MODELS - FOR APPLAUSE OR FOR

PLEASURE?

A long time ago I put my F4F-4 Wildcat

among other models at a Czech model

show. At the end of the show there was

a medal with my creation. The importer of

these kits appreciated my modelling efforts

and I was honestly surprised. Next to my

Wildcat, which was not 100% finished, there

was a beautifully built Mustang model in the

same scale from the same manufacturer.

In my opinion, it was several horse lengths

better than my Guadalcanal machine and

the award seemed out of place. Moreover,

the Mustang was built by a friend of mine

and I told him my opinion of his model afterwards. Later at another show I was chatting

with some friends and I asked what they

brought to the show. They said they brought

nothing, they didn't think their models were

good enough to display. Outside of the scoring contest, the rest of the models were

judged on a like-dislike system. I listened

for a while their typically Czech self-criticism then I asked them: "Are you building

these models for the judges or for your own

pleasure?" This caught them off guard, they

looked at me in surprise, and then admitted

that the idea had some merit and they will

give it some serious thought

More recently Tomáš, a former colleague from the company where I worked for

a long time, confessed to me that he has

been following Eduard for a long time and

regularly reads our magazine INFO. We

worked together for many years on the

preparation of civil and technological facilities, but he never admitted to me that

he was interested in plastic models. There

were about 200 of us in the Czech branch of

the company, and I knew about ten colleagues who built models of planes, tanks or

ships. One of them even found this hobby on

purpose, as a mental relaxation. But Tomas

was like still water, he never showed his

interest When I asked Tomáš how he was

doing with this hobby, I was quite surprised.

He reads our INFO magazine thoroughly, looks at all the details of kits and accessories

and spends a lot of time looking at photos

of built models. He explained to me that as

a technology engineer he enjoys and relaxes while doing it. I am not writing this to

praise our INFO magazine. In fact, I was quite taken aback by Tomas' conclusion, he told

me that he didn't feel he was good enough to

try building our models and accessories. In

fact, he sees the models in the photos built

in a way that he couldn't. I hope he will get

over this shyness one day.

Fortunately, there are a lot of models from

many domestic and foreign modellers at

the shows in the Czech Republic, but I hope

that more of the shy ones will come out to

show their models, or at least try to build

INFO Eduard - June 2021

them, even if they are not perfect. However

I understand a bit the hesitation, Czechs

are a very critical people and they are very

economical with praise (compared to some

other nations). All the more valuable is praise or constructive feedback for someone

who isn't exactly a national champion and

is struggling through the beginning, having

perhaps returned to the hobby as an adult.

A hobby should be done for pleasure. For

example, in the last issue of INFO magazine

you could see a Spitfire built in a fictitious

marking with the initials of the author's

son, who was recently born. A few days ago,

on social media, I saw a Spitfire model that

had two markings on it: the right side depicted one machine, and the left side depic-

ted a different camouflage and marking for

a different machine.

You're probably wondering what those modellers were thinking. But they just built

their models on their own and for fun. Maybe they would lose points with the judges.

But maybe they would win the "like/dislike" rating with their story. Anyway these

models certainly won in the mind of their

authors.

I bid you farewell with a slightly changed

Bohemian medieval revolutionary motto:

BUILD THEM! DON'T BE AFRAID OF THE

ENEMIES! DON'T CARE ABOUT NUMBERS!

Jan Bobek

eduard

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