Jaroslav Čvančara

”Growing up in Žižkov meant that one of the most frequent topics of home conversation used to be the time of the war and the time of persecution that followed Reinhard Heydrich’s assassination in 1942. Especially since our relatives lived in Biskupcova Street where some of the supporters of the paratroopers had lived during the war. We also had a book called ‘Shadow Behind Heydrich’ written by Andrejs. As I grew older I started to be interested in these things more and more. After reading the book again, many questions emerged. For example, why and how were our three relatives shot during the Heydrich terror. One day I met the author of the book and he warned me that the interest in this subject could be like a drug and that it would never let me go again. Of course he was right. I don’t regret it though. I have met many great people who were arrested or otherwise oppressed during the old regime and I have learnt a lot about their lives. I also got to know several people whom I admired at first but later found them to be dangerous confidents working for the Gestapo or the StB. However, back then I was naive and only had a vague idea about how things worked back then. It all revealed itself to me little by little as I dug deeper and deeper into the matter. I managed to get access to amazing archives, German, British, ours and many others.”

“Back then I didn’t even know if Foglar was still alive or not. I thought he was either in prison or had emigrated because every decent person seemed to be either in prison or out of the country, not to mention a person whom I had idolized - as a seven foot tall Rikitan, someone simply the best. My daddy somehow managed to get me Foglar’s address. This was in 1960. For several months I went there two or three times a week just wishfully thinking I might encounter Foglar himself. I knew he lived on the third floor but no one ever answered the door bell. One day – after the summer holiday - someone finally opened the door. It was his mother, Mrs. Foglar. She was very kind to me and told me to come back in two weeks. So I came back after two weeks and this time it was Foglar himself who opened the door. He was only a little bit taller than me, not exactly the seven foot tall Rikitan I imagined him to be. So I finally saw Foglar, around fifty years old at that time, basically an old man for me. But he was nice, he took me inside, showed me his room, signed a book I had brought with me and we naturally started to talk right away. In the end, he completely shocked me when he told me that the tourist troop Dvojka did actually exist and he even invited me to visit their clubroom. In a month, he wrote me a letter with instructions how to get there. Since I had to wait in Radlice for one of the members to pick me up, it really felt like I was going to some secret hideout. It sounded of conspiracy which I liked immensely”