Holidays Begin With Physical Exercising In Prague

30 Jun 2006, 14:00 - Sport
While most of the Prague citizens plan to have a vacation during first July week and flee from the city – there are 2 free days during the week (national celebrations on Wednesday and Thursday), others will arrive to Prague from all parts of Czech Republic to participate on the »14th Vsesokolsky Slet« (Meeting of all Sokols), giant gathering which takes place every six years.

Around twenty thousand people should directly participate on the 2006 Slet. The peak of the celebration - main programme takes place at the Evzen Rosicky stadium at Prague's Strahov on July 5 and 6. There are accompanying events on various places around Prague during the week.

The Sokol physical exercise organization - Czech Sokol Organization (CSO) is the fourth most numerous civic association in the Czech Republic, whose 180 000 members participate in sport activities. While it was founded in 1862, Sokol organization belongs to one of the oldest associations of this type in the world.

The philosophy of CSO is associated with the emancipation struggle of the Czech nation in the 19th Century. The idea of physical education as well as the promotion of moral values was formulated by the founder Miroslav Tyrs, a professor of the Charles University, and by Jindrich Fugner.

Interwar period gave the Sokol organization strong impetus to development. Membership grew to over a million. Important statesmen including the first two Czechoslovak presidents, Tomas Garrigue Masaryk and Edvard Beneš, were members of the organization.

Sokol was banned by all totalitarian regimes in Czechoslovak history. Firstly, Sokol was banned during the World War I., in 1915. Secondly, it happened during the Nazi occupation of Czech lands in 1939 and finally, Sokol was banned by the communists after 1948.

Communists abused the philosophy of Sokol meetings to organize so called Spartakiadas. These meetings were mainly about the promotion of communist regime ideas and showing the ideal type of worker, a member of proletariat.

The modern era of Sokol began with its revival after the fall of communism. In people’s mind, the stigma of mass Spartakiadas still remains and the meetings did not attract as many spectators as during the interwar period. And watching football championship on TV is, of course, better attraction, isn’t it?...

More about »Slet«: www.sokolskyslet.cz.