Soviet orbit.
Another key moment was in 1947,
when the government at first agreed to
accept American economic aid under
Unfinished business
While the Czech Republic is measuring up from the standpoint of foreign
policy, in domestic politics the situation is much worse. The government
has failed to respond to the demagogic
attacks of the radar’s opponents, who
are recruited from pacifist-Communist
groups; nor has it convinced the public. This is nothing unusual; foreign
military bases are never popular in
times of peace. A bigger problem is
that no agreement has been reached
on the domestic political scene among
the democratic, non-totalitarian parties. The Social Democrats, led by
former Prime Minister Jiří Paroubek,
are siding with the Communists on
the radar issue, and so Topolánek is
having a hard time finding the votes
needed for the radar in Parliament.
The radar in Brdy and two hundred
and fifty US soldiers at a small base
in the woods offer a historic opportunity, the death knell for a vanished
Communism.
The radar is part of the most advanced system in the world against
weapons of mass destruction and
rogue states with rockets, so it is more
than just an ordinary military base.
This makes it doubly gratifying.
The Poles like to joke that the Czechs
fight only “after the war is over”.
For the Czechs, this is a chance to
stand up: without exaggeration, it is
one of the most courageous acts in
Czech history.
Luboš Palata
reporter for Lidové noviny, Czech and Slovak
correspondent for the Polish daily
Gazeta Wyborcza
Photos: Michal Zdobinský, ČTK
From a protest meeting against locating the American radar base in the Czech Republic that was held in Ostrava
11
Czech Footprints
in Space
Eugene Cernan, the last man
to set foot on the Moon, came
to Czechoslovakia in October
1974 on a journalist’s visa. Officials were afraid to meet with
him: the country was undergoing “normalization” at the time,
crushed under the ideological
boot of the Soviet Union. And
even though Cernan flew in
from Moscow, where he was
negotiating the joint flight of
Soyuz and Apollo to take place
the following year, he received
no greetings.
Astronauts with Czech roots
Cernan came here in search of his family history. His grandfather Ondřej
Čerňan, who changed his name in America
to Andrew Cernan, moved to the USA in
1900 from the Slovak village of Vysoká
12
Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek
with the American astronaut Eugene Cernan (left)
at the press conference they held on 19 June
after their meeting in Prague. Beside Cernan,
his grand-daughter Ashley.
nad Kysucou; his grandmother was from
Tábor, in southern Bohemia.
In Vysoká, Cernan set out
with an interpreter for the local
town hall, and went to the
office of the local agricultural
cooperative. He wandered the
corridors, asking where his
grandfather had lived. Neither
the Chairman of the local National Committee nor the Chairman of the farm coop would
even agree to talk to him.
In Prague the situation was
the same. Embassy personnel
telephoned anyone and everyone that an American astronaut
had brought a precious gift –
a Czechoslovak flag that had been to the
Moon. All the astronaut wanted was someone to give it to. President Ludvík Svoboda didn’t want it, or didn’t dare to meet
with him. Chairman of the Czech Academy of Sciences Jaroslav Kožešník pled
lack of time. Finally the flag was accepted
Eugene Cernan, “the last man on the Moon”, came to the Czech Republic in June 2008 on the invitation of the General Director of the National Museum,
Michal Lukeš (right). Cernan is presenting the National Museum with a photograph taken on the Moon.
The historic dome of the observatory of the Astronomical Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences at Ondřejov plays
an important role in Czech participation in projects of the European Space Agency (ESA).
Science
We can observe dozens of
satellites in the sky, especially
right after the winter solstice,
when the sun drops low in the
sky. Some shine like stars, others
are barely visible.
www.vesmir.info
by the Director of the Astronomical Institute of the Academy of Sciences, Luboš Perek, who placed it in the most
dignified place he could find
– the dome of the two-metre
telescope at the observatory
in Ondřejov. “But after Perek
left the new Director told me to
put the flag away, because we
didn’t have a corresponding
article from the other side, from the Soviets,” recalls the astrophysicist Jiří Grygar.
The previously announced press conference with the American astronaut had to be
cancelled. Only three reporters who were
deeply interested in space flight went to
lunch with him – and were severely reprimanded by their Communist bosses later.
Twenty years later, in October 1994,
Cernan turned up again. People who go into
space are tough; they do not give way easily to emotion. But when he visited southern
Bohemia it was clear that he was moved.
No wonder: in Bernartice and Nuzice in the
Tábor region the local inhabitants showed
him the houses where his grandparents
Václav Cihlář and Rosalie Peterková had
been born. He went to the church in Ber-
The largest telescope in the Czech Republic,
with a mirror objective two metres in diameter,
situated at the Astronomical Institute of the Czech
Academy of Sciences at Ondřejov
nartice where the two had been wed; there
he knelt, and quietly prayed. At the Třeboň
district archives they presented him with
copies of the records of his ancestors back
to the mid-nineteenth century.
The astronaut spent his last evening at
the Astronomical Institute in Ondřejov. It was
only then that he learned what kind of troubles
had been caused by his Moon flag. He spoke
about the story behind it: “Each of us could
take a few small things with us in a little case.
I had the flags of several countries, Czechoslovakia included. I’d bought them in a store.
I knew my ancestors were from there.”
James Lovell, the commander
of Apollo 13, the ship that was
crippled by an explosion on the
way to the Moon but made it
back, also has Czech roots. At
the end of the nineteenth century poverty drove Anna and
Jan Mašek from Dolní Lukavice south of Plzeň across
the ocean. The Mašeks had six
children, and their daughter
Blanka-Blanche married an American named Lovell – who had a son named James.
The two visit the Czech Republic as
often as they can. Cernan was here for the
sixth time in 2008; Lovell has visited
twice, on the first occasion – in 1992,
when he visited his uncle, Dr. František
Mašek in Plzeň – in secret.
The Czech Republic joins ESA
On Tuesday, 8 July 2008 the Czech Republic joined the European Space Agency.
The agreement was signed by the agency’s
Director, General Jean-Jacques Dordain,
and Czech Prime Minister Mirek Topolánek, making the country a full and equal
member of the prestigious space agency.
13
Eugene Cernan (left) and Luboš Perek, former Director of the Astronomical Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences,
thanks to whom a Czechoslovak flag that had been to the moon (foreground) was placed on display in Czechoslovakia,
despite the wishes of the Communist regime.
James Lovell, American astronaut and head
of the legendary Apolla 13 mission, flew in an L-39
Albatros light training jet aircraft when visiting
the 34th Military Training Air Base in Pardubice.
After the flight he accepted a pilot first class
commemorative badge.
Under the Communist regime, cooperation
between Czech scientists and the West was
very limited. When the Soviets and Americans began to send up probes and satellites,
they acquired much valuable information
that could not be obtained by earthbound
observatories. At that time Czechoslovak
astronomers, geophysicists and other specialists were in danger of falling behind the
rest of the world. In the mid-1960s Soviet
experts realized that there was great unused
scientific potential in the countries of their
bloc. Thus the Intercosmos programme was
begun, with the Kremlin’s blessing.
Czech and Slovak specialists eagerly
took up the offer – it was the only way for
them to get into space. Astronomers and
geophysicists began to design instruments
for the Intercosmos satellite and other
interplanetary probes. As time went by
they were joined by medical laboratories,
communications experts and others who
began to learn how to make use of spacebased Earth research for economic purposes. A team from the Institute of Atmospheric Physics of the Academy of Sciences built the Magion series of all-Czech
satellites, which were very successful.
Many experts were sidelined by so-called
“normalization” after the 1968 invasion.
They were only allowed back just before
Czech cosmonaut Vladimír Remek went
into space, after being approved by the KGB.
Although the majority of Soviet scientists
were happy to work with them, some saw the
Czech and Slovak scientists as unwelcome
competition. Bureaucratic barriers were also
used to effectively limit cooperation.
When the Soviet empire and finally the
USSR itself disintegrated, the Intercosmos
programme collapsed as well. Neverthe-
14
less some projects with Russia continued,
for example micro-accelerometers – instruments for measuring non-gravitational
forces in space – continued until 2003.
The end of the Communist regime allowed
Czech scientists to seek cooperation with
the West, especially with NASA in America
and the European Space Agency as well as
with a number of universities.
ESA, like the aeronautics industry and
the atomic research going on with CERN
in Geneva, became the driving force behind a rise in scientific and industrial standards. Czech scientists were well aware
of this. At their urging, the Ministry of
Education made an official request for
cooperation with ESA in 1996 and signed
an agreement. Cooperation with Western
institutes is conducted according to rules
and regulations that Czech institutes and
firms had to conform to, and this was
sometimes difficult to achieve. Therefore,
in 2003 the Ministry of Education set up
the Czech Space Office as a non-profit
association to coordinate and expand cooperation with ESA, organize training
courses and promote student participation.
Later ESA created a special program
for countries that are not members but
wish to work with the agency, as a precursor to full membership. The Czech
Republic joined four years ago.
Since that time Czech institutes and
companies have implemented 27 projects
teorite craters on the Earth’s surface and the
development of methods for monitoring
biological experiments in space. Long-distance transmission research focuses on the
enhancement of information from images
and radar tracking of the Earth. Industry is
developing new approaches to the construction of space-based X-ray telescopes
and computer programmes for more reliable satellite navigation. The Aeronautical
Research and Testing Institute in PragueLetňany has won an important contract to
manufacture components for the SWARM
satellite, to be launched in 2010.
Going for Galileo
Investment in the field of space rocketry
has provided very quick returns. Even the
immediate benefit has been outstanding.
For example, in 2005 overall volume in
space applications was 180 billion dollars.
The largest profits were made by operators
of communications and navigation satellites. Ever greater possibilities are opening
for the use of information from pictures
taken of the Earth’s surface. Computer
firms are developing new methods of processing satellite data. Today the Czech
Republic is one of the countries competing
to become the headquarters of the European satellite navigation system Galileo. If
successful, the building of the headquarters
would mean a major injection into infrastructure and an important opportunity for
a number of domestic firms developing
software and communications technology.
Participation by the Czech Republic in
ESA brings new jobs for highly-qualified
specialists. It improves the quality not only
of Czech research and industry but also
of our lives.
Karel Pacner
Photos: ČTK, www.vlada.cz,
www.radaryrakety.cz
with a total value of 8.5 million euros. Last
year 19 projects amounting to 2.6 million
euros were funded; this year the figures
have risen to 25 projects and 3.5 million
euros. These include instruments for satellites, computer software, participation
in astronomical, ionospheric and magnetospheric research and the use of satellites
for everyday purposes, especially longdistance information transmission.
Czech institutions have taken part in
ESA projects in four areas: research, Earth
observation, communications and navigation, and industry.
Czech research institutes are working
on the study of space in the near-Earth
environment, the search for hidden me-
During his visit to the Czech Republic in June 2008, Eugene Cernan, the last man to have stood on the Moon,
met with ex-President Václav Havel. In the centre Cernan’s grand-daughter Ashley.
15
Temelín
A Symbol of the Dispute over
Nuclear Energy
In April 1986 the world learned
that a catastrophe had taken place at
a nuclear power plant in Chernobyl,
Ukraine, which killed 31 persons and injured 140. One
hundred thousand people
had to be evacuated. Despite
the scale of the disaster,
the Communist regime in
what was then the Soviet
Union hid it from the world
as long as possible and downplayed its consequences.
The tragedy at Chernobyl
was more than just a demonstration of the low value
a totalitarian state placed
on the lives of its people.
What happened at the power plant in Chernobyl shook people’s
faith in nuclear power for a long time
to come. Most European countries
abandoned the use of nuclear reactors to generate electricity or froze
16
plans for its expansion. Paradoxically,
Communist Czechoslovakia, a part of
the Soviet bloc, began to build a new
tention between the Czech Republic
and neighbouring Austria. But it is
also the acid test for a possible renaissance of nuclear energy,
once so hard hit by the
Chernobyl disaster. Temelín
remains the only nuclear
reactor in Europe built during an era when nuclear
energy underwent a general
decline from its former days
of glory. The dispute over
the Temelín power plant has
become a symbol of the dispute over whether the peaceful use of “atomic” energy
should be given a chance to
regain its lost position.
nuclear power plant that same year.
In the south of the country near the
village of Temelín a nuclear power
plant began to rise that in the fullness
of time became the focus of con-
The building of Temelín
In 1986, when the Communist
government of then-Czechoslovakia
decided to build a nuclear power
Energy
In the Czech Republic there is universal consensus that within the next
ten years the country will go from
being an exporter of energy to being
an importer. The question is where
we will import this electricity from.
František Janouch
(born 1931)
nuclear physicist, author
since the 1960s a firm proponent
of nuclear energy
plant of the Soviet type
on a hilltop near Temelín, with four reactors
and an output of 4000
megawatts, it had a much
easier position than governments in any democratic system. If anyone
from the area had wished to complain about the
power plant, their opposition would have been in vain. Several villages had to be evacuated to
make way for Temelín and dozens of
people lost their homes. But by the
time the cooling towers were visible
from afar, the Soviet Union was experiencing perestroika, and soon the
Communist regimes in the former
Soviet satellites, Czechoslovakia included, collapsed one by one. After
the fall of socialism in Czechoslovakia in 1989, the entire society then
began, in a democratic way, to come
to some decisions on what to do with
the half-completed project. Civic associations as well as many residents
of southern Bohemia began to protest
against the plant, at that time still a
giant construction site. “In the first
unofficial referendum in 1991, some
80 percent of political leaders in the
vicinity of the unfinished power plant
were in favour of halting construction,” says Monika Wittingerová of
Mothers of South Bohemia, one of
Temelín’s main opponents. One year
later Czechoslovakia split into two
independent countries, the Czech Republic and Slovakia, and the Temelín
electric power plant became the exclusive affair of the Czech Republic.
Some politicians, technicians and
officials of the state energy concern
ČEZ argued that the Czech energy
sector simply could not
do without Temelín. General concerns over the
safety of the Soviet technology used at Temelín
were to be addressed by
the government seeking
a new contractor for the
control system; the contract was won by the
American firm Westinghouse. The original design for four
reactors was scaled back to two. And
so construction went forward, despite
the opposition of several NGOs.
A nuclear-free Austria
Besides the Czech opponents, Temelín also had to face pressure from
neighbouring Austria, which decided
in a 1978 referendum not to put into
operation its already-completed nuclear power plant at Zwentendorf
near Vienna. The margin of the referendum was so close, however, that
for eight whole years everything at
Zwentendorf remained just as it was:
17
On 7 October anti-Temelín activists gathered on Přemysl Otakar II Square in České Budějovice to mark the seventh
anniversary of the inaugural fission reaction in the first reactor of the nuclear power plant at Temelín.
Austrian opponents of Temelín holding signs with
the names of Czech-Austrian border-points,
threatening that if the Austrian government did not
lay charges against the Czech Republic on the basis
of international law within four weeks, they would
block all sixteen crossings.
all they had to do was press a button,
more or less, to start the reactor up.
In 1986 there was to be another referendum over whether to start up the
Austrian reactor. Instead, fate took a
hand in the form of the disaster at
Chernobyl. Immediately polls in Austria showed over 90 percent opposed
to any use of nuclear power. It was at
this moment that the Czechoslovak
government announced that it was
beginning construction of another
Soviet-type nuclear power plant at
Temelín in southern Bohemia, which
lies just a few dozen kilometres from
the Austrian border.
As soon as the Communist regime
in Czechoslovakia fell, the Austrians
started to mount a massive campaign
against Temelín. Czech experts argued that no Chernobyl-like accident
could happen at Temelín because
they are two different types of reactors, but this did nothing to calm
Austrian fears. “Because of their differing constructions, the Chernobyl
reactor behaves physically differently than the Temelín VVER type at
higher temperatures and pressures
and in the event of loss of water from
the nuclear circuit,” says Dana Drábová, head of the State Office for
Nuclear Safety. In reactors of the
Chernobyl type, in such a situation
the neutrons continue to be slowed
and the splitting of atoms continues,
so the nuclear reaction has a tendency to accelerate instead of halting.
“At Temelín, however, water works as
a coolant but also at the same time as
a moderator of the nuclear reaction.
18
If the amount of water is lowered,
or if its temperature rises, the reaction comes to a halt by itself because
of the lack of slowed neutrons,” explains Drábová. She also points out
that Temelín has a number of other
mechanisms, independent of one
another, that are able to stop the nuclear reaction.
H
owever, the Austrians had little
faith in assurances of Temelín’s safety. In 1998 Austrian activists, supported by many Austrian politicians,
began their first blockade of CzechAustrian border crossings. At one
point the NGOs protesting Temelín
blocked the entire Czech-Austrian
border, turning the dispute over the
power plant into an international
problem. On top of that, the construction project started running into
major problems. The delivery deadline was postponed a total of seven
times; the first reactor at Temelín
began operations in 2000 and the
second one two years later. The total
investment in the nuclear power
plant came to over one hundred billion crowns.
The uniqueness of Temelín
Rather paradoxically, with their
firm opposition to Temelín, the
Austrians played into the hand of
the power plant’s Czech defenders.
Many Czechs did not appreciate their
Austrian neighbours involving themselves in the affairs of another country, and although there are other,
much older nuclear power stations
along Austria’s borders with Germany and Slovakia, it was Temelín
the Austrians saw fit to criticize. As
for the Czechs, their originally negative attitude towards Temelín has
gradually shifted: today 60 percent
of Czechs support the development
precisely the catastrophe at Chernobyl that caused the level of security
at nuclear power stations to be radically improved. However, for this
same reason the head of the State
Office for Nuclear Safety does not
try to minimize some of the concerns
about safety at Temelín on the part of
its Austrian and Czech opponents.
“Temelín is apparently the first
nuclear power station in the world to
be built under such intense public
scrutiny and such widespread interest on the part of the media. And such
scrutiny has surely brought a number
of insights that will be useful in the
future,” says Drábová.
Marek Kerles
Photos: ČTK, Temelín Nuclear Power
Plant archives
of nuclear energy. The International
Atomic Energy Agency found no serious flaws at Temelín. Austrian and
Czech anti-nuclear activists have
counted over 100 technical problems
at the Temelín plant since it started
up; however, officials of the Czech
atomic oversight agency say that the
vast majority of these were problems
in the non-nuclear part of the plant,
where the heat removed from the
reactor is converted mechanically
into electricity. Nuclear safety was
never threatened, they insist.
I
s Temelín absolutely safe then?
Even Dana Drábová admits that such
a statement would be too categorical.
On the other hand, the power plant is
said to be backed up so that every
possible operational problem can be
dealt with to the maximum extent by
several measures independent of one
another. According to Drabová it was
19
1
2
3
4
5
20
Photography
Those who’ve forgotten what it’s like to go
barefoot and wake up drenched in dew won’t
have a clue as to what it’s all about. But
believe me, it’s totally different to begin the
day fresh and full of energy.
Josef Moucha
1. From the book Libuna;
Photo: Iren Stehli
2. Roma, photographed by Viktor Richter
3. First day out of prison, Šternberk, 1990;
Photo: Jindřich Štreit
4. Man with child, Arnoltice, 1975;
Photo: Jindřich Štreit
5. From the book Libuna;
Photo: Iren Stehli
6. Man with a hat, Těchanov, 1975;
Photo: Jindřich Štreit
7. Romani workers during the floods
in Prague, 2003; Photo: Karel Cudlín
8. A group of Ukrainian Roma;
Photo: Karel Cudlín
6
7
8
21
Olga Sommerová’s
Seven Lights
On Yom Ha’Shoah day, Jews light
seven candles in memory of the victims of
the Second World War. The symbolic
lighting of the menorah marks the beginning of the story of six Jewish women as
told in the documentary film Seven Lights,
by the Czech filmmaker Olga Sommerová.
T
he film begins with the words of
the oldest of the witnesses to the Shoah
(the Jewish term for the Holocaust), Alice
Herz Sommerová, aged 105: Hitler
mostly punished me by forcing us to wear
the yellow star. I said to myself, everyone
who sees me probably hates me, but why?
After all, they don’t know me … My
little boy asked me who Hitler was, and
I really thought hard how to explain it
to him so that he wouldn’t be marked
by hatred after the war. Because hatred
breeds hatred, otherwise nothing.
22
Zuzana Růžičková at Terezín: “They take you away
from home, you lose everything and then you’re only
fighting against hunger and cold.”
They sent my 72-year-old mother off to
Auschwitz, with a rucksack on her back,
a year before us. I was struck by the
thought – none of us can help you, not
your husband, not your son, not you yourself. An inner voice spoke to me. And
in that instant I heard “Chopin – Études
op. 25”. I ran home and started playing –
day and night, over and over.
Zdena Frantlová, aged 85: On 15
March 1939 my father called us to the
window. The German army was passing
by below – loud rumbling and the soldiers
in their helmets – and we had no idea
what was next. But everyone was afraid.
Erika Bezdíčková, 77: Before the
actual deportations of Jews began, there
was talk of sending us somewhere. I had
lovely hair, flowing down far below my
waist, and one day my mother said “We’ll
have to cut it, otherwise it’ll attract lice”.
We lived in a continuous state of fear, our
Erika Bezdíčková at Auschwitz: “Strip naked, shave off all hair, have a number tattooed on the arm.”
Erika Bezdíčková lighting seven candles in memory of the victims of the Second World War
History
Shoa – “destruction” (Hebrew);
holocaust – “burnt offering” (Greek).
The murder of around 6 million
Jews in the course of the Second
World War
The Diderot Encyclopedia
rucksacks packed and ready. Then they
rang the doorbell and said “OK, get your
things and follow us”.
Pavla Kováčová, 95: My sister Anča,
she was always good, and she was the
first one they killed in Auschwitz. It’s the
good ones who always suffer. We weren’t
good, and so we survived. That’s the truth
– we other three siblings, we were bad,
and so we resisted.
The building was empty, our family was
the only one who hadn’t been sent off. The
Gestapo came looking for us and the caretaker of the building, Mrs. Pížlová, kept
moving us from one flat to another.
Zuzana Růžičková, 81 (later to become one of the leading interpreters of
music for the harpsichord): The Nazis
actually got children to hand out the
“invitations” to gather for the transport
to the concentration camps. It happened
that we came to a place and there was
a crowd of people in front of the flat of
a Jewish family, and gas was leaking out
from under the door.
Ruth Tosková, 82: When the Germans
came, my father said “I’m not staying here
and I’ll take the children with me”. His
idea was that we’d cross the border illegally into Poland and then move on. My
The documentary film Seven Lights
was directed by Olga Sommerová (born
1949), who shot it in 2008 for Czech
Television. She was inspired by a book
entitled They Fought on All Fronts,
which gave her the idea of shooting a
film about Jewish women who had withstood the Nazi terror.
The documentary tells of the experiences of six women who suffered the fate
of the Czechoslovak Jews after 1939.
After the occupation of Czechoslovakia
by Hitler’s army and the proclamation of
the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, the persecution of Jews within the
society was launched. Only after the conference in Wannsee in January 1942 did
the Nazis embark on their programme
aimed at the total liquidation of the Jews,
termed the Final Solution. A network of
death camps was established where Jews
were slaughtered in their thousands in
gas chambers. The Czechoslovak Jews
were first transferred to Terezín (the town
that Hitler “bestowed upon the Jews”),
and there then followed transport to Auschwitz, Belsen, Dachau and other concentration and death camps in Europe.
During the Second World War around
six million Jews were murdered in Europe. Another two million individuals
were executed or died as the result of
hunger and illness in the ghettoes.
mother said “Go ahead, I’ll follow you
and bring the family silver and Persian
carpets with me”. But of course none of
this came to pass.
Zdena Fantlová: They arrested my
father at home while he was having
dinner – a neighbour had denounced him
for listening to Jan Masaryk on the BBC.
In that instant our family was completely
shattered.
Pavla Kováčková: We escaped to
Slovakia. My old man managed to get
some fake documents and he said “We’ll
go on New Year’s Eve, everyone’ll be
drunk and they won’t inspect the papers”.
Even the partisans in Slovakia questioned me, asking whether I wasn’t
Jewish. I denied it. In Bánská Bystrice
there was a big cache of weapons. A certain Mr Matuška made a wagon available
and I travelled with him, distributing the
weapons. We handed out seven rifles in
every village. We lived there in the mountains in abandoned shepherds’ huts with
rotting floors, but each time there was
some little area where you could live, and
behind the place a tree that apples fell
from, and we ate those.
Zuzana Růžičková: We arrived in Terezín in January 1942. When they were
Alice Sommerová: “My little boy asked me who Hitler was, and I really thought hard how to explain it to him so that he wouldn’t be marked by hatred after the war.”
23
The director Olga Sommerová (left), holocaust survivor Alice
Sommerová and the camerawoman Olga Špátová (right)
counting us, my father looked at the Gestapo man in such a way that he immediately slapped him in the face. Seeing my
father in such a situation was a terrible
shock. They take you away from home,
you lose everything and then you’re only
fighting against hunger and cold.
Alice Sommerová: In the morning
black water – they called it coffee – at
noon white water – that was called soup –
and in the evening black water again.
Once we were sitting by ourselves in the
room and my boy started to cry, saying he
was hungry. By chance I happened to spy
a bit of bread, so I gave it to him. I was
now a thief! I’ll never forget it.
Zuzana Růžičková: Mrs Sommerová
performed around a hundred concerts
of Chopin’s music at the Sokol club
in Terezín.
Alice Sommerová: Every evening
there was a concert. Old people came,
children, the sick, people weakened by
hunger, but the music was food. That
was something awfully special. Maybe
when they have something spiritual,
people don’t need to eat.
Zuzana Růžičková: Then they herded
us together into the cattle wagons that
were waiting, and three days we travelled,
without food or drink … to Auschwitz.
Erika Bezdíčková: We entered the
cruellest place people who arrived there
were subjected to. The first order was
“Men and women separately”. No one
knew what was happening, we were in
columns of fives, and there stood Dr
Mengele along with some other people,
and they were making a selection.
Zdena Fantlová: Links links rechts
links – no one knew that links meant
instant death and rechts a bit more time
till it came. The conductor Karel Ančerl
was ahead of me, he was sent rechts, his
24
Olga Špátová preparing for filming exterior
shots at Auschwitz
wife and children links, and that settled
his life.
Zuzana Růžičková: Even today I
don’t know whether Mama would have
been sent to the left or the right. I was
carrying with me a piece of paper with
the notes for the Sarabande from Bach’s
French Suite No. 6 in E major. And as
they loaded us into the lorry, the paper
flew away from me. Mama knew that it
was a kind of talisman for me, so she ran
after it and the women in the lorry lifted
her up to join us. Bach saved her life.
Erika Bezdíčková: Dr Mengele asked
me how old I was and I obediently replied
sixteen. He had a kind of walking stick
in his hand and he thrust it at me and
suddenly Mama was somewhere else
than where I was. As they were taking her
off she cried out “It isn’t true, she isn’t
sixteen yet!” – she wanted us to remain
together. It was a second, and that second
is my nightmare.
Erika Bezdíčková: Strip naked, shave
off all hair, have a number tattooed on
the arm …
Zdena Fantlová: Then we passed
through a kind of barn where there were
Ruth Tosková: “When the Germans came, my father said I’m not staying here and I’ll take the kid with me.”
immense heaps of clothing and footwear.
The Gestapo women threw clothes and
boots at us at random. I caught a ballroom
dress made of heavy green silk, the jacket
from a women’s suit, and a pair of men’s
patent leather shoes. And that’s what I
wore till the end of the war.
Erika Bezdíčková: I have the feeling
that in the trees around the camp and in
the grass, that’s where my parents are.
That’s where they spread the ashes from
the crematoria. It’s just that … nothing
can disappear with no traces whatsoever.
And so I brought my children here, so
they could see where their grandfather
and grandmother are buried.
Zuzana Růžičková: There was a
children’s building there and I started
working in it as an assistant minder. The
Gestapo got used to going there when
we were rehearsing some play with the
children, for example Snow White and
the Seven Dwarfs. Dr Mengele came too,
and a certain Dr Klein. He always carried
sweets with him, and offered them to
the children. And if a kid took one of
them, he didn’t show up the next day.
Klein simply had him killed.
Zuzana Růžičková: When they liberated me, I weighed 25 kilos.
Pavla Kováčková: We counted it up:
they killed 320. Three hundred and
twenty of my relatives.
Zuzana Růžičková: Of my whole family, only Mama and I survived, no one else.
Zdena Fantlová: I never considered
myself a victim, more like an observer.
Your instinct tells you which direction to
go, where the person with the whip is.
When you emerge from it, you have the
impression that you’ve awoken from a
dream. And you don’t want to go on living.
Zuzana Růžičková: I ran to my piano
teacher, and she simply wept when she saw
my hands. But I refused to give in, and
spent ten, twelve hours a day at the keyboard. When they destroyed my life, I felt
sorrow rather than anger. But that destruction keeps on going, people never learn.
Erika Bezdíčková: The same things
keep happening. Humanity is paving the
way to its own extinction.
Zuzana Růžičková: Neo-Nazism drives
me frantic, I can’t sleep, it’s a monstrous
desecration of what we all remember.
Zdena Fantlová: We lost everything –
our homes, our families, our relatives, our
freedom. On the other hand, we learned
who we were, what we can depend on,
what’s important in life and what isn’t.
Alice Sommerová: This advanced age,
it’s the most beautiful part of our lives.
Zdena Fantlová: Once again they
loaded us into a wagon for coal, there
were 130 of us there, a young woman sat
under me, dead, and the only place I could
brace myself against was her teeth – her
mouth was open. At every station we
stopped at, they unloaded the bodies of
those who’d been pressed to death. This is
where human nature showed itself: when
they unloaded the dead, we were happy,
because we’d have more space.
Zuzana Růžičková: We’d been starving several years by then. You can’t possibly imagine what hunger is when you’re
starving year after year. Once I fainted
and apparently someone standing above
me commented “She looks like a person.”
The propaganda was so effective that
they didn’t regard us as people.
Zdena Fantlová: We travelled on, and
suddenly – beautiful countryside. A birch
grove blanketed in snow, blue skies, sunshine. The train stopped and I said to
myself, it’s so wonderful here, nothing
bad can happen to us here. And that was
the worst camp of all.
Zuzana Růžičková: If what we’d gone
through before was hell, in comparison
with Belsen it was only the antechamber
to hell. The soup was only for those
who volunteered for work, and the work
was dragging dead bodies into heaps to
be burned.
Zdena Fantlová: You stop noticing
corpses – it’s like trees that have been
cut down in the woods. It was a charnel
house. Some were breathing, some
weren’t. I was still breathing.
The fact that we’re aware of the beauty of
our lives. When we’re young, we live
through our bodies, when you’re old and
have that huge experience, it leads you to
the realization that we’re in fact a miracle.
There are beautiful things in the world.
Life is wonderful.
The editors
Photos: Olgy Sommerová’s archives
Erika Bezdíčková at Auschwitz: “I have the feeling that in the trees around the camp and in the grass,
that’s where my parents are. It’s just that – nothing can disappear with no traces whatsoever.”
25
I’m Vasyl, a Czech
Worker
Altanzul Yadamjav, Vasyl Savinets
and Tran Auyc Tri. Ms Altanzul is 43
and comes from Mongolia, Vasyl is a
28-year-old Ukrainian and 35-yearold Tran Auyc Tri hails from Vietnam.
What do they have in common? All of
them are employed by Czech firms.
M
s Altanzul works along with
several hundred other Mongolians at
the Foxconn assembly line in the eastern
Bohemian town of Pardubice, where
computers are assembled. Vasyl Savinets has a place with a construction firm
that sends him out to work on building
sites in eastern and central Bohemia.
Tran Auyc Tri sews covers for steering
26
wheels for Apos-Auto, situated in a
small town in southern Moravia.
All three came to the Czech Republic in search of a better job. “I have
to make money in order to pay off
the debts my husband and I owe in
Mongolia. I’m planning on returning
home in a year or two,” says Altanzul
Yadamjav. She knows how to say hello
in Czech and to express thanks, but
otherwise she communicates through
an interpreter. She doesn’t plan to learn
Czech. Why not? For her the Czech
Republic is only a place where she plans
Ukrainians working at the Czech Shipyards
in Ústí nad Labem – Valtířov. Currently there
are around 150,000 Ukrainians in the country,
with two-thirds here illegally.
Ukrainian construction workers at the Saturday “labour exchange” by the Prague Fairground.
Ukrainians make up two-thirds of the workforce in the building trade.
Society
“At Na Hůrce I found a threeroom flat let by Ukrainians. Seven
young women from the Ukraine
lived there. We took turns. Some of
us worked at night, others in the
morning.”
Ms N., a piano teacher from Lvov
in the Ukraine, now living with her
family in Prague
to spend two or three years, and Foxconn, where she works, is a “little Mongolia”: it employs several hundred
Mongolians, who live together in hostels and can talk to each other whenever
they want. Their bosses use interpreters
when giving them their orders.
On the other hand, the Vietnamese
worker Tran Auyc Tri came to the
Czech Republic with the intention of
starting up a business, and is only temporarily employed. He needs time in
order to learn the language and to go
through all the steps that are required
to set up a business. “I had a business
of my own back in Vietnam. Here in
the Czech Republic I know a lot of
people, and I have a few relatives.
People here have more money than
back in Vietnam, which is fine for
business,” says the Vietnamese, who
speaks quite respectable Czech.
Ukrainians – heading for
the promised land
According to the Czech Statistical
Office, more than 406,000 foreigners
were living in the Czech Republic in
April 2008. Traditionally the largest
group – accounting for more than a
quarter of the foreigners in the country
The Taiwanese-Chinese firm Foxconn makes
computers at its factory in Pardubice, where the
workforce includes individuals people from
Mongolia, Romania, Bulgaria and Vietnam.
Foreign nationals in the Czech
Republic: the ten leading states
(as of 30 April 2008)
1.
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
9.
10.
Ukraine
Slovakia
Vietnam
Russia
Poland
Germany
Moldavia
Mongolia
Bulgaria
USA
125,826
71,014
55,626
24,109
21,020
16,968
8,437
6,950
5,301
5,136
– is that of Ukrainians, who can expect to make much more here than at
home. And Vasyl Savinets too left his
native Ukraine because of the difficult
economic situation there. “Even though
things in the Ukraine have improved
in the past two or three years, as a
mason here I still make twice as much
as a teacher back home,” says Savinets.
Second place among foreigners goes
to Slovaks: since their country was part
of the former Czechoslovakia and is
also a member of the European Union,
they fit in here with the minimum of
fuss. Third in the list are the Vietnamese.
Czech – a prerequisite for success
Sooner or later every foreigner who
wants to spend an extended period of
time in the Czech Republic, or settle
here permanently, runs up against the
problem of the Czech language. The
average Czech is not particularly keen
on learning foreign languages or on
using them here at home. “I was a bit
surprised when I discovered that not
even the foremen here at work are
able to communicate in English, not to
speak of shop assistants or personnel
in ordinary restaurants. One of the
first things I learned in the Czech Re-
27
public was that I had to learn at least
a bit of Czech,” says Oyunzul Dergelkgbulag, who comes from Mongolia.
But it is not easy for foreigners
to learn Czech. It has a complicated
grammatical structure and mastering
the correct pronunciation is very
tricky for anyone who did not grow up
speaking it in childhood. “It’s more
difficult than I’d expected. I have to
work very hard at it. I’m enrolled in a
language course. I try to read Czech
newspapers and to speak Czech at
home with my kids. I have to master
it,” says Tran Auyc Tri. Without Czech
he can’t fulfil his dream of starting
up a business in the Czech Republic:
in accordance with the latest amendments to the Trade Act, every businessman has to have in his shop,
restaurant, workshop or stand (during
business hours) at least one person
able to communicate in Czech.
A
good knowledge of Czech is
also a necessity if an individual wants
to be employed with a Czech firm in
a job corresponding to his qualifications. This was something experienced by Henryk Zabrocki, from Poland.
At home he worked for an insurance
company, but here in the Czech
Republic he found a better paid job in
the Kierkert factory at Přelouč in eastern Bohemia, where he is involved
with the production of automobile
locks. As a Pole he understands Czech,
while Czechs have no problem when
he speaks Polish with them. But if he
wants to do more responsible work at
a higher salary, he has to learn Czech.
“I got a textbook and I’ve enrolled in
a language course. I’m capable of
more than just working at a conveyor
belt,” he explains.
Lyudmyl and Oleksandr Tyahur, a
married couple from the Ukraine who
want to settle permanently in the Czech
Republic, agree that the Czech lessons
they took have paid off. Thanks to their
improved Czech, they have moved up
at Foxconn from working at the conveyor belt to better-paid jobs in the
quality-control section. “Without Czech
this would never have happened. Now
we’ve rented a flat and if the authorities give us a residence permit we’ll
take out a mortgage and buy something
of our own. We want to live here for
good, for our children to be born here,”
says Oleksandr Tyahur.
28
The largest Asian community in the Czech Republic comes from Vietnam; already back in the Communist era
they were well established as vendors of footwear and inexpensive textile products.
Czech scepticism towards
foreigners
Insofar as something in the behaviour of Czechs bothers foreigners,
it is the former’s reserve and standoffishness. At least at the beginning,
most Czechs are somewhat mistrustful of foreigners, especially in small
towns where foreigners are uncommon. This is something felt particularly by Asians and Blacks, whose appearance makes it clear at first sight
that they are not locals.
“The first few months at work I felt
like a pariah. No one talked to me
more than they had to, and when I
came into the changing room at the
workshop, conversation suddenly
stopped. Over time things got a bit
better. That was when I realized that
for the most part Czechs are not very
open among themselves,” says Tran
Auyc Tri, speaking about his experience in Blansko.
W
orkers from countries of the
former Soviet Union are even worse
off here. They’re easily recognizable
because of their distinctive accent.
Some Czechs have still not forgiven
them for the occupation of Czechoslo-
meals at company canteens and an
extra week of vacation.
W
is enforced. For example, employees
have a right to a minimal twenty days
of vacation a year and during vacation
they continue to be paid (on the basis
of their average monthly pay). Other
provisions concern the working hours,
which are strictly fixed, as is the minimal period between two shifts.
In addition, foreigners in the Czech
Republic have the right to health care
and sickness benefits and, after working a certain number of days, they can
draw on various forms of support from
the state in cases of need. In addition,
some employers offer their employees
various other benefits, most commonly contributions to travel-related costs,
hen problems do arise with
the authorities or in connection with
the law, in most cases these involve
individuals who are employed illegally. This is the case of a Ukrainian
worker who refused to give her name.
“I worked alongside another thirty or
so Ukrainians and Belarusians for an
agency involved with the construction
industry – it’s owned by a group of
Ukrainian and Belarusian businessmen. No one ever signed a contract
with us. We had to pay them 4,000
crowns for a permit to stay in the
Czech Republic and a work permit
here. We lived in an isolated hostel
and worked sixteen-hour shifts. When
I realized how badly the firm was
exploiting me, I escaped and arranged
for a new permit to stay in the country
and a new, legal job.”
Vítězslav Dittrich
Most pro lidská práva, o.s.
(an advice centre for foreigners)
Photos: Foxconn, Radek Kalhous, ČTK
vakia in August 1968. “I’m living in a
village near Náchod in northeastern
Bohemia. Every Saturday evening I go
to the local pub. I sit down, drink two
or three beers, have some crisps. At
first it wasn’t easy there. No one spoke
to me, and many people made it very
clear that I wasn’t welcome. Once it
was quite scary. The guys drinking
beer began making all sorts of pointed
comments. But the woman running the
place defended me. She told off everyone in the room and warned them to
behave properly. She said they should
keep their grudges for Brezhnev, that I
wasn’t the one who’d sent the tanks in
forty years ago. Soon after that the ice
broke, and today I’m on first-name
terms with a lot of the locals,” says the
Ukrainian Boris Malkoskiy.
Legally-employed
foreigners
From the point of view of the labour
laws and social security, the Czech
Republic is a very hospitable country.
The Labour Code, whose provisions
guide labour relations here and which
applies to foreigners as well, as long
as they are here legally, provides more
or less the same benefits to employers
and employees. The state sees that it
Firms like Foxconn benefit from tax breaks introduced to encourage investment in the Czech Republic.
It is expected that in future similar measures will induce them to migrate further “east”.
29
“I Enjoy Great Dramas”
says the reporter Petra Procházková
The Czech journalist and author Petra
Procházková spent eleven years in Russia
and five years in Afghanistan as a war correspondent. She is now 43, and as she points
out, she has spent a third of her life “stumbling about in the trenches”. While monitoring the Georgian-Abkhaz war she was
kidnapped. In Chechnya she earned a very
large sum of money from the sale of her
photos of public executions to international
agencies. She then used the money to set up
a children’s home in war-torn Grozny.
for blind children in Afghanistan and the
training of Afghan doctors to be able to
carry out this operation.
It would seem that Czechs have sometimes found it difficult to accept your
rather controversial personality.
You’re right. Sometimes their reaction to
my humanitarian activities is “Hmm, there
must be something behind that.” And they
speculate about embezzlement, family ties
… Or someone will say “Well, I wouldn’t
have any trouble either in living in Afghanistan for a few years and then going around
giving talks.” I just tell them to get off their
butts and go there.
S
he was involved in the establishment
of the humanitarian organization Berkat
(Chechen for mercy, happiness), which at
first helped families hard hit by the war in
Chechnya. The association gradually expanded its activities, which now include a
programme focused on corneal transplants
30
“In Kabul they gave me this monster to look after …
a dog raised for dog fights. He’s not much use for
guarding homes – he likes people.”
Czechs certainly don’t hold back when
it comes to making comments about you
in internet discussions and chats. They
Procházková in war-torn Chechnya, seeking information on people’s most pressing needs.
Personalities
Petra Procházková (right), Afghanistan, Shamali Plain, 2002
“A war reporter is faced with the
issue of how much to present human
poverty and violence. It makes much
more sense to offer a story that
moves the viewer. So that that middle-aged man sitting in front of
the TV set at least doesn’t stuff that
sausage in his mouth.”
Petra Procházková
journalist and author
(born 1964)
claim, for example, that when you worked as a journalist in Chechnya you took
the side of the Chechens.
To a certain extent I’m paying for my colleague Jaromír Štětina, who was a publicistanti-correspondent – his views were more
extreme than mine. Today he’s a member of
the Czech Senate, and since I’m still in the
newspaper business I take the rap for him too.
In fact we’d said in advance that we’d be
reporting from the Chechen front. It wasn’t
possible to cover the whole sector objectively. We were honest in admitting that we were
only offering a slice of reality. For example,
we arrived in the town of Shali and simply
described what we saw there, nothing more.
We were Epicentrum, an agency consisting of two renegade journalists with a single
car, not CNN. Because we lived alongside
civilians in Chechnya, quite naturally we
experienced the same things they did.
Reporting from the place where something
is happening is something more than just
information – it’s also emotion, and do you
really think there’s any way for emotion to
be objective?
But there must also be some deeper
reason why Czechs view you as a controversial person.
People have the unjustified feeling that
I’m placing a mirror before them. That by
The village of Childochtaron, where the local women
sew and embroider traditional Afghan clothes for
Berkat, which the group sells in the Czech Republic,
with profits flowing back to Afghanistan
caring a lot and being so committed, I’m
reproaching them for something. I go somewhere and people start saying “You know,
we’d like to do something, to help in some
way, but we can’t, because …” And they
start defending themselves. But I couldn’t
care less whether they give something to
charity, whether they help or don’t help – it’s
their choice. I’ve got lots of good friends
who haven’t given me a penny for my projects. Reproaches and charity simply don’t
go together.
How did you set up Berkat?
There’s a humanitarian organization in
the Czech Republic called People in Need, a
group I stand in awe of – I believe in what
they’re doing and admire how they work.
The other large humanitarian organizations
don’t have my one hundred percent trust.
They spend too much on administration,
for example – things like that. When I’d
made a bundle of money in the war, I had
no idea what to do with it. I didn’t have a
family, so I travelled – I lived in Hong Kong,
in Nairobi, in New Zealand, I had no cares
in the world.
And then came a strange period in
Chechnya. First we hit a mine while travelling in a convoy – I literally caught our
driver dying in my viewfinder. My colleague
Jaromír Štětina was no longer travelling
to the region: because of his earlier work
there, the place had got too hot for him.
I had a strong sense that I wasn’t getting
any response to my work, that I was too
far away from my readers. So I took the
money I’d earned and put it into building a
children’s home. And it started to function
right away, the children got food to eat, new
clothes, toys and they were happy. People
in Need began to send me supplies they had
left over from their humanitarian work. As
a way – an official way – of ensuring these
were delivered, my friend Jana Hradílková
and I set up Berkat. Our idea was as follows: whether we invest time or money in it,
it’s a win-win situation, for us and for the
31
“The Orient ... is continuous bargaining.” Procházková in the village
of NauNioz, the site of Berkat’s sewing an embroidering project
others. And that’s how it worked out: in
my case, it brought great happiness, a huge
change in my life.
What are you involved in now?
We came up with something that helps
finance corneal transplants for the blind
in Afghanistan. Old women here in senior
citizens’ homes, people in psychiatric clinics
and others sew charming dolls for us. We
then get them signed by well-known public
figures – former President Havel, Minister
of Defence Vlasta Parkanová – and sell
them at auctions. And the result is that
two people are happy – not only the blind
person we’ve selected for a new cornea,
but also the woman who sewed the doll
in the senior citizens’ home.
Are there any special features of your
approach to charity work?
When we started up we fitted in perfectly with the social climate at the time. There
were many women around forty here in the
Czech Republic that wanted to help those
in need. For example, in 2001 I went into
a pub and suddenly a man approached me
and said “You’re Procházková? My wife’s
a great admirer of yours, so here’s 2,000
crowns – I’ll tell her I gave it to you and
she’ll be happy.” And I said “But what
about the tax-man, where should I send the
receipt?” and he just laughed: “I know
you’ll find a good use for it.”
Berkat wasn’t set up as an organization
but more as a group of like-minded people.
I prefer coming together like that rather
than setting up an organization.
Then we had to take on some employees.
One, two, ten … until we finally reached
thirty-five. Now we have an organization
with a fixed working day, and all the time
we’re trying to deal with the fact that some
people want to get together rather chaotically in the name of charity and fool
around.
32
One of the women from the village of Fakiro not far from Kabul, who sews and embroiders clothing
for the Berkat project.
A primitive type of heater used in Afghan villages:
the mountain people put glowing coals or charcoal
into the clay vessel.
Procházková was in at the birth of the Adzhamal
project: corneal transplants have given back their
sight to dozens of Afghans.
with the international Hanno R. Ellenbogen Citizenship Award, chose you as
its recipient.
How did the project for corneal transplants in Afghanistan begin?
I always admired Ms Albright, I circled
round her when she was involved in Russian
negotiations, shouted out at her in Czech
[editor’s comment: Madeleine Albright, neé
Marie Jana Korbelová, was born in Prague], and so on. It was amazing to observe
her negotiations back then with Russian
Foreign Minister Yevgeny Primakov – it was
a concert, they both had a certain noblesse.
So she was presented with the award, which
involved the opportunity to present a sum of
around 6,000 euros to whoever she chose.
And she chose me.
What kind of contacts do you have with
Chechnya these days?
Jana Hradílková manages to travel there
on a regular basis. She’s in charge of all our
Chechnya-related activities (my field is
more Afghanistan). In Chechnya, in addition to the standard humanitarian work, we
help people who aren’t even able to stand
in a queue for flour. This is a category of
people who simply can’t manage to make it
for the usual help. They have mental problems, they’re confused or isolated. There
aren’t many of them, but aid has to be
brought to them. Large organizations can’t
afford to do this. Two full days of work for
only three families – that doesn’t look very
good in the charts they create to prove
how efficient they are. But this is how we
distribute aid to crazy and helpless people
scattered about in the cellars of Grozny.
That’s why we began to call the project
“Podvalshchitsi” – cellar people. Today
they fall under what’s called Friendly Aid.
We find a specific Czech family and it
becomes the sponsor of a specific Chechnya
family. This is very important – it’s a question of the principle of mutual cooperation.
Not long ago former American Secretary
of State Madeleine Albright, presented
One time a person by the name of Marta
Nollová called me up by satellite phone in
Kabul. She said “They kicked me out everywhere, now you’re my only hope.” What
had happened was that she’d seen a picture
of a blind young Afghan boy in a newspaper
and decided that she’d save him. And I was
supposed to find him. We spent a number
of years in the attempt and in the end we
really did find him – his name’s Adzhamal.
It’s a strange paradox that even though he
was the inspiration for a major project that
has given back their sight to dozens of
Afghans, medical science can’t help him.
At an early stage Dr. Martin Filipec became part of the project. He protested:
“Don’t be crazy! There’s no point in bringing those children here – I’ll go to Afghanistan
and do all the operations there.” Ms Nollová,
a technician at a business school, who lives
in a block of flats in Prague and whose
greatest asset is her ordinary decency, was
the one who started the project on her own
initiative. Isn’t that fantastic?
Thanks to her, the Czech Republic was
the first country in the world to carry out
a transplant in Afghanistan. Today the
Afghans do it themselves. Professor Filipec
went there, operated on around seventy
people and taught five Afghan doctors there
the surgical techniques needed. And it all
began when Ms Nollová sent a crumpled up
one-dollar bill to me in Afghanistan.
In order to keep enjoying Berkat, I want to
bring together various people with various
crazy ideas and see what comes of it. It’s a
challenge: to transplant corneas in Afghanistan, when some groups in the society are
dead set against it and the whole thing is one
great drama. That’s what I enjoy.
Thank you very much for the interview,
and we hope that your ideas will continue
to meet with success.
Jakub Šmíd
Photos: Iva Zímová, Petry Procházková’s archives
During her travels around Afghanistan, Petra Procházková also visited a psychiatric clinic in Kabul,
whose patients include drug addicts.
33
The Roma
in Photography
Court Finds Communist
Prosecutor Guilty
Hence the academy is nominating him for
the Nobel Prize in medicine.
“We’ll do our utmost to ensure that the
criteria for the Nobel Prize, as set out by its
founder, go back to the original idea, which
A court in Plzeň brought down a verdict
of guilty in the case of an 86-year-old former prosecutor charged with participation
in the legal murder of the National Socialist
Member of Parliament Milada Horáková
in 1950. At the time of the trial, Ludmila
Brožová-Polednová not only demanded, as
Communist prosecutor, the death penalty
for Horáková, but also made inflammatory
speeches, signed the death sentence and was
even present at Horáková’s execution.
Roma as seen by the photographer Viktor Richter
As far back as the nineteenth century photographs were being made of the Roma as
a distinctive Central European minority. They
appeared fleetingly as a kind of exotic element in Beautiful Times (published in 1895),
a selection of photographs by Rudolf BrunerDvořák, one of the founders of photo journalism, who called himself a “photographer of
the informal”. More revelatory explorations
came after World War II, with Viktor Richter
(born 1919). He did not photograph indistinct
shadows seen from a distance, but instead was
invited into Roma homes. This was the beginning of a period marked by an enchantment
with other ways of life and priorities. This was
evident not only in the revealing images of
photographers but also in literary works, for
example those by the Romantically-inclined
Bohumil Hrabal. Roma simply seemed attractive because they had no interest in building a
career for themselves and so did not knuckle
under to the totalitarian state.
Beginning in the 1950s and continuing for
four decades, the sociologist Eva Davidová
(born 1932) assembled a vast archives. Her
photographs of Bohemian, Moravian and Slovak Roma are unmatched for their realism.
A monograph of her work published by Torst
in 2004 offers visual evidence of the changes
in the life of the Roma after February 1959,
when the Czechoslovak bureaucracy forced
them to abandon their natural nomadic existence (a process that of course also took place
in different ways in other countries in Europe).
In the 1960s Josef Koudelka (born 1938)
took up the theme. In order to ensure that
he would be free to return among the Roma
– in eastern Slovakia, Bratislava, the southern
Moravian town of Strážnice, northern Bohemia and elsewhere – he showed them the photos he had taken of them. If anyone was displeased with what he saw, then he simply tore up
the photograph. Koudelka’s selection of Roma
photographs first appeared in English in the
mid-seventies, and in 1977 in French. A warmly recommended book devoted to the Roma is
the recently published selection of photographs by the Czech culture, and which contains twenty-seven years of the work of the CzechSwiss photographer Iren Stehli, Libuna.
Josef Moucha
34
was that the Nobel Prize for medicine
should go to a scientist whose discoveries
have saved human lives,” says the President
of the Czech Academy of Sciences, Václav
Pačes. The Academy intends to remind
world-famous research institutes and well
known figures, as well as Stockholm itself,
of Antonín Holý’s achievements in the
development of unusually effective medicines for the treatment of deadly diseases
such as AIDS and hepatitis B.
“Holý’s handicap lies in the fact that he’s
most at home in the lab and refuses to boast
of his discoveries. He’s a chemist, but his
medicines save people’s lives. So does he
deserve the prize for chemistry or for medicine?” asks the daily MFDnes in reporting
Holý’s nomination.
From Milada Horáková’s trial. By means of a series
of show trials in which death sentences were handed
down, the Communists consolidated their power
in Czechoslovakia in the 1950s.
The judge stated that Brožová-Polednová’s greatest crime was her awareness before it started that this was a show trial and
that as a result she knew what the sentence
would be from the very beginning. For this,
the court imposed an unconditional sentence of six years in prison on the former
prosecutor. “Brožová’s case is a counterpart to the sentencing of guards from Nazi
concentration camps. They too are being
brought to justice today, despite their age,”
said the Director of the Institute for the
Study of Totalitarian Regimes, Pavel Žáček,
in a recent television appearance.
Holý Nominated
for Nobel Prize
The Czech Academy of Sciences will
nominate the Czech Republic’s most famous scientist, Antonín Holý, for the Nobel
Prize in 2009.
As a chemist, Antonín Holý has discovered a whole series of medicines that save
the lives of thousands of people every year.
Point-Alpha Award
for Václav Havel
On 30 September 2008 ex-President Václav Havel accepted the prestigious PointAlpha Award for his contribution to German, and European, unification. The German
Unity Curatorium presented the award to
Havel at the German Embassy in Prague.
Earlier recipients have included leading
world statesmen, among them former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, former
German Chancellor Helmut Kohl and former American President George Bush, all
of whom played a part in bringing about the
end of the Cold War.
Photo: German Embassy in the Czech Republic
Mosaic
Awarding
of an Emmy
This year the Academy of Television
Arts and Sciences (ATAS) made an
Emmy award in the area of technology
and engineering to a CNN team that included the current Czech Television correspondent in China, Tomáš Etzler.
Etzler’s team won the Emmy for developing and implementing a system for
gathering news and sending live broadcasts without the need for transmission
vehicles. Etzler used this system when
working as a CNN war correspondent in
Lebanon. Subsequently he spent more
than two years as CNN war correspondent in Haiti, Iraq and Afghanistan. Since
2006 he has been Czech Television correspondent in China.
On Monday 22 September the ambassador’s body was brought back to the Czech
Republic. The special flight with his remains touched down at Prague’s Ruzyňe
airport; President Václav Klaus, Prime
Minister Mirek Topolánek and First Deputy
Foreign Minister Tomáš Pojar were present
at the non-public memorial ceremony that
took place at the airport.
Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg phoned his condolences to the family from New York: “Ambassador Žďárek
always carried out his duties bravely under
the most difficult and riskiest conditions.
His death puts us under an obligation: to
stick to the path, to confront evil and fight
against it.”
The Czech diplomat had only recently
taken up his position. He survived the first
explosion, in which the suicidal bomber
had exploded a lorry loaded with 600 kilograms of explosives. However, his fate was
sealed by the subsequent explosion of gas
in the damaged building.
The Magion
Satellite
Death of a Czech
Ambassador
The Czech Ambassador to Pakistan, Ivo
Žďárek, died tragically on 20 September
2008 in the suicide attack on the Marriott
hotel in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad.
At least 52 others also perished as a result
of the attack.
This year marks the thirtieth anniversary of the launching of the first Czech
(Czechoslovak) satellite, Magion I. Sent up
on 24 October 1978, the satellite weighed
14.5 kilograms and was designed for probing the Earth’s magnetosphere and ionosphere. Hence the name Magion. The satellite, constructed in the ionosphere division
of the Geophysical Institute of the Czech
Academy of Sciences in Prague, operated
for longer than had originally been planned.
It fell silent just before disintegrating
in the thick layers of the atmosphere on
10 September 1981. Between 1989 and
1996 four further satellites of the same
name, weighing from 50 to 70 kilograms,
were constructed and sent into space. All
were guided from the telemetry station
at the Panská Ves observatory in northern
Bohemia.
The Republic
1918-1939
From 28 October 2008 to 15 March 2009
this year’s most important exhibition will
be taking place. Organized by the National
Museum, the Senate of the Czech Republic
and the Military History Institute, it sets
out to present the history of the First
Czechoslovak Republic in its broadest context. The exhibition aims to introduce visitors to the atmosphere of the period, illuminating not only all the most important
aspects of the era that Czechs look back to
today with pride but also those events and
phenomena that have tended to be forgotten. The exhibition will open on the ninetieth anniversary of the declaration of an
independent Czechoslovakia and close on
the seventieth anniversary of the death of
Czecho-Slovakia. As part of the exhibition,
visitors will be able to see the “Munich
Agreement”, signed by the leaders of the
four great European powers of the day –
Eduard Daladier (France), Neville Chamberlain (Great Britain), Benito Mussolini
(Italy) and Adolf Hitler (Germany). As a
result of this document, Czechoslovakia
was forced to hand over its border regions
to Germany and other neighbouring states.
To this day, Czechs regard the Munich
Agreement as a betrayal, convinced that
on 9 September 1938 the great powers
“sold out Czechoslovakia to Hitler”.
Today, seventy years after the “Munich
diktat”, the German Foreign Office has
agreed to lend this unique document to the
Czech Republic. For the first time, the
Czech National Museum will be putting on
display all four original pages of the agreement, only one copy of which exists, written in German, typed, and with a red stamp
declaring it to be a secret document.
35
“So bark! You’re a dog!”
or, A Reporter in Female Dress
In 1911 the famous Circus Henry
set up its tents in Prague on Charles
Square. The internationally famous
company employed a number of local
artistes for the programme: popular Prague songwriter and cabaret performer
Karel Hašler entertained the public
from the hump of a camel with his
“Prague, Mother of Cities”. In the refrain of the song, which caught on quickly with the public, he cast an ironic eye
upon the fame of a woman widely
known under the pseudonym Yvonna.
The amused people of Prague were well
aware of the woman he was referring
to: the first Czech female professional
journalist, Olga Fastrová, who had invaded what was previously an exclusively male profession. In doing so
she attracted a great deal of malicious
comment, criticism and even ridicule.
36
Portrait photograph of Olga F. by the popular
J. Schumpeter studio in Prague-Vinohrady
On a trip to Venice, in front of St Mark’s Cathedral with a friend
(probably Bohdan Pavlů, Slovak journalist and diplomat and later Czechoslovak
Ambassador to Bulgaria)
Like many women longing for
a more intellectual role rather than
labouring over a stove or pursuing
“genteel” crafts, Fastrová chose a
teaching career. After two years in the
teaching profession she decided to
marry, and so she had to leave her
post: the laws of the day only enabled
single women to be teachers or state
employees. Her mother was not happy
when Olga introduced her to her
fiancé, Otto Faster. The young man
came from a respected and affluent
Prague family, but he had abandoned
the career of businessman that his
parents expected him to follow and
opted instead for the world of theatre.
While courting Olga he was celebrating his first success with a theatre
revue celebrating the Czechoslavonic
Ethnographic Exhibition, that year’s
Otto Faster in an arranged photograph, during his recovery from a serious
bout of pneumonia in an Upper Austrian spa near Ebensee
The media
The always energetic journalist absorbed in the daily press
“As a journalist, you were creative
in the best sense of the word,
blazing an independent, successful
new trail, so your work was also
progressive”
From a citation in honour of Czech
journalist Olga Fastrová (1876 – 1965)
on her sixtieth birthday
most popular attraction in Prague.
He began to help produce the leading
theatre magazine Thalia, which he
soon took over completely, but at no
profit to himself.
T
he unemployed Olga Fastrová
began helping her husband in his work
– she took responsibility for Thalia’s
paperwork and subsequently helped in
a variety of ways in the production of
the periodical Divadelní listy (Theatre
Journal), which her husband had
founded. She saw to the accounts as
well and watched helplessly as her
husband sunk what was left of his
inherited wealth in the money-losing
magazine. In 1907, just when it was
finally beginning to do better, he died
at the age of 35 from tuberculosis.
Fastrová was left alone, with three
daughters. To support them she would
have to get busy. While her husband
was still alive she had begun to contribute to Divadelní listy with reviews
of Prague premieres, reports on the
German-language theatre in Prague
and premieres in Austria and in Paris,
feuilletons, portraits of actors and
obituaries. In 1904 she edited the new
fortnightly Vesna, focusing on the
problems of Czech women. She translated from French and German; besides novels and short prose works she
Olga F. as a widow with her three daughters (after
1907, in J. Schumpeter‘s studio in Prague-Vinohrady)
also translated and adapted more than
forty plays.
Even so it was mainly financial reasons that transformed her in 1907 into
Yvonna. Under her elegant new pseudonym Fastrová added a new column
entitled “Fashion” to the conservative
daily Narodní politika (National Politics). It soon became very popular:
Yvonna’s column was a must for any
woman who wanted to be chic and
elegant in Prague. The whole feminine
world read her articles about the latest
news from Paris, the fashion capital of
Europe. The rationally-minded journalist, however, was the last one to
approve of women spending too much
of the family budget on female vanity.
The articles in her column put the
practical perspective first, a priority
clearly reflected in the title of one
of her lectures for the Central Association of Czech Women: “Fashion
and taste, harmony in the family
income”.
I
n 1908 she began editing a magazine entitled Česká domácnost (The
Czech Household); a year later she
took on Dámské besedy (Ladies’ Discussions). When she became a regular
member of the editorial board at Národní politika in 1910, she also became the first woman to enter the pro-
Olga F. with her daughter Ludmila in the French Alps on the Mer de Glace glacier near Chamonix, July 1926
37
With friends in the famous Prague Functionalist café Mánes, May 1941 (Olga F. at right, beneath the star)
fession in the Czech-speaking world,
the archetypal Czech woman journalist. For 27 years she edited the Sunday
supplement. Besides the “Fashion”
section, she introduced right at the
beginning the first regular column
devoted to social issues from a female
perspective and wrote her own feuilletons. Her columns were among the
paper’s most widely read.
S
omewhat paradoxically, Olga
Fastrová won her greatest fame in a
field that she only entered into in
order to make a living, and one that
did not reflect her highest literary
aspirations: her novels and stories,
mostly autobiographical in nature,
were by no means ground-breaking,
and from the literary point of view
none of them rose above the conventional. But with the introduction of
a new women’s section in Národní
politika she not only became one of
the most prominent reporters at the
most widely-read newspaper at that
time. She also became the fashion
dictator of the age, so to speak. The
foremost literary critics of the day
praised her feuilletons, in which they
espied talent and a ready pen; they
bowed to the power of her personality
and the courage with which she “so
smoothly, elegantly and humorously”
38
braved the vicissitudes of life with
her children.
Under other circumstances the world
of fashion would have interested her
little more than life on the Moon.
However, as a passionate traveller she
saw in Paris that the subject of fashion
was becoming an integral part of the
newspapers there. Here was an opportunity to make a living and get ahead.
She was the first in the Czech lands
to write regularly about fashion and
she lived to see the day when no daily
newspaper could get by without a fashion section. However, popularity has
always had its flip side. The name
A portrait photograph from J. Schumpeter’s studio
Yvonna became almost a literary stereotype, characterizing a certain era and
a certain social class. The emerging
high-spirited Bohemian avant-garde
saw in her a perfect target for satire
and caricature. But the song mentioned
at the beginning of this article was
not the only shot taken at her from
the cabarets. For a long time she also
served as an object of ridicule on the
part of those with an aversion to things
new. Where needed, however, the
always sophisticated Fastrová was
able to face down the jeers without
flinching: an inappropriate jest at her
expense by Karel Hašler in her presence at Prague’s Cabaret Montmarte
she brushed off with the remark:
“You’re not a man, you’re a street
urchin. Smacking you in the face
would be like giving a medal to you.”
Her friend Ema Destinnová also
encouraged her to look on the funny
side of things when she wrote from
London, “Don’t get angry if someone
barks at you from time to time,”
humorously adding some lines from
the Czech poet Viktor Dyk: “Rabid
beast, coming after me, barking, barking – so bark! You’re a dog!”
Petra Štěpánková-Ježková
Department for Czech Theatre Studies
Theatre Institute, Prague
Photos: Archives of the Museum of Czech
Literature in Prague