Emilie Šťastná

* 1947

  • “We arrived to London and immediately went straight to our embassy to find out what was going on. And that's where it happened. Because I said, it was rather related to Ukraine; it really is now so closely related. Because the embassy had endless lists of addresses of people who gave their phone numbers, they wrote how many people they were willing to accommodate in their homes. And, there were hundreds of them. Oh, and they told us at the embassy that under no circumstances can we return home, that the borders were occupied. Then it was still kind of like a rumour, it wasn't entirely true, but then again it was neither too exaggerated. Because they said that we could not return home under any circumstances, as the border was occupied. And they told us at our embassy in London that everyone who returns from the West goes to an internment camp. That the Russians will immediately shove everyone returning from the West into an internment camp. Sure we were scared.”

  • “And on the morning of August 22nd, they were banging on our miniature tent, so I climbed out and said, 'What's going on?' And she shoved the radio at me. They had such a small transistor and she pushed the radio towards me and looked very scared. I kind of laughed. And my husband said, 'What's going on?' I say, 'Well, they're showing us the radio; I guess you think we don't know the transistor, yeah.' I was joking and I got out. And she started hugging me and started crying. And I was like, 'Well, what's going on?' And she kept pushing the radio to my ear. And there I heard: 'Prague. Russian occupation. Prague. Russian...' I said: 'Something is happening, get out. There's probably a war here.' Because we did not speak any English, we were nothing like... I was just talking to the Russians about Prague, there is probably fighting there. Let´s go.”

  • “And that's been an extremely, rather exciting and traumatic year for us. My husband and I met for the first time, we were not yet married, but we were both students. In the year 1968, it really was such a spring, as there was a great liberation period, suddenly one could simply travel a little to the West, which was practically impossible until then. They were... the atmosphere got more relaxed that after many years there was a Majáles again in Prague attended for example by the American beatnik poet Ginsberg. And it was really such a relaxed time, and we were expecting even better times to come.”

  • Celé nahrávky
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    Veltrusy, 09.03.2022

    (audio)
    délka: 50:35
    nahrávka pořízena v rámci projektu The Stories of Our Neigbours
Celé nahrávky jsou k dispozici pouze pro přihlášené uživatele.

At the embassy in London we were told that everyone returning from the West goes to an internment camp

Emilie Šťastná (en)
Emilie Šťastná (en)
zdroj: archiv pamětnice

Emilie Šťastná was born on October 26, 1947 in Kralupy nad Vltavou. In 1965, she began studying at the 1st Faculty of Medicine of the Charles University. In 1968 she and her boyfriend arranged a foreign exchange loan and went to France and England for the summer. On August 21, they were at the far end of Scotland and learned about the occupation of Czechoslovakia in the camp. They went to the London embassy, through which they managed to find accommodation with a London doctor. Finally, they stayed in London until October 1968, after which they decided to return to Czechoslovakia. Following her studies, Emilie worked as a doctor. In 2022, she lived in Veltrusy in the Mělnik region.