Image: Petr Malina
During my trip to Sweden three times I took the boat. Two Swedish ships were sometimes back and took a German ship that was to Rostock. The difference was amazing.
In Sweden I found as a very pleasant, neat and clean, and the Swedes as very kind, happy and well educated. Despite the harsh climate and a very short summer the Swedes are among the happiest people in the world. For our young democracy Czech Scandinavia have always served as an example of how a small country can operate within a community as large as the European.
The first two trips in the Swedish ships were welcome. People enjoyed the board the sun and did not care, strong wind. In the cafeteria quietly waiting in the queue, and the staff treated everyone with kindness and all spoke English. It was really easy to get used to that.
Rostock on the boat did was different. Most passengers were Swedish, but people in Eastern Europe, Germans, the Ukraine, Russia, Bulgaria, Slovakia ... and Czech Republic. Many of them were drivers of trucks or workers. And suddenly, after seeing the Swedish acostubrarme well dressed, athletes, healthy and well nourished, I was shocked to see people from "other Europe", worn, fat, bald, with dark circles, smelly and old clothes ... But not only was appearance but also the behavior. People came running to the cafeteria, colliding with each other, personnel forward and shouted in Russian (or whatever), knowing that they were German, and eagerly taking a quantity of food that could not be eaten.
I said, welcome home! and I felt a mixture of shame and sadness at the thought that's how we see the Swedes (German, French, English ..) also for us. In other words, is the world that I belong. A world that still was not sure where to go or who can walk well.
But then, to ask that another country would be born if given the chance to choose, I realized I did not find a better alternative. I am happy to be born in the place and time where I was born. I like the point from which I can see the world, the point has shaped me for who I am today. It seems more than perfect to have been born under communism, live in it just enough to remember the sadness and emptiness in which people learned to live, and it has collapsed just as I started to become aware. I could study and in an era of greater justice and freedom, I've lived through the change, I've seen how democracy was born and how hard is learning not ever neglect it.
