Jaroslav Šebek

“We may have been in tears from all the anger. We were young, full of optimism, wanted to do it. So we carried on. Junák was dissolved and our division came to an agreement at the Christmas meeting that it would cease activities which it did. We shared our things, some documents were made. We split up. But even before we weren’t able to get to our clubhouse. They didn’t want to get it open for us because it was in the Boleslav distillery. There was a gatehouse through which we had to pass. And probably the director of the factory gave an instruction not to let us in because they were already handing the possessions to the Pionýr. We were angry about it and so a couple of us decided to carry on scouting. We even published the magazine Junáček. We didn’t have too many ideas, it was all inside us. We even called our club Psohlavci [Dogheads] and as an enblem used part of what Svojsík had Mikoláš Aleš draw for him. So we edited it to get an emblem. And we ran the scout on our own.”

“Obviously, to show some loyalty, we took part in the 1 May march. This is where it begun. It was 1 May 1985 and we marched in our uniforms. On top of it we wore green scarves. And we walked with the march through what was called the Heroes of Socialist Work Square. Amazing name. There was a platform there with all those comrades. This is where the march stopped. We also stopped, around thirty of us. We all looked alike and there was no one else like us there except for the nurses-to-be. Suddenly a guy ran in from the sidewalk. He burst into us and began shouting: ‘Scouts, hooray, scouts!’ Immediately, two policemen dragged him back into the crowd so we don’t know what followed. I said: ‘This will be trouble.’”