SO…yesterday after I posted my blog entry about Day 8 in Prague, I received a few messages and emails from friends wanting more details about Prague and the
Summer Writing Program that I can't give.
I’m not being elusive, seriously,
what I’ve said is pretty much it. It has been surreal. And the facts are misleading. They might cause you to think wrongly of this trip if you knew: My luggage was lost Day
1, minute 1. Was lost somewhere in Germany. Day 1, hour three, my iphone was
stolen. Day 2, I was homeless and my first thoughts were to not "freak out" my family at home. Day 3, Monday, which was the first day of the
Writing Program, I dropped out and the leaving was not a pleasant one.
Confrontational is the right word.
Since then, I’ve found a new center and have made my own Prague
program. I feel like an expat and because of the people I’ve met, this path has
been way more amazing and dreamlike than anything I could have planned. So when
I talk about the experience so far, surreal is the only way I can talk about it
right now.
There is a visual that might make it more clear. It’s the only
photo of me in Prague so far, which isn’t really a photo of me. It’s the one
that Joshua Mensch tagged me in on Facebook a few days ago. Well, I was tagged,
Josh was and Crawford, too. It was taken at about 2am after we’d wandered into
a park after a day I can’t remember now. And the photo is of a 600-foot-high radio tower we "discovered" there with giant babies crawling up it. And it was
lit in different colors. I remember only red (you'll have to look at the photo for the facts).
While we stood there gazing up at it, Joshua talked about the artist who made it during the Russian occupation, how the artist would sabotage it while it was being built, then had to explain to me that the babies weren’t actually moving. :) [Since this post, Josh has corrected my memory...he tells me what he said was that the babies were added later, the artist (David Černy) had sabotaged a tank during the revolution by painting it pink, becoming famous as an irreverent dissident artist.] You see, talking about Prague is like giving a serious talk on giant crawling babies on a radio tower and trying to remember the history when really, the most memorable part for me, was the company and that somewhere in Prague, in a park, there are large baby butts on a radio tower. And maybe, my first question will come to mind as well: "How did those big babies get up there?"
While we stood there gazing up at it, Joshua talked about the artist who made it during the Russian occupation, how the artist would sabotage it while it was being built, then had to explain to me that the babies weren’t actually moving. :) [Since this post, Josh has corrected my memory...he tells me what he said was that the babies were added later, the artist (David Černy) had sabotaged a tank during the revolution by painting it pink, becoming famous as an irreverent dissident artist.] You see, talking about Prague is like giving a serious talk on giant crawling babies on a radio tower and trying to remember the history when really, the most memorable part for me, was the company and that somewhere in Prague, in a park, there are large baby butts on a radio tower. And maybe, my first question will come to mind as well: "How did those big babies get up there?"
I suppose my fascination is made more real by the fact that my days have started at 10am and
ended at about 5:00am with the sun rising while listening to folks recite poetry. Magic. So this has been my lens.
Thanks for reading and for the emails that jog my memory. :) xo
The photo:
Since posting this earlier, I've gotten a correction to my memory (ha!) and a question. So I thought I mention both here:
ReplyDeleteCORRECTION #1 TO BLOG ENTRY (by someone who was with me that night): "...not to counter your memory - the babies were added later, the artist (David Černy) had sabotaged a tank during the revolution by painting it pink, becoming famous as an irreverent dissident artist. He was also commissioned a few years ago to create an installation celebrating the EU, and found a clever way to piss off absolutely every EU country (except the Czechs, who felt flattered by the particular insult lobbed against them … Czech humour)"
ADDITION TO BLOG ENTRY, CORRECTION #2: (I will later figure out the best way to incorporate these "corrections"...when I'm not being lazy):
QUESTION: "Homeless?! Why didn't you go home?"
ANSWER: Because in those not so hot moments (which didn’t last long) when I was mad or feeling sorry for myself or worried, I’d look up and see some effing beautiful structure, or a stranger would show me some kindness, but most of all I always felt that if worse came to worse, I had a friend nearby who would help me if I called…would try to do something…even if all I said was, “I’m lost.”