Day 3: Goodbye Kertek
I awoke around 5:30 and had a quick, hot shower. I was on the road again by 6, taking advantage of the almost empty roads and really pushing the pedal to the metal. After an uneventful drive through a foggy but pleasant Czech countryside, I finally hit Brno, the second largest city in the Czech Republic. The spelling looks strange to a westerner, but the r is pronounced almost like a vowel, so the name almost sounds like "burno".
Allow me at this point to enlighten you a little about the Czech Republic. It is one of the two countries to emerge from the former Czechoslovakia when that country split up in 1993 (no prize for guessing the name of the other country, not even if you're American). It has just over 10 million inhabitants and is traditionally divided into two landscapes: Böhmen/Bohemia and Mehren/Moravia. Bohemia is the largest, with about 60% of the population including the capital, Prague, with 1,3 million people. Brno, with its almost 400 000 is the biggest city in Moravia.
Czechoslovakia was always one of the most liberal of the former communist countries, even after the Soviet invasion in August '68, and the people of the Czech Republic are very conscious about being CENTRAL Europeans, not eastern Europeans. Ever since the old communist block crumbled, they have been bending backwards to adopt western ways and distance themselves from everything Russian. To some extent, the memory of the old Austrian-Hungarian Empire still lives on, and German is much more widely spoken and understood than English, even though young people are becoming more skilled in the latter. For centuries, even before the Austrians took control of things, German was the dominant language of the elites, and any Czech movement for cultural and political independence didn't really catch on until the early 1800s.
I should also add that the western parts of Bohemia were heavily populated by Germans until 2,5 million of them were thrown out after the 2nd world war. Germans know the area as Sudetenland, and the expulsion of ethnic Germans and the seizing of their property after the war is still a major source of contention between the two nations. Ever so often, some conservative German politician will start mumbling about how the Czechs can't possibly expect entry to German markets unless previous wrongdoings are addressed. By tradition, this is met with a diplomatically phrased, yet resounding "fuck you, Nazi scum" from the Czechs, though lately they haven't even bothered being diplomatic about it.
Brno is a very typical "former communist" city. The old town center is full of charming old buildings, gray and worn from lack of maintenance but with an aura of wealth and industry about them. Surrounding this island of peace and beauty is a vast belt of concrete slabs, except for maybe a small area of villas where foreign diplomats and local Communist Party leaders used to live.
I exited the motorway and drove into Brno on random. It was still early morning, so I didn't have any problems finding a parking space in the middle of town, and found to my delight that there were no parking fees on Saturdays. My luck was further increased by the fact that I had randomly parked just across the street from a cyber cafe. I went inside to check my e-mail and catch up on news from the home country. I emerged a few minutes later, having caught up with the affairs of the world (not much of an effort required there) and started wandering around aimlessly.
Again, I adopted my "communist" principle - I simply followed the flow of people. Soon I found myself in the old town, just outside the museums I had been looking for (I had a small map of Brno with me, but I thought it would be cheating to look at it). I first went to a museum of Czech nature located at the old Bishop's Court. The weather was turning a bit gray and drizzly so I was happy to get inside.
The museum seemed to be empty, except for the three chattering middle-aged ladies behind the counter. They spoke maybe five words of English between them, sadly none of which were relevant to the purchase of tickets. Through the usual mix of sign language and pidgin German, I gathered that the museum had two different sections, one downstairs and one upstairs. I could buy entry for either floor for the ridiculous price of 30 Koruna, or both floors for 50. Feeling adventurous, I took the combination alternative, which seemed to please the ladies no end.
By now, I had found that two of them spoke a little German and understood a few words of English. The third seemed oblivious to the existence of a world outside Brno and was therefore, by the natural laws of the universe the one who took it upon her to assist me. She pulled out a thick wad of paper sheets in a plastic folder and set off on a galloping lecture in Czech. At one glance, I could see that the folder simply contained a list of all the animals and plants in the museum, with their names written in Czech, Latin and English. Mistaking my lack of proficiency in Czech for general mental retardation the old hag still insisted on a long explanation including much wagging of fingers before I was finally entrusted with the sacred folder.
Nodding humbly and repeatedly and grinning politely from ear to ear, I was finally able to back out of the reception area and venture inside the actual exhibition. The first rooms were full of stuffed animals in glass cubicles and birds either suspended from the ceiling by way of string or simply nailed to a branch. There was in fact an enormous amount of birds everywhere. Looking at my sheets and at the various befeathered corpses perched all around me, I quickly decided that if you've seen a dozen birds you've pretty much seen them all, so I tucked the folder under my arm and moved on. Still, I have to admit that the overall impression was actually pretty good and managed to give a pleasant presentation of the variety and richness of Czech nature.
Down a flight of stairs, I came to the aquarium, where a lady was sitting with two very bored looking children, staring at the fish swimming by. Some of the fish were huge sturgeons, the most popular fish on Czech dinner tables. These ones had obviously been pardoned and put to work instead, and looked almost as bored as the children on the other side of the glass did. Given the choice, they would probably have opted for the dinner table (the sturgeons, not the kids).
Having exhausted the somewhat limited means of entertainment on the 1st floor I tried to sneak up the stairs, but was caught by the airhead behind the counter, who insisted on following me up. In a way, it was just as well, since they hadn't unlocked the doors, nor turned on the lights up there, but she also took the opportunity to start lecturing again. Fortunately, the aquarium lady and the two bored kids came up the stairs just then and I managed to duck inside the doors while she turned around to eye her new victims.
This floor contained more stuffed animals and I idly wandered around looking at the various stiffs when I was suddenly dumbstruck by the sight of a glass case full of stuffed moles. I moved in close and peered at them with eyes wide. Cold sweat was breaking out, my paralyzed tongue fell out of my mouth and my head was spinning. I suddenly felt bereft and empty as I saw a cornerstone of my childhood crumble into dust.
Allow me to explain. When I was a kid, the Norwegian state broadcasting company, NRK, had a monopoly in Norway. Try to start a private TV or radio station, and you'd be thrown in jail - I kid you not. To save money (and possibly to further the sick ideals of the commies then running the company) the NRK always bought huge amounts of crappy but cheap eastern European children's programs. One of the very few series actually worth watching was an animated cartoon starring a friendly little mole named Kertek. Everybody, I mean absolutely everybody in Norway around my age knows this little fellow. The thing is: In the cartoons, he was drawn so that he looked to be the size of a small dog - enabling him to interact with a number of other animals without looking ridiculous. But it had all been a cruel lie. Because the hard truth, now on display before my watery eyes, was that these animals are actually the size of a small rat. They reach a maximum size of 17cm (6.7 inches) and have a brain the size of a pea. Deeply shaken, I stumbled down the stairs and out into the fresh, cold air.
Allow me at this point to enlighten you a little about the Czech Republic. It is one of the two countries to emerge from the former Czechoslovakia when that country split up in 1993 (no prize for guessing the name of the other country, not even if you're American). It has just over 10 million inhabitants and is traditionally divided into two landscapes: Böhmen/Bohemia and Mehren/Moravia. Bohemia is the largest, with about 60% of the population including the capital, Prague, with 1,3 million people. Brno, with its almost 400 000 is the biggest city in Moravia.
Czechoslovakia was always one of the most liberal of the former communist countries, even after the Soviet invasion in August '68, and the people of the Czech Republic are very conscious about being CENTRAL Europeans, not eastern Europeans. Ever since the old communist block crumbled, they have been bending backwards to adopt western ways and distance themselves from everything Russian. To some extent, the memory of the old Austrian-Hungarian Empire still lives on, and German is much more widely spoken and understood than English, even though young people are becoming more skilled in the latter. For centuries, even before the Austrians took control of things, German was the dominant language of the elites, and any Czech movement for cultural and political independence didn't really catch on until the early 1800s.
I should also add that the western parts of Bohemia were heavily populated by Germans until 2,5 million of them were thrown out after the 2nd world war. Germans know the area as Sudetenland, and the expulsion of ethnic Germans and the seizing of their property after the war is still a major source of contention between the two nations. Ever so often, some conservative German politician will start mumbling about how the Czechs can't possibly expect entry to German markets unless previous wrongdoings are addressed. By tradition, this is met with a diplomatically phrased, yet resounding "fuck you, Nazi scum" from the Czechs, though lately they haven't even bothered being diplomatic about it.
Brno is a very typical "former communist" city. The old town center is full of charming old buildings, gray and worn from lack of maintenance but with an aura of wealth and industry about them. Surrounding this island of peace and beauty is a vast belt of concrete slabs, except for maybe a small area of villas where foreign diplomats and local Communist Party leaders used to live.
I exited the motorway and drove into Brno on random. It was still early morning, so I didn't have any problems finding a parking space in the middle of town, and found to my delight that there were no parking fees on Saturdays. My luck was further increased by the fact that I had randomly parked just across the street from a cyber cafe. I went inside to check my e-mail and catch up on news from the home country. I emerged a few minutes later, having caught up with the affairs of the world (not much of an effort required there) and started wandering around aimlessly.
Again, I adopted my "communist" principle - I simply followed the flow of people. Soon I found myself in the old town, just outside the museums I had been looking for (I had a small map of Brno with me, but I thought it would be cheating to look at it). I first went to a museum of Czech nature located at the old Bishop's Court. The weather was turning a bit gray and drizzly so I was happy to get inside.
The museum seemed to be empty, except for the three chattering middle-aged ladies behind the counter. They spoke maybe five words of English between them, sadly none of which were relevant to the purchase of tickets. Through the usual mix of sign language and pidgin German, I gathered that the museum had two different sections, one downstairs and one upstairs. I could buy entry for either floor for the ridiculous price of 30 Koruna, or both floors for 50. Feeling adventurous, I took the combination alternative, which seemed to please the ladies no end.
By now, I had found that two of them spoke a little German and understood a few words of English. The third seemed oblivious to the existence of a world outside Brno and was therefore, by the natural laws of the universe the one who took it upon her to assist me. She pulled out a thick wad of paper sheets in a plastic folder and set off on a galloping lecture in Czech. At one glance, I could see that the folder simply contained a list of all the animals and plants in the museum, with their names written in Czech, Latin and English. Mistaking my lack of proficiency in Czech for general mental retardation the old hag still insisted on a long explanation including much wagging of fingers before I was finally entrusted with the sacred folder.
Nodding humbly and repeatedly and grinning politely from ear to ear, I was finally able to back out of the reception area and venture inside the actual exhibition. The first rooms were full of stuffed animals in glass cubicles and birds either suspended from the ceiling by way of string or simply nailed to a branch. There was in fact an enormous amount of birds everywhere. Looking at my sheets and at the various befeathered corpses perched all around me, I quickly decided that if you've seen a dozen birds you've pretty much seen them all, so I tucked the folder under my arm and moved on. Still, I have to admit that the overall impression was actually pretty good and managed to give a pleasant presentation of the variety and richness of Czech nature.
Down a flight of stairs, I came to the aquarium, where a lady was sitting with two very bored looking children, staring at the fish swimming by. Some of the fish were huge sturgeons, the most popular fish on Czech dinner tables. These ones had obviously been pardoned and put to work instead, and looked almost as bored as the children on the other side of the glass did. Given the choice, they would probably have opted for the dinner table (the sturgeons, not the kids).
Having exhausted the somewhat limited means of entertainment on the 1st floor I tried to sneak up the stairs, but was caught by the airhead behind the counter, who insisted on following me up. In a way, it was just as well, since they hadn't unlocked the doors, nor turned on the lights up there, but she also took the opportunity to start lecturing again. Fortunately, the aquarium lady and the two bored kids came up the stairs just then and I managed to duck inside the doors while she turned around to eye her new victims.
This floor contained more stuffed animals and I idly wandered around looking at the various stiffs when I was suddenly dumbstruck by the sight of a glass case full of stuffed moles. I moved in close and peered at them with eyes wide. Cold sweat was breaking out, my paralyzed tongue fell out of my mouth and my head was spinning. I suddenly felt bereft and empty as I saw a cornerstone of my childhood crumble into dust.
Allow me to explain. When I was a kid, the Norwegian state broadcasting company, NRK, had a monopoly in Norway. Try to start a private TV or radio station, and you'd be thrown in jail - I kid you not. To save money (and possibly to further the sick ideals of the commies then running the company) the NRK always bought huge amounts of crappy but cheap eastern European children's programs. One of the very few series actually worth watching was an animated cartoon starring a friendly little mole named Kertek. Everybody, I mean absolutely everybody in Norway around my age knows this little fellow. The thing is: In the cartoons, he was drawn so that he looked to be the size of a small dog - enabling him to interact with a number of other animals without looking ridiculous. But it had all been a cruel lie. Because the hard truth, now on display before my watery eyes, was that these animals are actually the size of a small rat. They reach a maximum size of 17cm (6.7 inches) and have a brain the size of a pea. Deeply shaken, I stumbled down the stairs and out into the fresh, cold air.
posted by Ghost of Goldwater at 9:48 PM
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