Eva Duskova's first day of school

Eva Duskova's first day of school

This is my first day of school, it was in about 1937. This photo was most likely taken by my father, Viktor Frey.

I remember my first day of school. I went to the first grade with my girlfriend Anita Frankova, nee Fisherova. We had known each other since the age of four, because our parents were friends. What's more, we were actually very distantly related. To be specific, Anita's grandpa and my great-grandmother's sister were married. In fact back then we insisted on sitting next to each other in school. And in the end we did. Of course, right the next day we were separated for misbehaving. We were simply talking to each other. What the teacher was saying wasn't as interesting. But I very much looked forward to school, I was hungry for knowledge. The first day Anita and I were accompanied by our fathers. I know that the gentlemen in the back behind the desks stood beside each other, and I think that they were quite amused. I think that our fathers took it as this personal prerogative. Whether there were mothers too, that I don't remember. Very early on I went to school unaccompanied, because it was a short ways off, without any sort of danger along the way.

I very much loved going to school. Summer holidays always took too long for me, I couldn't wait until I could go to school again. I liked studying, in elementary school I had, I think, liked everything. Perhaps less counting and more grammar. And I had a hard time coping with drawing. And in high school I loved all the humanities, while the natural sciences remained somewhat foreign to me. Though I must say that even so they interested me and I liked studying them.

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