ADDRESS BY MR. MILAN SISMIS

ADDRESS BY MR. MILAN SISMIS

It was sometime around 1986. In Trencin they were showing the movie Gandhi by British director Richard Attenborough. Parents got the tickets and we went together. It was the only screening in town. The cinema was packed to the last seat, all the prominent persons who managed to get tickets came as well. The film lasted three hours and when it ended, everyone spontaneously stood up and began to clap. There was neither a director nor an actor, no one to applaud, and yet everyone stood and clapped. Whom? What? Gandhi? His life, our lives, love, truth, compassion? I have not experienced anything like that before and after.

A few years later, Slovak translation of Gandhi's autobiography (by Dr. Anna Rácová) was published. One acquaintance from Czech told me that this book was the first and only Slovak book she read in her life. She found all the others she needed in Czech language. However, Gandhi's biography was not available in Czech language at that time, so she reached for Slovak translation and still preserves it as a rare commemoration.

The film and autobiography inspired many citizens of Czechoslovakia and, according to some, contributed to the peaceful change of the political system in this country in 1989, also to its peaceful partition into two friendly countries.

Gandhi inspired many Slovaks - several leading thinkers, representatives of churches and politicians. Ján Maliarik, Alexander Horák, Alexander Dubček, and even some of those who gave the movement of 1989 the name Public against Violence. In Martin, in the Slovak National Library, we have Gandhi's letter (from 1910), and a street bearing his name. Every year, in many places of Slovakia, on the day of his birthday, we remember the International Day of Non-violence. In this way, following the predecessors, Kollar, Stur, and others from the 19th century, with thankfulness, respect and joy we develop Slovak-Indian relations.

A few years ago in Slovakia, an idea arose to ask the UN to call in connection with the upcoming 150th anniversary of Gandhi's birth for a global ceasefire and a diplomatic settlement of existing disputes. How it would be like if our world had sunk for a year into peace. How would such a year of non-violence on Earth look like? Would we be able to survive it? At one Gandhi conference (and perhaps it was here in Bratislava in 2007) it was said that peace in the world begins in our hearts, in our families. One way to create it (from below) is to give up violence in ordinary life. Violence in society is closely linked to violence committed on animals. If we desire a happy life, harmonious relationships in the family, at schools, in workplaces, we should stop commit violence on animals. In practice it means to be a vegetarian, just like Gandhi.

I am glad that today's event is taking place at the University of Economics, one of our leading universities. I would like to propose to her representatives to consider the possibility - by their methods - to examine what would happen if the whole Slovak population had gradually moved to a vegetarian diet. What might be the economic, environmental, social and other impacts on it, on world society, on life on Earth. The positive health aspects of this diet have recently been appreciated by associations of American and Canadian dieticians, as well as by the World Health Organization (WHO).

Let us become the change that Gandhi wanted to see in the world and which, I believe, we too want to see. Let us start creating the world without violence. Let us begin to be more considerate to the environment and other living beings, that is, to ourselves. Let us start by adjusting our eating habits, our own diet.

Mr. Milan Šišmiš,

Slovak National Library

Slovak Union of Yoga in Daily Life