Trafika Europe 11 - Swiss Delights

Ilma Rakusa

sandwiches there are red lobed flowers. Everything blossoms and blooms here, in abundance. And so I draw a daisy in the guestbook. Dedication, thanks, etc. She beams. Outside, a starry night. I see people hurrying across the square. Boris says: They have to catch the last bus that will take them home to their villages. Many of the students live in the countryside. The stores have long since closed. It is quiet in Rimavská Sobota. I wonder where they held the balls Mother remembered with such enthusiasm. And where do people dance today? Boris leads me through sleeping streets without bars or discos, without any barking dogs. The streets are so empty, they become stages in my imagination. Over there, I tell myself, is where Olga Singer lives, the rabbi’s daughter and Mother ’s closest friend. And up ahead, where the light is shining, lives Gyuszi Vietorisz, her childhood playmate. Maybe he is practicing piano while the grown ups play cards. And further on is Illi’s house, good-humoured, curly-haired Illi who skates so fast. But suddenly I enter a house and find a Katinka of the present day, sitting and talking, asking me questions and offering me meat and cake. And I sink into the here and now.

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