"There was a regulation - I'm not sure if a written one or not - which prohibited wearing crosses. Some of the: 'Take it off!' and 'I won't!' took place. There were several conflicts and they were forced to take the crosses off and hide them in their pockets. But Pavel Kučírek was a believer, went to church and didn't wear the cross to show off - as every other person did back then - but as a real thing he believed in. Our headmaster Nerad got angry at him in the hallway and told him to take it off. Pavel replied that he won't and that it was his conviction. So Nerad grasped the cross and tore it off his neck."
"We called our headmaster Nerad Neřád ["Bastard"]. I think that Mirek was for him like a red rag for a bull, whenever he spotted him. Mirek hadn't provoked him but since he was standing tall above the headmaster in terms of intelligence and character, it was like the red rag."
At high school we were a great crew
Zuzana Tvrzská was born in 1955 in the city of Mladá Boleslav. She recalls the vast redevelopment of the town in the 1960s. She witnessed the invasion of the Warsaw Pact armies in 1968. At high school she encountered the strict headmaster Nerad who brought about a very stifling atmosphere. The enmity between the communist headmaster and the students culminated with the expulsion of Zuzana‘s friend Miroslav Jirounek from all high schools in the country.
