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by Jason Lockwood (Author)
At the young age of 26, and with nothing to lose, Jason Lockwood undertook an adventure where he would discover not only a new land, but also a new-found resilience and outlook on life. In the autumn of 1992, just three years after the Berlin Wall came down, Jason decided to pack up his life of comfort and head off to Slovakia to teach English for a year. He went with few expectations and too much luggage.
What he found there was a torn country grasping at new beginnings, but struggling to recover from decades of oppression and dictatorship. From drunks to Gypsies to unrepentant Communists, he learnt a hard lesson about a country unsure of its future: change does not come quickly or easily. Despite Slovakia's gloomy present and even gloomier past, Jason's story emerges as one of optimism for the future, with prescriptions not only for what ails the former Communist world, but also for the freer Western world.Author Biography
From as young as the age of eight, Jason Lockwood always wanted to see the world. Raised by journalists in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, in the 1970s and 80s, he had early and frequent contact with people from all over the world. His father was an editor for the Milwaukee Journal and invited foreign journalists home on numerous occasions. His mother worked for the International Institute, an organization that helped immigrants adjust to life in America, and thus Jason was exposed to different cultures, habits, and languages, despite growing up in a conventional Midwestern city. When Jason first got the opportunity to live abroad, he jumped on the chance and landed in Soignies, Belgium in the mid-1980s. Later, he received his degree in French and Secondary Education from the Université Laval in Québec City, Québec. After years of working in translation and computer technical support, he decided to embark on another overseas adventure, teaching English in the Slovak Republic, which is the basis for this book. Today, he resides in Sydney, Australia, a city he considers the greatest place to live on the planet.
