Prague taxidrivers

"Man, I payed 650 crowns from Old Town Square to Nusle."My friend Ole arrived from Denmark and immediately went to the trap of czech cheats on their four wheels. And I got pissed, that this is it! This is, what the foreigners get at first in the Czech republic.
"I have been living in South America for 7 years and haven´t experienced such a robbery, shit!"

My friend Ole doesn´t give a damm about decency, if he is pissed.
It´s funny how he gets excited but my mind goes fury. I did the same route two hours ago for 200 crowns.
"Did he have a meter on?"
"Yea, but I could not see the numbers, the meter was running like crazy!"
Poor man, he really doesn´t like to be robbed.
I pull out a beer from the fridge and open the bottle of slivovice, traditional czech alco which one has to drink and belive, that will see the world again next day.
I am with him. In ANY city of South America taxidrivers don´t cheat that way - without counting disastrous airports thiefs. You get a street taxi in any center of Buenos Aires, Sao Paulo, Rio de Janeiro, Bogota, Santiago or Lima and even he might notice right away, that you are "gringo", than doesn´t try stupid tricks but puts the meter on. Usually with two tariffs, one for week and other for weekend or public holidays.Even if no meter, than usually normal price for route can be agreed.
Not worth of mentioning northern europe taxidrivers. Last taxirobber in Finland or Denmark was propably shot down to death some time during beggining of the 20th century.
Finishing drinks a leaving my place. We head to Zizkov TV tower.
"Let´s go by tram..."
"No, man, I don´t want to wait..."
I see taxi approaching. We get in . Taxidriver talks on the mobile phone. After 100 meters switches meter on and choose tariff 3.I glance the price table in front of me. It has got 8 different tariffs.
"Hey, Ole, immagine, we have 8 different tariffs, how about Denmark?"
"WHAT? We have only ONE or two!"
"You see, better we are," with laugh. Than I look back to the price table.
I note, that currently we are escorted by one additional car, according to the price table and tariff."Why did you swith on 3, there is supposed to be 1! It´s crystal clear downhere - Prague, tariff ONE!"Price difference bettween tariff one and three is 13 crowns per kilometer. My blood starts boiling.Shit! We talked about it half an hour ago!
"OK, so you want me to work for 28 crowns per kilometer?" says taxidriver.
"WHAT, what 28, the price table states : tariff one - Prague, 22 crowns. The only thing I want is to go for THAT tariff, nothing damm else! "
Taxidriver switches over tariff from 3 to 2 and shakes his head.
"BUT , hell, we going for the same tariff as we woul call your company Call center! But, I haven´t done anything like that!" DAMM!
"SO YOU WANT ME TO WORK FOR 22 CROWNS??!!"
"I WANT TO GO ACCORDNING TO THIS BLOODY PRICE TABLE, WHICH IS IN FRONT OF ME!"
"But, the price is 28 crowns. Look at the car door."
I look breathless in front of me at the price table, which is contradicting that door info.
"So, why do you have here this price table, which is NOT VALID?!"
"Well..., that´s LAW!"
"OK, so please, change the tariff according to that law."
"SO, NOW YOU WANT ME TO WORK FOR 22??!!"
"NOO, I DIDN´T SAY ANYTHING LIKE THAT!"
I thing, Ole is laughing on the back seat.Finally we reached tariff ONE!I wiped off sweat of my forehead and got off the cab. I could hear taxidriver swearing.
"Man, you seem to be pissed."
"Yea, I can´t believe that..."
"Don´t worry, FUCK those taxidrivers!"
Ole always puts me into spirits.

Christmas at the Orphanage

“Hi, how are you?”
“I don’t know.”
A nine-year old boy is blankly looking at me. I’m looking at him. I don’t know what to say.
“How long you’ve been here?”
“Since yesterday,” he says.
We’re looking at each other and sweat is running down my face in this 35-degree hot weather. His Christmas started with the death of his parents.



People from the company where I work have been helping this orphanage on the edge of Rio, in one of the wildest part of the city, Duque de Caxias, for several years.

They go there every now and then and bring some money. A few enthusiasts built a roof and equipped the building with things like a refrigerator, washing machine, and stove.

I always knew they visit here but I never came along. I had a feeling they’d look at me like at a gringo who’s more interested in taking some pictures of the favela from the inside. I was probably also lazy to go to a place like this. But now I’ve decided to go. I’ll be handing out presents to the kids. It seems almost unreal. I feel a little like I am coming to atone for my sins.

The kids fall upon us. In a short moment, I have three little black kids hanging on my neck and three more are pulling my shirt.

“Uncle, uncle, I want up too.”

They don’t have anybody, neither daddy nor mommy who could hold them in the air and play with them. They’re begging for something that is for most kids, especially in Europe, a matter of course. They want, at least for a short moment, to experience that feeling of security of being held in the arms of an adult, somebody else than their caregivers.

My shirt is dusty and the kids are merry. The Christmas decorations are curling in the noon heat.

I walk through the orphanage. A few rooms, beds next to each other. Stuffed toys dominate the area.

The kids are showing off but I can still feel their longing for physical contact with an adult. They feel they should be close together with an adult somewhere else than in the dormitory. For example at home.

“Uncle, come on, I’ll show you where we play.”

A girl three years old or so with colorfully braided hair pulls on my hand. I go with her. It’d make a really funny picture. A two-meter tall gringo and a half-meter tall black girl walk hand in hand along the dusty road of an orphanage.

We look like a Christmas symbol. The children are standing in a row and we hand them presents. Everybody gets one. Every child, from three to twelve, stands and eagerly stares at the pile of the presents. Which one will they get?

I’m thinking about the orgies that take place in Europe. I don’t have to go too far, it’s the same in my house. Children attacking the Christmas tree, their eyes glowing, doggedly ripping the wrappings, and collecting their presents that they then spend the next hour moving to their room. However, prior to this madness, there is a three-month brutal campaign during which their exhausted parents – in the interest of the holiday of peace and ease – are forced to purchase things about which one really wonders.

I hand out the presents. A ball, doll, car… the children’s faces are almost grimacing with happiness. Once again, they want to be carried around, even the eight and nine-year old ones. Or at least get a hug. It seems that the feeling of having a family, which we’ve tried to bring them for this very short while, is the greatest gift they got.

Most kids get here because their parents die or leave them somewhere. The relatively dangerous life style in the poor neighborhoods easily fills up these establishments. They are usually run by volunteers who depend on contributions and the minimal help they get from the government. The community around then tries to help with forming different values for the children than banditism.

“Do you want to play catch?” I ask the boy I talked to initially. But it doesn’t work. He’s totally disoriented. He has no idea what’s going on, why he is suddenly here. Seven-year old Julio is holding his still wrapped present, dully staring straight ahead.

We finish handing out presents and the children wander around the small kitchen with their new toys. They perform a dance for us, and two girls sing a modern Brazilian song. Two boys are fighting over an old bike in the corner of a little courtyard.

“Uncle, could you swing me?” It’s my little girlfriend who earlier showed me the play area.

I push her on the swing. It squeaks, like in a movie.

She leans backwards and smothers me with laughter.

Vaclav Klaus(The Czech president)Likes to Be Photographed

“Angela, I’ll strangle him to death with my own hands!”
“Calm down, George, calm down… why are you so upset?!”
“Always, ALWAYS when they are taking my pictures, this weird type suddenly appears next to me!”

“Which one? That one with the mustache?”

“Yeah, him, he’s driving me nuts!”

“Ha, I know him, he’s really annoying.”


“Once he tried to get inside the White House. I told them, purposely, to piss him off, to let that ‘Slovak’ in. But he wasn’t offended. He squeezed himself in and started pestering me!”

“Calm down, Mr. President, shhh…”

“No, I won’t calm down, I’m trying to solve the Iraq thing, terrorism, and the Middle East, and he keeps rambling on about the gross national product!”

“Hmm… George, you’re talking too loud!”

“What do you mean loud? I want him to hear it – maybe he’ll finally leave me alone!”

“Mr. President, Mr. President, look at the camera, just like this, Mr. President!”

“I CAN’T BELIEVE IT! It’s like when I was a little kid and my mother was always comparing me with the biggest NERD!”

“Ha, ha, yes, yes, I tried to talked to him the other day when he said that global warming isn’t caused by people, but when he picked up the phone, he was speaking Russian and said he was in Mongolia, so I gave up.”

“Now he’s coming to me because of tourist visa. VISA!!! I have to deal with the North Korean nuclear arsenal and this fellow wants me to repeal tourist visas for Czechs. And then he’s pestering me about the weak dollar. I DON’T KNOW WHY THE DOLLAR IS WEAK!”

“Shhh, Mr. President, shhh…”

“Mr. President, look at the camera, just like I DO!”

“NO, NO, NO! I must be dreaming!”

“Well, promise him something and he’ll leave you alone.”

“Impossible. If I promise him something, he’ll have always an excuse to visit me!”

“Hmm… that’s true. Looking at him, it won’t be easy. They say he’s supposed to be in office two more years… Hang on, did you say gross national product?”

“Yes, he always starts with something else but always steers it slowly back to that product thing.”

“I just remembered that when I talked to the most important Czech economist…”

“Wait, which one?… I have to write his name down.”

“Well, I think his name is Komarek.”

“Shhh, Mrs. Chancellor… shhh.”

“Could you, Mrs. Chancellor, look at the camera just like I DO!”

“I’m fainting!”

“George, hang on… he is pretty funny.”

“And what about that Kejmar?”

“Komarek… he used to be Fidel’s advisor.”

“WHAT!!!!”

“And he also used to head some kind of organization where this one was too. He told me that he would spend half of every day trying to settle disputes that this one was always creating – supposedly he would insult everybody, the reason being that gross product thing.”

“I can’t believe it. Fidel, GDP, nuclear weapons, visas… my head is spinning.”

“I really, really want to ask you to look finally at the camera, just like I DO!”

“Angela, help me… please.”

“Calm down, George… I will look at the camera, Mr. President, WHEN I WANT TO!”

Eye for an eye

Naked Indians in trees are holding tommy guns. Their bodies are painted in war colors and their faces are beautifully sculpted. Even though the government proclaimed their territory a protected area, it doesn’t mean that their land was really saved from the white man. The year is 2007.


Lungs of the planet. Who came up with this stupid phrase?

Besides an oxygen production plant, it’s also the home of people. Some of the people living there have not been touched at all by civilization as we know and love it. This civilization hasn’t found them yet and “made them happy”.

They have their own habits and religions and they have no interest in those of the white man.

Government-sponsored research shows that there are 727 protected areas in Amazonia, but other research and satellite photos show that on twenty five percent of this land forest clearing continues the same as before they got on the list of protected areas.

Then the destruction supporters get on. They are sometimes called men of progress and product increase, and claim that researchers are anarchists and that what’s happening is not an outright clearing but only a selective timber cutting, which is actually better for the virgin forest than if there’s no cutting at all.

Then the cattle farmers claim that they need more cattle and that their cows just get confused in the forest. That’s why they need to burn the forest down, so they can create great meadows and feed the hungry masses. The result is that the majority of the forest isn’t cut down, as some people may think, but burned down. The fact that people live there is of no interest to the farmers - you know, they have to feed other people and make money, so they can raise more cows, and it’s for those cows they have to burn down a new living space.

Researchers timidly point out that the pictures speak clearly and if it continues this way, one won’t be able to breathe any more in a few years.

Politicians, bribed by the lumber and farmer lobbies, immediately curtail the funding of the researchers and explain to the public that the research isn’t valid because one of the researchers receives funding from the USA and his colleague has an illegitimate child.

The nervous public heaves a sigh of relief that there’s no danger with nature and immediately switches their attention to the world of soccer.

The area is so large that the law can barely be enforced there. The government does not have the money to pay an army of soldiers to send to the forest to enforce the law against wild lumberjacks and soybeans growers.

While this chattering is going on, hundreds of acres of virgin forest disappear every day together with unique plants, animals, and… people.

Indians do not see a tree as a “piece of wood”. For them, it’s a living creature who somebody, in their mind for no reason whatsoever, burns down alive or cuts down with a chain saw.

Death awaits every white man who tries to cut down a tree or destroy the forest on the territory of the Uru-eu-wau-wau tribe in the state of Rondonia.

Eye for an eye.

While in other protected areas the destruction of the forest has been increasing by tens of percent annually, on the territory of the mentioned tribe, it was just one percent in 2006.

The seat...

I decided to stop for a beer at the pub by our house.
I went in and sat down on a chair. I was there for a while but nobody paid any attention to me, so I got up and walked to the counter.
“One beer please.”

The bartender looked at me and told me to sit down. I did.
I lit a cigar and put my foot on the bottom of the chair next to me.
The bartender looked at me and slowly ventured around the counter.
Finally…, hopefully he’ll bring me a beer, my first Czech beer after a long time, it’ll probably be pretty bitter but on the other hand there’ll be a lot of it.
“Take your feet off the chair,” I heard above me.
“Why? And where’s the beer?” I asked.
“Take your feet of the chair before I get pissed!”
I put my feet down and stared at my cigar. It’ll peg out soon, just like me. Oh well.
The bartender came with a beer. As usual, the glass wasn’t filled all the way and the beer had foam with huge bubbles, well, what can you do…
I took a sip and suddenly felt my youth coming back to me. The years spent with this beer, parties and drinking binges at cottages and in apartments… IT WAS GREAT.
I got a little too excited, put my foot on the rail, and the chair cracked and broke…
FUCK!
I saw the bartender coming around the counter again.
“I’m sorry, I’ll pay for it,” I almost wept.
The bartender took my beer glass and without a word went back to the counter.
I must have looked like I was crazy.
“Please, gimme my beer back.”
Without a word, he poured the beer down the drain.
“Please, I’ll fix the chair, I’ll take it home and fix it, I know how,” I heard myself saying.
“I TOLD YOU NOT TO PUT YOUR FEET ON THE RAIL.”
“I’m really sorry…”
…
“Really, I’ll fix it.”
“Hmmm.”
“I’ll leave my ID here if you want me to…”
“Nooo… hmmm… you would really fix it…?”
“Yes, really, I know how to do it, I’ve fixed chairs before.”
“… OK… take the chair and bring it back tomorrow…”
I walked back to my table and picked the chair. I was sooo pissed, but I felt nobody could tell.
The bartender put his arm on my shoulder and walked out of the pub with me.
“You’re a good guy,” he said and squeezed the hand that was holding the chair.
“Hmmm,” I said and turned away.
There was a line of parked cars in front of me, ending at the intersection about fifty meters away, at the corner where I live.
I grabbed the chair and with all my strength slammed it against the ground. The actual chair fall apart in little pieces, but its seat rebounded and rapidly flew away above the sidewalk.
I heard some screams, but at this prolonged moment of time I was mesmerized by the seat as it rebounded from the sidewalk and jumped on the hood of the closest car, and from there on to another one…
I got scared that exactly at this moment somebody would drive by, the seat would fly straight into the driver’s face, and he’d be dead…
FUCK, I didn’t anticipate that.
“I’ll kill you, you fucking asshole,” I heard next to me.
Shut up, that’s not important right now, I answered the challenge in my mind.
“Guys, come here, look Frankie, this asshole…” I heard from a distance.
But all my attention was fixed on the flying seat. It was jumping from one car to another and it seemed it was accelerating more and more.
Jesus, please, don’t let anybody drive by right now, it could kill him…
“You bastard, I don’t want to ever see you around here again!”
“Well, I won’t be around, ever, don’t worry,” I heard myself answering.
The seat bounced off the last car and disappeared behind the corner.
It seemed that no car was coming. Uhhh… great, what a relief, I was already imagining myself in jail for murder…
I went home.
The seat was lying in front of the door. I picked it up and looked at it for a second. Goddamned seat.

In the bar Samuraj...

A car stopped in front of the bar.
Three black men got out and argued with the cab driver. He was getting shit and that was good. After a while he slammed the door and took off. The blacks headed to the bar towards me.
That was bad.

Shit, nooo, maybe they won't notice me.
I started intensely looking at cases of empty beer bottles like they were something very interesting. I felt their eyes on me, getting closer and closer, three huge black dudes… and me, maybe big, but pale, GRINGO...
Then I felt something move by my leg. Excellent, at least the dog's here with me, maybe they'll think it's mine and leave me alone. I looked down and realized that the dog had left. ASSHOLE, fucking goddamned asshole…
I grabbed my glass and pretended I was drinking. I hid my gringo face a little behind my hand, hoping it wouldn't be so obvious I'm of that different race.
Just in case of a fight, I rearranged the keys in my other hand so I could shove them in somebody's fucking face. I began shivering and felt sweat trickling down my ass.
I checked the other side of the street. There was somebody standing at the building door.
Who the fuck is standing there, some kind of juggler or what… and what the hell is he swinging with, some kind of pole or what???
I focused my exhausted eyes and the brothers froze in their steps, just like in the Matrix.
I saw a figure in a black habit with a huge scythe in her hand. She beckoned to me and made a notch in the air with her scythe. Her move was incredibly fluent, it was great to watch it because it was like thousands of pictures compressed in one. When she finished the move, she lifted her head and turned towards me; I curiously stared in the direction where I expected her eyes.
They were the eyes of a teacher from high school who died two years ago. Suddenly I had the same feeling like when he used to go to my parents and snitch on me and when I had to go down in the elevator to open the building door for him and he would be jovially punching me on my shoulder and laughing, "Well, Ivan, you got another whipping coming, eh, ha, ha, ha…"
I began shivering, my whole body was trembling. I realized the brothers were still standing in their tracks.
My eyes were fixed on one spot and I couldn't move them, I felt time vibrating inside of me, it wanted OUT, but I was holding it, no fucking idea how, but I was!!
A girl walked by the bar. She passed by the brothers, who were frozen in the middle of their step towards the bar, and continued in the direction of the bus stop.
I finally managed to take my eyes off the figure in the cape and looked at the girl's ass.
BANG! I heard and the brothers finished their steps. They were still in slow-motion but accelerating towards normal pace. They had just two more steps to make and they talked among each other in some strange lingo.
I wasn't able to get a word out and felt the car keys slipping out of my hand. I expected them to ram a knife into me, take everything I had, have a beer, and continue on their way, wherever that was.
I was contemplating how it would feel, to look at a knife sticking out of a belly… my own belly… how long would it take before the brain realizes the body's dying… what will I feel?!
"Three beers, old man!" shouted the biggest one and sat down on a chair.
I felt a hand on my shoulder. Jesus fucking Christ, thank God the keys slipped out of my hand because otherwise I would have, at this moment, shoved them into the man's fucking trap.
I turned my head.
It was the brother closest to me. He was smiling at me, showing his perfectly white teeth. Another one, the biggest one, had his curly hair done up into a bunch of little dreads that were, some way or another, glued to his skull. The third brother had a shaved head and a shit load of scars. All three of them wore humongous gold rings on their fingers and chains around their necks.
I knew they were from the other side. Nobody in this town wears gold like that because nobody can be SURE that somebody else won't mug him…
"Tchau, how's it goin'?" asked the one who had his hand on my shoulder.
"Great, excellent."
"I've seen you here before, they said you're from ..Finland."
"No, I'm from the Czech Republic."
"What the fuck is that, some kind of a country or what…"
The brothers looked at each other and started laughing…
I felt a rush of peace. They're all right! They don't want to kill me…
I smiled.
It took them a while before they could grasp that the local term for pussy is also a country in the heart of Europe, where I come from, and that such a country lies between Germany and Russia. I understood them, if I were them, I wouldn't be interested even where Germany is.

From the book "Short message" - release 2005

in the airplane...

"Should we go for lunch, Cris?"
"Not to the cafeteria though, supposedly there's cockroaches in the food sometimes."
"So what, I've eaten them before, they weren't too bad."
Cristina gestured like she wanted to puke.
I ate them in Thailand. We got trashed and ate frogs, then crickets, and in the end roasted cockroaches from a bag. I ate them on the way to our hotel. Then it became kind of weird and I threw them out the window.

The next day I flew from Bangkok via Vienna to Denver. Vienna was still all right.
The jumbo jet took off. I was looking forward to seeing Ludek and forgot all about the cockroaches.
Not far from Greenland I went to the bathroom. I needed to piss real bad because I always have to drink a shit load of beer beforehand in order not to be scared that the plane will go down.
I got in line and waited for my turn.
When I was three people away from the can, I had the piss almost in my underwear. I was fighting it. I could have said, people, let me go please, or I'll piss in my pants, but I didn't do it. Inborn shyness.
My anal muscles were holding on by their last strings.
Finally it was my turn. I let the anal muscles go. I felt an unbelievable freedom and relief…
After the marvelous feeling passed, I smelled something stink. Goddamnit, somebody had to shit here before me, nooo.
I reached down and found out that it was actually me who stunk. Watery shit was dripping down on my legs.
I immediately remembered the line of people waiting outside for their turn. I had to leave. I had to let them use the bathroom!!! Jesus Christ, what a situation.
I took off my underwear full of shit and put them in the toilet. I pushed the button. The lid opened and my underwear disappeared. I imagined it falling on somebody's head or car.
I washed my hands and in stinky pants, still with pieces of shit in them, stumbled out.
I could read one big question in the eyes of the waiting people.
WHAT WERE YOU DOING IN THERE SO LONG???!!!
You wouldn't believe it, but I was flushing down my underwear full of shit.
I spent the rest of the flight in the line and only four ibuprofens eventually saved me.
"Are we going for lunch?"

From the book "Short message", release 2005