Jindřich Suchánek

“I spent three days there during the Palach Week, that was very dramatic. We lived at Alenka Šenkyříková and her husband Láďa’s house in Jircháře. We went to see it.“ – “That was in 1989?” – “Yes. In January, on the occasion of the 20th anniversary of Jan Palach’s death. So, people gather by the horse at Wenceslas Square and there were about five or ten thousand people. The crowds were coming. The policemen made the mistake of storming into us. The crowds were moving, there were water cannons and whistling, catcalling. It was like a public demonstration. Arrests, beatings, they used batons there. We had a good view because we had been standing somewhere on the corner of Jindřišská street and Vodičkova street, that’s why we saw the crowds of policemen. Everyone saw it, so they moved elsewhere. So, the policemen moved elsewhere. And again, and again. They arrested many people there, of course. It lasted around two or three hours; it had started at 5 p.m. We came back the next day and there were twice as many people there.”

“Cardinal Tomášek acted honestly. We visited him thanks to Eliška Kovalová who had lived in the same village. She was the only one to receive communion exactly from him. So, he had known her from young age. Once a year she used to visit him – her spiritual father – and always took us with her. Three or four of us went with her to Prague by train in 1986, 1987. We informed him of the situation of the underground church in the Olomouc region. He really liked to listen to that. He always turned on his transistor radio and played Helena Vondráčková or Michal David very loud. He tuned it on purpose. He played it really loud and said: ‘So that those listening to us can at least have a good time.’ And then we talked. And every time he talked about the Christ, he turned the radio down and loudly said: ‘Turn to Christ!’ And turned it on again. The highest authority of the Church turned on radio so that the State Security wouldn’t hear us. These things really shape a person.”