Bachelor Jiří Vondráček

"From those times when I was 12 or 13, I remember the 1968. It was a really strong experience. Parents did not want us to go anywhere at all. But I remember how mom ran across the ... and she went home and said 'Boys, war broke out!' And I, being twelve, said 'And who on Earth would attack us?' And she said: 'Russians.' And I replied: 'That's weird.' Because one was formed by the society even at twelwe, I could not grasp that the Russians attacked us, the Soviet Union. And that was possibly the moment when I started to follow the political and social affairs. Or maybe it was [at least] done subconsciously. [There is] one more memory: whem my father met his brother in Ledec nad Sazavou and they talked about it. As a boy, I listened to them. And my father said: 'You know, it's good but the Russians won't let go.'"

"I kept wondering what Russia is like, what the foreign countries are like and such things - and where is the truth? And my first journey abroad - it was our honeymoon - was to Russia. We went there with the Cedok travel agency. We went to the Caucasus Mountains and I got a clearer picture about a few of those surprising things. For example: Pig in harness or a biker in a .... At the airport, the bus stupped abruptly and there next to the airport, a pig ran across the road. Terrible water, mess everywhere and at the greengrocers', only cracked melons. Fights for coffee. On the reverse, beautiful nature in th Caucasus. Then we flew to Suchumi and there were some of those things I talked about. So I got some idea. When we had a layover in Kiyv, there we re those blocks of apartments with inner courtyards with tiled walls. When we looked in the courtyard, there were little sheds to store firewood from which antennas were sticking out. The windows had newspapers pasted over the glass. I know that it's been a long time since but I got my idea about that."