My Favourite White Shirt and My Father’s Zatopekian Gesture

Today is Achan’s birthday. How young he is? I do not know for sure. On my birthday last month, I had gifted myself a plain white cotton shirt to replace the one which was found missing from my wardrobe on the last trip home. I have had a penchant for the white cotton shirts for a long time. I remember having a favourite white cotton shirt when I was at college. Those were the days of wide eyes and long curly hair, when the women of all ages couldn’t resist a passing glance at the handsome figure ;-)

The temptation to dress well and have simple yet great new clothes was hard to suppress. It can not be blamed, on someone hogging the limelight all the while J But often the demand was turned down at home by the Parents who conveniently followed the doctrine that whatever he wore, their son was the most handsome guy in the world. A few days after one of those bitter battles at home I found a new white shirt with a small red star logo on the left pocket on my Parents’ Godrej Storewell and readily took a fancy for it. I had inherited my Father’s liking for cotton shirts and did not hide my craving for the new one I had found among his collection. The demand was met with stoic silence and I had no option other than giving up my desire.

Emil Zatopek was one of the most popular members of the Communist Party of Czechoslovakia, a national hero whose statue stood at a prominent location in the capital, Prague and whose birthday was a national holiday. In 1968 he was one of the most prominent supporters of the then President Alexander Dubcek’s reform program known as the Prague Spring, the first of its kind in the communist bloc in Eastern Europe. He signed the “2000 Word Manifesto” which called for a break from the Soviet Union. But after the party hardliners ousted Dubcek and took power with the help of invading Russian troops, the Czech Army Colonel was stripped off his Army rank, and expelled from the Communist Party and was asked to work as a garbage collector in the streets of Prague. Alarmed by the crowds of people who turned up to help their national hero at work, the authorities later sent him to work in a uranium mine in a remote village where he worked in virtual isolation till his retirement in 1982. His national honours were restored after the Velvet Revolution of 1989 and he could travel and talk freely again and enjoy the affection and respect of the athletics fans the world over. But during those interviews he refused to blame his former comrades for the hardships they had imposed on him.

Had he been alive, Zatopek would have celebrated his birthday and wedding anniversary last Saturday along with his wife Dana, who incidentally was born on the same day a few hours later and to this day they remain the only husband and wife to have won the Olympic Gold medals on the same day.

“His enthusiasm, his friendliness, his love of life, shone through every movement. There is not and never was a greater man than Emil Zatopek.” So said Ron Clarke; the Mayor of Gold Coast, Queensland, Australia.

As a promising 19-year-old, Ron Clarke was chosen to light the Olympic Flame during the opening ceremonies of the Melbourne Olympics in 1956, coincidently the last and the least successful one for Zatopek. But in spite of setting 17 world records in long distance running, he failed to win an Olympic Gold medal, the ultimate dream of any athlete. In 1968 at Mexico, during a last ditch effort, he collapsed and nearly died from altitude sickness sustained during the gruelling 10,000 m race final, an event for which he held the world record from 1963 to 1972. Disappointed, he decided to call on Zatopek in Prague on his way back to Australia. On the point of his leaving Prague airport after the visit, Clarke was walked through the customs by Zatopek. Shaking hands in a final farewell, Zatopek quietly slipped into his hands a small package and said; “Look after this; you deserve it.” Worried that he was carrying some smuggled information from Zatopek, who was on a secret service watch list at the time for his support to the Prague Spring, Clarke took it unopened onto his flight. He hesitantly opened his package only after the flight was well outside Czechoslovakian airspace.

Inside it was Zatopek's 10,000 metres gold medal from Helsinki, with an inscription for Clarke!!

A couple of days after giving up my hopes on having the new white shirt for myself, I found it hanging inside my wardrobe J

And for me; there is not a greater man than my Father

Footnote: My missing white shirt was later traced to my Father’s wardrobe ;-)