Before embarking on our trip across Europe, we posed three questions that we still had about the Prague Spring of 1968. Our first question was about whether the citizens of Prague are very well educated about the protests that went on during the Soviet occupation of the city, and how/if propaganda they were shown affected their lives and views towards their government and the communist regime. While language barriers made it difficult to communicate directly with locals, we were surprised to find that people were really more interested in talking about the Velvet Revolution than Prague Spring 1968. The only time our tour guide really mentioned it was when she was telling us about Jan Palach, the student who set himself on fire after the democratic government had been shut down. We also couldn't find many people who could really speak about the experience first-hand because they were too young, or were not residents of the area.
Our second question was whether or not the Dubcek government thought they could get away with having a radically democratic government under a communist regime. While we couldn't find any hard evidence, we can answer our own question with the assumption that they didn't think they would become enemies of the state or they probably wouldn't have done it.
Our third question was how the lack of freedom, to complete freedom, and then again lack of freedom of the press affected journalists who lived in Prague. We didn't speak with any journalists who were alive at the time, but we find it reassuring that it is now the headquarters for Radio Free Europe. RFE is now located in Prague, a city formerly part of the Soviet Block, with the mission to broadcast to countries without freedom of the press. This really comes full circle when one considers that they have gone through the same circumstances.
When we were abroad, we saw a lot of homeless people. We think it would be really interesting to investigate further how countries that lean more to the left than the United States deal with poverty. Because they are smaller countries, citizens pay a lot more taxes, but things like going to the doctor are free. Our tour guide in Mainz told us that there wasn't a lot of poverty in Germany, and that if you see someone sleeping under a bridge, that was their choice. However, as soon as we left her tour we saw homeless people sitting in the snow outside of the church bundled up and begging for coins. It's interesting that some people fall through the cracks and aren't included in the benefits most citizens are handed by the government.
Signing off for the last time,
Peace, love, and pork knuckle,
Kathy and Jordan
Our second question was whether or not the Dubcek government thought they could get away with having a radically democratic government under a communist regime. While we couldn't find any hard evidence, we can answer our own question with the assumption that they didn't think they would become enemies of the state or they probably wouldn't have done it.
Our third question was how the lack of freedom, to complete freedom, and then again lack of freedom of the press affected journalists who lived in Prague. We didn't speak with any journalists who were alive at the time, but we find it reassuring that it is now the headquarters for Radio Free Europe. RFE is now located in Prague, a city formerly part of the Soviet Block, with the mission to broadcast to countries without freedom of the press. This really comes full circle when one considers that they have gone through the same circumstances.
When we were abroad, we saw a lot of homeless people. We think it would be really interesting to investigate further how countries that lean more to the left than the United States deal with poverty. Because they are smaller countries, citizens pay a lot more taxes, but things like going to the doctor are free. Our tour guide in Mainz told us that there wasn't a lot of poverty in Germany, and that if you see someone sleeping under a bridge, that was their choice. However, as soon as we left her tour we saw homeless people sitting in the snow outside of the church bundled up and begging for coins. It's interesting that some people fall through the cracks and aren't included in the benefits most citizens are handed by the government.
Signing off for the last time,
Peace, love, and pork knuckle,
Kathy and Jordan