“It might be weird, but for me, the most terrifying thing was this biggest air raid on Brno in 1944. During our school years we went to Scala, to the cinema, to see a movie, and halfway through the screening of 'Děvčica z Beskyd' ('A girl from the Beskids') those iron windows would drop, the lights would go on and someone would yell: 'Alarm!' So teachers just gathered us and they took us to the cellars beneath the Minorite Monastery. At that place we would survive the bombing. It was just horrible, the biggest air raid on Brno I guess. The floor was shaking and plaster was coming down, the lights were blinking, the girls were screaming and teachers were comforting them, although they just needed someone to do the same thing for them. Well, it was just terrible.”
“On the same day, they were bombing the Supreme Court in Brno, also known as the Capitol back then, at Malinovské square opposite the theatre. And my uncle, he was quite a rascal, but he had this duty during the air raid – this yellow armband he had – and he had to bring everyone to the shelter behind the Supreme Court. Once, after two hours or so, he thought that the bombing had stopped. He went out, looked around, and all of a sudden, he saw this plane coming right towards him, dropping a bomb. He ran down to the cellar to warn all those people. He opened the door, but at that moment, the bomb did indeed hit the shelter, so the door broke his nose. He was thrown backwards to this short corridor, bleeding. So his life was saved by his lack of discipline. As everyone else had been buried under the rubble. So that was quite a catastrophe.”
“After two hours of serious bombing, this boy told us: 'But the Americans, they have this bomb, which penetrates buildings, it destroys just everything, setting it ablaze, and it goes like this: Uííííí!' He stopped talking and I still heard the sound. It was just horrible. I said that it had to be the bomb. But it wasn't. It was a siren, as the air raid was over. I was afraid so much, thinking it was the bomb, so in the end, the boys just dragged me out on the street. And there was this catastrophe, right in the centre of Brno.”
Ladislav Kolbaba was born on June 8, 1932, in Brno, where he witnessed the events of the Second World War and the bombing of the city. After finishing his elementary education, he trained as a shop assistant, specializing in electronics. Yet, he didn’t finish his training and got a temporary job in Karviná as a miner. After that, he acted in many professions – a bus driver, a trolley bus driver, a driving school instructor, a cosmetics salesman, a storeman, a bouncer and a boiler operator. He travelled across several countries and had been panning for gold. He was a gold panning instructor, a correspondent and a photographer. He wrote memories of his childhood in the book ‘Bylo nás šest’ (‘There Were Six of Us’). He also wrote about his pursuit of gold in books such as ‘Zrození zlatokopa’ (‘The Birth of a Prospector’), ‘Sedm tisíc km v osmi’ (Eight People, Seven Thousand Kilometers’), and ‘Sedm tisíc kilometrů sám’ (‘Seven Thousand Kilometers on my own’). He holds the title of the gold panning world champion, which he had received in Poland in 2000. His son Jiří is a well-known traveller. In 2017, when the interview had been recorded, the witness had been living in Brno; he had been engaged in the ANO Political Movement.
