Are you not afraid to go into a forest with a criminal?
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Ludmila Janková, neé Bučková, was born on August 16th 1939 in Slavkov pod Hostýnem in the district of Kroměříž. Her father considered himself a Protestant, yet she had been raised as a Catholic. Her mother was a housewife; her father had been working as a foreman at Impregna, a wood-processing plant in Bystřice. Ludmila grew up as a youngest of three children. She attended primary school in Slavkov and Bystřice pod Hostýnem. After that, she had been commuting to study at the so-called eleven-year secondary school in Holešov. Due to her parents’ separation, she didn´t go to university to study teaching after taking the secondary school leaving exams as she had wished to, but had to support her mother, getting a job in Holešov. She witnessed the persecution of farmers while working at the agriculture purchase department and as an assistant to her boss, she was expected to be convincing farmers to join agricultural coops and meet the mandatory contribution quotas. After recovering from tuberculosis for a year, she started working as an accountant at Loana, a textile manufacturing plant in Bystřice, in 1960. There, she met her future husband, Jaromír Janek, a political prisoner, who had been sentenced to thirteen years for treason. After spending six years in labour camps, he had been released in 1960 due to President Antonín Novotný´s amnesty. They married and had a daughter and two sons. Ludmila had been working as an accountant at Loana her whole life. In 1981, her husband died of cancer of the intestines caused by the conditions during his incarceration. On October 28th 1989, on her way to see her son Daniel giving an oath in Karlovy Vary, Ludmila witnessed demonstration in Prague (Praha) on the anniversary of the founding of Czechoslovakia. In 2019, when the interview had been recorded, her daughter, Šárka Jelínková, has been a deputy chairwoman of the Christian and Democratic Union – Czechoslovak People’s Party and a senate representative. Ludmila has been living in Bystřice pod Hostýnem.
