Via Prague

Well ... four months later, I was disappointed. In all that time, I'd succeeded in seeing him two, maybe three times. Busy man. So I usually teach his receptionist, Misa, instead, together with Verona, a woman who works in administration. When we finally met, I was surprised -- I was expecting a silver-hair with a paunch. Instead, he was younger me, in his early thirties, but with a surprising air of dignity, or at least seriousness. He invited me into his spacious office, where we sat on a sofa. He presented me with a letter.

It was a personal thank you from Bush, personal I mean in that it bore Bush's signature. It thanked Mr. Novak for his hospitality during the U.S. president's visit to Prague in June, when Bush was here to promote his controversial missile defense system for Central Europe. When I finished reading the letter, Jan was looking at me, gauging my reaction. I expressed what I hoped was the expected degree of respect, which he dismissed with a wave. 'So why are you teaching?' he asked suddenly.

'What?' I was surprised.

'Why not journalism,' he said, with a look that seemed a challenge. 'James Tressler, CNN reporter ...' He beamed, as though he approved of his own vision.

'No,' I said.

'No?'

When Bush visited in June, CNN reported that the president was to meet with Czech Prime Minister Klaus Topolanek. The prime minister's name is Mirek Topolanek. The Czech president is Vlaclav Klaus. This slip up was a source of great amusement among the Czech press corps the next day.
I reminded my esteemed student of the incident. He dismissed the incident with another wave of the hand.

'Doesn't matter,' he said, a standard Czech phrase which covers all sticky situations. 'CNN, after all, they have many, many stories every day all over the world. A mistake can happen.'

'Maybe,' I said. 'But still, he is after all the prime minister of the country.'

Jan conceded the point with a shrug.

It was an interesting discussion, the kind I originally imagined. We talked of his work and travels. 'Sorry, I am very tired,' he said. 'Last night I was with the representatives of the Vietnamese delegation. A very long evening.'

'I see.' I asked about the purpose of the visit, but the topic seemed wearying to him.

The phone rang. Jan excused himself. 'The prime minister,' he said. He'd been in meetings with Topolanek all afternoon. 'Mirku,' he said, answering the phone, tipping me a wink. A rapid exchange in Czech, too quick for me to follow.

'--I'm sorry, James,' Jan said, breaking away from the conversation. 'But I must finish today. Misa will see you out.'

That was a couple months ago. I haven't seen him since.

There have been some compensations though. Misa, in particular, a pleasant, attractive woman in her early forties -- she used to work for Velvet Revolution hero and first Czech President Vaclav Havel, one of my heroes. She entertains me sometimes with anecdotes and snippets about the old days, like how Havel used to wear high-water pants, how his buddy, the great writer Bohumil Hrabal, used to drop in at Prague Castle in beat up jeans, dirty t-shirts, a bottle of beer in hand, dispensing with all formalities and striding into the great room calling out 'Vasek!' (short form for Vaclav). Misa has also met the Rolling Stones, Lou Reed, even Bill Clinton I think -- all this she willingly shares in a modest, disarming way. Verona, in her mid-fifties, is also charming -- a lovely, laid-back sense of humor. The girls and I share an in-joke, I suppose, that we're all at the whim of the Boss. Along with everything else ('Where is the report from Brussels? I need it. Where is my brown jacket? You know, the brown one. Did you change the meeting with so-and-so') they have to take their Boss's English lesson for him, and I have to show up not knowing who I'll be teaching from week to week. Another nice, tacit arrangement: Whenever I don't feel like going, I send an text to Misa to cancel, and she always texts back 'Thank you!! :) and vice versa. And at the end of the month when it's time for invoicing, they sign everything without breaking a smile.

Then late last month, I showed up and heard that Jan Novak was in the hospital. No one knew why. It was a mystery. Verona ventured she'd heard it was maybe appendicitus, but she wasn't sure. I asked Misa, who just shrugged. 'I don't ask,' she said. 'It's a personal thing.'

Right. The head of the government goes in the hospital, and his closest assistants don't know the reason. Hmm.

Then, the other day I showed up. Mr. Novak busy -- as usual. So I have the girls. No problem.

'Are you going home to America for Christmas?' Verona asks.

'Not this year -- to expensive.'

We talked for a while, ate up most of the hour on an article from one of the textbooks.

At the end of the lesson, Verona asked:

'Have you seen Jan today?'

'No,' I said. 'Not for a long time.'

Suddenly an idea occurred to me. I leaned forward. The girls leaned forward.

'You know, I think --' I dropped my voice to a whisper.

'Yes?'

'I think -- I think he's dead.'

Silence.

Then Verona erupted into laughter. Misa and I looked at each other and we laughed too.

Maybe he is, I mused later. Maybe the Head of the Office of the Government was dead. A corpse was at the helm of Czech bureaucracy. Come to think of it, I continued, that would explain a lot of things. Like the endless queues at the post office, the Communist-era sextagenarians dozing at the counter, screaming at you if you don't have a number, the proper form filled out. Yes! Yes! And after all, why is it a city of more than 1 million has only one Foreign Police office, when each day the line of immigrants waiting for visas stretches more than two city blocks?

It would explain a lot of things.

Of course, these are only jests and musings. I'm sure Jan -- excuse me, Mr. Novak -- is alive and well, at least I pray he is, for he seems like a nice guy, or at least when he's not busy.

But here's another thing. The other day, the girls and I talked about the future of our lessons. In sympathy for me, they said maybe they should get another teacher, so that I wouldn't have to play the guessing game each week.

'Why?' I asked. 'But why doesn't Mr. Novak just stop the lessons?'

'Because he says he is satisfied with you,' Verona said.

'Really?' I asked, amazed.

'Yes. He says so.'

'OK.'

That struck me, for some reason, as a little Kafkaesque, or maybe more like Kubrick, but that's beside the point.

Maybe he really is dead, after all. Oh well, I've met my share of government officials who very well could pass for cadavers. Meanwhile, I look forward to seeing him again, either in this world or the next, and will until then pass the time with Verona and Misa.