The author is a writer and lecturer in critical thinking
“I’m very close to emigration. Because Slovenia is small, but everyone who leaves Slovenia leaves us behind. That’s how it is,” said Martin M. Šimečka last Thursday in Prague at the discussion Ako začáčníť Slovensko.
Paradoxically, the hall was full of Slovenes and Slovaks, who – despite the fact that they already live in the Czech Republic – decided to devote their time to the debate on the Slovenian internal political situation. But when Monika Tódová asked at the beginning if anyone in the audience had decided not to vote, not a single hand went up. What are two good proofs, already these people are not abandoning Slovensko but they are not abandoning it.
I understand that, Martin M. Šimečka already expressed his vows with a good intention: he wanted to say it simply and clearly, even the country is invincible without its elites. But I understand that, he deliberately used a sharper wording to make his point better.
By using the word “abandon”, however, he draws a world in which Slovenians and Slovaks are divided into two groups: those who are willing to choose a more difficult and less comfortable road, but stay in Slovakia, because they care about the landscape, and those who si zvolia sebeckejší a životnejší život, but Slovensko nechajú za sebú napospas temným silám.
However, such division simply does not correspond to reality. There are many good reasons why Slovenians and Slovaks do not live in Slovakia. Some study abroad because domestic universities do not offer them the education they would like to obtain. PS president Michal Šimečka also studied in Cambridge, but of all politicians, Andrej Danko was the only one stupid enough to tell him that.
Others married a German or a Czech, an Englishman or a Japanese woman, but you had to find someone in the family modus vivendi, as it is not possible to have a household in two countries at once. Aj ja medzi nich patrím, but that’s how I listened to the podcast from the discussion on cooking risotto in Moravia.
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