Eva Kiedrońová

„Children who once spoke a dialect in families and went to Polish school remained speaking a dialect. In addition, they spoke Polish and Czech, because the Czech language was taught from about the third grade. Children from my generation who spoke a dialect at home and with other children, but went to a Czech school, usually no longer speak it. I will be honest. It was quite cruel, but so it was that teachers from Czech schools told parents not to talk to their children in ponašymu (the Cieszyn Silesian dialect), since their Czech would be worse. Some parents, who wanted their child to speak Czech well, stuck to it. Other generations of parents from Czech schools, or from ethnically mixed marriages, no longer speak the dialect. Now the situation is that the dialect is no longer a common language. Those who went to a Czech school seem to be ashamed of the dialect, but we are proud to speak it and on top of it we know Polish and Czech.“

„All his life my father was unhappy about having signed up to join the Unified Agricultural Cooperative (JZD). It didn't bother him that he worked, but it did bother him that he couldn't work on his own. He wanted to be a private individual, that's what he enjoyed. We always heard, 'And I was to emigrate to Canada in 1936 like my sister did. I would have a farm there.' It was a misery for him. He really wanted them to go then, but my mother who had a small daughter, Helenka, saw it differently. She didn't want to go anywhere with small children. Everything was fine until the agricultural cooperative started. And so he always said, 'If we went, that would have been good, we would have a farm.'“