Living in the shadow of the EU-US summit

Forgive me if I do not get too excited about President Barack Obama’s visit to Prague. It’s not that I dislike the man, his policies or anything like that – far from it. But his visit does disturb my domestic bliss, or would if I let it. It’s like this, I live in a sort of small island under the Prague congress centre where the EU-US summit – and usually any other big international events in Prague take place.

When they happen, life on the island - flanked by the congress centre on side Vyšehrad fortress on the other with the railway line running into Prague’s main station in front - tends to get disrupted. From what I have read so far, the congress centre security zone for the president’s visit starts around 200 metres from my front door and will take in my nearest metro station, Vyšehrad. I will not be able to walk that way from four o’clock on Saturday to the same time on Sunday. That’s okay. I hope to be around 200 kilometres away doing some gardening.

But the solutions for living in the shadow of the congress centre are not always so simple. During the World Bank - International Monetary Fund get together in 2000, the pleasant leafy Prague island was the centre of the fiercest clashes between protesters and the police.

After I had finished reporting on the dry economic news at the congress centre I found that the police would not at first let me go the half kilometre down the hill home. When I eventually got there I found I had a grandstand view as the originally peaceful demonstrations turned ugly. Some protesters had filled those well designed German wheelie bins for domestic rubbish with cobbles ripped up from the street. These coupled as cover and ammunition as they were rolled up the hill towards the police lines defending the world’s suited and booted economic leaders and bankers. It looked like a scene from the Roman invasion of Britain – the moderately well ordered police legions on one side against the painted, wheelie bin barbarians.

The Vyšehrad fortress had been saved from invasion by metal barriers put up days in advance - which meant a change in our dog’s morning and evening walks.

I and my girlfriend watched in horror as one protester pulled off part of her car’s plastic bumper to throw at the now advancing police. It somersaulted through the air falling well short of the target, which somehow made the vandalism even more wanton.

The car had been parked at the congress centre car park but we had to move it away days before as part of the security preparations. We learnt our lesson. For other international meetings the car was driven miles away into the Prague suburbs.

The police advanced, sometimes lobbing cobblestone in the direction of the protesters, mostly clearing their way with baton charges and some sort of firecracker magnified a hundredfold. The noise from the latter transformed our dog – an animal with a fearful disposition at the best of times – into a shivering wreck even hours after the clashes had moved elsewhere. I was quite proud when a photograph of the clashes in my street, Lumírova, won the top prize in the Czech press photo competition that year. I was even amused to see the same photo of a riot policeman, shrouded in smoke and looking like something out of Star Wars in the office of a prominent businessman who must have had a few hundred million crowns on his bank account.

Not so good was the protesters’ spray can graffiti, anarchy signs and some calls for the release of a Greek or Spanish anarchist, I’m not sure, which can still be seen on houses in the neighbourhood today.

As they say, it’s nice to meet people, but it’s not always so nice to live near the meeting place when the people are the world’s political, military or economic leaders.