"There were referendums where we lived. For example, whether the athletic track should be equipped with some additional facilities, or whether the retirement home needs to be expanded. I didn't understand that these things were decided by the people who lived in that village or town. They elect their teacher and the teacher is paid by that municipality, and of course he is controlled, it's the same as the police officers. It all happened locally, and I felt unequipped to do that, even though I didn't have the right yet, to sort out how the Swiss could make the decisions until I understood that this is the right thing to do, that it's about the quality of the people. They end up deciding to raise their taxes locally to pay for a better swimming pool, and then they take care of it. So the system that's set up there was huge schooling for me, which I resolved to apply at least in part here years later when I came back here, in that the decision-making on those things needed to be done at the local level, first and foremost."
"In the morning, around nine o'clock at breakfast, the radio announced that the first train to České Budějovice and beyond was leaving at noon. A radio notice on about the option [to emigrate]. I understood this was the opportunity to leave. I had a moped, we got on the moped - and we went to Smíchov. I had an hour to pack my stuff for the rest of my life. The first thing I got was my red diploma, a couple of books I liked, two or three shirts, and the little suitcase was full. The fellow we were sitting with said, 'Hey, I have a family, I can't. The only thing I can give you is fifty dollars, yeah, that's all.' I didn't have any savings. We went everywhere and the banks were closed, so I had no money. I left with this briefcase, a red diploma and fifty dollars. That was the beginning for me. My girlfriend, later wife, had her suitcase packed swiftly as well. Without saying goodbye, we got to the main station and took the first train that left. We went to Budějovice where we changed trains. I remember exactly where I had my last 'svíčková' beef; I know where the restaurant was. In the afternoon, we got on a motor unit going south, to the border. There was a group like on that train, pretending to be tourists - in short, we were scared. We were going with the intention of leaving, which was illegal. We were approaching the border with breaks, it got dark, and at about nine o'clock in the evening I remember that we were stopped about three kilometres from the border and couldn't ride any further. We got out and in that book way, somebody with a flashlight, just walked, the thirty of us. Someone led the way and we walked to the border with our suitcases and the uncertainty of whether the border would be open. Will they catch us or not... The danger wasn't real; nothing happened, but experiencing it with that uncertainty was part of the process."
"One wartime experience I fully remember was in the spring of 1945, when I was five years old. The Allied fighters started sweep-bombing freight trains 'parked' around Řevnice. The air raids caused our apartment to be hit by machine gun shells, as we lived at the train station, so we spent about ten days in the basement. I remember the darkness and - I would say - the fear of what would happen to us. Then they moved us across the river to the other side, where there were five families together in this little villa. I remember two families' cupboards being in the kitchen and so on. That was the kind of the pressure due to war effort, which culminated with the arrival of the American army in Řevnice. That was a moment I remember fondly because it was the vanguard of that American army from Plzeň that ventured towards Prague, and a number of soldiers arrived on trucks. My dad came to show me, I remember the soldiers took me on that truck amd gave me American chocolate, the taste of which I still remember, because it influenced me then, and it was such a feeling of relief. This continued because in the meantime the Russian soldiers came to Řevnice. My father was communicative and knew German and, for some reason, understood some Russian, so a high officer of the Russian army came to our place. That is, he lived there for about two days. I saw that this was a danger for my mother because there were, shall we say, indirect attempts on the part of the soldier, so I was afraid of what might happen. Somehow dad juggled it okay and nothing happened, but it was such a feeling of great uncertainty."
Petr Jan Kalaš was born in Prague on 17 February 1940. He spent the early years of his life in Řevnice near Prague where he experienced Allies‘ air raids at the end of the war. He lived in Libouchec in the Ústí Region from 1946 to 1954. Later on, he lived with his family in Kutná Hora where he completed high technical school of industrial engineering. He studied economics and energy at the then Faculty of Economic Engineering of the Czech Technical University from 1958. Between 1964 and 1965, he worked as an operating engineer at the Tušimice thermal power plant. In 1968, he became a member of the Club of Committed Non-Partisans (KAN). He left the country for Austria immediately after the invasion of the Warsaw Pact troops in 1968. He eventually settled in Switzerland. There, he worked as an international consultant in sixty-five countries on several continents for 18 years. From 1986 to 1994, he worked for the Swiss Ministry of Foreign Trade, coordinating cooperation with Central and Eastern European countries. Later he worked for the World Bank, including the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol on the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. From 1991 to 1994, he coordinated Swiss technical assistance in the field of the environment to Central European countries. From 2004, he worked as a consultant for the United Nations Institute for Education and Research. From September 2006 to January 2007, he served as the Czech Minister of the Environment. In the following years he worked as an advisor and consultant in the state administration for energy, environment and climate and as an advisor to several Prime Ministers and Ministers. He received a French national sustainability award. He lived in Prague in 2024.
Hrdinové 20. století odcházejí. Nesmíme zapomenout. Dokumentujeme a vyprávíme jejich příběhy. Záleží vám na odkazu minulých generací, na občanských postojích, demokracii a vzdělávání? Pomozte nám!
