BIBLIOGRIND
The Life of a Wordsmith — Read … Live … Write
Archive for November, 2008
November 29, 2008 at 9:43 pm · Filed under The Prague Blog
It was cold today, or at least it looked cold outside. I needed to shop – food, sundries, holiday candles – so today was the day. I finally got outside at 2.30-ish, and the air wasn’t as cold as i’d thought. So my thought was to walk through Latensky Sady (Prague’s largest park), then catch a tram down to the Tesco at Andel. I got off at Malostranska and walked up the block. I couldn’t find the park.
Biggest fucking green space in Prague and I’m standing by the river watching a trio of babushkas carry shopping bags. Where was this place? I thought I’d looked precisely on the map, but I must be a klick away. So I backtracked to the tram and took the #20 south.
Of course, I never leave the house without either a book, a notebook, and one of my Mont Blanc pens. I’d loaded my man purse with said items and was out.
When I got home, however, I unloaded my bags and discovered the Mont Blanc was not to be found. Shit! This is my older Mont Blanc pen, a gift from Matt & Kathy Ryan on the celebration of my MFA degree (today I wonder why I bothered with that 3rd degree, but that’s subject is for a later book-length screed). It’s a slim, black & gold pen that writes flawlessly across all surfaces but diamonds. Engraved on its middle gold band is the phrase “Nobles Oblige” (the nobel obligation— writing to ones friends … or in my case writing mostly notes and novel scenes on anything that will accept ink).
The pen was gone. I looked in the satchel. I looked on the floor. I looked on the bed, where I’d tossed the satchel. I looked in my coat pockets. I tried to remember which slimy fuck stood behind me on the bus lumbering down to Dejvicka. And I asked myself, Did someone steal my fucking pen? I thought and searched, and decided that theft was the answer.
Then, over a conciliatory glass of Bordeaux, I decided to look in my backpack, the last place I’d for certain seen and used it yesterday. And there it lay, the white five-point star emblematic of Europe’s highest mountain, Mont Blanc, whose “glacier massif” is melting so fast that the mountain may in my lifetime be renamed Mont Noir. Anyway… the pen is indeed safe, and … knock on wood (I just rapped my forehead twice) … I’ve still never been pickpocketed.
(Lately I’ve been thinking this question over: Did I move to France to live in the shadow of Mont Blanc because I owned its eponymous writing instrument, or did the pen compel me to commune—to pilgrimage, take the haj—with its namesake? I have no answer to this question. BTW…Mont Blanc pens are made in Switzerland and Germany, owned by Richemont (Suisse) and have nothing whatsoever to do with France. Never had, but for the name. Hmm. Who needs a drink?)
November 27, 2008 at 8:44 pm · Filed under The Prague Blog
In a few select publications, you can find news features printed in English. One prominent place is “Metro”, the daily info tabloid handed out in the early a.m. as people make their way into the subterranean travel portals. People are so intent on getting their Metro that they’ll flock around the distributors like pigeons to a bread-toting tourist in St Mark’s Square.
I don’t get a Metro, so these Czechs are basically in my way as I’m trying to get to my train. But one day a few weeks ago I noticed while looking over a commuter’s shoulder that the Metro has “The English Page” … one page devoted to teaching Czechs English by offering a tidbit news-feature piece (or two). This is an interesting phenomenon, I think. You don’t find a Korean Page in the NYC subway, or a Czech Page in Chicago’s subway.
While many Czechs don’t know English and will likely never even think about learning English, the two youngest generations are learning this all-important language (someday to be supplanted by Mandarin, no doubt) that help them get any number of important jobs. There are many foreign-owned companies employing a goodly percentage of Czechs. Some of these companies are owned by US co’s, other by the French, Duth, Germans, and Polish. The common language in Europe now is English (thus my presence in CR), because international companies always-always-always do business with the US, and so they already know English; which means that the best way to do business throughout the EU is by having one common language, thus relieving people of learning seven or twelve different tongues.
Oddly, the Czech’s Metro English Page is written at an upper-intermediate to advanced level. Phrases such as “in lieu of” and “a way to brush up on their skills” are not easy translations. In fact there are many English phrases, I’ve heard my students point out, that are difficult to understand the concept. It takes a bit of explanation, and then I’ll see the light shine in their eyes. Usually, there is an equivalent phrase in Czech (as is found in so many languages), but they chuckle at how English phrases are given, sometimes.
For the record, my acquisition of Czech is going poorly, as I have little time to practice, and it’s just a very tough language, not just to pronounce, but to remember.
November 27, 2008 at 8:30 pm · Filed under The Prague Blog
From the communist years there still lingers – and rightly so – the little proletariat garden plots. These were about the most private (and personal) property the average Czech could own. The concept of course was that if you give the people the little things in life, they won’t revolt over the big things, such as freedom to earn money on your own and freedom the travel anywhere in the world just by booking a seat on a train or plane.
The little Czech garden is a small plot of land, about 1/10 of an acre (or smaller) that people could put a little shed on, from which they may use as a potting shed or, for the creative minded, but in a small wood stove to heat up a pot of tea for a Sunday afternoon. And the Czechs work these gardens still, creating nice little flower plots (roses are hugely popular here), with a small shade tree to boot, a bench, and even a row or two of vegetables. Weekends find the oldest Czechs puttering around in these gardens (the young have no time for nostalgia, actually, so intent are they on making money to buy more “stuff”), turning the soil in springtime, pruning bushes and cutting fresh flowers in summer, raking leaves in winter, and leaving all quite fallow when the snow falls.
November 23, 2008 at 10:13 am · Filed under The Prague Blog
Last night’s Pub Night at U Karla IV restaurant saw 12 of us teachers speaking English and eating Czech food – chicken breasts with dumpling; pork skewers with potato pancakes; gnocci with cream sauce – drinking good Krusovice “black” beer and huddled in a cold “non-smoking” room whose heat, we were assured, “worked last winter.”
Nevertheless, the snow fell outside, covering the cobblestone streets. Once outside, just a little more bundled up than some were inside, we found that the snow was perfect packing snow. We gathered snowballs and had a spontaneous fight outside the pub. Arnot (the school’s resident French teacher) lived just a five minute walk from U Karla, so several of us slip-slid over to his apartment (at one point we needed to walk down a wooded trail and beside a fast-moving stream, over a bridge, etc).
Arnot has a 300 sq ft studio apartment for which he pays 7,500 Kc a month (including heat & web), which translates to about $360 at yesterday’s exchange rate. (btw … none of us expats speak often in exchange rate lingo because we’re all paid in krowns, which is exactly how one should think, cuz making the change is often counterproductive). I mentioned to the group that Arnot’s apartment would cost about $1800/mo in NYC’s Hell’s Kitchen, and $2500/mo on the Upper West Side. Everyone gasped, but we realized the relativity of such facts.
I needed to leave the party before 11pm because the last bus from Dejvicka up the hill to Suchdol (last night I learned a 4th way to pronounce my neighborhood. Ugh!) is at 12:03. Luckily, the apartment was a few blocks to Palmovka metro, with a change at Mustek for Dejvicka. I was home in an hour, but I stood at the Dejvicka bus stop for 15 min with many others, in the freezing snowy cold. (where some drunken scumbag about 4 feet 5 inches tall wanted to start of a fight with a 15 year old boy, whose two girlfriends stepped in and yelled lots of quality Czech explitives at the drunken dwarf ’till he backed off).
And to this morning: lots of snow falling outside the window. I’m going to put on my boots later and take the plunge outside because I need to shop for many household supplies. I think I’ll go to Nové Smichov (at Andel), where the Tesco has my favorite Thai curry pastes and all kinds of goodies (except their wine selection sucks).
November 21, 2008 at 6:48 pm · Filed under The Prague Blog
I walked up from the Hradcanska metro stop into a light rain. Within a minute my #18 tram came along and I got on for my trip up the hill, well past the castle. Halfway up the rain changed to snow, light and wet, but snow nonetheless. My students tell me November snow is not too early, traditionally, but there has been little snow overall in the past five years because of warm winters. Perhaps this winter, then, is going to yield a bumper crop of snowfall.
If the rainfall over the last 6 weeks had fallen as snow, I’d be up to my hips in the stuff. If the temps do drop to winter-temps throughout Dec-Feb, then I’ll be wearing my all-weather mountain hiking boots as I tool around the city going from class to class.
Anyway, the snow gives me visions of blanketed castles and Old Town Square and hot-spiced wine vendors and cafés with steamed windows behind the cold. I need to start taking my camera along daily to get some pre-winter scenes of leafless trees, icy streets, cold Czechs at tram stops, and happy Christmas shoppers plying the Christmas Market squares. (and, No, this photo is not from today, much as I’d have liked to see!)
November 18, 2008 at 8:41 pm · Filed under The Prague Blog
So reading my friend Chris’s blog re To Stop Drinking:
I mean really … I just c… well…not…mayb-…nooo…it’s like th-…..but really when I loo … well … okay—no sure well you see … that’s just not possible … notmorethanafewdaysanywayMAN.
I do love a good slurp of red wine.
If you doubt its draw and goodness, look at this photo and lie to me how you just now didn’t think how good a dram of wine flowing down the gullet would be! Don’t be shy. Wine goes well with a breakfast omelet (so very French, in fact).
Think of drinking this way: The more you get others around you to drink, the better the party.
November 16, 2008 at 8:17 pm · Filed under The Prague Blog
Addition. Subtraction. Division. Multiplication.
That’s where I find where the writing takes me these days. None of this is bad; in fact it’s good, very good. The analogy sticks: adding scenes; subtracting words; dividing chapters; and multiplying imagery.
November 13, 2008 at 11:18 am · Filed under The Prague Blog
Over the last week my students have asked me about the American election, who I voted for, if I’m happy about Obama, blah blah blah. In turn I asked them about their political system and, perhaps more importantly, what “democracy” means to them. Most of them have little recollection of life under communism, because they were either too young or just in their teen years and we all know most teens haven’t a clue.
Their parents remember communism of course, but they don’t talk about it much because “it’s in the past! Who wants to talk about those people?” Fair enough. Some students do remember communism, or have stories to tell about their family:
Pavol remembers standing in line for fresh fruit: “Bananas were hard to get, so when bananas came to the market, I stood in line to buy some.” Today the markets have so many bananas that you could think Czech have some extra monkey gene or something.
Ana remembers being 15 years old in 1989 when the Velvet Revolution happened: “It meant to me and my friends that we had a day off of school. We never had days off of school, so this was a big deal. We went down to Wenceslaus Square [sight of student protests that eventually turned national and thus forced a change in government] and hung out. We didn’t really know what was going on. We didn’t meet a lot of people who knew what was going on, either. I’m surprised the revolution happened because most of the people there, I think, were just having a good time being out of school.”
Martin told me the story of his grandfather: “My grandfather was a doctor and he hated the Russian government. He was always saying things against them. My grandmother warned him that he shouldn’t say these things around the wrong people. The wrong people could be anyone outside your family. One day when he was at a big meeting, some guy strong in the party said something like ‘The Russians are really good leaders’ and my father just got angry and said in this big group that the Russians were terrible for Czechs and he hated them. Two days later the police came and arrested him. He spent a year in prison doing hard labor. This was man who had never done things like that: he was a doctor and intellectual. My parents were kicked out of university because my grandfather was arrested. After a year he came home, but he was never the same. … You have to be able to say things against the government in order to be free.”
Lukas says he remembers long lines and having little money, but that the family was always happy because they did things together. When you just ignored the politics and got on with living, he said, you can focus on being happy and devoting time to your children. Under communism, people got home from work at 3 o’clock, so they could be with their children who had just come home from school. Now everyone works longer hours and worries about having enough money to retire.
Marie remembers life under communism as very happy for her, because she was just a kid and kids don’t know anything about the world outside their little life in the house and around the neighborhood with her friends. Parents do their best to shelter kids from the reality of the situation, until it’s time they need to know about such things.
My students say that the Czech Republic needs a couple more generations of leaders to make things better for them. Right now there are too many old people with old ideas, socialist ideas that take a lot of money and then don’t make things better. “We are only 20 years old as a country. We have a lot to learn.” Many Czechs are “fed up” with politics. They don’t want to go back to communism – they are liking their consumer society – but they know that right now politics just aren’t working out for “people.”
November 9, 2008 at 8:27 pm · Filed under The Prague Blog
Walnut trees are all over the Czech Republic. In Cesky Krumlov outside the castle gardens, I was walking down a narrow street between rows of squat houses when nut pods dropped beside me. They were dropping so often that it felt like September in Apple Canyon with its “acorn rains.” I picked up a handful of those castle walnuts and ate them later while riding on the bus back to Prague.
Well, this week the corner street vendors have boxes and boxes of freshly gathered walnuts for sale. A kilo (2.2 pounds) cost about $2.50. Fresh walnuts are easy to open, with no need of nutcracker. A butter knife wedged into the seam, much like shuckers open oysters, separate the nut. Raw walnut meat is tender, more nutty in flavor than the dried variety found in packaged “brands.” Along with the nuttiness is a sweetness in the meat. Not sugary sweet, but rich-sweet.
I have a “cold room” I leave unheated because, well, I don’t use the room otherwise than as an entranceway … sort of a mudroom or cold pantry, where the half-fridge stays. This room is good for storing walnuts, which I plan to stock up on (walnuts are an excellent source of complex proteins, are lower in fat than other nuts, and loaded with antioxidents), and for storing red wine (kept at about 55 degrees, such as one finds in French subterranean wine cellars).
Finally a sunny day sprung up between rainy-mild weekdays of late. I had to get out and breath this warmth, so I took the bus & tram to Hradcany Castle and walked through the gardens still open to the public. There are plenty of tourists yet coming through Prague. The phrase for the day is “hot spiced wine”: this is a potent beverage available at most cafés when the temps drop. If you’re lucky, or patient, you will find (look for) a bar that carries some home-made hooch.
I use this home-made term loosely, because this isn’t some Dago Red left to ferment in the cellar. In fact it’s special, unpasteurized “new wine” that is both rich-bodied and high in alcohol. You’ll know you’re getting this when the barrista pours a glass from a spigot plugged into a glass globe vessel, about the size of a basketball. Some bars have whole “trees” of these vessels, lined up on a back wall like the potions in an apothecary’s shop. So I walked around Malostrana with a cup of hot wine (juniper berries, allspice, and whole cloves added), looking into shop windows. I found an interesting puppet-makers shop, which had some amazing carved puppets.
November 5, 2008 at 11:05 am · Filed under The Prague Blog
I’ve heard from many Czech friends, students, colleagues. They have big smiles on their faces. They seem to be as proud or more so than myself at the USA’s election of Obama, and its return to reason, care for the world, and willingness to work with the other side. Given how Republicans treated Democrats in the federal government during Bush’s catastrophic, currupt and criminal administration, the urge for Democrats is to ignore Rightists, conservatives, and Republican lawmakers specifically. They deserve this treatment, as a point of fact. But America and Americans and the world in general do not deserve this. Both sides need to work … not for “compromise” as this word has taken on a sinister and pejorative meaning … but work to put this country back together and give people a chance to succeed again.
For my part, I’m going to hold the Democratic Congress and Obama to a higher standard, because they have a large majority and with that majority comes responsibility (and because they’re just smarter people than the last administration’s participants). I suspect Republicans to begin campaigning for 2012 today … first with attacks against Obama’s abilities and everything petty they’ll do, such as they always to, and then segue into doing all within their power to ruin good legislation. It’s simply in their nature. It’s historical; and it’s pathological. But that does not relinquish responsibility among the Democrats to make things happen anyway.
America has seen its best economic times under Democratic administrations. Each Republican administration in my lifetime has begun with secrecy, subterfuge, and nastiness against the other side and Americans in general, and each has ended in failure, disgrace, criminal corruption, and further ruination of the United States. The larger question, over time, and which must even be asked on this historic day — the return to the White House of someone who can successfully string two sentences together, at the very least — is the question Will America and Americans ever be fooled into voting for Republican government again? The legacies of Nixon (resigned), Reagan (bloodlust murderer of countless Latin Americans), Bush I (instigated Saddam Hussein into invading Kuwait and thus beginning Gulf War I), and Bush II (criminal invasion and occupation of a foreign country) are poor legacies for leaders, much less leaders of the United States, the bastion of Democracy on this planet of ours.
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