New Eastern Europe - November-December 2017

135

is a tavern. In the former brothel is a fine dining restaurant. The old cemetery is
now a park. Michal knows every corner of the town. He studies in Bratislava, but
he longs for Rimavská.
“Do you know what is the worst?” Michal asks rhetorically. “I have a brother
and I also despise him.”
“What irritates you in him?” I ask.
“I do not know,” he shrugs. After a brief pause he adds, “I cannot explain it pre-
cisely. He is water and I am fire. Do you think this madness will ever end?”

The protagonists’ names have been changed to protect their identities.

Translated by Agnieszka Pikulicka-Wilczewska

Dariusz Kałan is a Central Europe correspondent based in Bratislava, Slovakia. He writes for

Euronews, World Politics Review, Polityka and Tygodnik Powszechny, among many others.

The curse of Ján Ľupták’s duck, Dariusz Kałan Reports