My grandmother was chatting with her German neighbors one evening. The next day they wouldn’t talk to her anymore
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She was born on February 12, 1950 in Nymburk to František and Maria Janděra. Her father came from a Czech family living in the predominantly German village of Bílý Potok in the Frýdlant region, from where his parents and him had to move in a hurry in October 1938, when Nazi Germany took over the borderlands. He found work as a postmaster in Nymburk, where he met Alena’s mother and started a family. After the birth of the contemporary witness, he returned to Bílý Potok to buy a house, although he had not wanted to return to his native village before. The contemporary witness spent her holidays there and, like her father, fell in love with the village in the Jizera mountains. In 1968, she graduated from a secondary school of general education in Nymburk and started working at a post office. In 1969, she was sentenced to a three-year suspended sentence and a fine for participating in a demonstration against the Soviet occupation on August 21, 1969. In 1971, she got married and moved to Poděbrady, where she worked in the management of a glass factory for 14 years. After completing a one-year course, she worked as a social worker in Poděbrady until her retirement. She actively participated in the Velvet Revolution. In April 2023, she lived in Poděbrady, spending every summer at her cottage in Bílý Potok.
