Reality Czech May 1 - 6, 2001 or how important it is to confront your experience with those of similar fates.

Madhouse mode from last week continued into this one. First there were desperate messages from Lesley asking if we found her lost credit card. I caught her on the next stop (in Portland, she already left Cottonwood), with my message that we did not have her card. On the following day, Martina called from Monterey that she found it. Meanwhile, Lesley cancelled it, effectively rendering all our calling up and down the coast useless.

I also promised to pick Madeleine up from her school on Monday and stay overnight at Kren's, since George left for a business trip to Europe and Martina had to be in Monterey. Madeleine is completely self-sufficient, on my "babysitting" night I managed to read through half of a novel by Amy Tan. I realized it was almost eleven when something startled rattling in the garage. I ran out to discipline Madeleine that she was supposed to sleep (I thought she was working on something from her school project) -- imagine my horror when I did not find her. Her room was empty, no one at the garage. Pictures of catastrophic scenarios went through my head, including "they kidnapped Madeleine and are going to kill me", then I finally noticed last unsearched area - a guest room. Poor Madeleine went to sleep there so we, being known as internet addicts, might peruse her computer in her room. I still don't know, what rattled in the garage. Of course it stopped as soon as Sid arrived from work. Here's another proof that a man should be in the house !

And of course I keep going to my school as well. I have decided to finish it and I don't regret it. After all those years I am finally able to enjoy studying. I found that a homework gets me three points - one for bringing it by Monday 11 a.m.; second for a correct comment in the header of my program (for non-experts - a programmer may enter any comments into his or her program, which a computer ignores - unlike my professor, who rates them). Third and the last point depends on the actual functionality of the program, but it may be deducted if you divert into some programming style that is not recommended: e.g. you dare to name a variable with a single letter (let's say "x") instead of some adequate word expression. Bottom line? There's no need to struggle with a program - if I deliver a paper with some nonsense by Monday 11 o'clock, I still get one point. If I preface the blurb with a comment that is a literal copy of our professor's exercise definition (last time I even copied her typo!), I get two points. Obviously, a program in a programming class is of lesser importance...! Thanks to Sid I manage it all, even the programs, and keep receiving a full score

On Saturday, another government office took control of our lives for a while. We got invited for fingerprinting. Do you get it? On Saturday, and already at nine a.m.!!! That's an hour of our usual waking up. We prepared a map, the invitation papers, all our identification documents, and set up our muezzins.

	Our host did his best...

	A beauty and a beast

We easily found the indicated street, but not the building. Driving up and down between shopping malls and vacated lots, we saw no number 740. After passing a huge sign SAIGON NOODLE RESTAURANT for the third time, I had a feeling I saw something. We turned back and there it was - under red neon letters, a small rectangle with tiny numbers. Sid cursed that it is not possible, but he backed into the parking lot. From there we could see the whole mall block - Saigon restaurant, Thai noodles, INS (that was our immigration office) and then something with sticky booming music seeping out through black painted front, already at this early (or still at this late?) hour, and occasional, worn out bar warriors creeping out, with telling signs of a joyful night written into their faces. Under a roof, there was a line between the Noodles and the bar, a line of patient, sober customers of INS. I regretted not having taken my camera along, this would have been a colourful picture. But we were afraid that they would not let us enter a "federal building" with high-tech stuff (that was before, when we still imagined some large, noble bureau).

The only thing that a doorman (who was keeping excessive crowds out of the official waiting room) did not let us bring in, was my cup of coffee. That made me quite sad, as this radical move grossly interrupted my process of waking up.

The process of taking fingerprints was surprisingly well organized -- once inside, we were given numbers, we were allowed to sit down and read (Sid with his depressive expectations brought two books for himself). Actual fingerprinting took about ten minutes, and I'm quite thankful that somebody invented a system better than smudging your fingertips in ink. They scanned an image left by an oily finger on a glass, and the only hassle was a sticky feeling afterward.

We drove home to sleep it off, ate lunch out, and continued smoothly to a much better occasion we were invited to attend -- our friend Peter bought a fifty litre keg of excellent beer and asked a relatively numerous company to a party on his landlord's back yard.

	Some dressed for a garden party......

	Finally I can see everything from the right perspective

There we had not navigation problems -- it would have sufficed to use our ears (and to pick the place by watching for highest density of strange plates on cars (like "CAUVOLE" = HIBUDDY in Czech). We added our HROCH (= HIPPO) to the flock and joined the party, with beer mugs in ready position.

For following six hours, we talked and heard stories about America, about jobs, about beer, about bosses, other people, about volume unit mysteries (fifty litres represents 120 American beers), about scuba diving, flying, skydiving, about beer... and so on. I managed to invade and occupy one of the few deck chairs, which finally brought things into the right perspective. Sid agreed almost voluntarily to drive us home, and so I could fully enjoy this party, even though we were leaving while most of the participants were still relatively coherent. I wish I knew how it ended.

You can find rest of the pictures and movies from the garden party in a GALLERY.

Copyright © 2001-2004 by Carol & Sid Paral. All rights reserved.