Petr Král

"That year, it was kind of amusing because I went along with the times in a way. I just went through it. On Wenceslas Square, armored personnel carriers marked with VB [Public Security] were driving out of Opletalova Street. I counted about 22 of them. The police vans were already lining up near the National Museum, along with units in white helmets, carrying shields and batons. But I had to get back to work, so I did. After work, I walked past the Children’s House towards Hybernia and then to Karlín. The trams weren’t running, so I had to walk. Near the Children’s House, I lingered for a bit. At the corner of Wenceslas Square near Melantrich, there was a cordon of People’s Militia and police. People were whistling and shouting insults at them. I wanted to go home, so I turned around, and suddenly, I saw people running past me. It didn’t occur to me to run too, even though some shots were fired—yes, that’s true—but I didn’t think of running. I was heading home, walking away with my back turned, and out of nowhere, I got a hard whack with a baton on my back. I can still feel it to this day. At that moment, I turned into Jarmila Kratochvílová [Czechoslovak Olympic sprinter]. I think I broke her Olympic record, even though I was running in low shoes. Then I was just flying. I didn’t let them catch me. We didn’t stop until somewhere near Hybernia. My back was really hurting, so I decided to head home."

"They were regular customers, my friends. When someone shops with you all year long, how could you not set aside a Hrabal book, some poetry, or something like that for them? I hated it. For example, Ota Pavel’s works would come out. If your shop received 22 copies, you had to serve seven libraries, four so-called literary distributors who sold them in factories, so how many would be left for the store? And then you had, I don’t know, sixty regular customers... It was absolutely crazy for me—it was a nightmare, a trauma. But that’s just how it was back then. Those books couldn’t be published in larger print runs because the publishers were allocated quotas for each title. Priority was given to the kind of engaged literature, the socialist realism, which we had sitting on the shelves but which I, of course, avoided ordering whenever possible. So, those would end up in the warehouses instead."

"It's true that there were specialists who were eavesdropping and typing it straight onto a typewriter. The Russians were there eavesdropping. Those were interesting, those soldiers didn't know any languages, they just had a tape recorder with a reel where there was some special wire on which to record it. This reel had twenty-four hours on it, and then there was one person, he was a lieutenant, who was a linguist, and he would play it back and define these things in some way. So there was a kind of collaboration. Otherwise, when they went out on exercises, the Russians got Czech uniforms, but they were dilettantes, they didn't take the plates off their cars, the license plates, so if there was a spy there, he must have known it was from the Russians. In addition, they were certainly talking in Russian between those reconnaissance vehicles and those spotters. Well, let's be honest..."

"My grandfather's name was Josef Holeček, he was a builder and he worked as a builder during the war - and our parents went there too - in Persia. He worked for the Konstruktiva company, and the company there was building for Reza Shah Pahlavi's elder silo, roads, bridges and so on. Then when the situation there changed, that his son dethroned him because he was German and the son was the other way round, the Russians came in from above and the English from below. The company changed a little bit into the Škoda factory in Pilsen, but they continued the construction and my grandfather worked there as a builder. But he got sick and died. He's buried there and his grave is still being maintained. It is maintained by the Czech consulate, which is there."