We wanted a civil society not a hard capitalism where money rules
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Alenka Huslarová, née Boguszaková was born on 2 September 1929 in Prague. Her father Ing. František Boguszak was a land surveyor and a teacher at Secondary School of Surveying and at Czech Technical University, her mother was a teacher and a housewife after their children were born. Alenka grew up with her two years older brother Jiří who later became a lawyer and a teacher specialized in State and law. The Boguszaks lived in Dejvice where her father had worked as a land surveyor in army for 20 years, after the occupation in March 1939, he was transferred to the reserve and was dismissed from the army after February 1948. Alenka wished to become a doctor since childhood. She studied at the grammar school in Drtinova Street in Smíchov where she was among others a schoolmate of Miluška Havlůjová. She was admitted to the Faculty of Medicine in 1948 where she resisted the pressure of her colleagues who wanted her to join the Czechoslovak Communist Party. When studying, she met her future husband Mojmír Huslar who later worked as a neurologist in aviation healthcare. In 1950 they got married and they had their first child three years later. Alenka Huslarová describes a difficult situation connected to the housing crisis and work placements when the wife and husband had to live with their parents or in different towns and they did not get their own flat until after seven years of marriage. Alenka Huslarová specialized in the then developing field of gastroenterology, she worked in the health centre in Charles Square, she taught medical students, her work was her life mission. Thanks to political liberation she went on a five-week internship in the clinic of Professor Heinkel in Stuttgart in 1968. The internship focused on laparoscopy and liver biopsy, which she then introduced and performed at the gastroenterology department in Charles Square. The Huslars refused the possibility to emigrate in 1969. Mojmír Huslar left the party the same year and he returned to civilian life. Alenka as an independent was not allowed to apply for science candidacy. She was also not allowed to go on foreign internships. The Huslars listened to Radio Free Europe, read samizdat but were not directly involved with dissidents. They welcomed events in November 1989 with great hopes, their son took part in demonstrations in Albertov. Alenka for the Memory of Nations also narrated a unique war story of her husband who aged fifteen left Protectorate old to fight for his nation abroad.
