"I was at the first one in the square. Now I'm laughing about it. We decided to make these banners on two sticks. We went in pairs and there were eight of us. We were four pairs. I went with Máša Kolmanová. We had something written on it like free elections or something. I don't remember the slogans anymore. But I think it was free elections. It was one of those sheets with sticks. So that the patrol wouldn't catch us, because we were being watched, so we made them at Prokopec place in zwinger. We decided not to take the main road through Latrán to the square but to go up through zwiger, take the stairs by the theater, and continue along Horní Street. That’s where we met—there were eight of us. We had banners. As we walked down Horní Street, Máša and I were in front, calling out: "Czechs, come with us! Join us!" People were coming home from work—it was around four o’clock. Some stood along Horní Street, here and there a passerby, but no one joined us. We reached the square alone. It was empty, and no one had followed. We did this every day. Not with banners anymore, but always at four o’clock, we gathered at the fountain. Sometimes, people joined, and the small group slowly began to grow.
"I knew we lived behind an iron curtain that I would never get behind. One sort of accepted it, or admitted it, or I don't know. I knew I just wasn't going to go to that West, and I didn't even ask. We used to look at the Alps from the Klet when we could see them. And I really wanted to go, because I'm a mountain kind of person. I really wanted to go to the Alps. But I knew I'd never go. I knew I would never go to the sea, I knew I would never exhibit abroad. You just lived as best you could. With a handful of friends."
"We were hanging out with a bunch of people who were close in opinion. They were doctors. In the 1970s, some doctors from Prague moved to Krumlov. They bought a house there. They were young like me. My generation. We got together somehow and went to the cottage. We used to meet in our living room. We even exchanged some books by Hrabal, which were banned. You could say it was a bit like a "Konvalinková salon." A mattress on the window. Lock the door downstairs. A few people would gather there and speak openly—never on the street. So we exchanged some books. It was a group of about ten people from Krumlov, but originally from Prague. They were doctors. Young ones.
"When we were in the square, I don't know if I told you last time, I was arrested by the State Security. I was there in a red jacket and I didn't have my ID. A man came and unbuttoned the flap with the SS badge and said, 'Do you have ID? My jacket was borrowed by my daughter because she was cold. Yes, she borrowed the jacket, so I didn't have it, and there was the ID card. And I said, "Well, I don't have it," and he said, "Well, you're coming with me. And at that moment, maybe 10 or 15 people appeared in the square, and they guaranteed their ID card to him like that, with their ID card. And that brought tears to your eyes. That really moves you."
Vladimíra Konvalinková was born on 30 December 1951 as the second daughter of Leo and Vlasta Rosín. Both parents worked as teachers in Český Krumlov. After the war, they enthusiastically joined the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, and until 1968 they believed that they were helping to build a better future for Czechoslovakia. Vladimíra Konvalinková graduated from the Secondary School of Arts and Crafts in Uherské Hradiště in 1971. Although she successfully passed the talent exams for the Academy of Arts and Crafts in Prague, she was not admitted to the school for political reasons. In 1971, she returned permanently to Český Krumlov, where she became close to similar opposition-minded people. Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, the group of friends was united in their opposition to the official establishment and the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia. They discussed politics, culture and borrowed books. Vladimíra Konvalinková had a very difficult time coping with the transformation of Czechoslovak society in the 1970s. She describes how, during the normalisation period, people around her disappeared, either forced or voluntarily, into emigration or were prosecuted by the State Security Service (StB). In the early days of the Velvet Revolution, she founded the Civic Forum (OF) in Český Krumlov with a group of friends and participated in its activities. In 1990 she stood as a candidate for the OF in the first free elections. She then joined the ODS, which she left after three years. For many years she worked in the cultural commission of Český Krumlov. She initiated the revival of the Slavností rožmberské růže, founded the Perchta choir in Český Krumlov and others. In 2023 she lived with her family in Český Krumlov.
