Daniela Kapitánová - Samko Tále's Cemetery Book

Auntie Husličková was buried for free with state money because she didn’t leave any money, due to buying all that mustard.

There were only two people at her funeral and now you can’t even see where her grave is because it’s all overgrown and due to that it’s invisible.

Her name was Božena Husličková.

I love mustard, especially with sausages. I love sausages. Sometimes I can eat even four. Sometimes I eat only three. Sometimes I have sausages for breakfast. Sometimes I eat only two. Sausages with mustard are the best.

Anyway.

Uncle Otto wrote a letter to the High Ups telling them about Siberian Woodrot and how important it was and how it should be grown and spun into a yarn but he never got a reply because the High Ups knew all about Uncle Otto and his disability regarding his nerves, so they never replied even though he even wrote letters to Presidents. Sometimes he sat in the kitchen crying and wondering how he was supposed to save mankind if people didn’t want to grow Siberian Woodrot.

And after that he drew a picture on the back of a plastic tablecloth in the kitchen. The picture was called The Safe City and it was drawn in ink pencil. The picture showed a city with a big roof above that covered the whole city and there was Siberian Woodrot growing all over the roof. Uncle Otto said that even if an explosion happened right above the roof, the city would be safe and out of harm’s way.

But the greatest problem with Siberian Woodrot was that it always used to stink after rain. Even though he grew Siberian Woodrot inside our flat it always knew when it rained outside, and then it stank. It stank like rotten potatoes. That’s what Siberian Woodrot stank like after rain. Like rotten potatoes.

Sometimes I think that mankind didn’t want to grow it because it stank so bad. Like rotten potatoes.

And then Uncle Otto wrote to America regarding Siberian Woodrot because he never got a reply from anyone here, but instead of getting a reply from America he was summoned to the police and told to stop writing letters or he’d get into big trouble.

But Uncle Otto didn’t stop, because he believed that he had a Mission which meant that he could write letters to America and whatever, and then Grandaddy got so frightened that he locked him up at home to stop him sending letters. But sometimes at night Uncle Otto ran away because he needed mushrooms. And when he came back he brought mushrooms wrapped in newspaper and he was all dirty due to sleeping in the woods.

And that was very embarrassing for Grandaddy.

It was very embarrassing for me, too.

When Alf Névéry moved into Uncle Otto’s old flat he hung the plastic tablecloth on the wall like a picture and watched it instead of TV and drank alcoholic drinks as he sat watching it.

Then he died and Ivana took the plastic tablecloth and said that she would keep it.

She can keep it for all I care. Perhaps she thinks that I need it but I don’t need it, so there, she can keep it because I’ve got lots of tablecloths of my own and I don’t need to hang them on my wall or anywhere else, because I have lots of lovely pictures hanging there that I bought with my own hands and brought back on my own handcart because I’ve got three of them. They are really lovely. They have lovely frames, too One of the pictures is called Springtime on the Plains and it shows springtime on the plains. The second one is called Summertime on the Plains and it shows summertime on the plains. The third one is called Wintertime on the Plains and it shows wintertime on the plains. I didn’t buy Autumn on the Plains because they didn’t have it, but that’s very handy because there’s a door that opens to the balcony on my fourth wall so I don’t need a picture there.

The pictures are in gold frames. Sometimes I have to dust them. I don’t know what else I could say about the pictures.

Sometimes when I watch TV but I’m not really watching because it’s not very interesting, like when they are just talking, I watch Summertime on the Plains because it’s right above the TV.

Summertime on the Plains is beautiful.

But soap operas are the best. I love soap operas best of all. Soap operas are very good and lovely. The best thing about them is that they always start on time. What I like about soap operas is that they always start at the same time. That’s what I love most about soap operas.

Everyone in the world loves soap operas.

I love soap operas, too.

Anyway.

Except for Ivana because she hates soap operas and I can’t stand it when Ivana is like that and when she makes fun of soap operas and says nasty things about them. But the one thing I don’t get is what is it that she likes if she doesn’t like soap operas. Because everyone likes soap operas, right?

Right.

Margita, for example, loves soap operas even though she sometimes laughs at herself for watching them. Valent Anka sometimes watches soap operas too, even though he sometimes laughs at himself for watching them. Usually he watches sport.

I don’t watch sport very much because I don’t know any of these sportsmen, and that’s why I don’t watch them very much because I don’t know who is who and I can’t tell them apart. Valent Anka can always tell them apart. He always knows exactly who’s who and from what team and he never gets it wrong.

That’s very handy.

I like watching Slovak sportsmen best because I can tell them apart because they are Slovak.

And I support them, too I always wait for them to say on TV how the referee was unfair to our sportsmen again. When they say this on TV everyone gets very cross due to that.

I get cross, too.

Anyway.

The only thing I don’t get is why I’ve got to write about the Cemetery. I have no idea what I’m supposed to write in the Cemetery Book because nobody told me. I really don’t know why it’s got to be about the Cemetery because there are so many other lovely places in Komárno that I could write about, like the Market Place. It would be really easy for me to write a Market Place Book if that was what it said in my fortune-telling, but the thing is old Gusto Rúhe’s fortune-telling said that it I’ve got to write about the Cemetery and that’s something I’ll never get and I have no idea why it’s got to be about the Cemetery because you can’t write a good book about the Cemetery.

It’s out of the question.

I know this because I’ve already tried once when I wrote my First Cemetery Book, the one that was only short but I still don’t know if it counts as a Cemetery Book because I never got a reply and sometimes I think that they don’t have any idea about what a proper Cemetery Book should be like.

Nobody in the whole world could write a Cemetery Book, not even Alf Névéry or Cyril Malacký. And that’s why I don’t get it why it has to be me who’s got to write the Cemetery Book.

Once I asked this man whose name is Henrich Vigétz and he’s a gravedigger and works at the Cemetery regarding grave digging, so I asked him what it’s like at the Cemetery because I wanted to know what it’s like and this is what he said:

‘Bloody awful.’

But that’s a rude word and I don’t know if you’re allowed to write words like that in books, even though Alf Névéry told me about a book by this man Miller from America that had even ruder words in it but he was from America and they can do whatever they feel like in America, but I don’t know if you’re allowed to write swearing words like that here in Slovakia.

I don’t need to swear or use rude words because I never swear and if I swear it’s only at people who shout at me or at Gypsies and queers or that idiot Krkan from Recycling. Because he doesn’t take it from me but he does take it from that nasty rat-woman Angelika Édesová, and that’s why I swear at him.