... Give ‘em Air ...

The smokin’ boys
With the chokin’ fish
Give them air
FUCKHEADS
Give them air!

Foot-pump lyin’
Animals dyin’
Give them air
FUCKHEADS
Give them air!!

Wide-eyed torture
Pavement slaughter
Give them air
FUCKHEADS
Give them air!!!

Severing thud
Pavement blood
Give them air
FUCKHEADS
Give them air!!!!

...... But, there’s more than one way to kill a karp ......

Ancient tradition
From the bath to the kitchen
Give them air
FUCKHEADS
Give them air!!!!!

The season’s pet
To eat while wet
Give them air
FUCKHEADS
Give them air !!!!!!

Christmas’ habitual
Murder ritual
Give them air
FUCKHEADS
Give them air!!!!!!!

A Czech deviation
Horrified frustration
Fuck those
AIRHEADS
Fuck them!!!!!!!!

...... I just don’t get it ......

I love the Czech Republic, and Christmas in Prague is something everyone should experience. But it’s not all pretty spires, medieval alleys, snow and mulled wine on the Old Town Square. There’s a Festive Season tradition that’s unique to the region and that never failed to transfix me for the eight years that we lived there. And it has to do with fish!

Raising carp has a long history in the Czech lands. The first written accounts of fish pond construction date back to the 11th century, when monasteries maintained the ponds for raising carp, which was an important food for Lent. These days it’s big business at Christmas time, and the practice is as follow:

1. Families buy live carp from a street vendor a few days before Christmas. Then there are a couple of options…
2. Either the new pet is kept in the family bathtub till Christmas Eve, at which time it is slaughtered…
3. Or the street vendor provides the service for you. This is becoming increasingly popular and the gruesome process takes place on the sidewalk, in full public view. The gutters run red with thick, red carp blood.
4. The bottom line - Christmas Eve dinner of fried carp, potato salad and fish soup.

I desensitized over the years, and got used to the sight, sound and smell of this process, but it shocked me in December 1995 when I’d only been in the country for two and a half months. I remember watching punters selecting their fish before the hapless creatures were weighed, stunned with a wooden club or mallet and killed with a sharp blade to the spinal cord, before being gutted and handed over to the Christmas shopper in a recycled plastic bag. Sure, that was brutal but, as a carnivore I think outrage is somewhat hypocritical as it’s essentially the same process for all the meat we eat. In most countries we just don’t get to see it on street corners.

What did piss me off was watching the fish in their tubs on the sidewalk, starved of oxygen, frantically gasping and slowly drowning in the hypoxic water. Yes, the majority of vendors had foot-pumps to bubble some air through the water but, as things got busy and the blood and intestines were flying, pumping air to hypoxic fish was forgotten. Hence my appeal “Give ‘em air, fuckheads”!

I had just bought my first digital camera back in the autumn of 2000, and memory cards were small and expensive (8mb – 32mb). Consequently, the three video clips below are short, but will give you a sense of the annual carp slaughter.







Penned (during the deep freeze of the coldest winter in 75 years) between December 20, 1995 and January 5, 1996 at Janovského 36/919, 170 00 Praha 7 - Holešovice, Czech Republic.


Cheers, MAlfaRK ©