In the sixth year of the competition for the Hanzelka and Zikmund Travel Book of the Year Award, the jury selected five nominees from 39 titles. Among them was Jiří Černický’s geographical novel North Congo. “We all carry a heart of darkness within us. And it is also geographically located behind the city of Bukavu. There are mountains right next to it. There is only a primeval forest, a green wall,” visual artist Černický, who 30 years ago crossed 15 African countries on foot, says in the Host Radiožurnálu program.
radio magazine guest
Prague
12:06 p.m April 26, 2024
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You claim that travel doesn’t exist anymore, it’s just tourism. What difference do you see?
Today the planet has already been discovered, there are tourists everywhere. As you drive around the planet, there are clouds of them. There is always someone mysteriously somewhere, but the camera no longer shoots the crowds behind it. It’s somewhere near a waterfall, it’s called the Wilderness, but normally tickets are sold there.
The book is not an invitation to travel, it does not describe beautiful things somewhere in nature and monuments, it actually describes emptiness, says author Jiří Černický about the book Congo North
Why did you return to memories of Africa after so many years? The novel is based on the experiences of 1994.
Because I have traveled half of the planet – Tibet, North America, the Middle East, I travel the world all the time. And I’m also going back to Africa.
I wanted to see places where I used to be alone with my brother. And that’s why I dare to say that almost everywhere there are tourists, and where they are not, there is the book I came back to. That’s one of the few places they’re not, because it’s dangerous there and they have no business there.
Your book can be read backwards. What is your recommendation?
If I had to recommend as an author, it is possible to read the chapter and the short story.
The shorter part is about my life, which is also important, I was lucky or unlucky to grow up in Ústí nad Labem, where it was like you can’t imagine today. Today it is a beautiful city, but I lived in a housing estate that was surrounded by the largest landfill in the world, which was also chemical, and there were also surface mines. So that’s one void.
And there is such a void in Africa as well.
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Was it really possible to survive traveling in Central Africa on a dollar a day a quarter of a century ago?
Without a doubt, and it wasn’t actually a dollar, because you don’t need any money, it can’t be spent anywhere. You won’t spend a penny for a whole week or fortnight, you have to survive on charity.
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When I was there, I had checks, I was a bum, and you were in danger of being robbed. You have to have loose change all over your body, I didn’t have a bigger amount.
I had no idea there were no banks in Zaire. When you come to the counter, there is a money changer sitting there, who bargains with you black, takes you on a stick. So you have to figure out which black market guy won’t rip you off like that.
How difficult was it to maintain authenticity while writing retro? After all, you are telling the story of a young man from the nineties, when there were no mobile phones. The world was spinning much slower…
For one thing, I had diaries, and for another, the events are so powerful that you remember them for the rest of your life. And my diaries were also stolen several times, so I had to rewrite them over and over again. And that will help you remember.
I wrote the book because it was the most powerful part of my life that is uncharted. When you write about Tibet today, it is mapped out, thousands of books about everything.
But Congo, that is unknown. Not even Hanzelka and Zikmund were there. One can only go there out of stupidity, which was me. But then again, I can tell you what no one else will tell you.
Stupid camera
When your camera was stolen in Africa, did you cope by recording your memories with drawings?
No. I had to have a camera, but you couldn’t buy a camera in Zaire. There is a part in the book where the magician also robbed me, he lured me into the lottery, he robbed me, the mob wanted to rob me too, because he revealed where I had my money, that I didn’t want to give it to them, and at the same time I was a colonist.
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I ran away and hid in a hotel, the owner was a nice guy, he saved me, he didn’t let me out on the street. I lived with him after that, I was interesting to him because I was white. And he gave me a plastic clicker, of which there are photos in the book.
But just a few, I didn’t want to do it as usual with award-winning books that are full of beautiful color photos. Here it is not full of beautiful photos, but ugly, black and white student photos that are from a stupid camera. So they all have a black collar all the way around and it’s sewn on the inside.
Where to find the heart of darkness?
Apart from the fact that we all carry it within us, it is geographically located behind the city of Bukavu. There are mountains right next to it.
When you climb the mountains, you descend into the rainforest, and that’s where the heart of darkness begins and ends 200 kilometers before Kisangani, the capital of central Congo. There is only a forest, a green wall, when you walk along the path, it is quite often dark and muddy.
Listen to the full interview, the audio is at the top of the article.
Vladimír Kroc, pr
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