police

A Question of Identity

A Brno numbskull who doesn't need a passport © Ricky Yates — A Brno numbskull who doesn’t need a passport © Ricky Yates

In early December this year, my current British passport will expire. As the United Kingdom does not issue identity cards to its citizens, my passport is the only accepted form of ID that I have whilst living in continental Europe. In 2016, I will be travelling to the UK twice, as well as to Poland for the Eastern Archdeaconry Synod, not forgetting my now monthly trips to Dresden. All of this is before thinking about where Sybille and I might want to go on holiday together!

The Foreign and Commonwealth Office website states that I must allow four weeks from my application and supporting documentation, including my current passport, arriving at the Passport Office in the UK, before I can expect to receive my new passport. During that time, I will be unable to travel anywhere beyond the borders of the Czech Republic. As a consequence, these past few days I have been studying my diary, trying to work out when on earth there is a time-slot of at least four weeks, when I will not need to travel.

Recently, several people have said to me, ‘Surely you don’t need your passport just to travel to Dresden and back on the train?’ For them, and for any one else thinking along these lines, I will recount my rather ‘interesting’ experiences when travelling back to Prague today, having led and preached at the English-language Anglican Evening Prayer service at the Frauenkirche, Dresden, yesterday evening.

Having boarded my train at Dresden Hauptbahnhof, I found myself a seat in a compartment where the only other passenger was a young lady of Asian appearance. Soon after the train set off, two burly German Polizei walked along the corridor and outside our compartment, stopped two young German men walking in the opposite direction, and asked to see and check their respective IDs. Having done this, rather than walking on down the train as I expected, they instead entered our compartment and asked to see our passports.

I duly produced mine which was then subjected to a thorough examination. Herr Polizei held it up to the light to check for watermarks and the like. I think he was also a little dubious because, being nearly ten years old, it isn’t biometric. Noticing the stamp of the Czech Foreign Police granting me ‘Temporary residence’ that is ‘neomezený/unlimited’, he asked, in English, if I lived in Prague. I gave him quite a shock when I spoke back to him in German 🙂 My passport was returned to me 🙂

However, the young lady got a complete grilling. It didn’t help her cause that she appeared to neither speak German or English – or if she did, she was too shy to do so. And if I dare say so – because she wasn’t white Caucasian 🙁 Both Polizei didn’t think her passport photo looked like her. They insisted she took off the large scarf around her neck so they could compare her skin colour with that in the photograph. The also studiously studied the visa in her passport, (presumably a Schengen one), querying its validity.

There followed a phone call to headquarters, checking her details, with the whole business lasting around fifteen minutes, before she was finally given the all clear and her passport was returned. One funny side effect of all this was that neither of us ever got our tickets checked. The female ticket inspector came past twice, but because of the police presence, she left us in peace!

When the train arrived at the Czech border town of Decín, a tall blonde Czech young lady joined us in the compartment. Decín is also where the Deutsche Bahn train staff get off and are replaced by those of Ceské dráhy. Presumably both Polizei officers got off too.

However, shortly after the train left Decín, who should come along the corridor and open the compartment door – two Czech Policie! The Czech young lady flashed her Czech ID card out of her purse at the same time as flashing her mascaraed eyelids, and she was immediately told that all was fine 😉 The inspection of my passport and Czech residency document took a little longer but no query was raised. But the poor Asian young lady had her passport looked at, photograph and actual likeness compared, visa examined. It wasn’t quite the third degree of the German Polizei, but still lasted at least three minutes.

Therefore after today’s journey, I have no intention whatsoever, of travelling to Dresden and back, without a passport. The mind boggles what would have happened if I’d tried to do so today.

But not only do I have to find a minimum four week time slot when I can be without a passport, I also have to make a deep hole in my bank account to pay for the new one. A ten-year British passport now costs £83.00, together with a further £19.86 in courier delivery charges – £102.86 in total. And I have find a safe way, no doubt also expensive, of getting my application and associated documentation to the Passport Office in the UK to start the process 🙁

And to answer those who have said, ‘Can’t you get a temporary passport whilst your new one is being issued?’ Yes – it is possible to get an ‘Emergency Travel Document’, but – costing another £95.00!!!!

My Liebster Blogger Award – part two

As promised in my first post eight days ago, here are my answers to the last six questions set by my Liebster Blogger Award nominator Emily, the owner of the blog Czechesotans.

6. What drives you crazy?

The addiction that so many people seem to have to their mobile/cell/smart phones. In particular, the number of people I see here in the Czech Republic, who talk on their mobile phones whilst driving, even though it is completely illegal to do so. What drives me even more crazy is that I’ve never yet seen the police stop someone doing so, even though here in Prague, there are always plenty of police around and they seem to stop people quite readily for relatively petty offences.

It is impossible to be in full control of a vehicle if someone is at the same time, using a hand-held mobile phone. Yet I regularly see mothers doing so, with children in their car; truck drivers who carry an even greater responsibility given the size and weight of their vehicles, also doing so; and when travelling along the D1 Prague-Brno motorway, vehicles passing me in breach of the maximum speed limit, with their drivers talking on their phones.

As I’ve previously highlighted on this blog, even when not driving, constantly talking on a mobile phone is highly anti-social. I continue to see, predominantly but not exclusively women, out walking with their children and/or their dogs, yet with their necks bent forty-five degrees whilst they talk away to some friend on the other end of their mobile phone. What message does that send to the children/dogs? Quality time with Mummy?

Just this morning, I saw another example of anti-social mobile phone use. A woman talking on her mobile whilst at the same time, passing her shopping through the supermarket checkout. If I had been the checkout operator, I would just have stopped serving the woman, until she got off her phone! Being a supermarket checkout operator is a mind-numbing enough without being treated to such rudeness by a customer.

Yes – mobile phones are useful but they shouldn’t control our lives and their use should never endanger the lives of others.

7. Where do you do most of your blogging?

This one is relatively easy to answer. Almost exclusively whilst sitting at my desk in my office in the Chaplaincy Flat. Since May 2012, I’ve had a laptop computer which has enabled me to compile text when I’m elsewhere. But in more than two years, I think I’ve only twice successfully compiled and posted a blog post from somewhere other than my office.

8. How do you spend your free time?

This question raises an interesting issue as I don’t have a job with set hours or even a job description. Officially, I hold an office – I am the Anglican Chaplain in the Czech Republic. As I’m subject to canon law, I do have certain responsibilities that I must fulfil, but how I use my time is very much at my discretion.

Therefore, what is work and what is pleasure is frequently blurred. And I often move from one to the other and back again, several times during the day. Whilst I do regularly have to work unsocial hours – evenings and weekends; unlike many others, I can take ‘time-off’ during the day on weekdays.

I am actively encouraged to take one full ‘day-off’ each week which is normally Monday. Today is Monday, and what am I doing? Writing this blog post! So maybe that answers the question 🙂 I do also like to get out and walk around and explore various parts of Prague, especially the parks. And frequently these walks end by finding somewhere to have ‘a cool glass of something’ 😉

9. What is something cool you’ve found?

As in my previous answer, I’m adept at quite regularly finding ‘a cool glass of something’. But I don’t think that’s what Emily my nominator, meant 😀 Quite honestly, as a British male who is now the wrong side of sixty, I don’t think I’m going find anything that’s ‘cool’, in the sense that my thirty-something American female nominator intended 🙁

10. If you could switch places with someone for a day, who would it be?

I have two responses to this question. The first is that I don’t really want to switch places with anyone, even for a day. I’m perfectly happy being who I am, where I am. My second reaction is that if I did switch places, I would want to do so for far longer than twenty-four hours, in order to institute radical and permanent change. For example, to take over from Putin and put Russia on a totally different political path, in contrast to the confrontational one that is currently being pursued. That would certainly need plenty more time.

11. What gets your creative juices flowing?

With regard to this blog, it has often been current events and the reaction of other people to them, that has suddenly got my fingers tapping rapidly on my keyboard. The resulting blog posts have also usually attracted plenty of comments. Three examples come to mind.

Back in November 2012, I just had to write about the reactions to the result of the American Presidential Election that I was reading on social media, by right-wing conservative friends back in the USA, of a few of my American friends living here in the Czech Republic. It resulted in my post entitled ‘Two days after President Obama’s re-election‘, in which I challenged some of the absurd things that I was reading.

Earlier this year, the Russian takeover of the Crimea peninsula prompted me to quite rapidly write about ‘The Ukraine crisis as seen from the Czech Republic‘. It is a post that has since received many appreciative comments and unfortunately, continues to remain highly apposite in view of the very sad events of the last few days.

The most recent example was at Easter this year, when over fifty ‘public figures’, (for which read, ‘people full of their own self-importance’), declared that David Cameron referring to the United Kingdom as a Christian country, ‘fosters alienation and division in our society’. In response, I immediately wrote the post entitled, ‘The militant atheists are at it again‘. I can tell you, militant atheists and their pronouncements, very quickly get my creative juices going 😉

And finally…..

Thank you Emily, for your nomination and making me answer all these questions. And can I add that your own nomination is also highly deserved.

I do not have a criminal record in the Czech Republic

My certified 'Extract from the Criminal Records of individuals' which declares that 'there is no information about convictions regarding this person'. — My certified ‘Extract from the Criminal Records of individuals’ which declares that ‘there is no information about convictions regarding this person’.

This is what this two page official document, which I successfully obtained today, declares. In the nearly five years I have now lived in the Czech Republic, I have thankfully, done nothing to officially trouble the Czech Police or judicial authorities.

Whilst I can, and have 🙂 , made jokes about having evidence of my lack of criminality, the reason behind my obtaining this certified ‘Extract from the Criminal Records of individuals’ today, is quite serious. It is part of fulfilling the requirements of the ‘Safeguarding of Children, Young People and Vulnerable Adults Policy’ of the Diocese in Europe and the wider Church of England.

When I was offered the post of being the Anglican Chaplain in the Czech Republic, back in May 2008, it was subject to a ‘UK Criminal Records Bureau (CRB) Enhanced Disclosure’ being obtained. This was despite already holding such a document, applied for by the Diocese of Oxford, some four years previously. Only when the new ‘Enhanced Disclosure Certificate’ came through, showing I had no criminal record of any description, could my appointment be officially confirmed and publicly announced.

The policy of the Diocese in Europe, in line with the rest of the Church of England, is that every person exercising a licensed ministry in the diocese, should be re-checked not less than once every five years. It was because my current UK CRB clearance dates from July 2008, that the Diocesan Safeguarding Administrator wrote to me some weeks ago, asking me to complete a fresh ‘Self Declaration Form’, but also to obtain the equivalent of a UK CRB clearance from the Czech authorities.

I was greatly helped in obtaining my Czech certified ‘Extract from the Criminal Records of individuals’, declaring that, ‘there is no information about convictions regarding this person’, by my good friend and colleague, Rev’d Dr Karen Moritz. She was previously required to obtain a similar document, before being licensed to help in the ministry of the Anglican Chaplaincy in the Czech Republic, under the Ecumenical Canons of the Church of England. However, whilst her certificate came out of the system within a couple of hours, mine ended up taking the full twenty working days that are officially allowed.

The reason for this discrepancy became clear today. For along with the official Czech documentation, there was a further two pages in English, declaring what the Diocese in Europe and I already know – that there is no record of any convictions against my name, recorded in the UK.

As a result of the EU Council of Ministers Decision 2009/315/JHA, each EU member state, shares with each other, evidence of criminality recorded within their jurisdiction. Therefore, although I had not requested it, I also effectively received, an updated CRB clearance from the UK. Actually, it is from the ‘Disclosing and Barring Service (DBS), which is what the CRB was renamed in September 2012, for reasons that are beyond my comprehension!

Whilst fulfilling all the requirements of the ‘Safeguarding of Children, Young People and Vulnerable Adults Policy’ of my diocese, can at times, feel excessive and burdensome, I completely understand the reasons for them. For it has been the failure of the Roman Catholic Church to have a similar policy in place until recently, or even when belatedly put in place, the policy being bypassed or ignored, that has caused it so much adverse publicity in recent years, not forgetting the lives of the many innocent victims who have suffered at the hands of those who should have been caring for them.

Finally, on a lighter note, I could not help but notice the contrast in costs between the Czech Republic and the United Kingdom. To obtain my Czech certified ‘Extract from the Criminal Records of individuals’ today, cost me CZK 100 / £3.33 at current exchange rates. A new CRB (now DBS 😉 ) enhanced disclosure, currently costs £44.00 to obtain!

We have a dog!

Sam 1 — 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!

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 Royal Visit – as it happened – part one

C & C 3 — 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!

C & C 1 — 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…….