In 1993, Luboš’s mother moved to the United States on the advice of a friend. One year later, Luboš (who had been staying with his grandmother as his parents were divorced) joined her. He arrived in the Washington, D.C. area where his mother had first worked as a nanny and tutor, but when she found a new job, they moved to a suburb of Chicago. Two months later, they returned to D.C. and settled in Alexandria, Virginia, where Luboš started ninth grade. He says that because he was ahead of his classmates in most subjects, he was able to concentrate on improving his English. After high school, he attended Florida Institute of Technology for two years before transferring to Virginia Tech, where he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in aerospace engineering. Luboš lived in California for three years where he joined the Sierra Club and enjoyed hiking and climbing. He returned to Northern Virginia in 2008 to pursue his doctorate at George Washington University. Today Luboš works for NASA as an engineer and also runs his own computing consulting company. He is the creator of the web site SlovakCooking.com which shares traditional Slovak recipes. Luboš received his American citizenship in 2004, but says that he does not rule out the possibility of returning to live in Europe. He lives in Falls Church, Virginia, with his wife Sandra.
]]>Luboš Brieda was born in Brezno in central Slovakia in 1980 and grew up in nearby Banská Bystrica. His mother Katarina worked in the local dom kultury [House of Culture] as an event organizer and his father Peter was an economist who worked as a restaurant inspector. Following the fall of communism, Luboš’s father opened his own restaurant. Luboš’s family owned a chata, or cottage, in a village outside Banská Bystrica, and he has fond memories of spending weekends gardening and hiking. In 1989, Luboš recalls traveling to Prague with his father to witness the speeches and happenings of the Velvet Revolution. Luboš joined the Boy Scouts and attended a language-focused school where he studied English and German.
In 1993, Luboš’s mother moved to the United States on the advice of a friend. One year later, Luboš (who had been staying with his grandmother as his parents were divorced) joined her. He arrived in the Washington, D.C. area where his mother had first worked as a nanny and tutor, but when she found a new job, they moved to a suburb of Chicago. Two months later, they returned to D.C. and settled in Alexandria, Virginia, where Luboš started ninth grade. He says that because he was ahead of his classmates in most subjects, he was able to concentrate on improving his English. After high school, he attended Florida Institute of Technology for two years before transferring to Virginia Tech, where he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees in aerospace engineering. Luboš lived in California for three years where he joined the Sierra Club and enjoyed hiking and climbing. He returned to Northern Virginia in 2008 to pursue his doctorate at George Washington University. Today Luboš works for NASA as an engineer and also runs his own computing consulting company. He is the creator of the web site SlovakCooking.com which shares traditional Slovak recipes. Luboš received his American citizenship in 2004, but says that he does not rule out the possibility of returning to live in Europe. He lives in Falls Church, Virginia, with his wife Sandra.
“Since a lot of Slovaks live in apartments, the chata serves a lot of the purpose that, for Americans, a house serves. We have a garden, so you go there a do some gardening. You have some trees. But it’s really just to get away from the city, just to go and relax in the countryside. Slovaks love nature; we love to go hiking. I think that’s the most popular activity in Slovakia, just to go for a hike. We have these awesome mountains and people love to go hiking, skiing or mushroom picking. So it’s very popular to go out for the weekend to the countryside.
“So this place is pretty old. There’s actually a beam that’s in the new section of this chata that has carved on it, with some fire or whatever, 1891. So that’s when the new section of the house was built. The older part is much older than this. It’s from the 1800s sometime. There’s running water now. I think there was always running water. There was a studňa, a little pump, but I think now that is actually hooked up to the village water system. But we never had canalization, so we didn’t have a toilet, so there was just a little outhouse on the outside that you’d go to. It gets cold there in the winter; I remember going there in the winter. It takes these houses a long time to warm up, and then they stay warm. Once they warm up, they stay warm, but it takes a long time for them to actually warm up. And the water freezes in the winter, so you have to make sure to turn the water off.”
“Most of the demonstrations were in Prague and a little bit in Bratislava; there was really nothing at all in Banská Bystrica. But my dad, he saw the news, so he told me, ‘Luboš, this is a big event,’ so we got in the car and drove to Prague. We actually went over to Prague to check it out. We got there a little bit after the demonstration happened, but I remember going to the big outdoor pavilion in Prague and we went there and there was a speech there by Václav Havel. He was giving a speech there, and that was before he became the president, so it was in the transition era when the demonstrations have stopped, but the government was still in the transition to form this new post-communist government. But I remember going and I’m really grateful my dad took me there because it was such an important event, so it’s good to be part of that.”
“So when I came to the U.S., I found it ridiculous how far behind American schools were. I think in Slovakia we were maybe three years ahead of everybody here. When I came to the U.S., I had a really hard time with English, with the language, so it was a little bit difficult to go to school. But the upside was that all I had to concentrate on was the language because, the actual material, we already had covered that. In Slovakia, I left after the eighth grade, so in seventh and eighth grade we had one full year of organic chemistry, one full year of inorganic chemistry. We had a full year of biology, a full year of geology. We got up to trigonometry, so we covered all the basic algebra in the school and I remember coming here to the U.S. and we were just covering the Pythagorean theorem in the ninth grade, and we had this, I think, in the fifth grade in Slovakia. There was a lot of big differences in the speed with which you covered the material.”
“The web site was just kind of a way for me to collect my own recipes. I never expected it to be some kind of popular destination for people, and I was really surprised to find out just how many second-generation Slovaks there were in the U.S. that have interest in these forgotten recipes. I guess that is really who the site became for. A lot of people really appreciate it and I’m glad that they do. I constantly get these emails saying ‘I remember from my childhood my grandmother making some dish, but nobody ever wrote down the recipe and it has since been long forgotten and I thought I would never know this again and I found the recipe here on your site.’ So it helps a lot of people out in this sense.
“I would say the audience for this web site is really the American population, not really the Slovak population. Sometimes I get these emails from people in Slovakia and they’re writing ‘Why is this in English, not Slovak?’ and I’m like ‘Well, I’m not writing it for Slovak people.’ There are a million Slovak[-language] web sites out there. I’m really trying to show people not in Slovakia, people who are not already familiar with the Slovak cuisine, what Slovak cuisine is. Slovak cuisine is really unknown in the world. People don’t really know anything about it and part of the reason is simply because there’s such a lack of English-language literature, books, on Slovak cooking.”
In 1977, Luba began studying philosophy at the University of Leipzig. She says that her education was rather limited, as ‘everything was based on Marxism-Leninism’ and scholarly materials were not always available. During vacations, Luba worked as a tour guide for Čedok (then a state-run travel agency) and, in this capacity, was able to travel to Western countries on bus tours and cruise ships. Upon graduation, Luba began studying for her PhD at Comenius University in Bratislava and found a job at a library in a technical university. At this time she was also ‘determined to learn English’ and started taking private English lessons. In 1983, Luba met her future husband, Richard DeWitt, an American whose mother was from the neighboring village of Luba’s grandparents. The pair married in November of that year and Luba moved to Florida shortly thereafter.
Luba became an American citizen ‘as soon as it was possible,’ and she has fond memories of her naturalization ceremony, which took place on a presidential yacht in Biscayne Bay. After teaching history and social studies at several area high schools, Luba became a language professor at Florida International University and Miami Dade College. She has been a real estate agent in the Miami area for over a decade.
Recently Luba has become quite active with the American Czech-Slovak Cultural Club, sitting on the board and spearheading the refurbishment of the organization’s clubhouse. A dual citizen, Luba reads Slovak newspapers and continues to follow the politics of her home country; she says she is ‘very passionate about Slovak causes.’ Luba and Richard’s daughter is also a Slovak citizen. Today Luba lives with her husband in Coral Gables, Florida.
]]>Luba DeWitt was born in Nitra, a city in eastern Slovakia, in 1957. Her father, Michal, was a high-up intelligence official while her mother, Božena, was an office clerk in the police department. Luba lived with her mother and younger sister in Nitra and Banská Bystrica before settling in Bratislava, and often spent holidays in the village of Krtovce where her maternal grandparents lived. After going to elementary school in Banská Bystrica, Luba attended gymnázium in Bratislava. Her final year was spent at a school in the mountain town of Banská Štiavnica learning German and preparing to study abroad during university. Luba says that she made the decision to study abroad because she was somewhat unhappy and ‘wanted to experience something else.’
In 1977, Luba began studying philosophy at the University of Leipzig. She says that her education was rather limited, as ‘everything was based on Marxism-Leninism’ and scholarly materials were not always available. During vacations, Luba worked as a tour guide for Čedok (then a state-run travel agency) and, in this capacity, was able to travel to Western countries on bus tours and cruise ships. Upon graduation, Luba began studying for her PhD at Comenius University in Bratislava and found a job at a library in a technical university. At this time she was also ‘determined to learn English’ and started taking private English lessons. In 1983, Luba met her future husband, Richard DeWitt, an American whose mother was from the neighboring village of Luba’s grandparents. The pair married in November of that year and Luba moved to Florida shortly thereafter.
Luba became an American citizen ‘as soon as it was possible,’ and she has fond memories of her naturalization ceremony, which took place on a presidential yacht in Biscayne Bay. After teaching history and social studies at several area high schools, Luba became a language professor at Florida International University and Miami Dade College. She has been a real estate agent in the Miami area for over a decade.
Recently Luba has become quite active with the American Czech-Slovak Cultural Club, sitting on the board and spearheading the refurbishment of the organization’s clubhouse. A dual citizen, Luba reads Slovak newspapers and continues to follow the politics of her home country; she says she is ‘very passionate about Slovak causes.’ Luba and Richard’s daughter is also a Slovak citizen. Today Luba lives with her husband in Coral Gables, Florida.
“That’s probably the only place in Slovakia that has not changed. It remains always the same, and that reminds me very much of my childhood, of my happiest days. Perhaps they have internet nowadays but I doubt it, and people are still genuine and the same, and there is a road there and people probably have cars but there is still only the one shop, one pub. Nobody ever moves and the traditions remain, and I love that. There are very few places in the world that you can come and still find the same after many, many years away.”
Growing up there in the late ‘50s and early ‘60s, how equipped was that village then? It seems that things like electricity, etc., came quite late to parts of Czechoslovakia.
“I do remember, yes, they did not have electricity when I was little; we used candlelight. The water was pumped from the pumpa. The news was announced on the public loudspeakers. When the butcher came to town it was always announced – first it was a drummer announcing that; then later, when they brought the electricity, the loudspeakers were announcing that the butcher is coming to town. Now I think there is some kind of more sophisticated way to do it. People get newspapers and they have television.”
“We were one of the five families that were Lutheran. The majority of the population in the village were Catholics. We had our own bell tower; so when a child was born in a Lutheran family, the bells were ringing in the bell tower and when a child was born to Catholics, the church [bell] was rung. Or if somebody died… We were very proud of our bell tower. So when my husband’s mother died – she was originally from the village next door – we dedicated the bell tower to his mother and to my grandmother. So if you would go to our small village, there is a plaque remembering both.”
“Everything was based on Marxism-Leninism: interpretation of beautiful objects, the sciences, everyday life, psychology. Everything was based on Marxism-Leninism. And we did not have any access to literature that we would have a desire to read. At the university library in Leipzig, there was room called the ‘black room,’ and you had to have special permission from the head of your department to go and read the daily news, and, certainly, they had all the West German magazines and publications and so on. So no, it was not accessible.”
“I was absolutely determined that I was going to learn English, so I had hired a private teacher. It was a couple, Graham and Angela. They were British, and they were working at Comenius University teaching English and they needed extra income. So I hired them and I said ‘My goal in life right now is I must learn to speak English’ and they said ‘Alright.’ I gave them my entire salary. Whatever I was making, I gave it to them. I said ‘This is all that I have. I can’t pay you any more, but I’ve got to learn English.’”
Why were you so keen to learn English?
“I just felt that if I speak English I would have better opportunities in life, I would learn more, I would read more that’s not accessible, and, you know, ‘As many languages as you speak, so many times you are a human.’ I spoke a very basic, conversational English. After three months learning the language, I remember that Angela gave me a magazine, People magazine, and she ‘Read the article to see how far you are developing.’ I read the article – it was about the death of John Lennon – and I understood everything. It was like you were in the dark and suddenly light came about. It was wonderful, wonderful.”
“I was happy that the regime collapsed, of course, and that was because of my family. On the other hand, I was unhappy that the republic was divided into Czech [Republic] and Slovakia. There was no reason for it and the sad results of it too, because the Slovak nationalism developed in a quite awful way. That made me feel very sad about my people. But it was just beautiful for my family; I was very happy, of course, for all the struggling people that they would have a new life, better life, better opportunities. It was better for them.”
Jozef continues to write and play music; he recently put out a CD of Slovak songs and has performed at festivals. He is active in the Slovak community in New York and especially enjoys the Bohemian Hall and Beer Garden in Astoria, Queens. When Jozef travels back to Slovakia, he often meets with his siblings in the house their grandfather built and which Jozef has renovated. He became an American citizen in 2008 and says that the United States is where his heart is. Today he lives in New York City.
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Jozef Bil was born in Bartošovce in eastern Slovakia in 1961. He grew up with his grandparents, parents, two older sisters and an older brother. Jozef’s grandfather lived in the United States during the 1920s for about ten years and worked in the coal mines in Pennsylvania. He returned to Slovakia where he bought land and built a large farm. Jozef says that his grandfather’s stories about the United States planted a seed of emigration that stayed with him until he left Czechoslovakia in 1990. Jozef played guitar in a band for many years and says that he and his band mates often played English-language songs, even though they didn’t understand the lyrics. He attended a construction industry high school and served in the military for two years before beginning his career in construction. In 1990, shortly after the Velvet Revolution, Jozef immigrated to the United States with a friend. He lived in Pittsburgh for several years and worked in construction before moving to New York City. He became a construction supervisor and now owns a general contracting company.
Jozef continues to write and play music; he recently put out a CD of Slovak songs and has performed at festivals. He is active in the Slovak community in New York and especially enjoys the Bohemian Hall and Beer Garden in Astoria, Queens. When Jozef travels back to Slovakia, he often meets with his siblings in the house their grandfather built and which Jozef has renovated. He became an American citizen in 2008 and says that the United States is where his heart is. Today he lives in New York City.
States back in the ‘20s. He spent nine or ten years in the coal mines in Pennsylvania and he was trying to get my grandmother to come to America, but she was afraid to make the journey, so he came back. He would speak in Slovak and he would use English words; you know, you spend time in America, you kind of get confused. So he would tell me ‘Syn moj, Ty ked vyrasties len chod do Ameriky, keby si vedel ake tam maju velke buildingy.’ I’d say, ‘Ok, but what is buildingy?’ I had no clue as a child. So he explained what a building is. He just said ‘When you grow, my son, don’t stay here, just go to America. If you only saw what big buildings they have!’ Or another sentence that puzzled me was ‘If you go to America…’ Obviously he was speaking in Slovak: ‘Keby si vedel ake tam maju velke cary.’ I said ‘What the hell is cary?’ Well, he was referring to cars. So that was the idea that stuck in my mind and he kind of injected the temptation in my head. So I was growing up and I was thinking always ‘One day I am going to go there and see what America is all about.”
“As a child growing up in a small village, life was very happy, merry. The only thing we had to play with was outside, not like the children of today [with] computers and all that stuff. So we’d run with the ball, we’d play soccer and all kind of playing that kids would do outside as all kinds of after-school activities.”
Did you grow up in a house or an apartment?
“My grandfather, rest in peace, he returned from America as a rich man so he bought a lot of land. He was a big farmer; he had six horses, four cows… It was like owning a Mercedes at the time. He built a house that is still on the same property, which I fixed as a memory to him. Nobody lives there, but my sister spends summers over there and that house is a memory to all of us. I have three siblings, a brother and two sisters, so whenever I come to Slovakia we always gather there and we pull out pictures of our childhood and we’re laughing our tails off.”
“When I finished my school and started working the state-run construction industry, okresný štátny podnik as they called it. The vice-president comes to me one day and says to me ‘You are a young prospective talent; we want you in the Party,’ and I said ‘I go to church.’ And he’s like ‘So?’ ‘Well, I go to church, so I can’t serve two masters. I believe in God, so I cannot believe in Lenin or whatever.’ He had a smirk on his face. He wouldn’t bother me; he saw that he wouldn’t get me there.”
Weren’t you afraid?
“No. It was my persuasion; it was my belief. I had my education, I had my work, I wasn’t afraid of being in jail because I wasn’t a rebel, I was part of the masses that were part of the regime or ruling party, so I told them straight ‘No. Don’t even bother coming back because I’m not signing. I have no reason.’ There were cases, I know, where there were guys in the Communist Party and they were part of the church as well. So I was laughing. How can you be sitting on two chairs? I didn’t like the idea of somebody forces you into something and watching behind their back. It was just no. My answer was no.”
“I told him ‘I’m not going to settle down here because I know Czechoslovakia, Slovakia, is no place for me,’ and he was kind of upset about it because he saw other guys, 28 years old, settling down. I had a big place to build a house on and I said ‘I’m not going to waste my money and build a house because I don’t fit in here.’ As I said, that injection from my grandfather was always in the back of my mind. I want to see the world, I want to see America, and I came, I saw the light – it wasn’t easy at the beginning, but I saw the light at the end of the tunnel – and thank God I’m here, and I cannot even picture my life over there.”
“We wanted to go to the store and buy blue jeans. So I picked up the phone and I said ‘Hi Pam. Winter is coming; it’s cold outside. Could you come over and pick us up? We would like to buy a Rifle.’ Now, just to get you in the picture, Rifle was a brand of blue jeans in Slovakia and I didn’t know that blue jeans are blue jeans [in the U.S.]. It was a common thing to call blue jeans Rifles. So Pam says ‘What?’ ‘You know, it’s cold outside, we need to go out and we need to buy a Rifle.’ She says ‘Jozef, I don’t think so. It’s Sunday afternoon. I don’t think you can get a license to get a rifle.’ I said ‘A license to get a Rifle?’ She says ‘Jozef, this is America. You have to have a license to get a rifle.’ So I didn’t argue. I hung up and I tell my friend, ‘Listen, either Pam is crazy or I’m crazy. She says we need to get a license to get a Rifle.’ My friend says ‘She’s nuts. Let me see.’ So he looks up the dictionary and he says ‘Rifle. Blue jeans. Oh my God.’ So I’m calling back, ‘Pam, listen. We need to clarify something. Rifle is a brand of blue jeans in Czechoslovakia.’ We had a couple of them: Wildcat, Rifle… And she started cracking up: ‘What kind of language do you guys use in Czechoslovakia that you call blue jeans rifles?’ So whenever I pick up the phone and call her office [she says] ‘Jozef, you want to buy a rifle?’ So the language barrier and all that stuff, we’ve all been through and sometimes it’s funny how people confuse things.”
“Well, they say home is where your heart is and I believe my heart is in America. What proves that is when I’m coming back from Slovakia or travels, on my way from JFK, sitting in a taxi, I feel I am coming home. So I guess my home is here and I feel more Slovak-American because you still have feelings for the country you came from. But this country gave me the opportunity to live a better life and, yes, I’m calling it my home.”
Jana received a degree in physical therapy from a vocational school and, in 1975, began studying psychology at Charles University. Jana says that in order to be accepted, she applied for membership in the Communist Party; however, her application was not processed. She received her degree in 1979 and, in January 1980, she and Vladimir traveled to London for two weeks. When they were not granted asylum there, on the way home, the pair got off the train in Munich and went to the American Embassy. Jana and Vladimir were granted asylum and found an apartment; Jana says that she loved their time in Munich. When they received permission to immigrate to the United States, Jana was eight months pregnant. Their son Jan was born in September 1981. Eight months later in April 1982, the Pochops flew to Atlanta, Georgia. Jana stayed with Jan in Atlanta for six weeks while Vladimir found a job and a place to live in California. Once settled in Mountain View, California, Jana says that the language barrier was very difficult for her. She took many ESL classes and raised her sons (Martin was born in 1984) speaking English in order to improve her own language skills. In 1990, the Pochops returned to Czechoslovakia for the first time and Jana was able to retrieve her transcript from the vocational school she had attended for physical therapy. A few years later, she began working as a physical therapist at a hospital. In 2011, Jana completed a program in psychology at St. Mary’s College. As both of their sons now live in Prague, Jana and Vladimir have considered returning to the Czech Republic. Today, they live in Concord, California.
]]>Jana Pochop was born in Hořic v Podkrkonoší in northeastern Bohemia in 1947. She grew up on a farm in the village of Bukinova u Pecky with her parents, Jaroslava and Josef, and her two brothers and one sister. Jana says that her village was self-sustaining, but that after the farms were collectivized she remembers shortages of food and other goods. Because her father was in the hospital for several weeks, her farm was one of the last in the area to be collectivized. Jana attended elementary school in her village, but after fifth grade she had to travel to nearby towns. She says that high school was an especially difficult time as she struggled to balance travel, homework, and housework, and her mother was in the hospital. Her mother died when Jana was 16. After graduating high school, Jana attended the Institute of Chemical Technology in Prague for one year. She returned home to help take care of the farm for one year and then moved to Hradec Králové where she worked in the accounting office of a company that brought entertainment from Prague to the city. In 1970, Jana married Vladimir Pochop, whom she had known since she was 16, and moved to Prague.
Jana received a degree in physical therapy from a vocational school and, in 1975, began studying psychology at Charles University. Jana says that in order to be accepted, she applied for membership in the Communist Party; however, her application was not processed. She received her degree in 1979 and, in January 1980, she and Vladimir traveled to London for two weeks. When they were not granted asylum there, on the way home, the pair got off the train in Munich and went to the American Embassy. Jana and Vladimir were granted asylum and found an apartment; Jana says that she loved their time in Munich. When they received permission to immigrate to the United States, Jana was eight months pregnant. Their son Jan was born in September 1981. Eight months later in April 1982, the Pochops flew to Atlanta, Georgia. Jana stayed with Jan in Atlanta for six weeks while Vladimir found a job and a place to live in California. Once settled in Mountain View, California, Jana says that the language barrier was very difficult for her. She took many ESL classes and raised her sons (Martin was born in 1984) speaking English in order to improve her own language skills. In 1990, the Pochops returned to Czechoslovakia for the first time and Jana was able to retrieve her transcript from the vocational school she had attended for physical therapy. A few years later, she began working as a physical therapist at a hospital. In 2011, Jana completed a program in psychology at St. Mary’s College. As both of their sons now live in Prague, Jana and Vladimir have considered returning to the Czech Republic. Today, they live in Concord, California.
“We grew up on a very traditional farm, in a very traditional way. Most of the villagers were farmers; however, the village was self-sustained because there was a cluster of villages and every village had someone who did something. There was a dressmaker and a shoemaker and a cabinet maker and a baker, and there was a little church nearby and there was a priest and there was a school in the village, which was the grammar school, [grades] one to five. For middle school, [grades] six to nine, we had to go to the little town where the church was and the castle and the school. The only things we were buying were sugar, salt, yeast, and that’s about it. When the supply of meat ran out, then we sometimes went to the butcher in town and bought the meat for Sundays. Matter of fact, we were eating meat basically only on Sundays.”
“Until then, it was very traditional that people from the village were going to church, but when the so-called JZD [Jednotné zemědělské družstvo], collectivism, took place, the officials started to put pressure on people not to go to church, and if you went to church on Sundays they were threatening you that you won’t be allowed to study. So the people got threatened and so maybe the children stayed at home and the parents went only, or the children only who were planning to stay on the farm or go to vocational school, they were allowed to go. I was going until the eighth grade and then the communists came with a different idea of how to ruin the church and they relocated the local priests. They sent them to the communities where they were not known and new priests came, and it had a horrible impact on the whole church going and the church community, because people didn’t warm up to him. He was a stranger, he was different, he had different ideas of how to do things; he was a little prudish. He started to say what people should do; the other one was nicer. And at that time, I stopped going every Sunday. I was going on Easter and Christmas, but not often.”
“It was the best year of our lives. It was like a honeymoon, because we didn’t have any responsibility towards the family. We thought we had money. We lived as we lived very modestly, in a very tiny apartment. I mean, very tiny. It was a studio. But we were young, we made friends. I knew German, so I quickly made connections. I’m good at that. There were people there for 20 years and they said ‘We don’t have any German friends. We socialize with only Czech immigrants.’ I couldn’t believe it because the Germans were so friendly; so nice and polite and interesting. I loved Munich.
“Our son Jan was born there, and we were very happy because he was a healthy child, and I wanted to stay there. I nested. It was close to home. All of the sudden you see how close Munich is to Prague. From Prague under communism, Munich seems like thousands of miles away. When you are in Munich, you look at the map and you finally realize ‘Oh my goodness!’ From Bratislava to Prague, it’s closer to Munich. I just loved it there, because I felt comfortable. Probably, I have some German genes. You know, being orderly and being organized, I felt like at home. It didn’t bother me. Some Czech people were saying ‘Oh, the Germans are so picky and you have to do everything in order and you have to comply with the order.’ I don’t have any problems with that. I loved that. And the city was clean and full of nice things. I couldn’t buy anything, but it didn’t matter. I was window shopping every Sunday. We lived in the center of Munich and there was a farmer’s market there. I loved their folk costumes and I thought ‘When I save the money, I will buy one and I will be dressing like them.’”
“I didn’t want to push on them the Czech culture, because I’ve seen in other Czech families with older children that they hated it. There was a group of Czech friends down on the peninsula and they were actually trying to do dancing lessons for their teenagers and they of course hated the idea that they will be forced to dance. So I thought I’m not going to do it. They will figure out where they are from. Which they did actually pretty soon, because in 1990 we started to return to Czech Republic every summer, and they absolutely adore my old farm. They thought that grandpa, whom they met when they were six and eight for about two years before he died, they thought he was the coolest guy ever, because he did things like he mowed the grass with a scythe, and he was doing all kinds of stuff, like mechanically and technically, repairing stuff. Metal, wood, whatever it was. They thought that he was a god because he knew how to make everything and repair everything.”
Ján studied engineering at trade school in Prešov, but after one year returned to Strážske where he attended school to become a mechanic. His uncle Mike Frajkor, who lived in the United States, provided him with goods such as clothing and building materials to sell on the black market. Because of his connections with the West and his outspoken views on communism, Ján says he was seen as ‘disruptive’ to the state. He was arrested on New Year’s Eve, 1967, because of his involvement in a fight, but was later cleared of all charges. Following the Warsaw Pact invasion in August 1968, Ján says he was forced to go into hiding after provoking Soviet soldiers. He made his way to the border where he was caught and sent back home. Upon the insistence of his father, Ján made another attempt to escape in November 1968 and this time was successful. He made his way to Vienna and was then sent to Traiskirchen refugee camp where he stayed for three months. His uncle Mike sponsored him to come to the United States, and he arrived in New York City in August 1969, a few days shy of his 20th birthday. In the United States he was also assisted by his uncle John Frajkor.
After working as a motorcycle mechanic for one year in New York City, Ján joined the U.S. Army and became an American citizen in 1971. By the time he left the army in 1974, he had attained the rank of corporal, an achievement of which he is especially proud. Ján then worked for a heating and ventilation company, a job which allowed him to travel throughout the United States. He met his wife, Jean, in 1976; they married the following year and moved to her native Minnesota in 1979. They have one son, Andrej, who is named after Ján’s father. Ján says he taught Andrej many Slovak traditions. Today, Ján owns Andrej’s European Pastry which makes and sells potica, a traditional Eastern European pastry. He lives with his wife Jean in Chisholm, Minnesota.
]]>Ján Gadzo was born in Strážske, a small town in Eastern Slovakia, in 1949. Ján says that his family owned a successful farm and that they were one of the wealthiest families in town. When the farmland in his area was being collectivized, he remembers daily visits from government officials who tried to persuade his parents, Andrej and Anna, to sign the farm over to the local cooperative. Pressure was put on the family, says Ján, when they were forbidden from hiring any help to harvest their crops and had to hand over a large portion of their grain to the authorities. It was in 1964 that his parents eventually signed the farm over to the co-op. Ján says that thereupon his parents were unable to find desirable jobs and he and his siblings were not allowed to participate in extracurricular activities.
Ján studied engineering at trade school in Prešov, but after one year returned to Strážske where he attended school to become a mechanic. His uncle Mike Frajkor, who lived in the United States, provided him with goods such as clothing and building materials to sell on the black market. Because of his connections with the West and his outspoken views on communism, Ján says he was seen as ‘disruptive’ to the state. He was arrested on New Year’s Eve, 1967, because of his involvement in a fight, but was later cleared of all charges. Following the Warsaw Pact invasion in August 1968, Ján says he was forced to go into hiding after provoking Soviet soldiers. He made his way to the border where he was caught and sent back home. Upon the insistence of his father, Ján made another attempt to escape in November 1968 and this time was successful. He made his way to Vienna and was then sent to Traiskirchen refugee camp where he stayed for three months. His uncle Mike sponsored him to come to the United States, and he arrived in New York City in August 1969, a few days shy of his 20th birthday. In the United States he was also assisted by his uncle John Frajkor.
After working as a motorcycle mechanic for one year in New York City, Ján joined the U.S. Army and became an American citizen in 1971. By the time he left the army in 1974, he had attained the rank of corporal, an achievement of which he is especially proud. Ján then worked for a heating and ventilation company, a job which allowed him to travel throughout the United States. He met his wife, Jean, in 1976; they married the following year and moved to her native Minnesota in 1979. They have one son, Andrej, who is named after Ján’s father. Ján says he taught Andrej many Slovak traditions. Today, Ján owns Andrej’s European Pastry which makes and sells potica, a traditional Eastern European pastry. He lives with his wife Jean in Chisholm, Minnesota.
“And now these, we called them ‘agitators,’ they would come in your house in the morning and they sat in your living all day, and tried to persuade you to how it’s going to be for you to join the co-op. The hell it’s going to be good for me, my neighbors, three guys across the street, stand over there like this and then they send their mother or wife to our house to beg for the food. Don’t tell me, I learned this stuff when I was six years old. My brother and I were hiding under the bed; we were just little kids, and there are the two guys sitting all day, day in and day out, day in and day out. They were not succeeding. My ma knew what she had, and that was my uncle’s hard work, my grandpa’s hard work. But they kept coming, they kept coming.”
“I was going home from school, and we had the speakers throughout the town, and the band started to play. And they said, ‘And now, we are sending this song to Andrej and Anna Gadzo for signing into the co-op.’ And I go, ‘No, no.’
“So, I get home. I’m asking all these questions, but I’m just a kid, ‘Shut up, be quiet.’ Well, as my mother wrote in that letter, they came in, they parked in front with the trucks, with the militia. They brought the papers in the house. ‘Sign the papers, or you’re never going to see this house again.’ And this is how we lost everything.”
“He loved the land. He was good, I mean my dad was a good farmer. So he would plant, because there was a lot of acres. He would plant over there, and he had chicken and goats and he had sheep. He had everything over there. So now all these hierarchs, you know, the top people, they would kind of sneak over; ‘Hey Andy, whatcha got today?’ And my dad, he would butcher the chicken for him, or do the egg. You do what you got to do to survive. But he was good at that. And my dad was an awesome cook, so he would make those stews all the time. Outside, he had the camping [stove], and all the kids grew up with my dad’s cooking. He would just start it in the morning over there, and all the grandchildren grew up. So anyway, so that’s what kind of saved him.”
“So the packages are coming every week. Babushka, is something that old women wear. My uncle Mike would buy them in New York for ten cents, he would send them to us by hundreds. We had the network. Women would come in and take a hundred babushkas. Because everybody needed babushkas for morning, for evening, for church. All the women had five, ten, fifteen babushkas, and we had them. Plastic for the windows. I don’t what those plastics were, or why. My uncle used to go on Orchard Street, and again those packages are coming in, and the people would take the plastic and make curtains out of it. I mean, there was so much money coming in.”
“So I said to him, ‘When you guys get done working, say at 4:00, 5:00, your trucks sit over here, your drivers sit over here. I have work for you. These people are dying.’ There was no pick-up truck to be had in Strážske to haul something, except for the army deuce and a halves, and all these sat. He said, ‘Use it.’ I said, ‘You serious?’ He said, ‘Use it.’ And I was very honest and I said, ‘Well if I can make some money and raise some money, I want to donate some money from this process to that monorail. So that’s when I really went to town, big time. So I would say, ‘How many do you need?’ ‘Well, I need three loads.’ And I would just direct everybody, the drivers, and then collect the money, and of course, gave the drivers so much. This guy [the head engineer] didn’t need any, he had money and everything. So that went, oh man, I was 18 years old. My brother said ‘My brother was the king.’”
“Remember I told you one of these people who were at Stalingrad with him [Ján’s father]? Well, one of the guys made it to the KGB. He was a big shot. So when he’d seen that name, Gadžo, in a report – now I’m a nationalist – so he’d seen that name, Gadžo, and he remembered my dad. So he came over to our house. This is like 25 years after WWII, so this guy’s around 50 years old. In uncertain terms, he said to my father, ‘Tell your son he has to try to escape again or that will be the end of him.’”
Frank spent two and a half years in refugee camps in Germany while waiting for a visa to the United States. The majority of that time was spent in Schwäbisch Gmünd, where he established a Boy Scout troop, and in Ludwigsburg. Frank says that he was not given refugee status straight away because he lacked the proper documentation, and that his visa was delayed because of this. In March 1950, Frank received refugee status and a sponsor, and began the process of emigrating. He arrived in New York on December 21, 1950. Sponsored by the National Catholic Welfare Conference, Frank helped on a farm and worked in the carpentry shop at St. Procopius Abbey in Lisle, Illinois. In 1951, Frank joined the U.S. Army and served in Korea for one year. As a result of his service, Frank became an American citizen in 1954 and attended St. Procopius College (now Benedictine University) on the G.I. Bill. He studied political science and economics and began his career as a public health advisor. In 1959, Frank married Pavla Bouzová, whom he had first met ten years earlier at Ludwigsburg; they raised their six children speaking Czech. In 1967, Frank returned to Czechoslovakia for the first time. He says he had an emotional reunion with his four brothers who were at the airport to greet him. Today, Frank lives in Woodridge, Illinois.
]]>Frank Schultz was born in Maňovice, southwestern Bohemia, in 1930. One of five sons, Frank grew up on a farm run by his father, Vojtěch, and mother, Marie. He attended elementary school in nearby Mileč and went to high school in the larger town of Nepomuk. Frank says that his education during WWII was ‘poor,’ as the German-centered curriculum was not comprehensive. He spent much of his time helping on the farm. After completing high school in 1944, Frank became an apprentice for his uncle who was a cabinet maker. He traveled by train to Plzeň daily, and recalls his trip being interrupted in the waning days of the War due to bombings of the city. After WWII, Frank became involved in Boy Scouts, which had been banned by the Nazi authorities. He spent a few summers at a scout camp in Šumava as an assistant leader. Frank says that when the Communists came to power in 1948, the Boy Scouts were going to be absorbed by the Československý svaz mládeže (ČSM), a communist youth organization. He says that his opposition to this move branded him an ‘unreliable person’ and, fearing arrest, he made plans to leave the country. While at scout camp in July 1948, Frank crossed the border into Germany.
Frank spent two and a half years in refugee camps in Germany while waiting for a visa to the United States. The majority of that time was spent in Schwäbisch Gmünd, where he established a Boy Scout troop, and in Ludwigsburg. Frank says that he was not given refugee status straight away because he lacked the proper documentation, and that his visa was delayed because of this. In March 1950, Frank received refugee status and a sponsor, and began the process of emigrating. He arrived in New York on December 21, 1950. Sponsored by the National Catholic Welfare Conference, Frank helped on a farm and worked in the carpentry shop at St. Procopius Abbey in Lisle, Illinois. In 1951, Frank joined the U.S. Army and served in Korea for one year. As a result of his service, Frank became an American citizen in 1954 and attended St. Procopius College (now Benedictine University) on the G.I. Bill. He studied political science and economics and began his career as a public health advisor. In 1959, Frank married Pavla Bouzová, whom he had first met ten years earlier at Ludwigsburg; they raised their six children speaking Czech. In 1967, Frank returned to Czechoslovakia for the first time. He says he had an emotional reunion with his four brothers who were at the airport to greet him. Today, Frank lives in Woodridge, Illinois.
“As boys we went to school, we came home, we had food on a plate in the kitchen, and then already it was time to line up and we went out and we were working. Even though sometimes we were rebelling, it was good. We learned. Every one of us had a certain job we had to do. Me, as a young boy – I am talking about when I was 12, 13, 14 – we had about five or six cows that I had to take to the pasture. That was my job. Oh, I didn’t like that; I’d say ‘Daddy, today’s Saturday, I want to go running around with the boys,’ and so on. But that was my responsibility. And at home, of course, we had to take care of the chicken and geese and all that stuff we had back at home. But it was a good education. It gave us a certain accomplishment and certain responsibility, and that goes with you for the rest of your life.
“We were very self-sufficient because we had all the meat; I remember on Sundays, we usually had a rabbit or goose or duck. We were self-sufficient. It was good. Looking back of course, we would say it was all good times; well it was difficult and hard work, without any question, but it was peaceful living in the countryside day after day, and it was a nice way of living.”
“If I want to be honest, I had a bad education because those three or four years when I was in high school, we were learning about the Germans, and what was actually produced in Germany and history in Germany, every city in Germany, and we were actually neglecting quite of bit of education that we should have. Except maybe mathematics, but the rest of them – it was really poor education at that time.”
“I was with a couple of my friends in the fields behind my home, and we were watching what we called – American pilots, they used to fly two of them, we called them – hloubkáři, they used to go down and shoot everything that moved. And we were watching that from the top and we had to be careful because they could even start shooting at us, and if any German transports were moving on the highways, they’d shoot everything down. We were watching them maybe for a couple hours and it was a beautiful show for us boys, 15 years old. And then suddenly, we were standing next to a road coming from another village, Kramolín, to Maňovice, and then suddenly, two Jeeps and a truck with machine gun came in. And that was the first time I saw an American soldier.
“They came to us and they asked us if there are any Nazis, because there were wooded hills. They were interested if in our village there were any Nazis. We told them ‘No, there are not any Nazis here, we are okay.’ ‘Then you are okay?’ They saluted to us and they left. And I was standing with my friends, and I didn’t mention it to them, but I said to myself, ‘Boy, that would be really something to be an American soldier.’ And that was it, because they had a Jeep and they were dressed up nicely, and I mean, we were all excited because we were free. And I said ‘I would like to be an American soldier.’ And in my wildest dreams, I did not realize in six years, I would be an American soldier. Me, a 15 year old boy, in a village in Czech Republic in Bohemia, it’s impossible. Completely impossible! And it happened.”
“In 1945 we established [the group]. We had three villages and we had about maybe 45 boys. In 1946 the government gave us actually, after Germans on the border left, a nice cottage in Šumava under Boubín – Boubín is a big hill, forest, it’s a beautiful countryside – and we used to spend summers there. And later on when I was 16, 17, I became an assistant leader of our district group, and I was especially taking care of Cubs. I had about 15 young boys, and that was my life. It was my life, and I used to take my boys to that summer camp for a couple weeks, and that cottage was in a beautiful meadow and there was a little creek next to us, and it was an ideal situation.”
And why did you like Boy Scouts so much? Why did it become so big a part of your life?
“During the second World War, we cannot have anything like that, and we were receiving, or you could buy a magazine about Boy Scouting – it was Mladý Hlasatel – and any young boy has ideals and dreams and so on, and we were [in to] Winnetou, Indians and all this stuff and we want to express ourselves. But like I said, the Germans were very strict and you cannot participate and we never had anything and everything, universities and schools closed down, and when the second World War was over, of course that desire of the youth came up. And here we were.”
“The reason for my flight abroad: I always had an anti-communist attitude. After the Communist coup in February 1948 in Czechoslovakia, I was deputy chief of the Boy Scout section Chlumy-Maňovice. It was announced to me by the local communist youth organization ČSM – that was Československý svaz mládeže, it was a communist organization – that the Scout organization were to become a branch of ČSM, which was under communist indoctrination. I opposed this strongly, declaring that the Scout organization had been, and always should be, an international and non-political organization. Though I had been threatened, I did not submit to their demands. Therefore, I was declared as a member of the reaction, enemy of the people’s democracy, and unreliable person. Later, information against me was sent to the court, and this was the first step to my arrest – as I was more or less expecting. Therefore, I decided to escape abroad, and I escaped from my country on July 30, 1948.”
Eva graduated high school and enrolled in an international program through Comenius University which allowed her to study at affiliate colleges in the United States while traveling back to Slovakia to take exams. While in Richmond, Eva had been given a modeling contract and when she returned to the U.S. she settled in New York to pursue modeling. She also became a project manager and marketing director for a brand of luxury watches. Eva received an MBA from Columbia University. She now owns a branding and licensing firm and does PR consulting for luxury watches and jewelry.
Upon her return to the United States, Eva made friends with a number of fellow Slovak-Americans and émigrés and began organizing small cultural events and get-togethers. One of these events was attended by the newly-appointed Slovak consul general who expressed an interest in collaborating with Eva to formalize these events. She helped to form the non-profit +421 Foundation and is co-president of the organization, whose biggest event is Slovak Fashion Night. Eva says that while Slovakia will always be her home, she is glad to have had opportunities in the United States that have helped shaped who she is. Today, she lives in Los Angeles, California.
]]>Eva Jurinova was born in Žilina in northwestern Slovakia in 1979. Her mother L’udmila is a pediatric neurologist and her father Vladimír is a nuclear physicist who, prior to the Velvet Revolution, worked in the Ministry of Health. He now heads the radiation protection section of the public health authority of Slovakia. Eva started school in Trnava and later moved with her family to Bratislava. She says that her childhood was ‘beautiful’ and ‘pure’ and that she spent a lot of time visiting her grandparents, who lived in more rural parts of the country. She was an active child and participated in sports, dance, and theatre. Eva was ten at the time of Velvet Revolution in November 1989 and says that although her parents’ careers improved, she did not notice any immediate changes. In 1997, Eva spent one year of high school studying abroad in Richmond, Virginia. Upon her return to Slovakia, she made plans to move back to the United States.
Eva graduated high school and enrolled in an international program through Comenius University which allowed her to study at affiliate colleges in the United States while traveling back to Slovakia to take exams. While in Richmond, Eva had been given a modeling contract and when she returned to the U.S. she settled in New York to pursue modeling. She also became a project manager and marketing director for a brand of luxury watches. Eva received an MBA from Columbia University. She now owns a branding and licensing firm and does PR consulting for luxury watches and jewelry.
Upon her return to the United States, Eva made friends with a number of fellow Slovak-Americans and émigrés and began organizing small cultural events and get-togethers. One of these events was attended by the newly-appointed Slovak consul general who expressed an interest in collaborating with Eva to formalize these events. She helped to form the non-profit +421 Foundation and is co-president of the organization, whose biggest event is Slovak Fashion Night. Eva says that while Slovakia will always be her home, she is glad to have had opportunities in the United States that have helped shaped who she is. Today, she lives in Los Angeles, California.
“My grandparents lived in Kysuce and Orava, these two beautiful mountainous regions, so I spent most of my childhood there and the memories are just beautiful because it was the nature, the animals, the kindness and love of my grandparents. And of course my parents, but they were studying and getting their doctorates, so I was spending a lot of time with my grandparents and cousins. Both sets of grandparents had huge yards, animals – chickens, cows, geese, and ducks – so it was very farm-like and I loved it. I learned a lot about plants and animals and people and love.”
Were you allowed to run wild there?
“Oh yeah, of course! And we would go to the forest, mushroom picking, blackberry, blueberry picking. It was wonderful, really.
“Childhood in former Czechoslovakia was so pure. I was not touched by anything I learned later or read in newspapers about oppression during communism. I definitely felt very secure and safe and all those clichés about communism, that everybody is equal and there is no crime. I really felt that. It was a great level of security, and I really enjoyed that and I don’t see that anymore nowadays, I’m sorry to say.”
“Since my parents were scientists, they tried to be neutral. They were raised Catholic and both of my grandparents were active participants in the church, but since they were living in remote parts of Slovakia, it never really had an effect on my parents’ careers, and my parents were always going to church when we went to visit my grandparents; they went to mass and, yet, they had good positions. It never really impacted them. My dad had a leading position at the Ministry of Health; my mom was a very accomplished doctor. Back then, scientists didn’t really make much money and didn’t have recognition in our society, and I remember my parents complaining about that and my mom sometimes feeling like she was a rag that everybody was wiping their feet on. She would make more comments like that, especially dealing with patients who were workers, plumbers, and who were treating her not very nicely. I recall some memories like that.”
So did life for your family change for better after the Revolution?
“Yes, absolutely. My mom opened a private practice and my dad became a board member of all the multinational organizations, from the UN to the World Health Organization. They’d been traveling always because my dad had to travel for work, even before [the Revolution]. The government would send him on certain missions, and my mom would go along with him sometimes; she would get her visa permit. But, of course, after communism collapsed, my parents were taking full advantage of exploring the world and aligning it with their careers.”
Were your parents in the Communist Party?
“Yes they were. Not active participants, but they understood that if they wanted to advance, or even be functional somehow, they had to do that. It somehow worked out. We would still go to church when we went to visit my grandparents, and then they would be part of the Communist Party and somehow they didn’t think much about it. They just did what they had to do to survive and provide a healthy and happy environment for us.”
“It’s all about the people you meet and the activities you put yourself in, and I felt like that was my new home. Yes, I was very lucky. I met some people who are stimulating and a job that was very inspirational. So it was a flow. I didn’t make the cognitive decision ‘I am going to stay here.’ I just stayed because it was a no-brainer. Everything just fell into place, and with Grimoldi, it was a career that just…It was an international firm, so everything happened so fast. We were working with celebrities of the top format so it was just so exciting that one day you wake up and ‘Oh! It’s five years later.’ So it just felt very organic and natural to stay and be here.”
“I had some celebrity friends from Slovakia, so they would come and visit and they were always asking about possibilities of making it here or presenting their works here. So I had a lot of contacts in the music and entertainment industry, so I would try to help them and then through friends – I became friends with a lot of Slovak-Americans and Slovaks living or working in New York, especially – we started organizing little events for my friends coming from Slovakia. And it was very unofficial; it was always just a gathering for the community – the New York friends and the European friends. But then, I think the epiphany came when the first Consul General came to New York – Ivan Surkoš of Slovakia – and the Consulate General was opened, and the Consul General and his wife came to one of these concerts I organized. It was actually for my friend Misha who was a famous singer in Slovakia. And they were like ‘Wow, look at this. It’s so many people and an international crowd. How did you pull this together?’ And that was actually in cooperation with Slovak Info and a friend of mine, Otto Raček, who is also a very active Slovak-American. And the question was how can we institutionalize and enhance these activities? So the question was answered with two possibilities: one is to establish a non-profit organization that would help us obtain funding and would help to really attain volunteers and the whole community of artists and performers and other diplomats who are wanting to be active. And the second was for my ability to become part of a consulate team. So I’ve established, together with the Consul General’s wife, L’ubica, this non-profit organization called the +421 Foundation.”
“We organized many small exhibitions, concerts, book presentations, film festivals that the following year started to grow and they were not so small anymore. So one hundred people that were attending the first year became three to five hundred to fifteen hundred this year. And I do have to depict the biggest – and my favorite program – which is called Slovak Fashion Night.”
That’s the signature event, correct?
“That is. Not only because I used to be in fashion, but because it’s New York. Fashion is the breathing organism of the city, or one of the major industries in the city; and of course it’s very glamorous, models are always very attractive, and we have a very wide scope of guests, so we decided to organize a fashion show. I had to convince the Consul General and the whole team who, at the beginning, was very hesitant to do that, but eventually gave in, and the next thing you know, Slovak Fashion Night becomes a huge event where we get approached by our Austrian colleagues or other European consulates or non-European consulates or other colleagues in the cultural field to co-produce events with them, and it’s very pleasing. Also, since it’s such a popular program, it provides a platform where we can really introduce not just our upcoming and talented fashion designers from Slovakia, but also other performing artists like dancers, singers, photographers, visual artists, moderators. We’ve been able to compile a whole program of different art sections and put it all together and create one huge show that’s definitely, very surprisingly, great.
“It attracts Slovaks living here or other emigrants who have forgotten how Slovakia is and how it’s been growing and evolving, and this is an opportunity for them to come and see, and they’re like ‘Wow, we have all this? This is amazing!’ And I’m very happy to be able to provide this reality check, or this educational aspect in raising awareness about what’s going on in Slovakia and how Slovakia is growing. Also, culture, in my opinion – and this is my little phrase I use every time I promote Slovakia or what we do – culture is the best marketing tool to promote Slovakia as an economic or investment destination, and to help us form mutually beneficial relations, not only in the cultural sphere, but in the economic and beyond as well. So yes, we do invite all of the investors or potential business partners for Slovakia to these beautiful events, and strengthen their relationships. Show them how wonderful we are and what we can do.”
“It’s a constant aspiration of ours, and we do bring in the traditional aspect of Slovakia and all those features that you mentioned – the folklore, the beautiful traditional embroidery, the beautiful music and dances and traditional attires of Slovakia – but that’s not what we want to showcase only because that’s something that’s always been there and we’ve always been showing it in the past. But we bring the old and the new and bridge the modern, evolving, ascending culture and the arts that Slovakia is, as a modern, world-leading country. That we definitely are not stuck in the past or all we have are the wooden dolls and corn dolls and those beautiful, but yet older, traditions. So we bring the old and the new, and our fashion shows have folklore dances or the demonstration and presentation of the embroidery or the traditional costume, and I think it’s just a fun and very innovative way to connect both worlds. I think our guests can relate to that and have been relating to that very well. It’s refreshing, in my opinion.”
“It’s very simple and pure in a sense, because, when I come home to Slovakia, I just feel a sense of belonging. This really deep, gut feeling that that’s my home and that’s where I’m from, and the nature, the feel, the essence, the flair – that’s something that will always be me, my true essence. And when I am in the U.S., especially New York or Los Angeles – I’ve been spending a lot of time in Los Angeles because of my company that’s based there – I feel like this is great, this is where I have my house and my friends, but it’s sort of like a pied-a-terre. It’s not the true house, the true home. So, Slovakia will always be my home, and I hope I will be able to marry someone or find someone who will be either European or Slovakian or somehow will always be able to have that home with me there, too. I don’t have a vision how yet, but I know it’s possible to maybe have an international home, but always be able to spend a certain amount of time there.”
“I think it doesn’t matter whether it’s communism or it’s now or democracy or this era or the other era. It’s about individuality and who we resonate with or what we resonate with, and I as an individual definitely resonated with and found my perfect match in the USA and found my way to create another realization and self-actualization, and that’s what I think is wonderful about the world being open and the world being your oyster. But, my roots will always be in Slovakia and I will always come there and it’s always my home. But America really allowed to become who I am becoming. Who I feel that I can identify with. Who I can understand. And I’m very grateful for that.”
Elena graduated high school and moved to Košice, where her aunt and uncle had helped her secure a job at the Frucola (Pepsi-Cola) factory. According to Elena, one reason for her move was to attempt to visit the United States. Another uncle had emigrated in 1968, and Elena was unable to receive a visa in her hometown. After establishing permanent residency in Kosice, she was given permission to travel and flew to Florida in June 1985. Although her visa was for 20 days, Elena realized she wanted to stay permanently. Shortly after arriving, she met her future husband, Emil Brlit, and the two married.
Elena became an American citizen in 2000. Since arriving in the United States, Elena has worked with her husband’s dental lab. The couple has two children, both of whom speak Slovak. Elena and her family regularly travel to Slovakia, as her parents still live in the village where she grew up. She enjoys keeping Slovak traditions and has a large circle of Czech and Slovak friends. Today, Elena lives in Sarasota, Florida, with her husband, Emil.
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Elena Brlit was born in Pohorelská Maša in 1964 and grew up in the small village in central Slovakia with her parents, younger brother and younger sister. Elena’s mother, Anna, stayed home while her children were growing up and later worked in the factory in nearby Pohorela. Her father, Juraj, worked in a different factory – one that made pumps. During elementary school, Elena was involved in several activities including dance lessons and skiing. She recalls summers spent picking berries and cycling to a nearby lake with friends. Elena attended high school in Nitra, where she lived in dormitory and studied food chemistry. As part of her education, she and her classmates spent several hours a week observing and working in different settings, including a brewery and ice cream factory.
Elena graduated high school and moved to Košice, where her aunt and uncle had helped her secure a job at the Frucola (Pepsi-Cola) factory. According to Elena, one reason for her move was to attempt to visit the United States. Another uncle had emigrated in 1968, and Elena was unable to receive a visa in her hometown. After establishing permanent residency in Kosice, she was given permission to travel and flew to Florida in June 1985. Although her visa was for 20 days, Elena realized she wanted to stay permanently. Shortly after arriving, she met her future husband, Emil Brlit, and the two married.
Elena became an American citizen in 2000. Since arriving in the United States, Elena has worked with her husband’s dental lab. The couple has two children, both of whom speak Slovak. Elena and her family regularly travel to Slovakia, as her parents still live in the village where she grew up. She enjoys keeping Slovak traditions and has a large circle of Czech and Slovak friends. Today, Elena lives in Sarasota, Florida, with her husband, Emil.
“The brewery was in Nitra and we were just working there as students. So, they let us go near pivo, or beer, but it was either working with bottles or just little things, because we were there for just four hours. It was partially to see what’s going on so it’s not the first time we walk into a factory after we finish school. So they kind of let us observe what was going on in the real world; that was nice. During summers when I was in school, we used to go for letné aktivita – summer activities – and I spent one month of every summer, while I was in school, in Prague in an ice cream factory – I loved that place! – or I worked in Čelnice where they made fruit compote, so that was really nice. I loved those times because we could see and go to Prague. At that time we paid koruna for the metro, and every day we finished work, we showered, changed our clothes and went to Praha.”
“Because my uncle emigrated in ’68, we could not get a passport; we could not go anywhere. So we didn’t travel. We just stayed at home, and I think we lived in one of the most beautiful places in the world in Slovakia with the mountains… We also had a little farm. On top of my parents working, we always had a cow, and of course for winter you had to collect the food for the cows, so my father was working the fields and we went and helped. Then we went in the summer to pick blueberries and wild raspberries, but that was in the mountains. So that’s where are summers were. And we had a little lake, but we had to go on bicycles; it was maybe 6-7 kilometers, but we took our bikes, when our parents let us, and a whole group of kids went there for a whole day and we went to the lake.”
“To move to Košice I moved to my aunt’s apartment, because they helped me find the job right after school, and I wanted to go to America to see my uncle. Where I lived, in Banská Bystrica [region], they knew my uncle emigrated and it was on file, but in ’85 there were not many computers and my uncle helped me to get permanent residency in Košice. So because I had permanent residency in Košice, I applied for a visa to America from Košice, and that’s how I could go to America to see my uncle.”
“I went to school, the ESOL program, but most of the English I learned with my kids. They started growing up and we read Slovak stories and then English stories. Watching TV, news, and classical stories. But mostly with kids, when they were doing homework, vocabulary…”
After her stepfather’s death in 1979, Daniela and her mother made plans to leave the country. In July 1980, they joined a tour traveling to Germany, Italy and Austria, and left the group on the first night of the tour. Claiming asylum, Daniela and her mother had to wait to receive work permits before they could build their new life. Daniela’s mother eventually received her credentials and worked as a nurse for 15 years (today she continues to live in Germany). Because of her language skills, Daniela worked as an interpreter. At a trade show in Frankfurt, she met her future husband, Patrick Mahoney, who lived in Portland, Oregon. He invited Daniela to the United States and, in 1982, she traveled to Portland. The couple married the following year.
Since moving to the United States, Daniela has received a bachelor’s degree in marketing and a master’s degree in social work from Portland State University. Today she works as a case manager for the state of Oregon. Daniela has also had a successful career as a folk artist. She learned traditional egg decorating from her grandmother and, since arriving in the United States, has turned her hobby into a business, selling decorated eggs, giving lectures, creating children’s coloring and activity books, and promoting traditional folk crafts and culture. Daniela’s two children are also skilled egg decorators. Daniela has returned to the Czech Republic three times, most recently to research her family history and genealogy. She lives in Portland, Oregon, with her husband Patrick.
]]>Daniela Mahoney was born in Prague in 1956. Her parents lived in Karlovy Vary at the time and Daniela spent much of her time with her grandparents in Prague. When her parents divorced, Daniela’s mother moved back to Prague where she worked as a nurse. Daniela says that she became interested in languages at a young age and enjoyed learning Russian and German in school. After finding out from her father that he spoke French, she began taking French lessons at a cultural center. Daniela studied international affairs and business; however, her plans to build a career in governmental foreign services were derailed as several of her aunts and uncles left Czechoslovakia for Switzerland. She found a job as a receptionist at a hotel in Prague.
After her stepfather’s death in 1979, Daniela and her mother made plans to leave the country. In July 1980, they joined a tour traveling to Germany, Italy and Austria, and left the group on the first night of the tour. Claiming asylum, Daniela and her mother had to wait to receive work permits before they could build their new life. Daniela’s mother eventually received her credentials and worked as a nurse for 15 years (today she continues to live in Germany). Because of her language skills, Daniela worked as an interpreter. At a trade show in Frankfurt, she met her future husband, Patrick Mahoney, who lived in Portland, Oregon. He invited Daniela to the United States and, in 1982, she traveled to Portland. The couple married the following year.
Since moving to the United States, Daniela has received a bachelor’s degree in marketing and a master’s degree in social work from Portland State University. Today she works as a case manager for the state of Oregon. Daniela has also had a successful career as a folk artist. She learned traditional egg decorating from her grandmother and, since arriving in the United States, has turned her hobby into a business, selling decorated eggs, giving lectures, creating children’s coloring and activity books, and promoting traditional folk crafts and culture. Daniela’s two children are also skilled egg decorators. Daniela has returned to the Czech Republic three times, most recently to research her family history and genealogy. She lives in Portland, Oregon, with her husband Patrick.
“My grandma was from southern Moravia and she had several sisters, and one of the sisters became a maid for wealthy people who lived in Prague. There were usually women who came to the villages to recruit young, unmarried women to come to Prague to work for the wealthy people, and typically the young women would work for them for a few years and then they would get married and then they would find another woman to work for them. And so one of Grandma’s sisters got a job like that and then she brought several sisters to Prague and my grandma was one of the sisters. Typically the girls would be taking care of the children or they would work in the kitchen or they would clean the house. My grandma became involved in cooking, and she was a very good cook and she knew how to prepare all these fancy meals because in the old days people would organize large parties in their homes and everything was made in that home by the servants and so my grandma was one of those servants. My grandfather came from a farming family; he was the musician and he did amateur music, but he actually worked for the post office in the old days, so he had a full-time job. The way I understand it is that my grandma and my grandfather had been introduced to each other by someone, so it was like a blind date, and so this is how they got together in Prague, because they both worked there.”
“Grandma always would take me to Moravia for vacations because her sisters lived there, and we would spend the whole summer in the countryside and I have really fond memories from those times that I shared also with my daughter and my son, always referring to Moravia. I had really interesting memories because my grandma’s sisters were living in the farming communities and, certainly, the lifestyle there was very different than in Prague, and they always thought I was very skinny and they had to feed me because I am too skinny. So I recall that we would get up as children and my grandma’s sister would ask ‘What do you want for lunch? Do you want chicken or a rabbit?’ and she would just go and she would catch the chicken and actually prepare it for lunch, and so lunch preparation took like four hours and, of course, we would never do anything like that in Prague, so it was quite a cultural shock for me.”
“Ever since I was school age, my grandma encouraged me to communicate with my father in Karlovy Vary, so I found out that he spoke fluent French and he spent the time during the War in, actually, in France, and so I felt inspired to study French. It was not available in our school that I went to – I was already 11 or 12 when I decided to study French – and so I remember that Grandma would take me to a special cultural center where they would teach the French language, and we had to walk through a dark street and there was a cemetery on the side, and so I remember that Grandma would take me every Wednesday night. She would walk with me around the cemetery and she would take me to the cultural center and sit there and wait so that I could finish studying and take these classes. So as a child, I guess I was a small linguist and so I was very proficient by the time I was a teenager. I was very proficient in German and French and Russian languages.”
“We were a crafty family so I knew how to crochet and knit, and I remember that we had shortages of certain materials so when we wanted to buy clothes there was not really a big choice, so people would sew their own clothes; they would knit and crochet. I remember this unique experience that people would actually go to the stores and buy socks. They were woolen socks and you would actually take the socks apart and you would recycle the yarn, and so they would knit or crochet a sweater, and then, when I would grow, they would take the sweater apart and add more yarn, but they were still using these socks. I cannot actually explain it to anyone, but people who were born in the Czech Republic or grew up there would probably remember those times. I remember also that we would use old clothing that we would get from relatives from the United States. They would send us these packages, because my grandfather’s brothers and sisters all lived in the United States. So they would send this large clothing to us and we would actually take the clothing and put patterns over it, and I remember having clothing from those garments. Because of all these experiences, I actually became very resourceful and creative.”
“I had some contacts in Germany so we decided to sign up for a tour and, my mother and I, we would go on a tour and then we would essentially leave the tour, and so we went on a tour to Munich. It was a tour that went to Germany, Italy and Austria. It began in Germany and ended in Austria, and we actually chose to separate ourselves from the group already in Germany, on the first night of the journey. So we prepared for this escape for one year for sure – it was slightly more than that – so we sold most of our possessions and converted the money into Western currency and left. We left, literally, with a suitcase full of old clothes that we had to leave behind [with the tour] and my mother had a plastic bag and I had another plastic bag and that’s what we left with. But we had some friends who were able to travel across the border from the Czech Republic to Germany, and they were able to bring our documents and some valuables, but very little. So we had left not only our belongings, but all the memorabilia that had sentimental value – we had to leave all of it there.”
“For the first time in my life I was very relaxed. I didn’t have to be stressed out about what am I going to do, where am I going to work, how I am going to pay my rent. In the Czech Republic, as well as in Germany, there was always a fear. We always lived in fear of somebody or something. It is very difficult to disassociate yourself from the fear. There are certain fears that you have learned to somehow keep in your mind at all times – the alertness. So I think it’s some kind of a trauma actually, but that’s one issue that will never go away. So I’m always fearful of something, and I have learned to manage those fears but, still, there are times when I am afraid.”
“I love the Czech Republic. I absolutely loved visiting the Czech Republic; I felt like Alice in Wonderland. It was a beautiful, wonderful experience and I love the country and I love the people. I cannot see myself there anymore as a permanent resident. I remember coming back to Portland, and I was holding my passport in my hand, and all of the sudden this weird feeling came over me: ‘I am home.’ That still is sad; this is a very sad realization, where you basically have an identity problem, like ‘Who am I?’ and I think that is a problem that will never be resolved. But, I just am who I am. I’m a U.S. citizen; I work in the United States; I went to school here; I have a job here; my entire life is here. Of course, I could retire and then live with my retirement in the Czech Republic, but I have so many friends here and so many people I know and so many things I want to do here. So I think I can just go back as a visitor and I can embrace those opportunities but, sadly to say, this is my home, the United States.”
Anna’s first encounter with the West was in the Montreal airport on a layover on the way to Cuba. She returned to Canada (where an aunt and uncle lived) for a visit in 1989. In 1991, Anna decided to move to the United States due to ‘down-sizing’ at cultural institutions in Czechoslovakia (at this time she was working as a cultural and social coordinator for the Banská Bystrica region). A friend helped her get a job as a nanny and she settled in Washington, D.C. She connected with other Slovak émigrés and studied massage therapy. She also found translation work with the Czechoslovak Services Center and the Smithsonian and taught Slovak-language classes at the Foreign Services Institute. Since 2005, Anna has worked at the Slovak Embassy. She became an American citizen in 2002 and holds dual citizenship. She says that while she would like to stay in the United States and feels more ‘open and enthusiastic’ there, she does not know what the future holds.
]]>Anna Streckova was born in Banská Bystrica in central Slovakia in 1947 and grew up in the nearby village of Selce with her parents and two brothers. Anna’s earliest memories of are working on her family’s farm during school vacations and the collectivization of the farm in the early 1950s. She was involved in amateur theatre as a student and has continued this hobby throughout her life. After graduating from high school, Anna began working at the Military Cartographic Institute. She says that working on maps of Western countries was like ‘being a spy’ and piqued her interest in the West. Anna worked as a cartographer for 14 years and says that she joined the Communist Party in the 1970s after years of ‘nagging’ by her supervisors. When the new dom kultúry [House of Culture] opened in Banská Bystrica, Anna became the head of the department of amateur art activities where she organized programs such as children’s theatre, puppet shows, storytelling, and folk activities. She says that many of these programs were closely watched by the secret police and other communist authorities to discourage subversive messages.
Anna’s first encounter with the West was in the Montreal airport on a layover on the way to Cuba. She returned to Canada (where an aunt and uncle lived) for a visit in 1989. In 1991, Anna decided to move to the United States due to ‘down-sizing’ at cultural institutions in Czechoslovakia (at this time she was working as a cultural and social coordinator for the Banská Bystrica region). A friend helped her get a job as a nanny and she settled in Washington, D.C. She connected with other Slovak émigrés and studied massage therapy. She also found translation work with the Czechoslovak Services Center and the Smithsonian and taught Slovak-language classes at the Foreign Services Institute. Since 2005, Anna has worked at the Slovak Embassy. She became an American citizen in 2002 and holds dual citizenship. She says that while she would like to stay in the United States and feels more ‘open and enthusiastic’ there, she does not know what the future holds.
“There was a group of people coming to the village and they were communist authorities from the district committee, and then regional; then a policeman who was like a guard, and one very thin, tall guy in a long leather coat. All the time, the same people. And sometimes they also took the chairman of the national committee, predseda národného výboru. But those people who were in any kind of position in the local government were practically part of the village, so they were just there because they had to be there, most of the time. I remember those episodes. They were coming every single day to persuade my father to sign up for membership in the cooperative farm and he just said ‘No, no, no’ and then he was annoyed. So he said, all the time to me, ‘Just stay outside and, when you see them, come and tell me, but well ahead of time so I can run away.’ So he ran to the closest forest to hide, or just somewhere in the fields. They even came into the fields after him.
“But he was not the only one. He was this kind of mid-size farmer, but there were also people who owned more land, so my father was talking to them and they kind of tried to resist. But it was so much pressure from the Communist Party, from I don’t know where else… I remember once, they even took my father at night. When they came at night to our house, we all were up and [wondering] what was going on. Then they broke up them up and [they signed]. But it was also this way when they came: ‘Oh, you can sign up because Jano already signed up,’ and he hadn’t. So they kind of created a trap for them. So this is how it happened.”
“Anybody couldn’t travel [to the West], but I could travel to the Soviet Union, Hungary, Bulgaria, Soviet Union, Romania, Soviet Union and the Soviet Union. So I was there about five times. I even led a group of children – I was there twice or three times – in Tula. I was with 32 children all the time; that was also interesting, to compare the life of our children and the Russian children. They were poor, poor children. We really stirred things up there. They were very unhappy having us there. We tried to provide our children a summer vacation, not drilling. They were there for having fun and not marching along the river Voronka, and the Russian children were so envious because they were tied up with the rules and regulations. We were supposed to follow it too, but it was horrible to follow.”
“I even entered the Communist Party at that time because they were nagging me – the same way they did to my father to get in the cooperative farm. It was just so annoying and I had enough. I didn’t do anything else afterwards; my life did not change a bit. I went to church still, every Sunday. This is what I think, that people… I know that maybe it was not right from the point of view of certain people, but not everybody could leave the country. And I couldn’t imagine that I would leave my country. I really couldn’t. So I just really tried to get the best of it. It doesn’t mean that I somehow used this. There were people who really get into the Communist Party for a certain purpose. But one thing was getting in; the other was getting out. You couldn’t get out, because otherwise it could be a very hard consequence on the whole family, on everybody.”
What happened that ultimately led you to join the Party? You were invited, presumably?
“No, there was not an invitation; there was forcing. I asked them ‘Why me?’ and they said ‘Oh, we need the people who really do a good job at work, who are responsible’ and so on and so on. But it was so strong. Every single day I was called to the big boss’s office or this contract guy – he was a chairman of the Party – so I had them all the time on my neck. They had certain quotas to get what they called intelligentsia and the blue-collars, so they had to fill up the quota for intelligentsia. It took them probably two years until I broke down and gave up.”
“At first, yes, I tried because I needed to communicate, because it was so frustrating and depressing. That’s why I was doing those translations because at least passively I came into contact with the language, and that was important for me. I couldn’t call all the time – it was too expensive; I couldn’t afford that – and Skype was not working at that time yet. And I didn’t know too many people. Mostly, those older people, but I was glad because I can learn from whomever. Whoever has something to offer, I am willing to get. It was my gain. But I knew many people, young people, and I go occasionally, but since I still have that [massage] business, not as intense as it was before, but I still have it because I have to, so I didn’t have too much time. What I miss is [acting] on stage and hiking. People here are working a lot, so it’s almost impossible to coordinate our time. It’s possible, but everybody tries to do their best and do what they have to do. I didn’t go too much; I was once in the Shenandoah Valley and that was it for hiking. So that’s what I miss. I miss rocks very much.”