Last week 2/2007

The three kings – Caspar, Melchior, and Balthasar – traversed the Czech Republic on their regular Christmastime pilgrimage. Romania and Bulgaria joined the European Union. Meteorologists informed the public that, following in the footsteps of November and December, January would also be exceptionally warm and that there was a sixty-percent likelihood that the year 2007 would be the warmest in monitored history. “The warm weather is driving skiers to glaciers,”Mladá fronta Dnes remarked on the weather trend. A new ski park opened in Olešnice.

They started collecting tolls on highways. The police applied the new law protecting victims of domestic violence for the first time, banishing a man who abused his family from his home; the victims have ten days to decide how to proceed. New Year’s sales began. The post-election absence of a government entered its eighth week. Admirers of Jaroslav Hašek gathered at his grave in Lipnice to commemorate the eighty-third anniversary of his death. Czech President Václav Klaus had lunch with Premier Mirek Topolánek at Lány Chateau, and announced at a press conference afterwards that he would not name the new, already assembled government now because if he were the prime minister, or if there were a presidential system in place here, he would choose “markedly different” people than Topolánek. “We tried to find a solution acceptable for the Czech people, for the Czech Republic, but we didn’t come up with anything fundamental,” said Topolánek, describing his meeting with the head of state. The price of cigarettes went up. A twenty-year-old scrap metal collector died when an abandoned textile factory in Vejprty collapsed. The closing arguments in the trial of the Berdych gang – a group of hardened criminals who stole and murdered at the command of police officers in top positions – began. The first Czech child of the year was born in Znojmo. Statisticians disclosed that the new point system for drivers had radically changed the behavior of Czech drivers, who started obeying traffic laws overnight, and, thanks to that, the year 2006 had the fewest roadway deaths since 1988. Věra, a Czech radar system, was authorized for use in NATO’s rapid reaction force. Last year’s budget ended with a 97.3-billion-crown deficit, the second largest since 1994. ČEZ managers sold their shares acquired through the company’s option program. “We aim to challenge the stereotypes lurking all around us via a broader perspective and humor,” informed Czech Television, explaining the idea behind their new series for youth, Sabotage, “the first anti-lifestyle magazine ever.” UNESCO awarded its annual honorable mention prize for exemplary contribution to promoting human rights to the One World film festival, which has been organized by the non-profit organization People in Need for eight years running. The price of emissions permits plummeted from thirty to five and a half euros per ton. The era of ministry-dictated curriculum for Czech elementary schools came to an end, and the era of teachers drafting their own curriculum emerged. Aleš and Karel Loprais left for Dakar. A group of British detectives investigating corruption involving BAE Systems came to the Czech Republic, whose governing politicians had long tried to buy a squadron of BAE Gripen fighters and, when Parliament rejected the deal due to obvious imprudence and lack of necessity, they decided to rent the Gripens for 20 billion crowns. The Stráž pod Ralskem Prison opened a special ward for prisoners with mental illnesses. Maso Planá bought the loss-making meat processor Masna Studená. Scientists concluded that whales think, love, and perceive emotions much more than previously thought. “That they are extremely intelligent beings is absolutely clear to me. In their brains are the same types of nerve cells we have so far found only in humans and the primates most closely related to us,” said Patrik Hof of the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York, who was a member of the team researching the nervous system of the whale. A statue of St. Paul stolen fifteen years ago and found by police by chance was returned to Brno’s Petrov Cathedral. Agencies announced that the British firm Plastic Logic had begun construction of a new plastic semi-conductor factory near Dresden and thereby initiated a worldwide semi-conductor revolution. Unidentified pranksters changed traffic signs with the names of dozens of towns in the Pilsen Region to read “Fucking.” The life insurance company Nationale Nederlanden changed its name to ING Životní pojišťovna.