Anna Stibalová

* 1956

  • „In August 1968, I was in Perštejn, it was the holidays, we were running around outside. And when we found out what was happening and the adults were running that there was probably going to be a war, I ran to my mother at work to see if anything was needed. Well, she sent me to the store to buy flour, sugar, butter, just in case, to have it at home. And then she calmed me down, saying, 'Stay home and don't worry about it.'“

  • „So when Chernobyl exploded, I guess it was in April 1986. And at that time I was in the maternity hospital in Ústí and we actually learned about it from the doctors, because they forbade us to drink milk. And it's because the radiation actually gets to the meadows and the cows eat it with the grass and the radiation gets into the milk. And otherwise from the radio, but we learned almost nothing about that.“

  • „I'll go back to 1968. I didn't experience it that much, but actually my older siblings did. The oldest, she was already working in a porcelain factory at the time, and I remember she ran up the stairs and ran into her parents' bedroom, turned on the radio. And it was sometime around half past five and there was a report that Russian troops had attacked us. And I know that my sister was terribly afraid that there would be a war, because she wanted to get married that year. On August 1, 1968, the brother enlisted in the army. So the parents were very worried about that too. He was at Klatov's and they were actually buried there, they had a light cannon ready, dad was there to look at it. So they were afraid that he wouldn't have to enlist in Russia, because there, like some soldiers, they actually left for the Soviet Union. And the younger one, the youngest of the three, was in Ostrava at the time and had terrible problems getting home. Because in Prague's main station, everything was jammed, trains weren't running, so that was the parents' biggest fear. I didn't experience it, I am, at the age of twelve, you know nothing. But I know that, like the mother, she was afraid, and until the sister came home, she probably didn't even sleep. So it was the year 1968, that was the bad part.“

  • Celé nahrávky
  • 1

    Jirkov, 10.11.2022

    (audio)
    délka: 44:31
    nahrávka pořízena v rámci projektu The Stories of Our Neigbours
Celé nahrávky jsou k dispozici pouze pro přihlášené uživatele.

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Anna Stibalová in 2022
Anna Stibalová in 2022
zdroj: Post Bellum

Anna Stibalová, née Žvaková, was born on January 30, 1956 in Kadaň. She spent her childhood with her three siblings in nearby Perštejn. Her parents came from the Hlučínsko region; mother Cecílie Žvaková was totally deployed during the war, father Viktor Žvak had to enlist in the German army. In August 1968, the witness was only twelve years old, so she did not experience the invasion of the Warsaw Pact troops so much, but she perceived the ever-present fear of war and also her parents‘ concerns about her three siblings. She graduated from a high school of agriculture, after a year of working on a state farm, she started working for the national committee in Kadaň and later moved to Chomutov. In 1986, when the Chernobyl nuclear power plant exploded, Anna was in the maternity ward. There, the doctors forbade the mothers to drink milk so that they would not be affected by the radiation that could enter the milk. She learned about the events of November 17 and the subsequent events from her colleagues and also from the Voice of America and Svobodná Evropa radio stations. In 2022, she lived in Jirkov, near Chomutov.