John Schwarz

„My advice is, above all, stay flexible. Because the change that we live with today is accelerating so quickly that nobody can predict what tomorrow will bring. We can not even predict what skills we need to have to survive tomorrow. What we do know is that you will have to change your skill set probably five or six times during your normal working lifetime. And so the essential quality is to stay flexible and be willing to learn. Because if you don’t, you will become useless. And it’s not clear that society will have room for useless people. So stay flexible.“

"Between 21 and 30 August we had to go to Český Krumlov because my sister was staying with our grandma who lived there. It was also a trip. We had a car, my dad was driving and we were going down there to say goodbye to my grandma. We thought I might not see her again, and we went there also to pick up my sister who needed to go back to Prague. We got into military traffic, into a convoy of tanks that were going to České Budějovice or wherever. That was pretty ugly, because they encircled us and made fun of us. The tank behind us suddenly accelerated and started pushing on my dad, while the one in front of us slowed down. They had radio transmitters, so they could agree. I think my dad was pretty nervous at the time, but nothing happened. We got out of it, arrived in Krumlov and went back without an accident, and I said goodbye to my grandma and aunt."

"We used to send photos by post, back and forth in letters. I came to Prague once after the change of government in 1991 or '92. In the meanwhile, after I left Canada and before I came to Prague, the visa requirements changed. I didn't have a visa for Czechoslovakia, I had a Canadian passport. I didn't need a visa before, but I came to Prague, and, 'You need a visa, Mr. Schwarz, you can't enter.' So I negotiated with the Border Guard officer to let me in, and he said, 'The only way to get in is to go to the police and arrange it with them.' So I went to the police. They had an office there [at Ruzyně Airport], and I talked to the guy behind the desk, and he asked, 'Where were you born?' I said, 'In Prague.' He said, 'And where was the last place you lived here?' I gave him our address, which had been in Mánes Street. He went to the back room, came back and had a file of papers three centimetres thick. There were copies of all the photos we had ever sent by post. They knew everything about us. And this was after the change of government, under the democratic system. But they didn´t let me enter, anyway. He told me, 'I am obliged to let you in because you're Czech and you were born here, but when you want to go back to Canada, the only way you will be able to get out of here is to get a Czech passport. And that will take a month...'"

"She was so nice. She was fun from morning till night. She read everything, knew everything, spoke six or seven languages and she was kind of a fighter against normal life. Anything that was normal for most people, she didn't like it - she would always throw it out the window and lived her own life. When we visited her in [Český] Krumlov, we walked the surrounding countryside up and down. We used to walk twenty kilometres there and twenty kilometres back, even though we were young kids. She didn't care: 'Don't be a wimp, let's go!'"