Mgr. Jan Staša

“For me, and for all teachers who were Catholics or who believed at all and attended church, it was bad. They required us to leave the church, to bring [the children] up in Marxism-Leninism, to participate in trainings and to join work groups. That was extra labour for no pay. But we needed the certificate from the agricultural co-op or the town council for the education department, showing we had taken part in the work group. But I remained faithful to my beliefs even so, and I never stopped going to church. I went there publicly with my whole family. When I taught in Nivnice, the headmaster, and in fact all the teachers were already done with the Church, and they didn’t go to Mass.”

“Jenda Smetka and I travelled to Kroměříž to do the exams there for the archiepiscopal grammar school. Our dads took us there. We came there, and I gaped at the school like at an apparition, because I’d never seen such a building in my life. It’s an enormous institution next to the Kroměříž palace, they’re connected by an overhead corridor. And the gardens are right behind it. We went in through the main entrance, the nuns were there, they welcomed us. Our dads had to stay in the visiting room by the main gate. One of the teachers came for us and took us upstairs to one of the classrooms. I didn’t know anyone, just Jenda Smetka. I saw how some of them were shaking with fear, some were red, some were white. Altogether some thirty students sat there, all boys.”

“Lieutenant Bauer had us line up, and he asked: ‘Who can play a musical instrument?’ And that those of us who had a musical instrument at home would get leave to go home for it, and that we’d put a band together. We started looking one at the other, and then we broke out laughing. No one volunteered, so the lieutenant said: ‘I don’t believe it that none of you ever played anything. I’m serious!’ A few boys raised their hands. Later we found out that some of those who signed up didn’t actually have an instrument and didn’t know how to play. When they came back without an instrument, they were put in the locker for punishment. And those who had an instrument began rehearsing. I didn’t sign up. I thought it’d be some kind of trickery. As is usually the case in the army - they sign up, and then they get sent to peel potatoes. But I had played back at home. When the band began rehearsing, I started to take an interest. I went to have a look, they were rehearsing some piece and there were some higher notes in it. One trumpeter wasn’t able to play them. ‘Give it here, I’ll try it,’ I told him. I enjoyed the heights. I played it, and the company commander happened by just then and heard me trumpeting. He asked me why hadn’t I signed up. I said I had an instrument, but back home. He gave me a pass, it was right for Christmas, so I went home for the trumpet. Then I started playing with them.”

“Our village was fought over for a whole week. It lies on a plain. Towards the end of the village there was something of a market place, Zelničky it was called, and the Germans constructed several machine-gun nests there. They could see out on the approximately one-kilometre wide plain. No one could get there in the day because as soon as someone moved, the machine guns let rip. In the evening when it got dark, they couldn’t see, and back then they didn’t yet have binoculars with night vision. We had about six families hidden in the cellar with us. It was about nine o’clock and my friend ran up: ‘Staša, the Romanians are here!’ We turned round and saw a group of some five six soldiers standing behind him. So we greeted them. They told us: ‘Hitler kaput! Viktoria!’ So we welcomed them with smiles and handshakes. We couldn’t speak. We gave them wine. Dad gave one twenty-five-litre barrel. It was gone in a moment.”

“When I was in my last year at the teachers’ institute, before my graduation exams, I had a crazy idea, which was to organise an ethnographic exhibition in the institute’s assembly hall. I went back to Hroznová Lhota and brought with me various painted and carved pieces of furniture, antique and new, various embroidery, ceramic products and glass paintings, spinning wheels, parts of folk costumes, and so on. All the schools in Kroměříž - and there were a lot of schools there, Kroměříž is called the Moravian Athens - visited the exhibition, and even schools from the surrounding area. And the public, of course. The entrance fee was optional. The exhibition was a tremendous success. And because I was the organiser and I had also been there in costume with the girls for the opening, I suddenly became amazingly popular both with the teachers, and with the students and the public.”