So that everyone can live happily and without hardship
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Dušan Perička was born in Vrchlabí on 14 March 1952 to parents who had relocated to the Krkonoše promontory from Slovakia after the war. He was industrious since childhood, loved cars, and was eager to travel. Having completed a vocational school, he went on to graduate from a high school of mechanical engineering during the early normalisation period. He initiated a six-week summer trip to the USSR and undertook it with two schoolmates. They drove 11,000 kilometres and visited the Baltic states, Georgia and Armenia, and then Romania and Hungary on their way back. Having completed his mandatory two-year military service, he was employed with a company that assembled cooling equipment. Five years later, he achieved his lifelong wish: traveling. The ocean shipping business, Československá námořní plavba sought a ship engineer. For the next five years, he would sail to ports in Europe, Asia, and Africa, and when he wanted to legally import a Mercedes-Benz, the State Security (StB) took interest in him. He was detained, interrogated, and conditionally sentenced, and his passport was withheld. He briefly worked in Trutnov, increasingly becoming an active part of the local political opposition in Vrchlabí: he went to encourage dissidents during court hearings and was friends with Pavel Wonka, a victim of the totalitarian regime. When Pavel died in 1988, he helped to organise his funeral in Vrchlabí and carried the coffin. In August 1989, Dušan Perička was imprisoned for five months. When interrogated, he consistently refused to say or sign anything. He was among the last prisoners to be released in December 1989. He received a certificate of participation in the Third Resistance movement in 2023.
