I was born during the Cold War in Czechoslovakia, in a time when many were celebrating world peace, though it was far from the reality. Conflicts, armaments, wars, genocides – one conflagration never finished without another bigger one starting up. There were murders in the name of ethnic conflict, religion and agrarian socialism. Though I never heard a gunshot or watched a bombardment, I too was living at war. They taught us to hate without themselves knowing any reason. They put people in prison for decades for having different opinions, killed those who didn’t want to stay in the country, and destroyed the future of millions. Few could imagine the Cold War’s consequences, and not even the most pessimistic of estimates could come close to what people are still facing even now. Even if no shot was fired on the road to freedom, there are many dead.