Planning an Escape for 13 Years: How One Family Outsmarted the Iron Curtain (439)

27:04Peter Kasl:and were actually contemplating whether they should stay in West Germany at the time. But they knew that if they decided to stay, we would become orphans, me and my brother. Communism was notorious for keeping families apart, especially when the parents defected, for example. Sometimes we heard stories that would take 10 to 20 years to reunify the families. Basically, we would have been adults by then. And my parents knew that this would have been horrible for us. So they eventually decided to just go back, cross the border. They bought some goods like a boombox radio station and an ABBA CD, which was a big hit back then, the ABBA.

27:52Peter Kasl:And it was magical. And that's when they truly made the ultimate. Okay, this is not a matter of when, but we got to put it now into motion. We have to put this plan into motion. And it also showed the regime, hey, they came back. They went to West Germany for a week. They came back, no issues. So I guess you can say they were not on their hit list anymore, so to speak. They honored the visa by coming back on time and continue to live our lives. What did they tell you and your brother about West Germany? Did they describe what they'd seen? Because at this point, you don't know that there's an escape being planned because your parents are keeping it from you completely.

28:46But what did they tell you about the West after that visit?

28:51Peter Kasl:Of course, they kept it very simple. when you're talking to a young kid. So everything was beautiful, colorful. One thing that they noticed is just everything, people were more relaxed, people were more calm, people were more friendlier in West Germany. And everything was just bright, colors, colors. Communism just lacked color. So even if you went there in a fall where all the leaves were off trees, Everything just seemed more brighter. And the abundance, that's one thing communism lacked. We had abundance of everything in West Germany. Food, you go grocery store, stores, everything was abundant and everything was available.

29:38You didn't have to wait in line for anything. A lot like we had to wait in line for food in communism, which was a common practice where family had to switch spots, you know, spend three hours in a line.

29:52Peter Kasl:A relative would show up, spend another three hours. So it's just it just was such a new world. Now, we had a somewhat of an idea because my father. Build this huge antenna on our house where we could get the West German TV stations. It was grainy, black and white TV, obviously, but we were still able to see. So we saw the commercials, the commercials on bubblegum and just stores. So we had some inclination. And my parents actually learned somewhat German from watching TV. We had about three West German channels. We were watching shows like Dallas and Dynasty, American series. And it was just an eye-opening.

30:39We never watched those two or three channels of communist propaganda TV. We just watched American movies on German channels. So it was helpful. But it's one thing when you see it on black and white TV, some commercials, versus heading out to West Germany and seeing the life and the ease and the lack of restrictions.

31:03Peter Kasl:They could breathe. So, again, they were very careful how much to tell us. So we would not brag about it. We would not be sharing it. But they gave us some idea what a wonderful, colorful place it was. And what is their plan? How are they envisaging that you're going to get out of Czechoslovakia? Well, after that, after that trip, they decided to meet in secret with other two families who had the same goals, is to escape. Both families had two kids, so a total of four, eight, twelve people combined. They decided to meet for about a year in secret, either at our house or one of the family's houses, discussing basically what they're going to do, how they're going to go to Yugoslavia, because Yugoslavia was a communist slash socialist country.

32:04Peter Kasl:and you were relatively easy, if I may say, be able to go to other communist countries on vacation, whether it was Poland, East Germany, Romania, Bulgaria, all those Eastern Bloc countries. You still had to explain why you're going there and you got yourself a gray passport, so your regular passport would be confiscated and you would end up with gray passports for Eastern European. so there was discussed and I don't know if you want me to go into more and more details how and stuff like that but so that's when they started to 1982 83 that's when they were planning to make this by going on a supposed vacation to Yugoslavia which is now Croatia slash Slovenia yeah it's quite a challenge having 12 people well it's not 12 people but at least 3 families in on this?

33:03Because it just needs one of them to tell somebody. I mean, your parents must have trusted these other families and the other families must have trusted your parents implicitly.

33:14Peter Kasl:Oh, absolutely. I mean, everybody had to be on the same page. They could not tell their parents, their grandparents. Their kids were a little bit even younger, so they didn't even have to bother explain it. My brother, he was one year older, so he had a little more inclination of what was going on, but to a limited level. I guess they trusted him more than me. So I was totally left out of the dark. But yeah, it was, everyone was secret. And as far as, as we got closer to 1983, basically every family requested to go on a vacation. It was done separately, separate time. There was a window, I think about February or March, where you can apply for a visa to go any other communist country to go on a vacation.

34:11Peter Kasl:So my parents applied one day, the other family another day. Back then there was no computer, so there was no way to notice if there is a pattern. They didn't know if they knew each other. So one family applied one day, the other day, and stuff like that. My mother had a note from a doctor suggesting that it would be good for her to go to the Adriatic Sea to heal her varicose veins, and stuff like that. So even going to a communist country on vacation, you had to go through leaps and bounds and bribe a doctor to write a note, which was not a total lie. Apparently, it is good to bathe your legs in the sea when you have varicose veins.

35:07Peter Kasl:I didn't know that. So it was true. so those were the kind of things we had to put together as a real reason and us kids we've never seen the ocean so that was also something that was added make sure our kids see the ocean for the first time in their life so it was a good compelling story everyone had their own story their own reasons why they wanted to go to Yugoslavia to see the beautiful warm coast And the first step you take is to meet up in Hungary. That's right. So after everybody got their visa, every family left on a different date. We were the last one out of the three. So one family left a week before, the second one three days after, and we left Czechoslovakia on July 4th, ironically, the American Independence Day.

36:08Peter Kasl:Yeah. That was a total coincidence. We even never heard of Fourth of July, obviously. Back then, 1983, we waved to our parents, grandparents, because they just knew that we're going on vacation to Yugoslavia. So, nothing of it. So, we drove there and we drove through Czech Republic, through Bratislava, which is now Slovakia, to Hungary, and we had a meeting point at the Lake Balaton, which is the largest lake in Hungary, where it was a very common place for people to go camping from other communist countries. So that's where was our rendezvous point. We met there. We set up our camp for three days, I believe.

36:54There were hundreds and hundreds of tents. Now I know from looking in the past that about half of them were potential escapees as well because that was a very common route so nobody really talked to anybody else we were the camps were tight like sardines next to each other so we we couldn't just

37:17Peter Kasl:be talking through a tent about our plans because somebody else could be hearing you so it was but that was the first step is to to finally gather at that point and then drive to Yugoslavia from there and Yugoslavia is an interesting country as far as the Cold War is concerned because whilst it was a communist country it wasn't controlled by the Soviet Union it was independent of the Soviet Union and not part of the Warsaw Pact that's correct yeah and that is why it was the most common escape route because Tito, you know, was not following the Soviet Union regime. So his borders were relatively open.

38:03Peter Kasl:Yes, they still had pretty tough guards, but as far as the open areas, all you had was a barbed wire fence versus in Czechoslovakia, they had such an elaborate technology where they They cut all the trees around the forest along the West Germany. And they had such a technology even back then where if a deer ran across the border, they would have an alarm where the whole army would show up at those spots. So it was just impossible. So Yugoslavia was the logical escape route. What was the route that you went to get from Hungary to Yugoslavia? I mentioned all the cities in the book, essentially driving from that Lake Beloton through Slovenia.

38:58Peter Kasl:But when we got to Slovenia, well, Yugoslavia, now it's Slovenia, which borders Austria. Before we went to the ocean, visiting the ocean, the sea, ocean, we decided to make an attempt to go through Austria as though our car broke down. We drove a 1936 classical car. My father was a mechanic, so he built it, and he drove with a classical car. So what we did as a first attempt to escape is as soon as we drove to Yugoslavia, We drove to the Austrian border pretending that our car broke down and we needed to go to Pilsner, our hometown, as fast as possible, all three families because our car broke down.

39:46So the fastest route, when you look at a map, is right across through Vienna and going to the Southern Czech Republic. That was the fastest route. And, of course, the border patrol didn't buy our BS. they knew exactly what we were trying to do. So we were actually fortunate that they were not arrested on the spot.

40:09Peter Kasl:But my parents were convincing enough, like, well, listen, our car, you know, it's a classic. It's a piece of, you know what, it stopped working and we needed to get back. And so they said, no, you're not going. So my parents continued, drove to Yugoslavia on the northern part of the ocean near an island called Kudok Island. And that's where we camped out. And the reason why we went to the—this is very important—the reason why—this was a two-week vacation. The reason why we went to the ocean is so we truly have some kind of vacation experience. Because there was always an assumption that we could possibly have to return.

40:51Peter Kasl:So in order for us to have an alibi and have a story to tell as kids, we had to actually go to the ocean, camp there, have a surreal, real vacation. I learned how to swim in the very salty Adriatic Sea. So it was a wonderful experience. And we needed that because, God forbid, if we return with not being able to escape, just imagine what our friends would be asking. Like, how was your vacation? Of course, a naive kid would say, well, we didn't even go to the ocean. We were spending in the forest by the border. And if we even mentioned something like that, my parents would go to prison for 20 years.

41:39Peter Kasl:so my parents had to know it all to be able to even plan something that if it did not work out we had a still a storyline so we went to the ocean we were there for about a week and then we plan our next course of action and what was that next that next course of action We drove north to the Austrian border to a town called Maribor, which is now in Slovenia. And that's a border town with Austria. And we went to the main square. We parked. Each family had their own car, so they parked their car separately. We were already separate. We could not be going the same path as three families, just too many.

42:28So everyone went their own path. We parked our car at the main square. There was a post office. So we parked right in front of the post office. The reason why is because post office is always busy. And in Yugoslavia back then, it was so common for Czechoslovakians to escape that they, as soon as Yugoslavians saw a Czech car being parked for a week, they would just steal it because they knew that the Czech

42:55Peter Kasl:defected. So we wanted to put the car in a place at a post office where there's always traffic. So we left our car, we took our backpacks, our luggages, and we started walking in that town all the way up to the hills, basically. And we were trekking into the mountains looking for the border. We spent about three hours in the forest, deep forest. The mountains over there are basically the lower Alps bordering Slovenia and Austria. So those were some massive mountains. We had to avoid small villages because villagers were instructed to report any suspicious activity and they got financially rewarded.

43:42So we had to avoid any kind of towns. We had to go in forests. It was really tough for my mother, especially. We kids, we took it as an adventure.

43:53Peter Kasl:So we were enjoying ourselves, relatively speaking. Did you have any idea what was going on and why you were up in the mountains at this point? No, to be honest with you, I thought we were some kind of hiking trip. Because we did some hikes when we were in Yugoslavia by the coast. So I didn't, again, it still didn't dawn on me. My father sometimes went ahead of us to look for a path. Remember, we didn't have any maps. You could not be caught, God forbid we were caught, with maps. Especially because it's like, okay, you're obviously looking for Austria. So we had to go by knowing which direction is north, east, south, west.

44:37Follow the sun on the west side. So we knew that the border was north of us. So we had to go that direction. We also wanted to avoid a river that bordered Austria and Slovenia, which many people have drowned, we have heard, in the past. So we had to avoid that. And essentially, we finally found it after about three and a half hours.

45:01Peter Kasl:And we walked up on a hill and we see a white pose that says Österreich, which means Austria. Chronic migraine is 15 or more headache days a month, each lasting four hours or more. Botox on a botulinum toxin a prevents headaches and adults with chronic migraine before they start. It's not for those with 14 or fewer headache days a month. It prevents on average eight to nine headache days a month versus six to seven for placebo. Prescription Botox is injected by your doctor. Effects of Botox may spread hours to weeks after injection causing serious symptoms. Allerge your doctor right away as difficulty swallowing, speaking, breathing, eye problems, or muscle weakness can be signs of a life threatening condition.

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46:25Peter Kasl:And a winery, wine fields from the Austrian goes all the way to the border. And we're looking down like in awe of this straight rows of wineries that we've never seen. Well, I've never seen. My parents may have in the past, but I haven't seen. And I was in awe of the view was just incredible. And that's when it hit me, even as a kid, like, okay, we're not going back. My parents were crying emotional about being happy that we were not caught. They kissed, they hugged. and i knew that at that point this was not your ordinary hike this was something more so that was the moment where it really hit me that we were not coming back wow wow incredible incredible and what's your first encounter with austrian police or or border guards like presumably they're patrolling in that area oh absolutely uh the 80s were were time where a lot of eastern europeans were defecting to that route as soon as we walked down through the winery through wine fields first road we got on we were there maybe two minutes and a border patrol is right behind us they knew that route it was very common and they were very nice very professional we knew the laws that there was an international law that they could not return us to communism because my parents would be in prison and we would be orphans.

48:01My parents would be in prison probably for 20 years.

48:04Peter Kasl:By the way, the amount of time in prison for immigrants or people who were attempting to escape depended how many kids you had and if you had males because we were considered army. We were already considered army boys. And if you, for example, this is just another example, how communism viewed men and women. If you had five daughters, you were not as important to the regime as if you had five sons. So my parents, for example, would be, they had like almost artificial trial after where they got about 18 years of hard labor in prison because they took two potential soldiers. Anyway, so we knew, we felt pretty comfortable and safe that we were not going to be returned.

48:52Peter Kasl:The two Border Patrol agents took us to the local station. It was getting dark already. This was already in July. I think around 9 o 'clock, 10 o 'clock, it was getting dark. So they put us in a hotel. First time I ever stayed in a hotel. Very, very nice hotel. and we tried to sleep, but we were just so wired from going, having the experience. My father went down to the town to look for the other two families, whether they even made it. So the next morning we get up, we go downstairs to the cafeteria. And what do we find? The two other families, they were caught by the same patrol agents. So we ended up hugging.

49:37Peter Kasl:We were glad that we all made it to Austria. and yeah. Wow. Wow. And how long did you stay in the hotel? And I'm presuming you were taken to an immigration camp or something like that. That was the next point. So in the morning, the next day, they took us to their mini police station, essentially. They put us in this charming cowboy kind of prison you would see in movies where the sheriff would be sitting right next to the prison cell and talking to the guy. So it was kind of like that. So it was the first time I'd ever been in a cell. But that was not because we were in trouble. It was to keep us in one room.

50:20The men were taken one at a time for interrogation, make sure we had the same

50:24Peter Kasl:story, everybody. And after that, they said, okay, we're going to send you to Vienna through Graz, the city of Graz. And we're going to put you on a train and we're going to send you to the main immigration office in Vienna for processing. We did not want to stay in Austria. We wanted to go to West Germany because we already had pre-planned plans to go to West Germany through our Czech German friends who were immigrants themselves from five years before, and they were going to pick us up and take us. But of course, that's when the Austrians were a little bit irritated because they told us basically, you're already illegal here.

51:04Peter Kasl:How do you expect to get to West Germany? No, that's not happening. So they put us, they made us pay our own tickets, train tickets with a little money we had to Vienna. They waited until the train actually moved so we wouldn't jump out. Of course, we were clever. We, at the next stop, we got out out of the near Graz, city of Graz, got out of the train. We went to a pay phone. we called our friends in Neuenberg that's where they lived in West Germany hey pick us up we're at this station pick this up I remember as a kid making pay phone calls you had to feed the machine with quarters and I remember they were just throwing it like one quarter lasted about 10 seconds for chit chat so they were just feeding the machine to have a two minute dialogue.

51:58Peter Kasl:I remember that as a kid. So they said no problem. They are two friends, drove two cars, drove, found us in Austria and picked us up. And then we were heading out to Salzburg, which is on the border of West Germany. And that was the next plan, how to get across the border from Austria to West Germany. Yeah, which was another challenge for you, because as you said earlier you're illegal aliens effectively in austria that's right so how do you manage to get across that austrian west german border that was another uh challenge those two gentlemen who helped us out they thought we're gonna just put us in a car and just drive drive from austria to West Germany.

52:49I didn't think it was going to be that simple looking bad.

52:52Peter Kasl:But at the time, there were a lot of activity with the, what were they called? The RAFA? The Bader-Meinhof Group or the Red Army Faction. Exactly. I mentioned that in the book. They were very active on the border because they kept going back and forth with Germany and Austria. And for some reason, they were on high alert on that day which was a bad luck for us. We were so paranoid that we thought they were after us. Of course, that was not the case. But the border had special security that even those two gentlemen that they said, we've never seen this and they've crossed the border before. So the first night, they had to put us in a forest to sleep.

53:39Peter Kasl:We drove as close as possible. We ran up into the deep forest. We laid out our towels, our beach towels, everything we had. And all 12 of us were huddled in a forest for overnights until they could come up with a plan on how to get us across the border. So that was a little bit scary. Luckily, it was warm. It was summertime evening. But I remember I would not sleep at all. The parents were chit-chatting among each other. But we were basically just lying in the open sky. Trees are all around us waiting for those two gentlemen to come back at 6 a.m. 6 a.m. we're rolled around. We didn't see anybody.

54:24We had a view down the bottom on the road so we would see them. So we decided to just come down to the road and start walking. We were lucky that Austrian Border Patrol didn't drive by because we would look very suspicious. 12 people with luggages walking around the border. That looks very suspicious. Luckily, within minutes, our two friends were right behind us, picked us up, and he said, listen, the only way to do this is we're going to pretend we're Austrian, German, tourists going on a hike. So we went to Salzburg. We took the tramp, the skiing tramp, which are open in summertime for hikers we took the gondola the one that has like 12 people up

55:11Peter Kasl:and then from there we took a individual seat lift which was the scariest thing for me i've never been i've never sat on an individual ski lift i think they're described as chairlifts Yeah, chairlifts. There you go. I've never been on a lift. I've never been on a ski resort. So I cannot even believe. So they put us down as kids one at a time. I was scared to death. I've never been this high ever in my life. And we somehow made it all the way to the highest point. I guess in wintertime, that's where pro skiers go ski. That's why they had the single seat lifts. We ended up all the way on top. and luckily we kind of blended in we had casual clothes there were so many people luckily as hikers from Austria and Germany then we saw a sign that says state line it said in Germany it said state line in fact in the book there is a picture of us that one of us had a camera picture of the of we're standing by the sign it says state line and on the other side people coming from West Germany it said Osterreich looking down on Salzburg.

56:27So we were able to, I was able to put a picture in the book of us at that sign.

56:33Peter Kasl:So we ended up on top and now we had to walk all the way down on the German side, a steep hill, huge. It took us hours and hours to get down. Those other two gentlemen took the ski lift back down, pick up their car, drove around the mountain on the other side. They were already being looked suspiciously because they kept going back and forth already twice or three times. And they had an equivalent to green card. So they were not full West German citizens yet. And so they kept asking, like, why do you guys keep going back and forth? And they gave them some story that they went hiking or something like that.

57:09So they allowed them to go back again to West Germany on this side. They picked us up on the other side of the mountain on West Germany and put us up and took us to one of the gentlemen's home in Nuremberg.

57:24Peter Kasl:surprise surprise his wife knew that her husband was helping out some czech immigrants but she had no idea it was gonna be 12 of us so when we showed up at her at their little tiny townhouse he's like wow there's a lot of you so we had they had to cram all of us all 12 of us into their house for about a week so that's how we ended up in west germany wow wow what an incredible story what happened to your car did you ever get your car back great question my father knew in advance that he wanted to give this antique classic car to my uncle because we hoped that he would be sponsoring us to go to the united states and he did so what we did is as soon as we got to west germany we made some contacts to a Czech-German gentleman who had a tow truck, and we basically told him, hey, would you mind driving to Yugoslavia, to Maribor, town called Maribor, and pick our car?

58:29Peter Kasl:He said, sure, no problem, I'll do it. But before he left West Germany, we called the post office and asked them, basically, hey, would you mind looking outside and see if there's the classic car? It was a 1936 car, so it was very obvious. Is it still there? And this was about eight days, and they go, yeah, it's still here. Okay, thank you. So essentially, our tow truck guy drove to that town, towed it, and he had a little problem getting from Yugoslavia to Austria because the Yugoslavians knew that this was another Czech defecting, defected, and now he wants his car. So they were basically giving him a hard time, like, no, we're not going to let that Czech SOB have his own car.

59:23Peter Kasl:He escaped, and now he wants his car? No. So after bribing the Yugoslavian border guards, he said, you know something? The Czech bastard, as they said, left. Let him even have the car. That's fine. whatever go so he towed our car through austria through west germany and we had our car in west germany with us brilliant brilliant story brilliant story and are you still in contact with this czech emigre family uh yes yes we are still in contact with the one of them one of the gentlemen And the other one that was married to the lady that housed us, they've separated and we have no idea where he is.

1:00:08But I would love to contact with him or have contact to show him how much we appreciate because they didn't take any money. They just did it out of their kindness to help other fellow immigrants. And I have a lot of gratitude to them for helping us escape. because the reason why we wanted to go to West Germany is when you were an immigrant, you had to apply for the country that you arrived. And Austria back then was not the strongest economy. So if you're going to leave a country, you leave your family, your possession, your home behind,

1:00:46Peter Kasl:you might as well go to the best country, I guess, economically in Europe, and that was West Germany. So since we wanted to go to the United States, that was our first pick. But your backup country had to be the one where you're staying at. And since many people were not approved to go to the United States, there was a 50-50 chance they were going to end up in the country where we're immigrants at. And we didn't want to be in Austria. that's why we were so adamant about going to West Germany because at least Germany was economically strong enough to be able to for us to have a future and have a good life.

1:01:24And you must have had to alert the West Germans that you were in the country in order to apply to emigrate to the US. I mean how did you explain how you got there?

1:01:38Peter Kasl:There was really no need for explanation. After we stayed at the family's home for about a couple of days, we drove to the immigration office in Munich, Germany. And you walked in there and said, we are immigrants and we are here to apply for asylum to go to the United States. One family wanted to go to Canada and the two families wanted to go to the United States. And it was so common, unfortunately or fortunately. There were so many checks that they didn't even ask how we got there. Germans didn't really care. I mean, you were here. You applied for asylum, so no need to explain. So that's what the process is.

1:02:21Peter Kasl:So the paperwork, the interrogation, the interviews, make sure we were not comedy spies. Because there were a lot of spies back then. Czech, Slovakian spies living or pretending to be immigrants and stuff like that. So they put us in the first camp, immigration camp, which looked like military barracks, these buildings. That was really rough. That was overcrowded from people from all over the world. We've never seen somebody from India or Bangladesh. It was eye-opening for us as kids. I've seen nothing but white Czechs in my life. I've never seen such a diverse culture from Africans and stuff like that.

1:03:07Peter Kasl:So that was a little bit rough the first two weeks. The conditions were really poor. And I get into details in the book about the conditions. That was a rough, rough start. But within a week or two weeks, we were transferred to more permanent immigration in a town called Kempton, which is on the Austrian-Switzerland-German border. overlooking the tallest mountain in Germany. And it was a building structure, seven floors with nothing but immigrants from Yugoslavia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Czech Republic. And that was easy. That's where we lived essentially the remaining nine months waiting for asylum to be approved.

1:03:57And you're not certain that you're actually going to get asylum in the US, are you until you actually hear that can you describe the moment when you get the letter

1:04:09Peter Kasl:through absolutely absolutely we had no guarantee that we were going to get it now what helped is my uncle who defected 1968 he lived in los angeles california and he was our sponsor that helped tremendously but again that was still no guarantee um the other family who wanted to defect to United States, they were rejected. And here's the kicker, the reason, because he was in a communist party. He was not a believer, but this was during the Ronald Reagan era, where Reagan was really tough on communists. And whether you believe it or not, if you were in the party, you were rejected. So this was a perfect example where my parents' steadfast effort not to join paid dividends because if my parents were in a party, they would not be allowed to go to the United States.

1:05:05So essentially, we were the only ones out of the three families that went to the United States. The other two stayed in West Germany, lived their lives. So they're again, living in Kempton for about nine, almost 10 months. And then we got this letter in check,

1:05:26Peter Kasl:basically saying congratulations you've been approved here's your flight tickets on Lufthansa to Los Angeles through New York we were ecstatic we were just amazed that we were approved and thank God because it was getting a little tough at the immigration housing because most of the people had no idea what our fates are going to be now again if we were rejected we would have stayed in Germany but we were elated and very happy to be able to fly to the United States. Wow. Wow. And did your parents write to your grandparents to let them know what had happened or did they just leave them in the dark?

1:06:09Absolutely. This actually happened even in Austria while we're waiting at that payphone for our German friends to arrive, my father called his father, my grandfather, and even then did not want to be so blunt.

1:06:31Peter Kasl:He told me, yeah, we're in Austria. We're going to kind of check it out here, kind of in a nonchalant way. Yeah, we're going to kind of see, you know, how things are here. And he didn't tell him, yeah, we're definitely defecting. So kind of give him that hope. And my grandfather told that to our other grandparents and that they're going to stay in Austria a little bit. We didn't even tell him about West Germany. But once we got to West Germany, that's when we called them saying, listen, we are an immigration office. We're not coming back. We're going to seek asylum in the United States. And that hit them hard.

1:07:06That was hard on my parents, obviously, and my grandparents because they lost their kids. And back then, you assumed that you were never going to see them, which was true. We would never see them if communism continued. We had no intention of going back. We couldn't go back if we wanted to. So this was a tragic situation for my grandparents, not knowing what's going to happen. And not to mention a shock when everybody heard that three families defected at the same time. And it was just a shock to the whole community. Absolutely. Absolutely. And can you remember your first impressions of the U.S.?

1:07:52It must have been such a culture shock. Hi, this is Rhonda in Virginia. And I support Cold War conversations because I think the work that Ian is doing is critically important. I think it's vital to record the firsthand accounts of people who lived and experienced the Cold War because it illustrates history in a way that a book never can. So thank you so much for the podcast. It's my favorite podcast and I look forward to it every week. To be like Rhonda and help to preserve these incredible stories of the Cold War. as a monthly or annual supporter. You'll be able to listen ad-free, you'll become one of our community, get the sought-after Cold War Conversations drinks coaster as a thank you, and you'll bask in the warm glow of knowing that you're helping to preserve Cold War history.

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1:09:19Peter Kasl:Oh, absolutely. Again, we lived in Germany, so that was kind of like... a preview of what Western world looks like, you would think. But the United States is a total shock. I remember we flew from Frankfurt to New York City. I think it was JFK. And we were at the airport. I was just amazed by the sheer humanity of people from different cultures. And it was just amazing. We were thirsty. So I got myself a drink I never heard of called root beer, which I never heard of. That was such a disgusting drink and an awful taste that I was sick to my stomach. That was my introduction to the U.S. I was sick from New York to L.A.

1:10:11Peter Kasl:because I'm drinking that root beer, that incredibly sweet medicine-like flavor on an empty stomach. It may make me sick. So I don't remember much on the flight to L.A. But once we landed, we got some water, stuff like that. And I remember my uncle, I've never seen him. I've never met him before. And my father hugged his older brother and he put us in a car. I remember going on a freeway, highway. Everything was just big. Everything about America, especially Western United States, everything was big cars. You saw all those 70s Cadillacs. And it was just, everything looked so like out of this world.

1:10:56Peter Kasl:I could not believe it. And I remember driving like an hour, which seemed like eternity on the highway. And we went to his house and he housed us for several months. And it just, everything smelled different. Everything, the air was different. Obviously, you can smell the ocean, which is next to LA. And it was just everything was so out of this world that just when I thought I was shocked by West Germany, it's still Europe, right? But Los Angeles, California, it was just a totally different world. So I was in awe and disbelief. I can imagine. I mean, I remember the first time I went to the U.S.

1:11:40and was just astonished by how big the open spaces were and how big everything is. you know not not hugely dissimilar to to your experience there i wanted to ask you about you know how soon did you go to school and and how soon did you manage to learn english because at this point you don't really know any english that's correct we're forced to learn russian

1:12:02Peter Kasl:in in czechoslovakia ironically russians were being taught english but for the most part most of the Eastern European countries had to learn Russian. We went to school, we went to summer school. So this was, we arrived in, I want to say April, yes, April of 1984, we arrived to the United States. We went to school, I think within a month or so, ESL classes, which are ESL classes are for those who are immigrants. it was relatively easy we were young so they put us in a class we would just observe learn just osmosis learn by hearing the language uh reading it so that was a really relatively simple we already spoke german because we went to school even in germany for that six seven eight months And we picked up German pretty well as young kids.

1:13:05And so that transition to learning in another language was easier for us as kids. Obviously, for my parents, it was much more difficult. But we picked it up pretty fast. I remember there were summertime Olympics. That's 1984 Summer Olympics of Los Angeles. So we were just amazed watching that on TV, summertime Olympics when we were in Los Angeles. Went to summer school during the summer of 84.

1:13:34Peter Kasl:And again, we assimilated pretty well because we were young kids. We got our friends, mostly immigrants from other countries, but even American. You know, that's one thing we noticed. Everybody was so welcoming in the United States. You got different nationalities from all the world. And nobody judged you when you compare it to West Germany. I went into detail how West Germans were so rough on us, calling us Auslanders, and just basically making sure that we knew we were immigrants and we're never going to be part of Germany no matter what, which was kind of ironic that we essentially defected because they started the war.

1:14:14If there was no World War II, there would not have been communism.

1:14:18Peter Kasl:So it's kind of the irony was deafening when I look back. That's one of the reasons why we didn't want to be in Germany. Because in our experience, I'm sure it has changed now, but in the 80s, if you were a Czech immigrant, you could have lived there 20, 30 years. You were still looked at as an immigrant no matter what. And your options were limited. Let's just put it that way. So we were just elated by the United States welcoming attitude, friendly. Nobody cared where you're from. Everybody just cared for how you were, how you treated others. And it was beautiful. It was beautiful to be in this country.

1:15:01Peter Kasl:Wow. Wow. Now, I'm just going to fast forward five years to November, December 1989. 1989, what's it like in the castle household when you hear news of the Velvet Revolution? Well, we were shocked. Obviously, we saw when the Berlin Wall came down. We already, even before that, we heard how some East Germans were going to Prague to the U.S. embassy to defect. and it was just kind of surreal to even experience that and watch it on TV. We thought that communism was going to last for another 20 years. We had no idea, obviously. Had we known that it was going to end in 1989, if we had known that 1983, maybe my parents' plans would have been totally different looking back.

1:15:58Peter Kasl:But, you know, it was just surreal to see the total collapse and having that velvet revolution. We had mixed feelings about it. Of course, we were excited for the individual people. But we had a mixed reaction as far as what is the aftermath? How is it going to be after? Because there were some hard times for people who went through that. Because you had from totalitarian regime now to relative freedom and lawlessness because there were no laws and books and a lot of people had suffered after. So we had mixed feelings about it. But again, excited about the fact that it finally ended. But at the same time, worried about the corruption, which we knew what was going to follow.

1:16:54Peter Kasl:So initially, it was just we were amazed and elated for the communism to finally end. Yeah, you and me both. You and me both. Astonishing that year. Absolutely astonishing. Now, I think it's 1991, you get your American citizenship. That's correct. The process was you get your green card. You have to wait five years with the green card, and then you can apply for U.S. citizenship. So basically, you count 84 plus five years. So essentially, yes, we got our American passport citizenship in 1990, 1991, something like that. Yes, exactly. And first, as soon as we got it, we were able to visit our grandparents.

1:17:44Commerce ended. So we were able to, and that was a surreal experience when we went back to Czechoslovakia. What was that like? I mean, that must have been so moving and powerful for you. Moving and shock.

1:17:59Peter Kasl:We didn't realize how more the country has deteriorated from commerce from 83 until 1991. It was so much worse. I remember we flew to Munich and we drove from Munich to Czech Republic, Czechoslovakia, through the border. And we drove through common towns like Klatovi. And I remember it was such a horrible scene of grayness. Again, it was almost like a flashback of that horrible emptiness of coldness in the air by looking at the communist cars and the gray buildings, those communist high-rise rat houses, I like to call them. It was just eerie and sad. Even my parents, who lived there obviously much longer, we were just in awe.

1:18:59We couldn't comprehend how bad it was. But it was obviously nice to see three of our four grandparents. Unfortunately, my grandfather from my mom's side passed away in 1989, so we did not see him ever again. But the other three we saw, we were elated to see them. A lot of emotions came out crying, and it was a beautiful experience. A lot of crying, a lot of, I'm sorry. I mean, how do you explain, right? Something like that. And my parents carried heavy hearts. Still do, I think, having to do that. But they had to look out for our best interests. They essentially defected for us to have a better life.

1:19:51They did it for the kids. And I think at the end, my grandparents did understand that. And they knew it was the right thing to do. So it was very emotional. Yeah. Yeah, I can't imagine that experience there. Peter, you have told me an incredible story there. If listeners want to get in contact with you, what are the social media channels that you use? Well, I have several options. They can go on Instagram at Peter Castle. That's spelled P-E-T-E-R-K-A-S-L 2019. So Peter at Peter Castle 2019. They can also email me at PeterCastle at Yahoo.com. I can also be reached on X. I used to be Twitter, Peter underscore Castle.

1:20:47I'm also on Facebook. They can find me there at Facebook.com dash Peter Castle. They can also find my book on Amazon UK, Amazon USA.

1:20:59Peter Kasl:So just simply typing my name or the name of the book, which is called Escaping the Grip of Eastern European Communism, A True Story of Courage, Perseverance, and the Pursuit of Freedom. so if somebody wants to read my story I'll be very delighted I have go into great detail in the book about the specific location the experiences, the emotions that I felt even at that young age so please I'll be delighted if you go on any of those sites and buy my book it's a wonderful read, it's a very emotional book so you may have to have a tissue with you which which is a good thing it is it's a very it is a very powerful read i will put links in the episode information to peter's social media channels and where you can buy the book and peter thank you once again for coming on cold war conversations thank you very much from the bottom of my heart to be able to share my story with you the episode extras such as videos photos and other content are available via a link in the episode information the podcast wouldn't exist without the generous efforts of our financial supporters and i'd like to thank one and all of them for keeping the podcast on the road the cold war conversation continues in our facebook discussion group just search for cold war conversations in facebook thanks very much for listening and look forward to seeing you next week.

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