1971 was also my first visit to the Czech Republic. My parents fled in 1950, and it was the first time they were permitted to come back on a visa as US citizens. My memories are more of family members I was meeting for the first time and grandparents whom I got to see for the second time in my life. (They were permitted to visit us once they were old and defection was no longer an economic loss to the state). Over the years I made a number of visits. There is simply no comparison between the dreary, oppressive socialist years and those of restored liberty. Before WWII, this was a highly educated and industrialized nation in the heart of Europe. The losses under socialism were great on many levels. Productive enterprises were expropriated or destroyed, families torn apart, historic structures demolished or neglected until they collapsed, young people denied higher education. The list goes on. Unfortunately, many of these injustices cannot be resolved during our earthly lives. I hope justice will be served in the next world.
Sorry about your unpronounceable last name. (Just kiddin, I got one of those too.)
I love the Czech Republic which I visited several times in the past decade to see my pal who had defected from there in 1968. Unfortunately, he decided to return again to Switzerland, for, he says, political reasons, though I suspect family reasons, and he’s now appearing internationally under a Germanized name, unrelated phonetically to his Czech name. Go figure. The Czechs will recover.
Ciao Think free,
Visiting parents, you got to see the real deal, I just went on a school organized trip from Heidelberg, Germany as a tourist.
But shortly after the fall of Communism, I worked in many places in Czech Republic and even lived for a period in Slovakia so I breathed in the spirit of freedom, the happiness and also many of the troubles of the transformation. Both countries hold a special place in my heart.
The Czechs have a delightful figure called Jara Cimrman (the man who invented everything, but invariably showed up 5 minutes late at the patent office). The fictional character was voted their greatest national hero.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J%C3%A1ra_Cimrman#Greatest_Czech_contest
And in the same poll, the “worst Czech” was the Communist dictator Klement Gottwald (who like Lenin was put on permanent display after his death, except they botched the embalming and he turned black!)
Merry Christmas
Vessili Vianoce (or something like that)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Klement_Gottwald#After_Gottwald
To my mind it shows what sort of crazy and poetic people they are.