Expats

About a month ago, two friends and I saw a documentary called "Alive and Well in Prague." The film followed the lives of four expats, three men and a woman. As expats ourselves, we were a little curious how our lives, or rather lives representative or ours, could be subject matter for a documentary. Afterwards, we were unanimous about one point. The film did not reflect ours nor our friends' lives.

The director, Edward Longmire, an expat himself, spent several years making this, and claims to have  interviewed many people before settling on these four: two teachers, an aspiring actor and a would-be pornographer.  His aim was to illustrate through them Prague's hold despite the struggles they faced. He makes reference to Kafka's oft-quoted statement about Prague: "This dear little mother has sharp claws", which Kafka wrote in his diary to express his inability to leave the city. Longmire went further and said during the post-screening Q and A that the city had a 'dark energy'. I assume he wished to show that these four people were in its thrall. Bullshit.

Of the four people, one of the teachers and the pornographer were alcoholics. The pornographer ended up in a coma from excessive drinking. The teacher eventually returned to his native UK to dry up. Longmire seemed to be suggesting that it was Prague which held these people down with its 'claws'. I suspect that these two guys already had problems with alcohol before arrivng here.

The actor and the female teacher came across as harmlessly aimless, if a little self-absorbed. Then again, who doesn't appear to be an egomaniac with a camera in their face? With its cheap beer and favourable exchange rate, Prague can let a person drift as they 'find themselves'. But that's economics, not dark energy. After a while, just as with any city, you have to start making choices. More importantly, you have to start facing the consequences of your actions.

There are plenty of people here who do more than warm bar stools. There are musicians, singers, writers, poets, journalists and entrepreneurs. A couple of days ago my wife and I went to see the singer Tonya Graves. Graves has been in the Czech Republic for 15 years, speaks Czech, and has quite a following here thanks to her involvment with the group Monkey Business.  She's not someone pincered by claws. Another example is Emily Prucha, a teacher and writer, who often uses her experiences of living with a Czech husband for her column Half-and-Half.

Between these extremes are the whole swathe of us expats who go to work, raise families, play sport with friends and basically try to set up a life not dissimilar from the one we had at home, tempered somewhat by our new home. Not becuase of any dark energy or claws but because circumstance has made it convenient, because it seemed as good a place as any to live or, simply, we like it. However, that doesn't make such compelling viewing.