Panorama (11 page)

Josef is to stay an entire year with Herr Neumann in Umlowitz as part of an exchange whereby Erwin will stay with his parents in the city, for Josef has become too anxious, his parents not knowing what to do with him, though when they proposed this exchange Josef was happy to take it. He now goes to school in Umlowitz, and though he should be in the fifth grade, in this school with six grades in total they didn’t want to start him in the fifth. Principal Bolek had made sure that he didn’t, he wanted to show the coddled city child a thing or two, namely that the farm children know a lot more than the educated people of the city think, which is why Principal Bolek made Josef take an entrance exam, although none was required, and Josef had good grades from the fourth grade back home already, almost all of them A’s. Principal Bolek had made Josef write something in ink on paper, and Josef had done a beautiful job, but Principal Bolek was not pleased with how he held his pen. Which is why he pointed to a large picture that hung on his office wall, nothing else on it but a hand that is writing and, beneath it, “The Proper Way to Hold a Pen.”—“Look, Josef, that’s the way to hold a pen when you write, just like you see in the picture!” But Josef can’t write with outstretched fingers, only with fingers curled around, which is why he doesn’t like to write all that much, for he still remembers how he once cried in first grade, many others crying as well, when the teacher wanted him to hold the pencil in the right hand and not the left, because you are supposed to write only with the right hand, not the left, though it was always hard for Josef, and that’s why he’d grown used to writing with a strongly curled index finger. But Principal Bolek had said, “No, this way of writing is not encouraged here in Umlowitz. You need to write the way the picture shows in order to write properly!” Yet as Josef tried to write with outstretched fingers all he could produce was an unreadable scrawl, Principal Bolek laughing that one couldn’t be allowed to write that way in Umlowitz. “All the children
here learn how to write properly. If you want to study with us here in Umlowitz, you’ll have to learn it as well!” Then the principal had asked Josef some more questions that he didn’t know the answers to, though the principal had constantly replied that all the children of Umlowitz knew the answer, since this was the best school in the district, while at the close he had asked, “Tell me, what color is water?” Josef thought for a while, and because he believed water had no color he answered, “Water doesn’t have any color!” But the principal said, “Water does indeed have a color.” Then Josef recalled that the sea is blue, so he said, “Water is blue.” Yet the principal had immediately responded, “That’s wrong. Water is not blue. Water is green. When you look at clear water on a mirror, you will observe that water has a green coloring.” Since then Josef knows that water is green, Principal Bolek having declared, “If you want to go to school here in Umlowitz, you’ll have to be in the fourth grade, where you’ll learn what you need to learn. The children in the fifth grade know all of that already. You just wouldn’t be able to keep up.”

Therefore Josef starts again in the fourth grade, though Herr Neumann had said that in Umlowitz all the classes learn the same things, it doesn’t matter if you’re in the fourth or the fifth grade, while Josef thinks that it would be such a disgrace at home, though here it’s not a disgrace, because the children of the village know so much, yet no one thinks it a disgrace that Otto is still in the first grade. In the fourth grade there are sixty boys from the surrounding area, Herr Lopatka in his first year of teaching here, a very nice teacher with a black mustache that dips and rises like a swallow’s wings when he speaks, which looks funny. Class is held only five days a week, Wednesday being free so that the children can help their parents, though often there’s no class on Saturday, either, and all the children go barefoot to school when it’s not too cold, their feet always dirty, even Josef now going barefoot and it not even hurting when he walks on stones, though Otto and the little boys and girls go barefoot most of the time in order to save wear and tear on their shoes and socks. At night Poldi prepares a large tub of hot water in order to give Otto and Josef a good washing, though only once a day, for you aren’t at all expected to wash up as much as in the city, even though you get much dirtier in Umlowitz.

Josef told Herma that no one learned anything in school, even if Herr
Lopatka was a very good teacher, for the children can’t understand what he says, though Josef can, but when it comes time to practice writing no one knows what he is supposed to write. The teacher had said the children should write down what they see in the classroom, to which all the children made such puzzled faces, holding their pens as they looked around, though the paper remained empty, no one having written down anything except Josef, who had listed everything in the classroom, the teacher praising him and saying that the other children should still be writing something down, though all they put down was “Our Classroom,” as they wrote “Writing Practice” in brackets underneath, the date also set down in the margin as the teacher had instructed at the start of the lesson. Now the lesson was over, the teacher saying, “Today we’ll have to skip natural history and spend the next hour doing our writing practice.” During the break the teacher stayed in the classroom and in chalk wrote out a writing exercise on the right side of the board, underlining some words twice, simply writing out others, then on the lefthand side of the board he wrote out another exercise that was not exactly like the one on the right but somewhat similar, as he underlined some words twice as well. When he finished, the break was already over, after which the teacher divided the class into four groups, not the way they were arranged on the benches but instead mixing them up, each boy counting off one, two, three, or four, so that each one knew which exercise he was meant to copy down. Once the teacher had finished dividing them up, he asked each student again which group he was in and, once the children finally knew, he told them they should begin copying down the exercise, but slowly and neatly, so that no one made any mistakes and wouldn’t make the teacher upset at having to make corrections. But at the close of the class not all of them had finished, and the teacher said that his patience was wearing thin, he couldn’t wait any longer, at which he gathered up all the exercises, the children glad that the whole thing was finally over. Later, when the teacher handed out the graded exercises, Josef got an A, most of the children receiving bad grades because their penmanship was so poor.

This is the way that you learn in Umlowitz, and not a single teacher cares whether you hold the pen right or not, so Josef continues to hold it the wrong way and never learns the way the principal believes he should, he
soon becoming bored with school, Herma having spoken with Herr Neumann, who then asked Josef whether he’d like to help out in the fields and become a herder. Josef replied that he’d love to, and so Herr Neumann said that he could and came to an agreement with Herr Lopatka, who understood completely that it was not his fault, and that all that was needed was for Josef to show up once in a while in order to see what he knew, so that Principal Bolek didn’t complain. Then Josef became almost a family member, he liking Herma the most, and then Otto, and then Herr Neumann, who has a large shop where you can buy almost anything. To get to it, you climb two steps to enter through a glass door, and as you open it a little bell rings first in the kitchen, which is behind the shop, and to which the bell is wired, making a
ting-a-ling-a-ling
so that Herr Neumann or Arthur or someone else can immediately be there to serve the customer, though usually someone from the family is in the shop, or at least Leopold the clerk, a tall, thin man. The store is long and narrow, with a wide aisle through the middle, the shelves rising to the right and left, the goods stored behind them and wherever there is space, though not where customers can reach directly for them, one being able to buy almost anything at Herr Neumann’s, much more than is listed on the sign outside the door, where
JAKOB NEUMANN
is written in big letters, while in smaller letters below there appears
VICTUALS, TEXTILES, HARDWARE
. There is also candy, red and white peppermints and other sweet things, as well as sour pickles, which float in a big barrel from which you fish them out with a pair of wooden tongs, as well as spices, fennel the farmers’ favorite, for they like it in their bread, there also being lots of other grocery items, barley and cornmeal, beans and lentils, as well as cans and pots, harnesses for the horses, and scythes, and sickles and spades and shovels and pliers and nails, as well as buttons and darning cotton, knitting needles and sewing needles, lots of fabric like the kind that the farmers’ wives like, which is measured with a wooden yardstick, and scales, as well as soaps and powders and toothbrushes, lovely candles, brown soup powder, normal salt and red salt licks, writing paper and picture-postcards of Umlowitz, one of which shows a panoramic view of Umlowitz with the Thomasberg in the background, the central square, the church, the school, the power station, other items being pencils, pens, and notebooks, slippers and stockings, Herr Neumann having the biggest store
in Umlowitz, not even Herr Iltis having as large a store, though there things are properly displayed as in the city, while Herr Neumann says the way things are displayed isn’t everything, but rather what matters is good and prompt service, and that you understand your customers and have the right connections.

Herr Neumann’s store smells of all his goods, a sweet, pungent smell that Josef likes very much. Up front the store is well lit, in back it’s darker, so that an oil lamp is always kept burning there, because the electric light works mostly just at night, Rudolf saying that they had done a bad job in designing the power station, for it runs on an oil turbine, and one can never get enough oil, nor is it economical, for electricity is still much too expensive. Some people have no electric lights whatsoever, while others do indeed, though they rarely use them and prefer to buy oil for their lamps or candles, Herr Neumann not having a single electric light in his entire house, not even upstairs in the living quarters, for one hardly spends much time there except to sleep, everyone instead spending time in the kitchen, which is quite large. Rudolf says that the power station should have been designed much more practically to use waterpower, but no one thought of it, and now it’s too late, and many years will pass before someone decides to build a power station that uses water. And so an oil lamp burns in the store, Leopold always having to fill it with oil, clean the wick, and keep the lamp in good working order. Each morning Leopold sweeps up in the store, fills a large bucket of water, then takes the funnel he uses to fill the oil or vinegar and plunges it deep into the water, holding his thumb over the hole, as he walks through the store and behind the shelves to spray water in arcing lines that look like lots of off-kilter bicycle wheels, after which he takes wood shavings and strews them around, the floor as clean as it gets, for it is always gray and greasy.

Whenever Herr Neumann doesn’t have anything else to do, he’s in the store, especially on Sunday mornings during church, almost the entire family there as well, and the store full of people, because the farmers and their wives otherwise have little time to shop. Arthur says you run yourself ragged trying to serve everyone at once, but otherwise evenings are the other time they come, when it often is full, Leopold having to lock the shop so that no one else comes in, opening up to let customers back out when they are
ready, for Herr Neumann doesn’t like to let anyone out through the kitchen, as then the people passing through look into the pots cooking on the stove, which Herr Neumann doesn’t like, since it’s none of their business, which is why they all need to be let out through the front, even Josef helping to do so when all the others have their hands full. Otto also sometimes comes into the store, though he doesn’t open the door for customers, and actually Herr Neumann doesn’t like having him there, saying that Otto should go into the kitchen, but because Otto likes it so much Herr Neumann doesn’t outright forbid him and doesn’t say another word if Otto doesn’t disappear. During the day only a few people enter the shop, usually not staying for long, unless the weather is bad, when they all have to talk with the customers a great deal about this year’s harvest and the cows, the times, what’s going on in politics, how good the corpse looked, what the priest said at the cemetery, as well as the most recent wedding.

Normally Herma is not in the store, but some women ask for her right off and she has to come in, but when she has no time someone has to ask that she be excused or says that she’s not home. The men, however, like best to talk with Herr Neumann, especially the older ones, while the younger are also happy to chat with Rudolf or Arthur, and many others just want something good to drink. Way in the back to the right Herr Neumann has some schnapps, be it caraway, anise, or black cherry, and eggs stewed in Cognac, which usually Rudolf and Arthur mix up, as well as rum also made by them both, and finally plum brandy, which the farmers and Herr Neumann like best of all, the customers always saying, “Another shot, Herr Neumann!” And so he pours another jiggerful, the farmers lifting the tiny glasses to their mouths and bending their heads back, as one-two, the shot glass is empty once again. Everyone is sad when the plum brandy is finished, for it tastes so good, and then they have to drink something else, a caraway schnapps or a black cherry, a lovely red schnapps that almost looks like glowing raspberry water, though the men say that black-cherry schnapps doesn’t warm them up the same, that it’s only sugar water, not real schnapps. The shot glasses rest on a bare metal tray that Leopold says is made of zinc, and when someone wants a drink he picks up the shot glass and holds it out to Herr Neumann or whomever in order to have it filled, but when he doesn’t want any more he places the glass back down on the metal tray or
simply on the counter, though Herr Neumann would rather he didn’t, for inevitably someone doesn’t see a shot glass resting there and it gets knocked onto the floor and is broken. The shot glasses are not washed, and everyone drinks from them, no one afraid of catching anything, as once a week Leopold rinses out the glasses in a bucket that holds the water he uses to clean the store, Josef having once said to Herr Neumann that it cannot be healthy, at which he laughed and said, “We’ve always done it that way in Umlowitz, and it’s never harmed anyone yet.”