Jaroslav Proche

“One thing led to another, and he says: ‘Would you like to work at the Castle?’ And I say: ‘For goodness’ sake, I’m a former circus manager, I’m just a circus guy, what would I do here... You’re an advisor, you’re an architect, an educated bloke, an engineer... the only job I could do here is that of a stableman, except you don’t have any horses, you got rid of the stable...’ And he says: Well, okay, but if you’d like to, what about managing the Royal Garden?’ And I say: ‘Well, that would be something!’ And he says: ‘You could even live in the garden house by the wall, where the cops used to be when they guarded Husák.’ And I say: ‘By the gate, next to Belvedere? Well, that would be fabulous. There’s a Renaissance garden there... And I could live there?’ I ask. ‘Yep,’ he replies. And so I came to the office all poshed up, and Mirek Masák came there - he was already waiting for me there, and a moment later the president came and said: ‘You must be a jolly sort, going by what Mirek says. You two work out when you can start.’ Well, and I moved in two weeks later. And there I was!”

“At the circus we took anyone after the season. In fact, I know that one time we were next to some prison, perhaps it was in Leopoldov, and we were waiting for them to open the gate, and straight up we took five people who were willing to join the circus. That’s how it was back then. Because the circuses didn’t make any trouble, politically. Unless the person was headed into management, into some higher position. And because I didn’t have an exactly great background profile, politically, I couldn’t get accepted to any school after my graduation exams - I tried Brandýs nad Labem, where they interviewed me, I wanted to apply to a teaching institute. Back then I wanted to do physical education and biology because I enjoyed the subjects, but I wasn’t accepted. Then I tried a hotel school, but because they didn’t take me there either, I joined the circus.”