Jaroslav Kukol

“I went to Praha. And finding anything about them wasn´t so easy. I would hear some names and addresses on the Radio Free Europe. So I wrote down the address where Marta Kubišová lived, who was Charter 77´s spokeswoman back then. I found where she lived and I saw that the house was under surveillance, but I went inside, I found the flat and I would knock and ring at the door. But no one would open. Then some old woman would show up, telling me that there were less secret police men than usual so Mrs Kubišová might have left for her summer house. So I left without achieving anything. It might have been in 1978. It was in 1980 when I got the address where Honza Litomský had been living, who had been prosecuted by the Secret Police and later was the Charter 77´s spokesman. So I went to see him. He had been living in the village of Vyskytná near Jihlava. His father would open the door and he would tell me that Honza was at work at the coop and he would come late. So I went to Pelhřimov and came back later. And I remember that I would wait in a nearby woods so it would get dark. Then I would ring at his door again and this time he would be at home. So I would tell him my story and state that I wanted to sign the Charter. So I became the Charter 77 signatory”

"As boys we would have these wooden gallows in the square in Opava and we would hang Mr Biľak. Him being a rag doll with a sign 'We would hang Biľak by the cock' on it. Also me and my brother-in-law would take down traffic signs. And people would support us of course. First came the Poles, the Russians would show up later. And they would set a camp by the graveyard, they might have had maybe twenty tanks. And as it was hot they would sleep in them. And we would go there trying to explain them what was going on here. Still they didn´t believe us. They were convinced that there was a revolution going on. And they would tell us: 'We wouldn´t shoot at you if you wouldn´t attack us. If you would, we will open fire.'”