To Do The Right Thing

I was backstage at Wembley Stadium. I was there for the Nelson Mandela concert. The weather was typically English. It was hailing and outside 72,000 people were sitting in the cold. I didn't think I would meet Mr. Mandela but I was hoping to at least see him. I had been reading in the press about how the lineup for this Mandela concert was inferior to the previous one- no megastars. That we musicians were politically naïve and stupid- didn’t we know he was a Communist- he hasn't rejected violence, etc. Plus an interviewer from the BBC with incredibly bad breath had informed me that WEA- my record company- had taken out an ad to retailers saying, "Make Mandela work for you." Well, they're obviously capitalist dogs, I said, and we should cancel the concert right now, don’t you agree. So what if Nelson Mandela went to jail unable to vote and came out 27 years later still unable to vote- so what that he was being given the opportunity to speak to one billion people on this night (except in America- America where it was deemed too political and people are tired of these benefits anyway.)

And no, I didn't get to see Mr. Mandela, not in person anyway. I viewed him on a big video monitor and then on a TV just as you may have. And he was incredible at age 71, at any age, and I hoped I could be that way at that age, and I wondered another thought- how does anyone go to jail for 27 years over an idea. Three months, okay. A year. But 27 years. It reminded me of the old Lenny Bruce routine when he's playing a captured soldier and they threaten him- hey, this isn't necessary, here's their time, dates, do you want his home phone number.

This question stayed in my mind because I was leaving the next day to fly to Prague to interview Vaclav Havel the new president of Czechoslovakia and a personal hero of mine- a man who like Mandela could have left. They wanted him to leave- he was a successful playwright- why didn't he leave. They told him- if you put a wreath on that dead dissident's grave you go to jail. He did it anyway, and went to jail. And now he was the president of that country, his cabinet made up of various other dissidents, the Communists removed from power, the Czech people rising up to demonstrate 300,000 strong in Wensislav Square for days, finally clashing with the soldiers over the senseless death of a 10-year-old boy. And Vaclav Havel was no longer in jail but president. A poet, a playwright, a great man.

Before leaving, we had some strange conversations with our Czechoslovakian contacts, exacerbated, no doubt, by the language problem. It was Kafkaesque. Phones dropped off hooks- footsteps clicking down corridors, it was hard to get clear answers to our most basic requests. The line that made me nervous was when we were told with exasperation- the government will take care of you. I'm from New York. I wouldn’t want the government to take care of me. Plus they wanted me to play. At a club. For the local promoter. Visions of various people I knew raced through my mind making me nervous- scalpers, bootlegs, ticket prices. I said no. I didn’t want to play for the local promoter. Maybe later when I do a real tour, and no photos or press conference at the airport. After all I said I'm here as a journalist.

Prague is clean, so elegant so old. We were in the International Hotel, which at a distance looked to me like a project. Close up it was actually okay, just very boxlike and brown. It had actually been hard to get a room because there were so many journalists and tourists in town. The Pope was coming to Czechoslovakia in two days. We were taken around Prague by Paul, a German photographer, and later by a man who I think became a new old friend, Kocár. Kocár’s real name was Kosarek. It's a 400-year-old name and means small carriage. When he grew up his name became Kocár or big carriage. Kocár was a streetwise person who spoke what he called street English and had resisted all attempts to enroll him in a school to teach him correct English. But he spoke just fine. He told us that only a while ago Havel was hiding in his house trying to get the dissidents of Charter 77 together for more protests against the government. And now he was president.

Kocár apologized for the very large, clumsy man following us, another bodyguard. Havel has many enemies. The Communists hate him. And, he said, making a gun with his hand pointing it at me, they'd like to hurt his friends. Havel, Kocár said, gets 20 death threats a day. Of course, 99 percent of these are not serious. But one might be.

And so we went through Prague waiting for the interview. We saw where the 30-meter bust of Stalin was destroyed. Kocár pointed to that spot with particular revulsion. He'd been 14 in 1968 when the Russian tanks came and had blown up two tanks himself. The Russians are stupid, he said. Their gas tanks are on the rear of the tanks quickly available to a hammer and a match and then you run quick. In the demonstration that overthrew the Communists, if you were in the front lines, and he was, the secret was hit and run quick. He had seen an 80-year-old woman beaten by a soldier after she’d told him he was worse than a Nazi. Kocár attacked him, and I supposed that was how he lost his front teeth.

We went to the Jewish ghetto and the Jewish cemetery, which was very sad. There was so little land that the bodies could not have individual graves- the tombstones were piled atop and next to one another. Isn't that said, I said. Isn't that beautiful, said our translator Yana, hopefully misunderstanding.

We went to the old square. There was a large crowd gathered in front of the astrological clock. On the hour saints popped out of the clock and at the end a brass rooster crowed. We went across the Charles Bridge, named for Charles IV, their greatest king, from the thirteenth century, a king of their people. The bridge had 30 statues of various Catholic icons placed 10 feet apart from one another on both sides of the bridge. Young kids were playing Beatles' songs and Czech country songs. Prior to Havel, no music could be played or sung on the bridge. No young people could gather there. You never knew what they might come up with. We passed a bust of Kafka on a street but were told not to bother to see his apartment- everything had been ripped out. We ate some dumplings in the oldest restaurant in Prague and then gathered ourselves to go to the castle to meet Vaclav Havel.

The castle is just that, a large castle in yet another square directly opposite a very beautiful church with a gold-plated clock. We were met outside by Sacha Vandros, the young bespectacled secretary of state. He led us up the red-carpeted stairway to the president's office. We went inside the office and sat at a medium-sized table. The press secretary was to act as our translator. President Havel's English, he said, was not so good. I set up my tape recorder and there he was, President Vaclav Havel.

He's the kind of person you like on sight and he only gets better when he talks. He searched for a cigarette and chain-smoked the whole hour. I'd been told he put in 18-hour days, which was a little rough on him since only three weeks ago he'd had a hernia operation. He's one of the nicest men I'd ever met. I asked him if it was okay to turn on the tape.

HAVEL: We invite you too for breakfast...
REED: No, I mean, in the hotel we ordered breakfast and three people came up to give it to us. We thought it was very odd, small tray, three people. So I always thought of Kafka, I think of Kafka when I read you, er, I'll see if this is working...
HAVEL: The State Security was liquidated in this country, but these people work in spite of this fact. I think they are interested more in me than in you, these people.
REED: I don't think so, I don't think so, I don't normally do this. I've done other interview in my life, that was two weeks ago. There's a writer I really admire named Hubert Selby, who wrote a book called "Last Exit to Brooklyn," and a new magazine asked me to interview him. I really wanted to meet him all my life, so I said yes. And it was really wonderful. I got to ask him a lot of questions about writing. So yesterday I found out that that's a great interview. If we had more time I would show it to you. I also have a present for you. Anyway, the magazine rejected the interview.
HAVEL: [In Czech] Hang on, I don't understand...
INTERPRETER: [In Czech] That the magazine rejected it.
HAVEL: [Laughs]
INTERPRETER: [In English] Was it your idea to do the interview?
REED: It wasn't my idea. It didn't occur to me that I would be interviewing the president of a country. I was told that I was one of the people who would be acceptable to do an unconventional interview.
HAVEL: Well, I think I have some message work for this magazine, and I would like to tell it to you in this interview, but we must begin immediately because unfortunately I have a lot of work. There are a lot of crises and problems which I have to solve very quickly. And we can begin if you agree. But I would prefer to answer you in Czech and Michael will translate it because he speaks much more better than me.
REED: This is a present for you.
HAVEL: Thank you very much.
REED: That is a CD-
HAVEL: [In Czech] Ah yes, this is great. Finally, I'll be able to listen to some music properly.
REED: - of a project called "Songs for 'Drella." It's about Andy Warhol that I did with John Cale.
HAVEL: I will be very soon in the little village where he was born, Andy Warhol. Meziz Droje. Mezilabolse, very small village in-
[coffee served]
REED: No alcohol-
HAVEL: No, no, no. It is forbidden in this castle, only me, I can secretly drink.
HAVEL: [Through interpreter] The worst thing about being a president is that I have no time to listen to music. Only the presidential tune...And the only time I can listen to music is in my car when I'm going from place to place. Nevertheless I will play the CD as soon as I have the opportunity to. But I equally enjoy good rock music. And sometimes there are even moments when I listen to ugly modern music, commercial music, pop music. For 20 years there was only the most banal pop music on our radio. Now it is already possible to hear on the radio music that previously people could only clandestinely exchange on tapes. And if someone distributed the tapes for too long, he was usually arrested. Now they are all out of prison and the music is played on the radio.
REED: Is it true that on the Charles Bridge, not too long ago, you couldn't play guitar?
HAVEL: Yes, it is true, the pop musicians there were arrested from time to time. Or at least detained...detained for a while at the police station and then let go. But since we started to talk about music, I'd like to say one thing. That this revolution of ours has, apart from all other faces, also a musical face. Or an artistic face. And it also has a very specific musical background.
At the end of the '60s there was a wave here of rock music....Most of the bands after the Soviet invasion broke up or started playing different music because good rock music was actually banned. There was one band in particular which lasted, which did not rename itself, which did not change. There were several, but this one was the best known. And their style of music was very much influenced by the Velvet Underground, whose record I brought back from New York in 1968. It was one of their first records...And this band began to be much persecuted- first they lost their professional status, and then they could only play in private parties. And for the time they also played in the barn of my summer cottage, where we had to, in a very complicated way, organize secret concerts...And its name was the Plastic People of the Universe. And there originated a whole underground movement in the dark '70s and '80s. Then they were arrested. With several friends we organized a campaign against their arrest, and it was quite hard to convince some very serious gentlemen and academics and Nobel Prize winners to take a stand against some hairy rock musicians. Nevertheless, we succeeded. And this led to the formation of a community of solidarity of sorts.
Most of these musicians were released and some received light sentences under the pressure of our campaign. And it seemed to us that this community that originated in this way shouldn't just dissolve after this but should go on in some more stable form, and that's how the Charter 77 organization was created.
REED: Really?
HAVEL: The trial with the bands was a special affair. Then it was still possible to enter the court building to be at such a trial. The building was full of people. You could see a university professor in friendly talk with a former member of the Presidium of the Communist Party and with a long-haired rock musician, and all of them surrounded by police.
This was a sign of the things to come, of the special nature and character of the Charter 77, which united many people of different backgrounds and background views in their common resistance to the totalitarian system and in their speaking out against the system. And then some of us got arrested and jailed. But now, members of the Charter 77 are deputies in the parliament, members of the government, or here in the castle.
I myself was one of the first three spokesmen of the Charter 77. By this I mean to say that music, underground music, in particular one record by the Velvet Underground, played a rather significant role in the development of our country, and I don't think that many people in the United States have noticed this. So this is one thing I wanted to tell you, and I have another thing to say but maybe in a while.
But first I should mention that, as is usually the case with rock bands, they undergo changes, they change the names, some of the people leave, etc. etc. Well, the core of this band still exists but it has changed its name and it's now called Midnight- Unots. We had Easter recently, and I turn on the radio in my car while I'm driving to my cottage and the music they played was Passover music played by this very band and recorded at my cottage.
REED: Passover music?
HAVEL: Yes, Passover music. The music was recorded about 13 years ago...It was never released before. They just locked themselves in my cottage and recorded this thing. [In Czech] Secretly. It was a very strange experience to suddenly hear this music on Czechoslovak radio.
REED: Joan Baez says hello.
HAVEL: [In English] Thank you very much. Please greet her too, and I hope I will see her on the seventh of June when she has to have a concert in Prague. Sixth or seventh, I think. You bring her to Moscow. She will have once concert in Bratislava, I think, and one in Prague.
REED: I admire you so much. In reading "Letters to Olga"...
HAVEL: This unread-, unre-
REED: Unreadable
HAVEL: Unreadable book. It was written in prison, and everything that was understandable, was, er, forbidden.
REED: Censored.
INTERPRETER: Censored.
HAVEL: Censored. Censored, and they learned me to write more and more complicated sentences, and now I don't understand it well. It is extremely complicated language, but it was the result of prison censorship, yes, because if they don't understand it, they permit it [laughs].
REED: Why was it called the Velvet Revolution?
HAVEL: This name. [In Czech] I'll say it in Czech.
HAVEL: [Through interpreter] The name was not given to it by us, but by Western journalists. They like simple labels. But the label caught on here. And some people use the word to this day.
Well, it is true that the interesting thing about our revolution was that, except for the first massacre which started it off, there was no blood spilled during the revolution. But it doesn't necessarily mean that it was as velvet as that. Or that we lived in a velvet time. That's just by the way.
I wanted to say another thing for this magazine, if I can volunteer. The whole anti-establishment movement of the '60s had marked significantly my generation and also the generations after that. In 1968, I was in New York for six weeks. I took part in demos and rallies and student protests [at Columbia University]. [In Czech] As well as that I went to Greenwich Village and the East Village.
REED: Which ones?
HAVEL: They were on strike but they still invited me to give a talk there- I was also at Yale and MIT. And with Milos Forman I participated in be-ins and things like that. We wandered around Greenwich Village and East Village, and I bought a lot of posters which I still keep. Psychedelic posters which I still have hanging in my cottage.
REED: Did you go to CBGB's?
HAVEL: That was later. Many of the famous musicians like Bob Dylan and Jimi Hendrix were already there, but some only appeared later. [In Czech] Recently during the revolution someone stole two of my treasured posters. I don't know why.
REED: So you never saw the Velvet Underground?
HAVEL: Not live, but I bought the record. First edition. At least I think it was the first edition.
REED: Does it have a banana on it?
HAVEL: I haven't seen the record for a long time. I mainly played it at the beginning of the '70s. So I don't remember the banana. But I know it's all black with white letterings [White Light/White Heat LP]. And from time to time some rock musicians wanted to steal this record. But I think I still have it. But to go on with what I wanted to say.
The whole spirit of the '60s, the rebellion against the establishment affected significantly the spiritual life of my generation and of the younger people, and in a very strange way, transcended into the present. But we differ from this 20-year rebellion in that we made another step further. As small and inconspicuous as it might be, but it's the knowledge that we can't just tear things down but we have to build in a new way. And, for example, Michael Kotap, probably the best-known rock musician in this country, is also one of the best-functioning deputies in our Federal Parliament now. He doesn't have much time for composing music. It is a sacrifice of a kind that he has brought to society. But he still managed to write the tune for the castle guards.
And when we were in New York on a state visit two months ago, with Milos Forman, we dropped in to CBGB's one night. And as I learned later, the manager of the place, a man we hadn't really noticed immediately, phoned his friend in Prague that he's got the president of the country in his joint. The people most scared about this were the 30 people from Secret Service who were guarding me. And these guys were real Rambos. But in the end the Secret Service guys grew to like me, and they actually gave me a sweater as a present. And they were moved when I was leaving. But I didn't print things like that.
INTERPRETER: Oh, he says I'm supposed to censor it. I think that's okay.
REED: Do you know that in the United States they are trying to censor the records now? By labeling them?
HAVEL: Well, when we were in the States, they organized a concert at St. John the Divine in New York and there were many famous writers and musicians and other people appearing there, and from them I learned that they also have other problems of their own. My heart is always with those who fight for freedom of expression. But it still seems to me that the 200-year-old American democracy is mature enough not to need me as mediator to take messages to Mr. Bush. I think that they can tell him directly.
REED: We try.
HAVEL: They were sort of asking me to plead on their behalf, but I think that would not really be the thing to do. Because in this I would be humiliating them. They are citizens and can say whatever they want to their elected representatives.
REED: Are you in favor of German reunification?
HAVEL: I think it had to happen sooner or later. And whoever did not think so had no foresight. And if anyone's unprepared for this mentally it's his problem.
INTERPRETER: [To Havel in Czech] I'm having difficulty in translating because I don't get enough time to think.
HAVEL: [To Interpreter in Czech] You're the interpreter. Yes, it's a rock magazine. There won't be a scandal, will there?
INTERPRETER: [To Havel in Czech] Not from this, surely?
HAVEL: [Through interpreter] The Berlin Wall was a symbol of the division of Europe. And the fall of this wall was the liberation of us all. And it's natural that when the wall falls, the nation reunites itself. If such a wall went through Prague at the moment it would fall. People would also come together.
REED: You obviously feel and prove that music can change the world.
HAVEL: Not in itself, it's not sufficient in itself. But it can contribute to that significantly in being a part of the awakening of the human spirit. [Knock at the door. Conversation between Havel and female secretary about things to do and running out of time.] I think we're running out of time. Is it true or not that you will play at the Gallery tonight?
REED: It was never true that I would play at the Gallery. I brought a guitar with me, though, because I would have played for you, but I wouldn't want to go to a nightclub and play. I would play in private for you as I said, but not in a club. It would make me way too nervous.
HAVEL: I think it would be sort of embarrassing for me if only I could enjoy it and tens of my friends who would like to be there as well could not be there. The bands that I was talking about would be there and people who had been arrested for listening to this kind of music, and friends...
REED: Would you be there?
HAVEL: I have a first-night performance of my play tonight. I could be there between 11 and 12, I couldn't make it earlier than 11 and I couldn't stay after 12.
REED: The advantages of being president...
HAVEL: There are no advantages at all, but after midnight I still have several speeches to write. And I'm not particularly looking forward to my first night, but the play had been banned before so this is my first time, and the theater struggled for two years to be able to produce it, so this is their first night, so I have to be there. But I could come after...But I just have to be there and then thank the actors and company, and shake hands with the actors, and then I could be-
REED: Is this a big club, because if it was President Havel and some friends, I would feel comfortable. But a big club with lots of people- see, I'm a private person.
INTERPRETER: It's not a big club. It's a smallish club, and we were just discussing how many people can-
REED: You see, I'm a very private person, when I came here, I didn't want any photographers at the airport, because I don't like my picture taken. I don't like being interviewed- and, er, I like controlled situations, as opposed to just a lot of people. I'm not looking for that. It would be a privilege to play for these people under the right circumstances, but I'm not aware of the circumstances, and it's difficult for me to walk into-
INTERPRETER: I think there would be a couple of hundred people at most. And they would all be friends because it's by invitation.
HAVEL: [In English] Mostly musicians, people from Plastic People and from other bands, and Michael Kotap whom I mentioned who is the best deputy in our Assembly, and some friends. It would not be public, nobody will know it, and if you don't want to do us, and if you don't want photographers they are not there, and I will not mention to anybody that I will come there, because if I mentioned it anywhere 1000 people would be there together with me, yes.
INTERPRETER: [In Czech] They're all friends. There's so many.
HAVEL: [In English] We have many friends. But we could arrange that there will be only about 150 friends and we could speak with them and they can play, and if you want to play for them, et cetera, and I could come there around 11 o'clock and if I would have the opportunity to hear you, I would be very glad. If you prefer only discussion with them and with me, we can discuss it, then I'll leave it.
INTERPRETER: [In Czech] Maybe it would help if we could put two or three lads on the door.
HAVEL: [In English] It's no problem to arrange that two or three because of my private security could control them.
REED: They'd take care of me.
HAVEL: No, just control the entrance so there are only people who are friends could get in.
REED: If it's important to the people and it is a request from you, it would be a privilege is the situation was a controlled one, because as I said, I'm very private. So I always try to have control over the situation if I possibly can, so that I can do what I do as well as I can. But if this is something you would be like, it would be an honor to do it for you and your people.
HAVEL: I would be very happy if this could happen for me and for people who have been listening to this music for 20 years, so that it became part of their lives, and of course I can guarantee be just those people and no one else. I will be there at 11 plus/minus 10 minutes.
REED: [Laughs]
INTERPRETER: [In Czech] I said plus/minus 10 minutes and he started laughing. [In English] Because I don't know precisely when the play is over. It starts at about 7:30.
REED: Would somebody be there to take me and my wife there?
HAVEL: Sure.
REED: This is a very new situation for me, this city is so beautiful and my admiration for you is so enormous, that I would want to do something positive, as long as I knew what it was.
And when it's a mystery to me, I don't know exactly what to do. That's why I said no to almost everything, until I was here and could speak to someone who could tell me what they thought was right in the situation, which I presume is you.
HAVEL: [In English] We can recommend you right people and we know who we don't recommend you. It's a little bit funny that such things, we do here, in castle, and for example [In Czech], if Lada can be responsible and organize it? [In English] I don't know who all of them tried to contact you and tried to arrange something, but these people who are all right who arranged this appointment, we can recommend them. These people from underground, what I explained to you, what was the people and people around them, the so-called Czech underground and it's all right.
REED: It was very difficult for me because I never knew who I was speaking to.
HAVEL: I understand. Of course Sacha my adviser will discuss with you the details about it. I unfortunately have something else to do. Appointments, some minister, somebody-
REED: It was such an honor to meet you, thank you for your time.

Kocár came at 10:00 to pick us up and take us to the club which everyone called the Gallery ("Je Podivna" in Czech). It was dark as we left the ornate buildings and decorative facades of the old Prague and headed into new Prague. The Gallery was a medium-sized club with a small stage two feet above the floor where an audience of about 300 now sat. Others milled about talking and sometimes moving to the balcony which stood about 30 feet overhead. The Gallery was also an art gallery, a town hall, and a dissident communication center. We arrived and went down two very wide flights of stairs to the stage area where a band was playing. I commented on how young they looked. Those aren't kids, I was told, the drummer's 42. The band was Pulnoc or Midnight and was made up of members of the Universal Plastic People and the Velvet Underground revival bands. The band consisted of two guitars, electric keyboard, bass, cello, drum and a girl singer. There was an old Fender Twin sitting at the front of the stage just as Kocár had promised. The house system was typically small club, a little boomy in the vocal but otherwise fine.

I suddenly realized the music sounded familiar. They were playing Velvet Underground songs- beautiful, heartfelt, impeccable versions of my songs. I couldn't believe it. This was not something they could have gotten together overnight. The music grew stronger and louder as I listened. "The drummer says he will faint because you are here," said Kocár. "It is their dream come true for you to be in this club to hear them play."

The audience was actually all dissidents. Charter 77 had a membership of 1,800 out of a population of 15,000,000. One after another, the songs flew by, each as impassioned as the next, the arrangements, the emphasized lines, the spaces. It was as though I was in a time warp and had returned to hear myself play. To say I was moved would be an understatement. To compose myself I went backstage into what could be called the universal dressing room- small, cold and bare, one bright bulb swinging from the ceiling- and took out my guitar to tune it. My tuner was dead. Its arrows flashed at me with inane irregularity. "I'll get one from the band," said Kocár. And it went dead. Here I am, I thought getting ready to play for these amazing wonderful people, not to mention the president, and I'll be out of tune. Just like the real Velvet Underground. But this band Pulnoc was not a mimic. It was as though they had absorbed the very heart and soul of the VU- all those great ideas and absorbed them into the very marrow of their bones. Steam was rising from me fogging my glasses as I tried tuning by ear. I had sung solo before 72,000 people at Wembley, but this was a bit more personal. Then Kocár said, "Havel is here." I looked at my watch. It was 10 after 11.

I went onstage, plugged into the Fender, hit a chord and discovered I was in tune. Well, there's no stopping me now. I did a few songs from my "New York" album realizing they were wordy but aren't all of them. I started to leave when Kocár asked me if the band could join me. They did and we blazed through some old VU numbers. Any song I called they knew. It was as if Moe, John and Sterl were right there behind me and it was a glorious feeling. Soon I had exhausted myself and sweaty but ecstatic I followed Kocár to the balcony and sat down at a table with a beaming Vaclav Havel. He'd removed his jacket and loosened his tie. "Did you enjoy yourself?" he asked. "Yes," I said. "I did." "Good," he said. "I'd like you to meet some friends of mine." He then introduced me to an astonishing array of people, all dissidents, all of whom had been jailed. Some had been jailed for playing my music. Many told me of reciting my lyrics for comfort and inspiration when in jail. Some had remembered a line I had written in an essay 15 years ago, "Everybody should die for the music." It was very much a dream for me and well beyond my wildest expectations. When I had gotten out of college and helped form the VU, I had been concerned with, among other things, demonstrating how much more a song could be about than what was currently being written. So the VU albums and my own are implicitly about freedom of expression- freedom to write about what you please in any way you please. And the music had found a home here in Czechoslovakia.

President Havel was having a drink with his friends, something he does not do in public because he is president. The only time he had for writing was for writing speeches. And the Pope was coming in two days. I thought, imagine a man who writes his own speeches, says his own words. What if George Bush...no. Havel said the speeches were easy to write, in fact some resented the fact he said he wrote them so quickly. So now he said it took them longer. He had no time for his own writing, no time to listen to music. No time to have a drink. Foreign policy was not difficult, he said. There are more unpleasant matters.

And then he was up from the table. "I must go. I have to meet some foreign minister or some such thing. Oh, you must have this," and bending from the waist he handed me a small black book about the size of a diary. "These are your lyrics hand-printed and translated into Czechoslovakian. There were only 200 of them. They were very dangerous to have. People went to jail and now you have them. Keep your fingers crossed for us."

And then he was gone.

The day after next- Havel called it a miracle- the Pope arrived. His and President Havel's speeches were broadcast outdoors through the square. As we left the hotel and took a back road to the airport we still heard their voices. The Pope, we later learned, had warned Havel against the virus, the moral decay of the West. "Maybe he meant you," laughed Kocár. "There," he pointed to an ugly, square gray building behind wire fencing. "That's where they detained Havel before they sentenced him. You know, it's safer to be in an old car than a rich car." He pointed his fingers in a gun again. "Better the old car. You know we double the security for the president last night. He must go to club, make things difficult. But to get him would not be so easy. And you had a good time in our country, my friend?"

Yes I did, Kocár. Yes I did. And not a day goes by that I don't think of Vaclav Havel and the answer he'd given to the question I'd most wanted to ask- "Why did you stay, why didn't you leave? How could you stand the terrible abuse?" And he's said, "I stayed because I live here. I was only trying to do the right thing. I had not planned for these various things to have happened but I never doubted that we would succeeded. All I ever wanted to do was the right thing."

I love Vaclav Havel. And I'm keeping my fingers crossed. I too want to do the right thing.