Word of the Editor - Recent Events

This spring and beginning of summer was sure a busy time for me as editor of a magazine for Czechs at home and abroad.

First of all, in May, we had a reunion of Mlada Boleslav natives. It had not been possible for me to be there in person, since at that time I had to be present at the American Spring, respectively, at the colloquium part called the Czech -American Cultural Relations. That took place right after my return from a meeting of Czechs in Kyrkekvorn, Sweden. However, we did take active part in those events through a presentation in our magazine, and in case of the colloquium through a lecture. Right after that came our departure to Budejovice where from June 25th to July 2nd the 23rd World Congress of the Association of Arts and Sciences was being held. Both of us editors, me, and Ing. Fialkova, took part in it. The South Bohemia University that had offered their facilities for the event became quite a busy and hectic place. 500 participants from home and abroad, mostly from USA had signed up, but not all were present. The program was as full as ever. There were a lot of workshops dealing with different subjects, impossible to name since it would take several pages. However, the main theme of the Congresss was "Czech and Slovak Art and Science in International Relationships".

The Czech Dialogue was presented at the Media workshop along with the Americke Listy and Radio Praha. It's a shame that as always there were just too many different workshops and lectures so that at times there were just a couple of people attending a single presentation. Most of the people spent much time running to and from different university buildings trying to hear as many lectures as possible.

Meeting with our readers was most definitely a pleasant and satisfying experience.

The opportunity to chat with them and again experience the unique and sincere academic atmosphere of that company was surely a treat. We learned much that was interesting about scientific and other kinds of dedicated work of our people abroad. Unfortunately, I was not able to join the group at the end when they all took a trip to Cesky Krumlov because I had to attend the opening of the Sokol Slet in Prague.

On July 1st I went with one of our American subscribers Agnes, to see the amazing acrobatic feats of the participants during the festive opening of the event at Sazka Arena that was practically full. The next day during the Sokol Parade through Prague, the 81 -year- old Agnes with whom I raced to Old Town Square in order to shake hands with the Sokols before they started out, said, "Please write in your paper that it's a shame that such a small number of people came to greet the Sokols. I feel ashamed even though I'm from Texas." I heartily agreed with her. This is a comment my neighbor made, " The communists must still be trying to boycott the Sokol events as in the past. As before, there has not been much of a campaign."

However, I feel that propagation must have cost millions but the Czech Sokol Community did not put an ad into magazines such as the Czech Dialogue and compared to other possibilities it would have cost them only a few crowns. Those are the publications that go all over the world and reach readers who have a "Sokol heart". Where did all the money go? Where was the propagation? Is it possible that those in charge were so sure that there were enough people with a Sokol heart who would come anyway that there was no great need to advertise and consequently used the money to renovate their gymnasiums?

The Czech Press showed the same ignorant attitude. There appeared some mini- articles with just a few photos. I don't think that the communists played a role in the background but rather; it is the youth and flagrant lack of education of the editors who know nothing about the subject. Neither do they know that Sokol after being prohibited by the Nazis and then the communists continued to flower abroad, mostly in America.

Some of the propagators did not even want to hear about it. Thus I shall take the liberty and bring back to mind this important and often ignored information on the pages of the Czech Dialogue.