Ricky Yates

Sam our adopted dog © Ricky Yates

I am pleased to announce that, much to Sybille’s great pleasure, on Wednesday 20^th April 2011 we became the proud owners of a dog. Strictly speaking, until a date in early October 2011, we are only the surrogate foster parents of a dog. I’ll explain that situation in greater detail in a moment. But first of all, let me introduce the dog.

Our dog, pictured here on the left, was found by the police in early April, wandering around a Prague suburb. He did not have either an ID microchip or a tattoo to identify him. But he did have a collar with a metal tag attached, which gave his date of birth & said that his name was ‘Sam’. However, rather oddly, the tag had no address or phone number.

Officially, Sam is deemed to be a Labrador mix. However, other than a few spots on his ears, there is nothing to distinguish him from a pure bred Labrador. As I have very little knowledge of dog breeds, I shall leave any detailed discussion of exactly what his breeding is, to those are more knowledgeable in these matters than I am.

We obtained Sam from the stray dog and re-homing centre, run by the police and located just across the Vltava River from where we live. We did so, by finally finding a way to circumvent the absurdities of Czech bureaucracy that I described in my earlier post in February this year entitled ‘Czech bureaucracy again’.

After our experience described in that post, we had various ideas as to how we might challenge our being treated as second-class citizens simply because we were deemed only to have ‘Temporary Residence’ in the Czech Republic. These ranged from getting the British Ambassador involved or taking our friend, an English-speaking Czech lawyer, along with us. Eventually, we decided to try the slightly less heavy-handed approach of asking a Czech-speaking member of the St. Clement’s congregation to telephone the stray dog and re-homing centre, to see if the impasse could be explained & overcome.

The person we got to help us was Karen, one of numerous ladies of that name either in my congregation or commenting on this blog! This Karen has both Czech and Australian nationality and speaks several languages fluently, including Czech and English. Having managed to speak on the phone to the man in charge of the dog centre, Karen was assured that, if she came in person with us to the centre and explained the situation, we would be allowed to adopt a dog. So on the morning of Wednesday 20^th April, we met Karen outside the dog centre to see if the promise made on the phone would be fulfilled.

Unfortunately, the same very difficult and officious lady that we had met on our previous visit, was on the front desk. She gave Karen exactly the same story as we got the first time we were there – we were foreigners with ‘Temporary Residence’ and therefore not eligible to adopt a dog. Karen demanded to speak to the man in charge of centre saying that he had assured her that we could adopt. The gentleman duly came and a long discussion in Czech ensued.  Eventually, a solution was arrived at which is once more best described as Kafka-esque.

Officially, Karen has adopted the dog because she is a Czech citizen and therefore has ‘Permanent Residency’ here. However, the authorities have noted on their records that the dog will actually be living with us and not with Karen! Hence my description earlier of us being only ‘surrogate parents’ to Sam. This is all because they think that we, as foreigners, will run away out of the country with the dog. The reality is that Karen, together with her Australian husband and family, are planning to return to live in Australia in two to three years time, whereas we hope to be living here for at least the next six years.

The reason that we, together with Karen, are only ‘foster parents’ until early October is much more straightforward and something we were fully aware of before embarking on this exercise. If a stray dog is found by the police, wandering in the streets anywhere in the Czech Republic, the original owner has six months in which to reclaim his or her dog, measured from the date the dog was found. After the expiration of that period of time, the foster parents can register the dog as their own.

Therefore, in early October, providing the original owner doesn’t come forward, we can return with Karen to the dog centre and transfer Sam’s registration into our names. Apparently at that point, the fact that we are foreigners with ‘Temporary Residence’ doesn’t matter!

Oscar and Sam © Ricky Yates

You may be wondering how Sam the dog is getting on with the existing third member of our family – Oscar the cat. As most people know, cats consider themselves to be superior to humans and certainly far superior to dogs. I believe the picture on the left illustrates this reality very clearly!

The Prince of Wales and The Duchess of Cornwall arrive at St. Clement's Church accompanied by the British Ambassador Sian MacLeod (far left) © Sybille Yates

Further to my previous posts entitled ‘A forthcoming Royal visit’, ‘Three days to go…….’ and ‘Only 12 hours to go…..’, today was the big day when, as part of their official visit to the Czech Republic, Their Royal Highnesses the Prince of Wales and the Duchess of Cornwall, joined the regular St. Clement’s Church congregation for our Sunday morning worship.

I set the alarm for 6am, just to be sure I had plenty of time to have a shower, eat breakfast and collect everything together, ready to travel into the city centre. In fact, the four-legged alarm clock called Oscar, landed on my bed before 6 am. I think he knew I had to get up early!

The 9.34am Number 8 tram duly carried Sybille and I from Podbaba to Dlouhá Trída in the 18 minutes it was scheduled to do, meaning that we arrived outside of the Church at about 9.55am, more than an hour before the Royal Party was due to arrive. However, the streets around the Church were completely clear of cars and numerous policemen were already patrolling. Only when I pointed to my clerical collar was I allowed to walk across the road and stand nearer to the Church. This rather confirmed my worst fears that the security concerns of the Czech police might prevent some regular members of the congregation actually getting to Church.

Our host congregation, the Ceskobratrské Cíckve Evangelické /the Evangelical Church of  Czech Brethren, were having their normal 9.30am service. As I stood near the door I could hear their hymn singing and the voice of Pastor Eva Halamová. However, Pastor Eva had previously promised that she would try and shorten their service a little and, true to her word, they finished at 10.15am, a full 10-15 minutes earlier than normal. As I entered the Church, Pastor Eva and I exchanged a hug as I thanked her for her cooperation and she wished me well for our service.

I was followed into Church by several Czech security personnel and a couple of sniffer dogs as the whole premises were carefully searched to see anything untoward could be found. Only  Churchwarden Gerry Turner, Sacristan Marshall Johnson and Welcomers Peter Morpuss and Amanda Neill, were allowed in until the search was completed.

Once the congregation were allowed in, the Church began to fill rapidly. It was good to see that many of the regular congregation had heeded my instructions and had come to Church in good time rather than dashing in at the last minute. And there were quite a number of somewhat unfamiliar faces who had obviously mainly come to see our Royal Visitors though many were friends and family of regular members of the congregation.

I was fortunately in the vestry when my mobile phone rang at 10.35am. It was Sher, an American member of the congregation saying that she and several other people were across the street from the Church but were being prevented from getting to Church by the police. I charged down the aisle still talking on my phone and was very helpfully followed by Gerry Turner and a couple of British diplomats from the Embassy. Between us we sorted things out and hopefully nobody who wanted to come to Church in the normal way was prevented from doing so.

However, one of my most abiding memories of today will be of an angry Gerry Turner telling a Czech policeman in no uncertain terms in Czech, that he was behaving like the police used to during the latter years of the Communist regime! Gerry can speak from experience having lived in Prague for ten years during the Communist era. I don’t think the policeman concerned was quite expecting that!

Gerry Turner and me waiting for the arrival of the Royal Party © Sybille Yates

By 10.50am, the Church was virtually full with only the reserved pews empty and the rarely used seats along the side walls also occupied. Sitting in many of these were a group of over twenty young people who I assumed had just come to see our Royal Visitors. My assumption proved to be completely wrong. They were a group of young Dutch Christians who had taken part in a competition which involved travelling in pairs and hitchhiking from Utrecht to Prague. They came to Church to worship totally unaware that we were expecting special guests!

Soon after 10.50am, I spoke to the congregation reminding them of the note in the front of the Order of Service about turning off mobile phones and that no photography or videoing of any of the service was allowed. I then went to the main door to wait with Gerry Turner, for the arrival of the Royal Party.

We stood and waited opposite a large group of accredited press photographers which included Sybille. There were quite a large number of people gathered to watch on the far side of the street and many locals looking out on proceedings from the windows of the surrounding apartment buildings.

Right on time at 11am, preceded by numerous police cars all with blue lights flashing, the Royal Party arrived. The accompanying photographs taken by Sybille, illustrate the event far better than my written words.

Elise, better known as 'Pixel' with her posy of daffodils for the Duchess, together with Mom Susanne, Dad Mark and Gerry Turner © Sybille Yates	Me greeting Prince Charles whilst the Duchess and Gerry Turner look on © Sybille Yates
The Duchess of Cornwall with her flower posy, together with the Prince of Wales, walk towards the Church entrance watched by Peter Morpuss, Church Council member and welcomer for the special occasion, together Pixel's parents and Gerry Turner © Sybille Yates	Amanda Neill, the second welcomer on this special day, looks on as the Prince, the Duchess and the British Ambassador approach the Church door © Sybille Yates

Once I had escorted the Royal Party to their pew, the service started and, I am very pleased to say, ran remarkably smoothly. But more of that in my next blog post…….

After being the Anglican Chaplain in Prague for just over nine months, I’ve finally taken a proper holiday (vacation to the American readers of this blog) as, having celebrated the Eucharist  on the morning of Sunday 5^th July I am not officiating at Sunday worship again in Prague until Sunday 26^th July. This is the reason why I haven’t posted anything on this blog since the end of June until today.

I wrote a number of blog posts whilst we were away in the hope of being able to post them from where we were staying. But the facilities and opportunity to do this never materialised so instead I will be posting them over the next few days now I’m back in Prague.

We decided to have a completely unplanned holiday with absolutely nothing booked in advance. The only thing we decided was to travel in the car to Croatia and spend some time relaxing on one of the numerous islands that lie parallel to the Dalmatian coast. Therefore, having written those last few emails, tried to remember to pack everything we might need, unloaded the dishwasher for the last time and put out the recycling and rubbish, just before 5pm on Sunday 5^th July, we finally set out.

The aim of our drive that Sunday evening was to at least leave the Czech Republic and reach somewhere in Austria. Leaving the flat in Prague as late as 5pm meant we would not get as far into Austria as I’d originally envisioned. However, there was remarkably little traffic about and we reached Ceské Budejovice in an hour and fifty minutes, ten minutes quicker than when I’d driven there the once previously. Beyond Ceské Budejovice, we entered territory that was totally new to both of us. And as we did so, we had two experiences which we were really not expecting.

After travelling on from Ceské Budejovice for about half an hour, we were within two or three km of the Austrian border when we saw a woman standing at the side of the road. She had bleached blonde hair and was wearing an exceedingly short skirt, together with a bra top that left a large amount of midriff on view. I remarked to Sybille that there was bit too much flesh on show & she agreed. Then, within a hundred metres there was another young woman in a short halter neck sun dress followed by a third in a short frilly miniskirt and a very cropped crop top. It was only when we saw the third young woman that we both realised what we were seeing. All three were prostitutes openly touting for business. Slightly further on, on the other side of the road, we saw at least four more.

Whilst the fall of the Iron Curtain twenty years ago, has undoubtedly brought massive change for the better in the lives of the bulk of the population of the former communist counties of Central & Eastern Europe, some changes have been for the worse. In particular, laws in relation to gambling in the Czech Republic are now either lax or almost non-existent. When travelling along the Nürnberg – Prague motorway, I had seen signs to casinos, strategically located just inside the Czech Republic, enticing Germans to cross the border and gamble, freed from the strict regulation of gambling in their own country. And here on the Czech – Austrian border it was the same as I observed several hotel-casinos just before we left the Czech Republic and entered Austria. And with gambling has come prostitution.

What we observed was the bottom end of the market. No doubt, the ‘higher class girls’ work out of the hotels. Whereas police seem to be everywhere in Prague, here they were noticeable by their absence. I am well aware that there are complex issues, both legal and moral, in relation to prostitution and gambling which I’m not going to try and address in this blog post. But that evening, I saw something I had never seen before in my life and certainly something neither of us had expected to see on our journey from the Czech Republic to Austria.

On entering Austria, we decided to make for Freistadt, the first town of note on our route. Freistadt has a well preserved mediaeval town centre, surrounded by much of the original walls and is very picturesque. We found a reasonably priced room in a pension situated in the heart of the mediaeval centre and then found place to eat. But as we explored the town after our meal, we had our second experience that we were not expecting. Here, on a sunny Sunday evening in July, in a picturesque town in Oberösterreich, there was hardly a soul to be seen. And as we looked more closely at the shops and businesses, we noticed that many were having closing down sales or had already closed down and were for sale. There were no longer tourists visiting the town in their usual numbers and therefore little business for the shops. We also discovered that there were only two other people staying overnight in our pension.

Living in Prague, we have not really experienced the worldwide economic downturn as such. Czech banks have not overextended themselves with dodgy loans and the like and therefore the effects tend to be secondary with fewer tourists visiting the city and more hotel rooms free. But there are still plenty of tourists about. However, in Freistadt in Oberösterreich, the full effects of the current economic crisis were manifest in a manner that neither of us was expecting to see.

I must apologise that unusually, this blog post is not accompanied by a photo. For obvious reasons, I didn’t take any pictures of the ladies at the side of the road! And for reasons I cannot explain, neither of us took any photos of Freistadt.

A friendly smiley from the Czech police

In October 2008, just about a month after we had arrived in Prague, I walked past my car, parked outside our block of flats one day, to discover I had parking ticket under the windscreen wipers. This came as a complete surprise as I had assumed that it was perfectly in order to park on the access road to the flats, as many others also did. When I told my Churchwardens and Church Council members, they too were surprised as this had never happened previously.

A few days later, I went with Gerry, a Czech speaking member of the Church Council, to the local police station shown on the parking ticket. I donned clerical shirt and collar, hoping to appear the innocent foreign clergyman. According to the young police officer that we met, it is an offence under local bye-laws, to park anywhere on our estate except in the designated parking bays. Breaking this bye-law can lead to a fine of up to 2000 Kc (over £60)! However, a combination of the dog collar and Gerry’s pleading of my innocence, got the parking ticket cancelled without me having to pay anything.

Ever since then, I have always parked the car in one of parking bays marked with a ‘P’ sign, even though it has meant, on some occasions, leaving the car further away from the flat than I would like to. And in the past few weeks, the police have been around nearly every day, putting parking tickets on any car that is not parked in the correct designated place.

Yesterday morning, I went down to do my daily duty of taking all our recyclable rubbish to the appropriate bins. As I left flats, I could see the police had already been around again putting parking tickets on every car not correctly parked. But then I noticed that there was something under my windscreen wipers too. I was parked in a designated parking bay. Surely I hadn’t done anything wrong!

The note on my windscreen was from the Prague City Police – from Police Officer 26570 to be precise. But as well as the police logo, it also had a smiley on it. It was not a parking ticket but a ‘thank you note’ for parking correctly!

The Police here are not very highly regarded. Many people say that they still operate with the same mindset as they did under communism. So they have recently launched a campaign to improve their image. Issuing parking ‘thank you notes’ with smileys on them, is apparently part of this police campaign to try to get the ordinary public to like them a bit more! What I enjoy most is the wording of the last line which assures me that parking in the correct manner is ‘a responsible approach, contributing to the improvement of order in this locality’!!!!!