Painting a home

Flower beds would replace a packed earth lot and by the intersection, where today stands a lonely cross, a small gazebo. „For the tourists,“ local children explain. „And also for us.“ The municipality of Dobrá Voda u Toužimi has not seen many tourists in the last few years. An air of defeat rules the area, much like in other villages in former Sudetenland. Most houses are abandoned, and those that have tenants are mostly broken-down apartment buildings inhabited by problem citizens. The scene is to change for the better this year, however. And local children are to play an important role in this transformation.

Absolutely everyone

Over the last 20 years, Dobrá Voda became something of a world unto itself, wedged between empty fields. As has often been the case in the past, the Toužim town hall set aside old apartment buildings for non-paying tenants from neighbouring municipalities.

„Most of the residents are Roman. Their relatives in many cases moved in with them. Now 80 of the 90-person village are Roma,“ says Jana Kosová, head of Český západ, an association that helps provide social services for people in need and operates a local community centre.

The association was founded by the monks of a nearby Trappist monastery. "When they came here in 1998, Dobrá Voda looked awful. It was a mess. You had garbage containers and car wrecks…