Milan Hrabal

"I have a specific memory of 1968. No troops came to Varnsdorf. We live in an area where we can almost see the green border that connects the Hrádek restaurant with Špičák. It was a popular place to cross at certain times. It has to do with the fact that there is an unforested area, and military vehicles nicknamed 'ducks' used to stand somewhere on the slope. They were radio trucks with speakers. They broadcast the Vltava radio station in Varnsdorf. Those who remember it know that Czechoslovak Radio did not broadcast at that time, it was occupied and the editorial offices were disbanded. There were these broadcasts, though, allegedly broadcast from Berlin. In order to speak in Czech, one of the announcers of Lusatian-Serbian Radio was told to say in Czech, with a German accent, 'This is Radio Vltava calling' and then they read the content dictated by the Soviets. This went on for about one to three days."

"The town of Varnsdorf is surrounded by Germany on three sides, the only way to Bohemia being in the south, to put it poetically or lyrically. Around the whole of Varnsdorf there was a plow with a fence, like a border between two countries that don't like to be neighbours. The plough was right behind the houses in the areas where German and Czech houses were close. There was a forest under the Špičák and so on and the border was like 500 metres inside the Czech territory. The border would open for one day, one morning in the summer, it could be crossed, and citizens - I don't know if they were picked, but I know that I was there with my father for blueberries. It was a Czech forest, but it was actually behind the fence."