Categories: Arvid Ratnieks

I remember that only from my childhood, the anecdotes were mostly political. If it was Khrushchev’s time, then people told anecdotes about Khrushchev, if Brezhnev’s – then about Brezhnev. I remember one of them. There was a great artists’ contest, where it was necessary to create the biggest picture of starvation. Thus, painters were working for a week or how much time they were given. There was an American, a Frenchman and a soviet man or a Russian, as it was said then. The American unveils the picture; there are some Africans, little black children stretching their arms towards a banana or a potato, or a candy. Everybody say, oh, this will be the winner. The Frenchman has painted some homeless man, at that time there were no homeless people, it was some poor man rummaging a waste bin. Yes, this will get the first prize. Then they go to look at the Russian’s painting. Let’s see. The sheet is taken off, everybody says yes, everybody is at a loss. The Russian has painted a big, big ass that is covered with a spider web. That means that a person definitely has not eaten anything for a while. Well, such were the anecdotes.

Anecdotes were told. I recall that when we were secondary school boys, we went to the museum to help with something and on our way there, I don’t remember his name, but there was a lad who could tell anecdotes for an hour without stopping. I still remember some of them from those times. This was one of them. But the men also joked, not so much telling anecdotes, but now, I don’t know if it’s right, to make fun of somebody, to mock at somebody. There in the kolkhoz, when people worked, the work was hard and it was necessary to enjoy oneself in some way. And then, someone might put a brick in somebody’s bag, or some other foolery was done. But those jokes were not evil. Everybody understood and laughed. Various nicknames were given, sometimes people even couldn’t remember why a man was named like that and not differently, though he had a real name, he still was named by God-knows-what nickname. Thus, people somehow managed to enjoy themselves, people have always been able to have fun.

Researcher: Dr. philol. Valentīns Lukaševičs, Daugavpils Universitāte