Daniela Kapitánová - Samko Tále's Cemetery Book

Because a long time ago, when the Jews went away, for example to concentration camps, they had to leave their things behind and the things had to be sold, because why would Jews need things like a piano in a concentration camp, right?

Right.

Grandmummy swore that she would never sit at the table with the marble top and that’s why Grandaddy had to keep it in the back room regarding keeping vegetables fresh and also because we didn’t have any chairs to go with it anyway.

Grandmummy didn’t need to sit at the piano even though it did have a chair because she didn’t know how to play.

The piano was black too but it wasn’t made of marble, it was made of wood and its name was Petroff-Grand. It lived in the main room and its feet sat in little ashtrays to stop them from leaving marks on the carpet even though we had no carpet.

I wanted to ask my Mum if there was blood on the piano too, but I didn’t because I didn’t want to know about the blood on the piano even though I knew that it wasn’t real blood, because I’m no retard and I know that the blood wasn’t real, only regarding the Jews. So it wasn’t real blood.

Once there was this man in Komárno who was a Jew. His name was Goldstein and I used to shout at him like this:

‘Bertík Goldstein

Lost his foreskin.’

Because his name was Bertík Goldstein and it rhymed with the rhyme and that’s why it was very humorous. It always made me laugh a lot.

It made other people laugh, too.

Later on he left to emigrate to Israel but he died as soon as he got to the airport because he was so happy to be in Israel that he died of joy at the airport.

When he was still living in Komárno he used to mend bicycles and I used to shout at him like this: ‘Bertík Goldstein lost his foreskin’, even though I didn’t know if he had a bit of his skin cut off down there or not, but that’s what people say about the Jews because it is very humorous.

There’s just one thing I don’t get and that’s why the Jews have a bit of their skin cut off down there. You know where I mean. On their penis. Because then everyone can tell that they are Jews straight away and they get sent straight to concentration camps and whatever, because as soon as they take off their underpants they can’t pretend that they’re not Jews because it is obvious they’re Jews. Right?

Right.

And another thing I don’t get is how they could tell with women. Maybe they made them take some tests and it showed up in the tests.

I often have to go for all sorts of tests, especially due to my disability regarding urine. So that I can have all sorts of tests done on my urine.

Nowadays people don’t find urine funny any more, but when I was at school and we had to take a urine sample to the school doctor for a check-up, all the children thought it was very funny. But that’s not allowed, and a proper Young Pioneer doesn’t find urine funny because he is good.

And if anyone finds it funny he’ll get reported and he’ll get into big trouble.

A good Young Pioneer has lots of good qualities, like not finding urine funny, and like collecting waste paper. Anyway.

I’ve been collecting waste paper ever since I was little and I have always collected lots and lots of it. I collected so much waste paper that I came top in the whole school and that’s when I got given the book called The Young Pioneer’s Heart and I got reported on the school radio.

In the old days you didn’t get to come top just like that, because there wasn’t much cardboard around then, there was just waste paper which is much lighter, so a Young Pioneer had to make a real effort to come top and of the whole school at that.

But I always came top.

Sometimes I shared some of my waste paper with Darinka Gunárová so that she would also get praised, because I always had lots of waste paper due to being hard-working.

Yesterday I saw Darinka Gunárová outside the Cultural Centre.

The golden shoes she was wearing had really high heels and they made Darinka Gunárová very tall. They made her much taller than me even though she used to be only normally taller than me. Because she never used to be that tall, like my sister Ivana for example. Ivana is so tall that she has to bring her own piano stool when she has a concert, that’s how tall she is.

The only thing I don’t get is why someone who’s as tall as Ivana could cry so much in the toilet after Alf Névéry died, because he wasn’t really all that tall, he was just normal, meaning he wasn’t as tall as Ivana. And that’s why it’s out of the question that Ivana could do such a thing because she was much taller than Alf Névéry.

Because that’s out of the question.

She got her tallness from our Grandfather from Detva who was so tall that he had to take his hat off to get through the door. My Dad’s older brother was also tall but not quite so tall. My Dad was the least tall of them all.

My Grandfather from Detva used to say that the taller you are, the better a Slovak you are.

But that can’t be true because I’m a very good Slovak even though I’m only 152 centimetres tall, but that’s not due to my nationality, it’s just due to this illness of mine that has a proper name.

And Ivana isn’t a good Slovak, even though she is very tall. Meaning it’s got nothing to do with nationality at all.

That’s just is how it is.

And that’s why I hate it when people say things that aren’t true because then people might think it’s true when isn’t really true.

I’m a really good Slovak and I used to be a really good Young Pioneer, too But the one thing I don’t get is why it had to be me who got a Young Pioneer’s Scarf that wasn’t properly red but sort of orange. That’s why sometimes I thought that people might wonder why my scarf wasn’t properly red like all proper Young Pioneers’ Scarves and that they might think that I was different. But I’m not different, I’m just like everyone else in the world and the only reason I have a disability pension is because of my kidneys and not because of this illness that has a proper name and makes you stop growing and stops your beard from growing.

So there.

Alf Névéry once told me that German Democratic Pioneers had Pioneer Scarves that were just like mine and he promised to show me a picture but he never did because he died, and when Ivana was packing up his things because he’d been divorced regarding his wife, so there wasn’t anyone else to pack up his things, I asked her to find me the picture of the German Democratic Pioneers but she went crazy and wouldn’t even talk to me and wouldn’t let me anywhere near his things as if I was going to rummage in them. But I wasn’t going to rummage, I just wanted her to find me that picture.

Then Ivana told me to take all of Alf Névéry’s things that were left over to Recycling but I didn’t because I didn’t want to get into trouble with that idiot Krkan regarding things that weren’t mine. I don’t see why Ivana can’t take it to Recycling herself. Because I know that idiot Krkan would ask all sorts of questions and I don’t have time for silly things like talking to that idiot Krkan who takes it from Angelika Édesová when it’s wet, but won’t take it from me. I could go to another place for Recycling if I wanted to, because everyone knows me and everyone respects me.

But I don’t really like to go to other places for Recycling because this one is close by and it’s really handy because it’s close by. I only wish that idiot Krkan didn’t work there.

He hasn’t got any good qualities at all.

The only thing I don’t get is why the High Ups don’t send him away.

I have asked Karol Gunár (PhD Social Sciences) lots of times to get the High Ups to send him away, but he just said that we got what we wanted, so we had Democracy now. But it’s not what I wanted and anyway, nobody asked me if that’s what I wanted, so I don’t get it. Why can’t Karol Gunár (PhD Social Sciences) sort out that idiot Krkan and have him sent away? Because this isn’t what I wanted.