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"When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love h

as always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem in
vincible but in the end, they always fall --
Think of it, ALWAYS."
Mahatma Gandhi
"Truth" series-"Behind Iron Curtain" part 5
"Behind Iron Curtain"
By Maya
Welcome you all who made a time to visit this part of series. Please pay attenti
on because what I describe here is a real picture about life in socialist countr
y under communist government and no matter what you might think, you are on the
way towards it if you do not wake up soon from your notion that something like t
hat can't happen here. Trust me, it can and very easy, after all you did prepar
e a grounds for it, although many still do not realize it.
Please be aware that this shall be about life in Czechoslovakia, country that ha
d it really best among those being suffering countries caught in a trap. Second
I would put Hungary and worst of all I would say had it Romania under that horri
ble tyrant Chauchescu with his slovenly, grasping wife. Russia I did mention in
previous parts.
I would pick my starting point from age of 15, because that was a highly signifi
cant point in lives of growing generation. We obtained so called "citizenship pa
ssport," which must be carried at all times when one left the house. We could be
checked at any time by police with a questions like: "where are you going?", "w
here do you work?", "why aren't you at work today, it is Tuesday morning?", etc.
etc. We were checked at the movies if we qualify for film rated age 15 up, at th
e times of long hair fashion boys were often taken from the streets to police de
pt. and got involuntary haircut and beating when they resisted.
Working: I have mentioned in part 4 that there wasn't any private company in exi
stence any more because all was in government hands. So for that reason structur
e of companies was just a same everywhere. Something like here is Postal service
. (That one too, of course) Now, not to leave a trace of that old, bad capitalis
tic system, no more company presidents as a title. New bosses were members of c
ommunist party, now named directors. Under director there were departments and
their leaders were called actually "leaders" in exact translation, but their pos
ition was something like management. So besides personnel, wages and similar ba
sic departments every company had, then there were dept. adequate to specific i
ndustries, obviously.
However, under director in every company there was always very special and most
prominent department (of course totally unproductive, not contributing ANY work
to the running of company and quite a bit feared, but of course well paid) for w
hich name there is no translation because it was newly created under communists
, first time in history and had to do with "checking" and following behavior of
every employee where one stands regarding political beliefs. If you were communi
st, "green light" for you. If not, which was majority, we must be careful and ke
ep in line, keep marching and keep our opinions and thinking for ourselves. So i
t happen that most often the brightest and most capable workers were paid much l
ess the the "elite" those being "elite" only in one instance already mentioned.
Wages: That was very simple structured. If you were, for example clerk in wages
department, that same salary was paid everywhere in that particular dept. and t
hat's it. Salary itself was comprised of 4 parts. First there was a base, lets s
ay 1500. Then one part was plus according to how you qualified for your position
considering education. If you fulfilled requirement (high school, university, e
tc) you received the whole portion, it could be for example 150 plus to it. Seco
nd part was for length of experience. If just starting, nothing there, if fulfil
ling required years, plus another 150 has been added, or somewhere in between.
Last portion was political. No communist, no third portion. This was exactly w
hat I always missed. And with me majority of nation. Sometimes that amount was s
o very important to family, especially with more children, that people simply jo
ined. My "political" boss was coincidentally rather friendly woman saying often
to me: "Why don't you join, we need people like you and you'll get more money."
She obviously wasn't too great judge of character, because I was so called "rig
ht" wing person (which I had to carry in my references) and also of strong chara
cter and conviction...so...
Still, no matter being member or not, we had a lot of meetings, listening to lea
der's self-praises and extraordinaire achievements of comm. party, although we d
idn't see any. But what did we know? We were not elite.
Leaving any position besides when possibly washing dishes somewhere in restauran
t was extremely difficult. Depending how many years of work one had, there was s
et time when it would be possible to leave without facing consequences. It was u
p to six months. So how could one find new job if not being happy with work or c
ompany or simply wanted some advancement. What company would be waiting 6 months
for employee? But when someone would leave under "no matter what," this had be
en noted on personal reference list and forwarded to new company. It usually sta
ted; "was let go for being absent", no matter if one worked somewhere for 10 yea
rs without single day being absent for work. Then poor victim had very hard tim
e to find work. So that much for having chance for improvement or promotion...
That has been "reserved." By the way, unemployment benefits were non-existent. E
verybody must work. It was up to us to find work. Also when we were checked on a
streets and asked where we worked and said nowhere, we were taken in to see why
, etc...Simple answer "looking for work" didn't make it.
Vacation: "Check beauty of your own country and if you really want to travel, vi
sit neighboring socialist countries.". That was it. Chance to see some other pla
ces came later, but was almost impossible go get visa. At the beginning nobody
could travel. But who would be interested to go somewhere where was a poverty gr
eater then we had. Only the sea in Bulgaria was of interest, because our locatio
n in central Europe didn't provide that. Once in a blue moon when someone got ou
t visiting "west" that person upon return (if one did return) was center of atte
ntion and endless questions. We were simply like a birds in a cage.
Medical: Because there were no "Insurance Companies" in existence we all had an
universal medical and dental coverage. We couldn't pick up our own doctors or so
. We "belonged" to the nearest of central clinics according to where we lived. I
f we moved, which happened very seldom because there was tremendous shortage of
housing of any kind, then we had to switch to the nearest medical establishment.
All was always centralized in one large building, from family physicians to den
tists. Waiting was endless, too many people in lines... Dental was the worst as
far as work done. No white fillings even on front teeth (that came much later, b
ut never on back teeth anyway) so I saw even very young girls with dark fillings
in front teeth, which was horrible, but no choice. There wasn't private dentist
to go to either, obviously. Dentures, problem. Root canals without numbing. I w
as actually surprised when I saw here they do it.
In a hospitals (which were really clean and all that) were usually minimum 8 plu
s people in one room, with no dividers whatsoever, so all knew what was going on
with others when doctors came on main visit. And so on.
Shopping: When I came to this country and occasionally had discussion about this
topic, everybody was turning head that all stores were actually identical ever
ywhere and had same prices. Something like is happening here with "Home Depot" a
nd was already "MacDonald", etc... but nothing in between. So textile stores, ha
rdware, supermarkets were the same everywhere... that is with their logos includ
ing inside choices.
Advertising was non-existent... after all what for? There was nobody to compete
with. Sales discounts were non-existent, except perhaps when there was a broken
piece occasionally or so, one could get it cheaper.
I can tell you rather funny story here.
When watching TV (after coming here) we saw an ad from Sears on some linen sale
that stated something like: "great sale only for 2 weeks" and I said: "How very
unfortunate that we do not have money to buy it, it would be so good to save on
this." I meant it seriously, I really thought that this sale was one lifetime ev
ent and I've missed it. I've never seen sale ads like this before.
There wasn't any choice in anything. Two brands of TV, one from Hungary, one our
s. Take it or leave it. Same with only small refrigerators, stoves...Even when p
eople saved some money, they had to stay in lines for this or that, no choice in
anything and often just returned home not being able to buy what whey needed.
Basics were lacking. People were handy, inventive, knowledgeable, talented, but
no! Than would be just capitalistic way. No small businesses. Nothing that coul
dn't be controlled by government from A to Z.
Another story that amazed me when I lived in NYC. I walked a lot to save money,
so one day during my walking on a sunny day, suddenly started raining. I couldn'
t believe my eyes. In no time on street corners appeared umbrella sellers. Like
they would fall from the skies. And money were made :) I thought how wonderful i
t is to be able to open up own store, start own business, do something what one
wants to do and have a chance to do it.
You know at those times America was a "dream world" for people living in sociali
st countries. It was very difficult to get any good information about life here
also propaganda was strongly negative, but still occasionally some film made it
in and we could see something what we had before WW2 and elders remembered.
FREEDOM! And we wanted it again. We wanted to pursue our dreams, utilize our tal
ents, see the rest of the world. At night we tried to catch on radio broadcast "
Free Europe" from London, where at least we could find out a little bit of what
was happening in the rest of the world. Some people had relatives overseas from
times after war and earlier. Many people escaped in 1968 and then was again the
end of chance. In those years escaped many talented people of various professio
ns, like Martina Navratilova, Ivan Lendl, tennists...
Although I intent to write special, comprehensive article about education (in ge
neral) I would like to mention here that there was one great thing communists ga
ve us. Superior education. I wasn't aware of it until I came here.
They did it actually because they needed qualified, thinking people in order to
stay self-sufficient as a country.
I do not see any other explanation. Because at the end that was their downfall.
We knew it all, including our hated communism. From Marx (Marx's Capital was dut
y reading, I red it at age of 13-14.) through all history and all the rest. We n
ew we lived something what didn't "match." What we were told and promised all th
e time wasn't reality. But "they" insisted it will happen. Yes it was happening.
Going more and more down the hill.
No, it couldn't happen and shall not happen ever anywhere because idea of commun
ism cannot be realized, ever. (About this in article about Education I'll write
soon) We studied languages. We studied everything. One of our universities is se
cond oldest right in Europe after Sorbonna in Paris France. Exams to get accepte
d by universities were extremely difficult, but were conquered. There also was
very much preferential treatment for children of communists, but still they must
fill universities anyway. But everybody wanted to study, wanted to know, wanted
to understand. And we did. And our students made revolutions. In 1968, and the
n in 1990 and won. Russia was deeply in debt and having problems of their own th
an, changes also in a line with dissatisfaction of suppressed lives of people.
These were revolutions for Freedom. To get out of something what was unacceptabl
e.
I have to digress here for a second...I recently came across totally brain-washe
d via wrong direction Meghan McCain as she spoke so ridiculously and passionatel
y for revolution. Poor girl revealed herself as a total dummy. Everybody with an
ounce of knowledge of history and glimmer of understanding of events I describe
d in my series must now the truth and hold on to what you still have left with y
our life. Yes, you are going where you should never ever turn and trust new gove
rnment, but hopefully you'll see light in time.
Although I must stress one other thing. You have lot of work to do. Because prog
ressives are brain-washing your children. History is not taught. They are actual
ly 2 reasons for it. One I don't wish to mention and another is they learned wel
l that educated nation is very difficult to conquer. It can't be fooled with flo
wery learned speeches.
We never were fooled! We were forced as a small nation by giant but we kept tog
ether. Yes, it was easier in a sense that we were one nation and small and we AL
WAYS talked politics. We were always against tyranny. And we won. So now they ke
pt you less and less informed, they replaced real knowledge with sexual educatio
n and similar damaging nonsense for small children who are not ripe even to unde
rstand it and neither other ridiculous things. Children do not know how to read
often in high school (statistics). How could one learn then? We had to read in
1st class at age 6-7. Otherwise no 2nd grade. And that happened once in a blue m
oon. Mostly with child that might got sick and missed some months of learning, s
o had to repeat first grade class.
But more about education in my special issue.
You have problems now that were created by not decent, hard working Americans, b
ut greed and hunger for power. By those who want to destroy this country and tak
e a direction to something that was proven several times as a fiasco.
And your students know NOTHING! What a shame! And are actually active against no
t just you but themselves! What an irony and weirdness of it!
Hold onto your freedom, once lost it could be for good. Educate your children! E
ducate yourself!
With you in freedom,
Maya

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