Adamov

I remember this place so well.  The smell of the pine forests, the sound of the rushing river close by. A big sprawling building ablaze with lights and an air of tangible excitement.  It is Christmas, before the time of communism, and dad has driven my mum and myself from Plzeň to Moravia, as it was known then.  A treacherous journey in snow from one end of Czechoslovakia to the other.  My mother is a shaking wreck, having endured a hair-raising drive along the top of deep ravines and gorges in the car that once belonged to the German dentist and his family back in Touškov.  It was a car dad was yet to be familiar with.  My half-brother runs out calling “They are here, they are here!” and lifts me onto his shoulders.  I am clad from head to foot in furs and as he bursts into the room, me still on his shoulders, the heat assails me.  The room seems to me ablaze with light: stoves are burning, soft couches are all occupied, mirrors reflecting, crockery and glasses dancing with the flicker of fire-glow from the stoves. My cousins Mařenka and Květa leap to their feet and run to grab and kiss me.  They are chattering like little birds, “come see our toys” and “look at the Christmas tree!”  I concede.

Never have I, or will I again, see such a magnificent tree; huge, bedecked and laden with a star that grazes the ceiling.  Every little wax candle balancing on the edge of its fronds has been lit.  They have all been waiting for me, it would seem.  To my young eyes it was if everything shimmered, from the polished wooden floors to the little girls in their red velvet frocks; from the glistening iced biscuits to the bowls of walnuts and apples next to the Three Kings in the golden nativity scene.  My cheeks are ablaze with heat and the excitement.  My mum is being handed a drink as she recants details of the near misses we have just endured on the road.

My heavy coats and furs are removed. I am in heaven.  Everyone I know and love is here.  There will never again be another Christmas like it.  How is that everyone has gathered here and where is this place? It is Adamov, the home of auntie Mary, Uncle Gustav and my cousins.  Beautiful, romantic, historic Adamov.  A paradise for children and adults alike.  Something from a fairy-tale.

My cousins, now grown women, kiss me and little sis and embrace dad.  “Come,” they say “We’ve roasted a goose”.  Never long in this country before the conversation finds its way back to food, and I re-enter the here and now, the warm summer day and tread the floor as I did that Christmas some years before.

The sprawling house in Adamov lay at the foot of a pine-clad range.  Not quite a mountain range yet, somehow, much more than hills.  Sharply steep and rugged, they culminated in a row of deep caves.    

It was here that my paternal auntie Mary, Uncle Gustav, cousins Mařenka and Květa and my half-brother Jarka, had hidden, looking down as the Germans marched in on the road below them.  From here, they had witnessed the soldiers entering their home and leaving with their Turkey rugs thrown over their shoulders, and various other items of worth, never to be seen again.  Lost somewhere in Europe, gracing another home. Such is war.  But the various families of Adamov didn’t care about their rugs or the chattels being taken, only that they were safe in a cave full of bats, out of sight. Safety was paramount.

When I say “house” it is hardly a correct description to be bestowed on such a grand building.  It was originally a hunting lodge, Moravia and Adamov in particular, being in a region of prolific hunting.  It stood alongside a turbulent river.  The sort of river that lays beneath steep mountainous slopes and is constantly on the move.  Dotted here and there were little roofed bridges which took one into the steep forest.

The lodge was of a long, low construction and boasted tall, arched windows with shutters along its sides.  These double windows had curved arches and shutters.  The gap between these windows were marvellous hiding places for Jana and, I in later years. A heavy, overhanging

Tyrolean roof crowned her, along with massive chimneys, where the wood smoke would curl up to meet the low mists in winter.  Inside a huge salon was graced by high ceilings and two enormous stoves with beautiful blue and white tiling depicted hunting scenes.  One lay at either end on the salon and half-circled with heavy couches and deep-seated chairs.  One could imagine the wealthy huntsmen reclined by these stove Stoves after a day of hunting to regale their fellow hunters with stories of personal victory. They were very stoves where my auntie, uncle and family would gather now on freezing evenings when snow lay thick on the roof.  My auntie Mary, who liked to think herself quite a lady, had furnished this salon with Bauhaus furniture.

Hanging by chains, above one of the stoves, was a monstrous painting. Little sis and I felt unnerved looking at it: stripped to the waist and glistening with sweat were men shovelling coal into a roaring furnace.  Some kind of steelworks, we supposed, but to us, years later, it took on a sort of Soviet, ‘power to the workers’ feel about it.  A black grand piano stood near a window and it was here that Jana would first get her taste for playing.  Here we sang “My Red Skirt” a loved Czech folk song. Jana still plays to this day, her desire to master that great instrument born in that very room. Wonderful artwork of all sizes hung everywhere.  These were much more to our taste, in the early days, I have to say.  They depicted the surrounding forest of Adamov; winter scenes with sleighs and horses; people in furs and covered with rugs, laughing at some happy event.  Little cottages overhung with deep, deep, snow and icicles which almost touched the ground. Deer, wearing startled stances, looking directly at you.  These were our particular favourites.  Summer scenes of the little bridges and the gushing river on its everlasting tumble of rage.  These were those that the German soldiers had not taken.  These were the ones that had been hidden, painstakingly, or carried up to the bat caves in preparation beforehand.

On either side of the stoves, and in comfortable reaching distance, stood glass and chrome tables covered with handmade lace cloths boasting Bohemian crystal vases of flowers and family photos in deco frames. Trollies laden with pastries and fruit just in case one should feel peckish in between meals. This scene of delight was flanked by a corridor where uncle Gustav had installed his own special ode to Joy: a monster addition of a bathroom, proudly displayed as an epitaph to modernity; the last word in mod cons and oft-discussed.

A mammoth lavatory, again with a front trap, stood way back on an outer wall.  Jana and I added it to our list of terrible toilets which by now was quite lengthy.  Sitting on this throne was uncomfortable not in the least because there was no lock on the door.  What if somebody burst in whilst one was perched there? Little sis and I decided that this being too dreadful to contemplate, one of us would keep guard outside the door.  The bath itself was a hideous affair of such size and depth that neither of us ventured near it unless we were made to. Overhead and high up gurgled a vicious boiler.  When the taps were turned on it rumbled and shook like it was about to explode.  Generally, we stuck to the cold taps at the sink and thereby got quietly filthy as time passed until someone would shriek out at the sight of our grime-circled necks and scour us accordingly.  The sink was no handbasin either; it more looked like a sort of medical contraption.  An arrangement used perhaps in a hospital or, worse still, a mortuary. No little bars of scented Yardley soap here either; just a big block of what looked like wax.

Needless to say we never actually picked this up and would just rub our paws quickly along the top.  By now, brown as berries, with golden, matted hair, sloppy Clark’s sandals (they had stretched to resemble boats) and devoid of polish, dirty fingernails, minor injuries from climbing and falling etc., and coupled with a sort of ongoing rash, which we were told was from too many strawberries, we resembled a pair of urchins.  We had grown plump with greasy dumplings covered in succulent pork fat and goose dripping. Gallons of goats milk and cheeses, slabs of honeyed cake and strudel laced with cream. We were making up for lost time: back in post-war Britain, where it was a case of spoons of cod liver oil dished out at school; the sufferance at home in the form of grey mince and greens, spam and corned beef.

A long row of rooms flanked the other side of the lodge. These were, for the lesser part, bedrooms and the others predominantly empty. These rooms bore an air of faded glory of a bygone era and a miasma of sadness; rooms which used to accommodate huntsmen in style, with deep double windows, shutters and stoves.  Near the entrance, but tucked out of sight, was the kitchen area still replete with ancient pulleys, ranges and spits. To this my uncle Gustav had fashioned a modern 1930s style kitchen and a garden, conservatory room which lead to a balconied veranda.  On this veranda, bedecked with outside table and comfortable wicker chairs, we would sit at breakfast.  Having risen from beneath our goose down quilts and not even bothering to touch the wax soap, we would with blackened, bare feet, plonk down to make a start.

The term ‘continental breakfast’ is used today in a slightly derogatory term which somehow implies the missing out of the “full English” and often served in the form of a micro heated croissant, some rubbery cheese square and nasty little peel lid pots of runny jam. These breakfasts bore no resemblance whatsoever.  In the centre, a beautiful basket lined with a white napkin, piled with little rolls fresh from the oven.  A mound of lozenge cut butter. Homemade conserve of strawberry, apricot, cherry, plumb and black-currant, decanted into glass dishes with shiny spoons.  Jewel-like conserves as thick as jelly.  Sometime, if someone had got up early and taken a woodland walk, mushrooms gathered that very morning served with scrambled eggs and chives. Little dishes filled with tiny, wild strawberries teamed with little jugs of cream. Curd cheese and salami, sliced ham and grainy mustard. Pots of coffee and tea served in beautiful crockery. These were ‘mother ‘of the ‘continental breakfast as we know it today.  Afterwards, the adults would drink cup after cup of coffee, light up their cigarettes and talk about the menus for evening, how these would be prepared and personal preferences noted. The other conversation, the political one, would always take place after the evening meal when Jana and I were elsewhere.

A huge inner shingled courtyard and stable block, together with a couple of cottages, lay behind the lodge. This cottage was now let out to the gardener, his wife and family. The stables intact but devoid now of their equine occupants were full of a decaying mixture of furniture and articles from a bygone age. A kitchen garden lay at one end of this yard and then a large rough grassy area with a row of occupied rabbit hutches.  These being a great source of delight to sis and me who would construct makeshift pens to give them a little run.  Every now and again one would go missing and we would worriedly report this to auntie.  She never seemed that perturbed and would always suggest it would return when it missed its mother.  We never followed through with this possibility or never thought to question her as she hammered out pink flesh for the evening schnitzel, nor for that matter, why a rabbit pelt would be hanging in the shed.

All this with the rushing sound of the turbulent river, the crystal air and smell of pine. When my cousins were smaller my uncle had made for our cousins, two massive boat chairs.  The type of chairs one would see at fairs, in which one would sit and gather momentum to extreme heights crisscrossing the other occupant coming the other way.  These had fallen into some disrepair at this time but it didn’t stop us kids standing on them and working up to such heights as to have a view of the roof of the house. To say this was a paradise for two skinny, pale-faced, poor kids, was an understatement.  We were in heaven.  The halo of childhood was still almost intact.  We gave no thought to the catastrophic anti-climax that would follow when we returned home. We would never again be with family in that beautiful place. The time was long overdue even as we were gathering up speed on those swing chairs, on this first holiday after the war.  The rugs, turkey or otherwise, were soon to be pulled from under their feet.

For the time being, however, we were lost in a wonderful world of Adamov. Not for the first time, we conjectured as to why the reasons for leaving this beautiful life had been such as to make my mum and dad pack up and leave.  Why, oh why, had we been hastily uprooted and plonked down on planet Portobello Road?  Britain in the throes of clearing its bomb sites and hurriedly erecting massive, soulless rows of ugly council houses to re-house the bombed-out East End occupants. Life for little sis and I entered a life of pure hell of which and I shall tell you soon enough.  Mary would be stripped of her proud swagger.  Her fur stoles, her artwork, her Bauhaus furniture, her maid, her gardener, her veranda and black piano.  She would be turfed out of the hunting lodge whilst it was turned into a school and put into a flat which only allocated a square footage per person.  Her furniture looked ridiculous, didn’t fit or had to be transferred elsewhere, she was sent to a laundry to work to earn her pension.  A great comedown for a woman who had barely done a day s work ever, who had married into wealth and lived a privileged life, along with thousands of others.  Ordinary now and queueing for bread.  All that remained was a tiny dolls house set of furniture, a complete replica of the furniture, every piece, in the hunting lodge.  This had been made by my uncle for his daughters when they were little and these they gifted to Jana and I.  We took great pleasure in playing with these to the sound of the BILLY COTTON BAND show and the smell of broiled greens.  It took us back to a time and a place we had loved. Tragically, that whole set got somehow lost and thrown on some tip never to be recovered.  I feel such shame about it for my cousins now have grandchildren of their own and I would have loved to return it to them as their birth right.