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AN ARCHAEOLOGY OF THE IRON CURTAIN
on the 1 st of October in the evening. The station was full of soldiers to be, all
saying goodbye to their family and friends. The train took off and stopped
in several places along the way letting soldiers on and off. My destination,
Budejovice, was around 700 km away and we arrived here in the afternoon
of the 2 nd of October. At the station there were buses and military lorries
waiting for us. A short time later we were behind the barrack gates. Our
civil clothes were sent home, our hair was cut, after which we showered and
were given our military clothes and equipment. We were also trying to get
to know the other new soldiers. We were then divided into groups such as
dog handlers, drivers, and cooks or, such as I was, a telephone and radio
operator. In the evening we put our clothes and things into the lockers and
our first night in green was about to commence…” (Jozef, 2010, pers.
comm. 14 th November) (Figure 58).
There were different specialisations of border guard such as gunners, dog
handlers, drivers, radio operators, engineers, surveillance technicians and
cooks. Initial training was given at several training facilities such as in
Jemnice which was the training facility for the border guards in the study
area (Tomas, 2010, pers. comm. 14 th October). Here the future border
guards were trained in physical exercise, shooting and gun handling,
military tactics, special border training, political schooling (communist
propaganda) and particular training required for the different specialisation.
This training lasted around 3 months (Marek, 2010 pers. comm.4 th
November). If you were given more specialised training such as to become a
radio and telecommunication operator the training was usually around 6
months (Jozef 2010, pers. comm. 14 th November 2010).
A border guard had approximately 10 days off per year with an extra one
to three days off in order to travel home depending on the distance. The pay
a border guard received was not much more than pocket money but the
guards that served directly on the border were paid a bit extra. This did not
include people at the border guard station, for example cooks that were not
out by the actual border. Work as a border guard could be hard. The guards
schedule followed the following pattern: two days on duty then one day of
training followed by one day off and then it stated all over again. If,
however, the area was under high alert (due to circumstances such as
political disturbances in the country or an important political visit) there
would not be any days off or time for training at all. A working day was 10
hours and 12 during periods of high alert. Work was not, however, limited
to these hours. Marek who worked as a driver with the 12 th Company, 5 th
Brigade at the Chebská border guard station near the border to GDR
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