Barack Obama will visit Prague in April

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U.S. president Barack Obama will visit Prague on April 4 or April 5, the iDNES.cz news server wrote Thursday, citing sources that participate in the preparation of the visit. The White House has not confirmed the visit officially.

Obama plans to attend several events in Europe around the given date. He will visit the G-20 summit in London or NATO celebrations in Strasbourg, France and Baden-Baden, Germany.

The news server wrote that Obama was invited by the Czech government immediately after his victory.

Something tells me that Czechs like Obama more than they would like McCain. The only reason Czech masses would gather alongside streets to see McCain’s motorcade would be the sole fact that they could say they have seen the president in his armored car with his Secret Service entourage. McCain’s “heroic past” does not (or, would not) speak to Czechs and considering their experience with previous political figures, they need and tend to show respect to politicians who know what they are doing and – at the same time – have enough strength to do it. Seems like Europe in general thinks that Obama means “future” for America – a man who has much still ahead of him. We do not joke about McCain being old (in the Craig Ferguson style a la “did you hear the joke about George Washington and John McCain walking into a bar….”) but I think it is safe to say that president McCain would not convince much of Europe…

BREAKING NEWS: Bird flu in the Czech Republic

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— UPDATED FEB 25

A dead goose that was found near the town of Hodonin, southeastern Czech Republic, was diagnosed with bird flu. Luckily it is not the H5N1 type, but “only” the H7.

Three thousand geese will have to be slaughtered…

UPDATE: The sick bird was not a migrating wild goose but one from a local farm. The numbers cited above refer to the entire farm. Local crisis response team will be in session anyway, even though no risk to people is involved…now…

UPDATE FEB 25: Apparently, it probably will not be necessary to “kill” all three thousand birds from the farm after all. “Only” 670 had to be “killed” today. Veterinarians are waiting for tests results regarding the rest of them…

Serial shoplifter pardoned by the president was caught stealing again

Zdenka Conkova, 54, from the town Ostrava is a convicted multiple shoplifter. Last December she received the general pardon from president Vaclav Klaus due to her bad health, so she avoided serving time for multiple theft, the Novinky news server wrote.

She was caught stealing again in January and she is scheduled to appear in court in early March. According to the spokesman of the local court there is no way she can get just suspended sentence. She had been granted this privilege before but obviously it did not work, the news server wrote.

The woman is a diabetic and one of her legs had to be amputated. The January theft took place in a big grocery store where she stuffed groceries worth over CZK 1,000 into her wheelchair and left without paying. She was caught by a security guard.

I generally think that the instrument of presidential pardon shall NOT apply to crimes committed “on purpose”. There have been pardons granted to people who had been involved in unfortunate accidents that were qualified as gross negligence (car accidents). It is okay to grant pardon to a person based on “everybody can make a mistake” approach. But doing the same in case of a repeat offender just doesn’t sound right, even when it comes to “stealing groceries”. She was not stealing “bare necessities” like bread and butter and it IS illegal, after all.

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High School Musical bed clothing: is this licensed?

This small Czech company offers pillows and other items with photos of Vanessa Anne Hudgens and Zac Effron. I must say it looks kind of suspicious because Disney does not give out licenses for its merchandise like this. One thing is putting a clip on YouTube but making money on Disney characters just isn’t right, if it isn’t actually licensed…

I think it is worth finding out and doing a news story…

Czechs named Petr and their two name days

In many countries people celebrate name days. In the Czech Republic, each day corresponds to one or more names and people celebrate their name days and they get gifts (just like they do on birthdays).

For some reason, there are Czech names that are not listed in the name day calendar. And oddly enough, men named Petr have TWO name days: one on February 22 and one on June 29 – together with Pavel (Paul).

I was once told that having name days like this in the U.S. would be impossible, considering the number of names people can have. In the Czech Republic, there is only Katerina. And I know 5 women named Kate and each of them is spelt differently.

On December 24, by the way, Adam and Eva celebrate their name day. So if a boy is born on December 24 (Christmas Day) and if his parents name him Adam, he celebrates Christmas, birthday and name day on the same day, which means no presents for the rest of the year. Bummer…

Filming crews in Prague to pay more for using the city as a set only

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Prague used to be a favorite spot for American filmmakers. There were two categories of movies: one, the movie actually took place in Prague and naturally it was also shot there, because you can’t build a fake Prague lot and you can’t shoot the movie in Budapest, or elsewhere, because people would not buy it. And two, the movie did not actually take place in Prague and Prague only “played another city”. It is interesting how it only works one way.

However, the methods of filmmakers paying filming fees to the municipality of Prague 1, i.e. the central borough, do not work at all as they should. According to the Reflex weekly, the municipality came up with two sets of fees. It means that filmmakers who only use Prague as a set will pay more than those who actually admit that the story in question takes place in our capital.

Be it as it may, the Prague municipality’s requirements are becoming unacceptable (translated: bureaucrats want too much money) and so production companies consider Budapest, Vienna and other cities more often than they used to. Too bad … for everybody. We wanted too much and we ended up having nothing… Typical, eh?

Judge cried while reading a life sentence verdict in child rape case

A Slovak man was sentenced to life in prison for rape and murder of a nine year-old Czech boy today. As evidence was presented in court, many people cried, including the District Attorney. While reading the life sentence verdict, the presiding judge had to stop for ten minutes and ask the people in the court room to leave, because he started to cry himself…

The paedophile pleaded guilty and he himself requested death penalty (although we do not have it here…) or life sentence. He will not appeal the verdict.

Since he is a Slovak citizen, he will be deported, which means he will serve time in a Slovak prison.

According to experts, this would not have happened under normal circumstances: the man was a registered offender and as such he was on medication. However, he stopped taking the pills which led to changes in his behavior. After he raped the boy, he had to “get rid of a witness”, the DA said about the main motive.

Czech Lesson: How to say It is over if you date a Czech

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One of the most interesting things about languages is the use of metaphors. I am lucky that most texts I translate do not have/use any, as they are mostly contracts, manuals, marketing reports, laws, regulations, etc. And the movies I translated [including Greyhounds with James Coburn, or Double Tap with Heather Locklear or Farewell My Love with Robert Culp] were pretty easy in this regard. The first time I heard the English phrase I gave her the heisman, I had no idea what it meant, because 1990’s language schools do not teach this type of colloquial language… I am sure the Czech version of the same is way more understandable.

Oddly enough, it also has something to do with football. The term heisman, or Heisman, is derived from the name of NFL Heisman Trophy, The Urban Dictionary explains. So when a Czech guy wants to say he broke up with his girlfriend, he will say:

Dal jsem ji kopacky.

which literally translates as

I gave her football shoes.

I have no idea why football shoes but I am pretty sure it has something to do with the similarity of the term used for football shoes, kopacky [kicking shoes], and the verb odkopnout, which means to kick [somebody] out/away. Either way, it is still strange that the most popular sport in this country [US: soccer/EU:football] deserves to be associated with breakups.

Not to worry, football/soccer friends. Another way to describe being dumped/having dumped someone in Czech is:

Pustil jsem ji k vode.

which means

I let her go to the river.

My dictionary offers English-languare equivalents like: I stood her up, or I gave her the air, or I gave her the mitten. Can’t tell by the listing how established they are, but I only heard the first one. I think it has something to do with the fact that water flows fast and it will take her away. Or she will drown, perhaps.

Czech kids think they’re cool with their cell phone music…

Do you remember late 1980’s and early 1990’s Eddie Murphy movies a la Beverly Hills Cop? Almost all of them featured a scene from Bronx-esque neighborhood and there would be a wanna-be-cool black guy walking down a street with a huge stereo on his shoulder. Kind of like this one:

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The music would be loud, but it would add to the atmosphere of the neighborhood, and the black guy with huge hair and tight pants would belong there. You would know because a squad car would drive up and the said black guy would not even bother turn it down, and instead he would yell at the police officer something along the lines of Wassup, man?

I hated the attire but I did like the atmosphere.

And now, the town of Brno, the year 2008. A typical scene: two wanna-be-cool junior high boys are walking down just any street, most usually in downtown Brno. One of them is holding his cell phone and you can hear loud music playing. You only need one second to realize that he is not really listening, nor is his buddy. A normal person does not carry their cell phone on a busy street, they have it in their pocket and they use an earpiece.

The black guy was carrying his huge stereo to demonstrate his love for music/rhythm, to say that by playing music outside he think he “owns the street” of his neighborhood (with all due respect, one would probably NOT see the same in the Hamptons). Czech kids need to feel better about themselves by showing everybody “look what my parents have money for”…

Kinda sad…

Postal worker who opened almost 40,000 letters will NOT go to jail

Between the years 2001 and 2006 a postal worker from the town of Breclav had opened and stolen contents (foreign currency) from more than 39,000 letters from foreign countries whose addresses lived in the Southern Moravian Region. And now the presiding single judge announced his verdict: one year in prison subject to one-year suspension of sentence (probation) and a CZK 50,000 fine. Which means that if he pays the fine and if he is good for the next 12 months, he will not go to jail.

The cash stolen from the letters over the period of five years amounted to CZK 11,000 (a little under $500), authorities say. The man did not cooperate with the police at the beginning, despite being shown strong evidence. This is why he did deserve jail…but oops. The judge explained:

I am bound by the provisions of the penal code. It may seem like a light penalty. Couldn’t do more [be stricter --ed.]… The man was on trial for theft and violation of secrecy of mail obligation.

I said it before and I will say it again…somebody should take our penal code, go section by section and multiple all numbers referring to jail by three…

A few months ago TV Nova did a story on Letters Never Delivered. The reporter actually brought some letters to their addresses and asked for their reactions. One of them felt like a Hallmark love story: “it was a letter from my then-boyfriend…I thought he had stopped writing because he had broken up with me”….

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