Ricardas Gavelis - Vilnius Poker

But most important of all is that this belongs in my mlog too. Just like these gloomy rooms and the dust of books, just like our bathroom with the shit-covered toilet and the eternally broken water tank. If I were to leave this out, neither the deepest philosophy nor the most horrendous metaphysics would mean a thing.

“A friend of mine was in Paris.” Beta interjects, “Well, you know, the one whose husband works at the Central Committee. She said all the girls were walking around with brown nail polish. Nails in any other color simply wouldn’t be decent there.”

They all sigh deeply and squint their eyes, giving homage to unattainable Paris, where everyone paints their nails brown. The ROF made a big mistake when it let people find out they could live differently somewhere else. Stalin was consistent in that regard: no one even suspected any other life was possible.

From my collection:

When the first Soviet people escaped for a bit out into the world, a relative quizzed a writer returned from America:

“Well, so how’s the situation with food in America?”

The writer, somewhat surprised, answered that all was quite well.

“That’s ridiculous!” the relative got angry, “Even we don’t have anything to eat, so what’s there to say about America.”

Understandably, the writer and his relative were Russian. Homo lithuanicus always knew that it’s possible to live differently. Homo lithuanicus experienced it himself, or at least heard from his parents, that abundance is possible, that not all that long ago a Lithuanian could not only dream of Paris, but go there too. Lithuania was independent for twenty years; this spoiled Lithuanians for the duration.

“And Moscow’s full of Dior perfume and Lithuanian smoked sausage,” Gražina remarked, stretching herself lazily. “They have that stuff for themselves. They took it from us.”

“They do it on purpose,” Marija agrees. “They’re dying from envy that so far we’ve at least had enough to eat.”

Elena frowns, but she’s quiet. The ideological boundaries haven’t been stepped over yet; she knows exactly when to take the women’s rising revolt in hand.

The saddest thing is that if someone gave them good sausage, perfume and panties, they’d be entirely satisfied with life. Out of the famous formula “bread and circuses,” only bread remains in the Ass of the Universe. In the best case, “bread and butter.” It’s the ROF’s greatest success.

“But what can they do? They can’t even manage to raise pigs for themselves!”

They! It’s a miraculous term, homo lithuanicus’ magic word. It’s always them, not us at all. We’ve nothing to do with it. A genuine homo sovieticus is obliged to say: our revolution, our victory, our government, we did it. A genuine homo lithuanicus says: their revolution, their government, they did it. And we’ve nothing to do with it. By no means is this merely a lexical nuance; it’s a key marker of an inner philosophy. Homo lithuanicus couldn’t even explain who “they” are. They aren’t us. We’ve nothing to do with it. The greatest downfall of the state doesn’t worry him: they fell, but we’ve nothing to do with it. No victory cheers him: see how well things turned out for them. Unfortunately, we’ve got nothing to do with it. If some foreigner attacks him about the horrors of the Soviet state, homo lithuanicus’ eyes bug out: excuse me, but what do I have to do with it? I’m a Lithuanian.

I have no idea if that’s a good thing or not. That’s simply the way it is.

“The coffee is awful,” Marija announces. “It’s gotten five times as expensive and they sell you manure.”

Thank God, at least they’re not talking about children today.

Children are the principal subject of my cosmic despair. The carefully regulated system of stupefaction sucks them dry by preschool. Our little children don’t learn in preschool that they should love mama and papa. However, they find out right away that you have to love Lenin and the Soviet state. The kid can’t hold a knife and fork yet, doesn’t know how to read, but he already knows that Lenin was the best person in the world.

An absolutely authentic incident from my collection:

A teacher’s aide was leading a group of preschoolers through the Antakalnis grove. Unexpectedly, a real, live rabbit ran right by them. The excited teacher’s aide started prompting the children:

“So, who will tell me what ran by just now? So, who’s the smartest? Who will tell me?”

The kids stood there gaping and said nothing. The teacher’s aide got totally annoyed, she really so wanted to brag about her clever group of children when they got back.

“Come on now, remember, remember, what we talk about every day. So, what do we talk about all the time? We talked about it yesterday, and we read a book too. So, what ran by us? What do we talk about every day? Come on, what ran by?”

At that moment Aliukas, undoubtedly a future top student, shyly stepped forward, hemmed a bit, and answered:

“Was it Lenin?”

Incidentally, the Aliukases of this world are divine innocents only until the age of five. Later, they start comparing the lessons of kindergarten and the lessons of life — what they see every day on the street, in the yard, or in the store. The child slowly internalizes that all of life is a lie, so you must always lie. We are a country of liars, everyone lies and knows full well they’re lying: they also know they’re lied to, and those liars know their listeners know they’re being lied to, and in their turn, they lie too. And so on.

It seems I’ve thrown over my mlog and I’m starting a new dissertation about the education of children. I have to stop.

Elena summoned me; she’s boss for the interim. I hope she won’t start talking about meat, or else I’ll start singing her a popular childish song:

One Russian, two Russians

The trolleybus is full of Russians!

There is no meat, there’s nothing to eat,

Just little red flags on the seat!

God forbid, I really don’t blame people for the fact that they’ve forgotten their souls. For a human to feel the hunger of the soul, he needs not just a well-fed body, but one maintained with tasteful food; he must be not just warmly, but nicely dressed as well. Only then can he reflect that it seems he needs some kind of nourishment for his soul too.

I understand everything. I don’t blame those poor Lithuanians. Hell, after all, I’m exactly like them. I’m not blaming; I’m merely stating the facts.

Elena didn’t talk about meat. She went on about newfangled bibliographic indexes, which from now on will replace the flawed ones VV had thought up. I had completely forgotten that our office was preparing a computerized card catalog. I mean, can you really be expected to remember what excuse they’re using to pay you that beggarly salary?

I immediately replied that our card catalog ought to be like a layer cake. After all, the largest part of the collection is accessible only with special permission. And a significant part of it — only with special, special permission. So it’s essential to invent special, layered indexes, which would immediately show who can read what. So the first thing you need to do is create special, indoctrinated computers, ones that would give out permission themselves. The problem is difficult. However, Soviet technology is, one way or another, the best in the world; no stumbling block is too difficult.

I was driven out of her office because of this brief monologue. And, by the way, I wasn’t being in the least bit sarcastic. The Lenin Library’s collection in Moscow is the largest in the world. It’s a fact. Another fact: ninety percent of that collection isn’t accessible to an ordinary citizen. Question: this being the case, what is a computer supposed to do? Hundreds of censors will have to sit there anyway, and judge the books — are they allowed, or are they part of the special collection? There’s only one solution — to design an indoctrinated computer that would take the place of those censors too. That’s not a joke. It’s a general concept.