Fooled Again
Czech pessimism, politics, and presidents
One of the first Czech authors I fell for when I arrived in Prague was a well-known economist who had written a bestseller about economics, yet without any formulas or numbers, I don’t like those. He traced the origins of what we now call “economics” through the ancient legends of Gilgamesh and the Bible, and argued that at its core, the root of economics are the stories we tell about ourselves, and the values derived from those stories. I guess the same could be said about politics.
About ten years ago now, I was riding my bike home from school one day and saw this author by himself outside a pub smoking a cigarette. I stopped my bike, said hello, and told him I enjoyed his book. In the most typical Czech self-deprecating manner, he told me, Someone gave you a bad Christmas present, eh? I asked him what he thought about the approaching election between Trump and Clinton, and he told me what was either the most glib, or most profound thing I’ve ever heard about modern politics, Some people like rap music, some like country, others like classical. Choose your album, but the record label is the same. What type of music do you like? With that, he took a final puff of his cigarette, flung the butt on the ground and walked back inside the bar.
Building a safer world and more hopeful tomorrow, yes we can, change we can believe in, hope, stronger together, I’m with her, future to believe in, forward together, make American great (healthy) again. Which song did you like?
I almost met the Czech President the other day. I pulled in the driveway with a truck piled full of horse shit and saw my wife and two daughters returning from a walk. My wife told me that the president and his entourage had just walked up to the brewery, a stone’s throw from our farm.
I’m going up there to meet him, I tell her. Don’t be silly, she says. I ask my little girl if she wants to go meet the president. She bobs her head and offers me her hand. As we start walking up the hill, she asks what a president is. He’s kind of like a king, I tell her. I practice saying Good day, Mr. President aloud in my finest Czech.
We walk up the hill past a couple of black Mercedes with tinted windows and two unimposing Secret Service guys on the bridge that return my greeting and keep chatting. The brew master meets us by the door. Today’s a big day, Brette. That’s how Czechs say my name when they address me. The president’s here. I tell him I heard the news, that I’d like to meet him. As we stand talking by the door, an old guy wearing a hat with CIA stamped on it comes walking slowly up the ramp. I almost laugh out loud at the thought that he is actually in the CIA and this is his ironic cover. I wonder if in Russia, people wear KGB hats.
We follow the CIA agent inside, and stop at the bar to order a beer and lemonade, for me and Marie, respectively. The barmaid pours the drinks with a little extra enthusiasm today, pointing with her eyes to where the president sits. I turn and take a good look at him sitting with his entourage. I wonder if they feel comfortable. They look comfortable in their nice clothes and makeup, all smiling, eyes wide, sipping their beers. How well do they know him? Do they speak formally or informally together? They must be aware that everyone in the place is aware of them, though Czechs aren’t gawkers. I’m not Czech. He’s got a nice look, the president, dignified, full head of silver hair, thick but trimmed beard to match.
The brew master is inside now and waves us over to the last free seats in the opposite corner of the President. We sit down at the edge of the table next to a pudgy guy on his laptop, a huge camera lies next to him. I put it together that he’s the president’s photographer when he turns his screen towards me and shows me the president, mid-stride, walking through a field that I recognize as up the hill from the farm. Nice one, I say. The guy nods, satisfied with such good feedback of his photo. I tell him that we have a farm just down the hill. I don’t know what the president’s plans are, but if he wants to stop by and get a few photos with our chickens, they wouldn’t mind. The guy turns his screen back towards himself and doesn’t say anything. I feel like an idiot. He’s not the one to talk to about what’s on the president’s schedule. I’ll probably have to send an email.
I turn to the brew master and ask if the big visit was a surprise. He tells me no, that they knew, but kept it a secret for weeks. I wasn’t in on it. The manager of the bar goes up to ask the president if she can get a picture with him. He graciously agrees. I help Marie finish her lemonade and ask her if she wants to go meet the president. She tells me that she wants to go home. I try to imagine shaking hands with the president and then look at my hands. They’re filthy. I realize my coat and jeans are splattered with mud and my boots still have horse shit on them. I take Marie into the bathroom with me to wash my hands. I ask her again if she wants to meet the president, and again she says no, she wants to go home. Alright, I tell her, we’ll ask Miša if she can take our photo with him. I give Miša my phone and start my approach, carrying Marie on my hip. She starts trying to climb over my shoulder with the urgency of someone escaping a river full of snakes. My heart starts beating faster. I try to run through what I’ll say. I get within ten feet of the back of that silver head, and a serious-looking Secret Service agent, in too small of a jacket, stands up, shakes his head at me, and moves his arm a little, like he might cut my throat if I take another step forward. Message received, I turn around, take my phone, and head to the door, defeated.
I kicked myself the rest of the night that I had missed my chance to meet a president in real life. I would’ve told him that I’m an American immigrant, but I love this country, and that my wife and I started a farm. And if that went well, I would’ve invited him there to meet our chickens. He could get a photo with them, too, if he wanted.
My wife can tell I’m sad as we eat our dinner of pork chops and potatoes. She says there’s no point in being sad and repeats that phrase loved by all Czechs, nedá se nic dělat. There’s nothing you can do. You can’t change it, so don’t worry about it.
First thing in the morning the next day I drive up the hill to the lumberyard to pay my tab on some planks of wood I bought for a shed last week. I brag to the guys working there that I almost met the president the day before. They perk up and say they read he was in the brewery in the papers. And is he good? I ask. Yea, sure, he’s good. He’s good. They nod, assuring me. When they don’t say anything else, I tell them that I have no idea, I’ve never even heard the guy speak. He’s got a good face though, looks like someone who could talk you into doing something. Yes, he’s good, they say. Normal. You know, normal. They’re all fuckers, but he’s alright, just a normal fucker. In a nation where pessimism and cynicism are considered the only rational approach to life, that’s about as great of a compliment as anyone could receive. I think the President himself, had he heard that coming from these working class guys could turn that into his next campaign slogan, just a normal fucker. Slap that on the side of a bus.
So I figured the guy was alright. The only things I know about him are that he used to be a communist back in the day (just like the current Prime Minister), and more recently, was a big shot general in NATO. When confronted on the campaign about being a communist, he said he was young and stupid. As far as excuses go, those are two very good ones. I voted for Bernie Sanders back in the day. I was young and stupid.
As far as I know, he didn’t offer any excuses for being a NATO general. I guess he felt like he didn’t need to.
Jan used to work on our farm. He’s now starting his own farm. I asked him recently if he gave it a name yet, and he told me it’s called Dědova Farma (Grandpas’s Farm).
Jan’s grandfather was a school teacher in the 1950s and got into a bit of trouble passing out some literature to his students. What was written on those papers was deemed to be against the State. So he was arrested, and because it was the 1950s in Czechoslovakia, he was sentenced to death. He went to work one day and never came home. His young wife had no idea what happened to him.
His execution was postponed a few times, and eventually his sentence was reduced to only ten years. He served time in five different prisons all around the Czech lands during his decade locked in a cage, and would come to call it “his little tour.”
Jan’s grandfather met all kinds of guys in prison: murderers, WWII resistance fighters and Czech pilots that flew with the RAF, actual Nazis, everyday guys like himself, and even had the distinction of doing time with a former president of the nation, Gustáv Husák, whose last name means “goose.” They’d all eat lunch together, and according to Jan’s grandfather, they all more or less all got along, except with the former president. Some of those guys would later fill a box with white feathers and mail it to Prague Castle with a note that said, We plucked your goose.
After ten years, Jan’s grandfather was released from prison, and like any good husband, went looking for his wife, only to find she was now married to another man, and pregnant. His wife left her second husband to return to him, and the other poor guy killed himself. They ended up having a boy. That’s Jan’s dad.
Jan’s grandfather took up gardening. It could be hovering above freezing and raining sideways all day, it didn’t matter the weather, he was in the garden. He spent the rest of his life, in every moment he could, planting flowers, weeding carrots, watering tomatoes, and pruning his fruit trees. If you’re ever lucky enough to go to the village where Jan’s family lives, you’ll drive down a country lane sheltered by a row of large walnut trees. Jan’s grandfather planted those.
He lived to a ripe old age, saw the Wall fall that brought a record scratching end to the reign of the communist party, and witnessed the revolution which followed, that set the track to, well, whatever weird sounds you can call the satanic pop music screeching through every supermarket speaker. Till his dying days, whenever politics came up, his grandfather usually didn’t say anything. But if he did, it was this: The political situation in this country was shit, is shit, and will be shit.
There’s no shortage of people who have only ever known peace and material progress that would bristle at this sentiment, who think that if only they could play their song, things would be better.
But they’re just young and stupid.
Definitive, picturesque, realism. The perfect encapsulation of cynicism, in a way that evokes a sense of longing.