Hounds of the dogs of Florida

When we landed in Miami, it was raining, and with the hope of a golden tropical tan had to say goodbye. It, however, is for the better: on the winter Prague Street there is a risk of going down for an idiot, shortening leisure in the solarium, or even simply for the victim of jaundice.

Fifteen, Celsius - for February, it was as if quite well, but as in past visits, local residents complained about an unprecedented cold. It is not difficult to deceive the gullible guest, but I flew to Florida more than once, and fifteen degrees - quite typical.

In Miami lives the world -famous boy Elian, whose mother died, trying to flee from Cuba. The father of the child, encouraged by Fidel Castro, requires his issuance back, and the American administration would be quite glad to meet, but the Cuban community of Florida should death for a small emigrant. During this confrontation, local enthusiasts found that miraculous healing power comes from Elian, and the guards accompanying him to school have to drive out annoying patients trying to touch the boy.

But for me, Miami with a miraculous boy is only a transfer point, a postal station. With a suitcase at the ready, I go in search of the terminal of the company "American needles", which is in charge of shuttle flights to Sarasot on the west coast of the peninsula. Apparently, her location at the local airport is classified: all my questions do not lead to anything, bringing numerous and completely different results. The woman dispatcher from one of the drives is sympathetic, then he asks, carefully choosing the words:

- Speak in Spanish?

“No,” I answer in a fallen voice.

- A pity. Alicia knows a lot, - she nods at her partner at a distance, “but in English it will not work with her.

Here one of the surrounding round -the -world passengers comes to the rescue:

- Do you transfer to you from Portuguese?

“From English,” I cut off, and I’ll be Seed, ashamed of my own rudeness. The language will probably bring to Kyiv, but in Miami it should be Spanish.

Residents of Sarasota are very proud of their city. In this, they are no different from the inhabitants of any city in America. I am immediately informed that there is an opera theater and a museum of fine arts. In addition, they assure me that residents do not lock their houses. I heard this story in many places, but usually in the past tense: they say, this is how morals fell, but before we did not even lock the doors. But I immediately convince that the house, which has given me hospitality, really locks up only at night - during the day the entrance and exit are free. The hostess owns art galleries in Florida and Massachusetts, and get an intelligent thief here, he would have found something to profit from. Even I, a round ignoramus, understand that the drawings of Georgia O'Kif, which my room is hung, pull on many thousands. Meanwhile, I met the mistress just an hour ago, she is a friend of my friends, a meeting with whom was the purpose of the visit. However, such an emphasized inattention to the door locks is a rare prerogative of a wealthy Sarasot and its extracted police: somewhere in a swing, kilometers about forty north, even a cast -iron bolt cannot be considered a guarantee.

In the morning, until I was picked up to inspect resort attractions, I go to have breakfast in one of the local institutions. I dream of writing about a traditional American breakfast for a long time, but the topic requires a fabric wider and painter painting. I’ll just list the full menu, what is called the words in English: mandatory eggs prepared in any ordered method, fried grated potatoes, bacon slices, small sausages from minced meat, pancakes or a waffle with syrup, oil and sour cream. All this is brought on a half -meter dish with a diameter without gaps. Wrink a bucket of orange juice and tank coffee. A person without practice, having ordered such a breakfast, puts life on a map. Rare lovers of corn flakes are bashfully hide behind newspapers.

Modern man sees Florida through the prism of her endless beach. Such a look formed historically quite late, our ancestors were indifferent to the beaches, and even many inhabitants of the coast, the very art of swimming was unknown.

The most indigenous inhabitants of Florida are the Indian tribe of Seminols, but they also came here relatively late. Seminols arrived at the beginning of the 19th century, escaping from the pressure of white settlers in Georgia, but even here they were not left alone.

At the dawn of American statehood, the presidential administrations tried to protect the Indian tribes from oppression - partly from completely humane reasons, partly from political, because in conflicts with Great Britain and Spain the Indians could stand on any direction. But since the time of President Monroe, when all these international conflicts were resolved, this last trump card was also taken from the Indians. And then, along with Andrew Jackson, a new Democratic Party came to power, which from populist motives lost to the pressure of its voters who demanded a new land. Thus began the great eviction.

By this time, contracts were concluded with most Indian tribes that guaranteed them the inviolability of hereditary lands. But the paper did not protect anyone, the Indian leaders with the help of fraud, forgery or just whiskey forced to sign new agreements, about evacuation for mission in some two or three years. All compensation was barely enough for relocation, up to half of the people died along the way, and those who got, often found that they were allocated a desert or swamp.

When in 1821 Florida officially became part of the United States, there were about 5 thousand Seminolov there, and during the great eviction some of them were deported to Oklahoma. The remaining was headed by Osiol, known for the Russian translation of Main Read as Oceol. He killed the former leader who signed the treacherous agreement, and with a handful of supporters for years he filed a partisan war against the White Power. In the end, he was captured, where he died.

Now Seminols have several villages in the southern mangroves, and the road crossing the peninsula can visit the bench with samples of Indian crafts. Seminols have not been fighting for a long time, but they are the only tribe that never concluded with the United States of the World. Their name is a distorted Spanish word Cimarron, "indomitable."

The last stage of the great eviction has already occurred in almost our civilized time. In 1960, the Tuscaror Indians, who miraculously managed to defend their reservation on Niagar more than a hundred years ago, were removed from there for the needs of the construction of a hydroelectric power station, and the then Supreme Court of the United States approved this decision. Here's what Judge Black wrote in his special opinion, to whom Judges Warren and Dlasas joined, who did not agree with the decision of the majority:

“Judging by the documents, the lands of their reservation are not the most fertile, the landscape is not the most beautiful, and their houses are not the most remarkable samples of architecture. But this is their homeland, the birthplace of their ancestors. They were born, their children and their ancestors. They also have their own memories and their own love. There are things that are more expensive than money and allocations for new enterprises. I am sorry for the government that deceived the government that deceived, which deceived. The trust of the people depending on us.

For most Americans, the south of Florida is a resort, like what the Caucasus was for the Russians, until it was turned into a landfill for testing the constitution in working conditions. The permanent population, followed by the mentioned Indians, can be divided into two unequal categories - pensioners of all stripes who abandoned the last anchor in a subtropical paradise, and locals who serve resort and pensioners. Hence the two types of sports and entertainment games that are characteristic of Florida. For pensioners, this is the so -called "Sabbor": on a solid court, players push small horizontal wheels with sticks. You drive into the correct sector - you will get a point. The game on the shoulder is almost anyone who still manages to maintain a vertical position, and serves as the object of the attendant sharpness for fifty -year -old youth. For a long time, I was confident that Schaflborn was invented by Florida intricacons specifically for the needs of this sedentary public, but it turns out that the story of the game has several centuries: it was especially popular on the deck of ships, where other types of physical activity are impractical.

Aborigines prefer dog running. We arrived at the place in the afternoon, by the beginning of the second race. I began to think about what to call this place in Russian: "hippodrome" is not suitable, because there are no horses here. Maybe the "film" or "movie show", in a different Greek dog - "Kino". The day is cloudy, the temperature is even lower than the record fifteen, and therefore the stands are empty, only a handful of enthusiasts is crowded at the barrier. Most, including us, settled at a table in a glazed building, something like a cafeteria with a prison or student model, in the far corner - cash desks for bets and payments.

Representatives of nurseries, unperturbed and arrogantly clubfoot young men, while the announcer lists the names and weight of the participants before the start of the dogs. They are locked in starting boxes, and then an electric rabbit is launched from the far end of the track. When it caught up with the start, the enclosures automatically open, and the race begins. On each dog there is a ass with a number and a muzzle, so that prohibited techniques do not apply to rivals. When two circles of 800 meters run, a curtain falls, like a large blanket, from which the guards catch floundering and barking animals - the winner will determine the photofinish.

Nature is the best standard of taste, and most of its creatures delights the eye, but on the hound, it has laid out to the end: it is difficult to imagine something more beautiful and graceful. This breed is one of the most ancients, the images of the hounds can be found on the ancient Egyptian paintings of five thousand years ago. The dog is like a string stretched from the nose to the tip of the tail; When she lies on her stomach, he hangs in the air, because there is actually no abdomen, only the chest and spine. I and my companions are quite enough for me, but the regulars came to earnings, and therefore they make troubles of the programs in the programs, find out the speakers of numbers and screaming non -storage in nonsense during the races. Dogs are encouraged not by nicknames, but by numbers - in fact, they encourage themselves.

It is interesting that you can really make money here, although the fate of the millionaire does not wait for anyone. The dog is not a horse, on the run she does not have a boss, and therefore she repeats the learned one day each time: she cuts off the corners equally, presses to the inside, goes around the partner. A person who has studied the results and pedigree has always has an advantage - more significantly than on horse jumps. Some professionals generally rarely come to the track, preferring to study the programs at home, and then bet through couriers and by phone.

From the 30s to the 70s, Florida was a world center of dog jogging, it remained him to this day, but the business itself went abruptly under the slope when they allowed regular lotteries. Life has become much simpler: he crossed out six rooms - and back to the TV, until they call to get the long -awaited millions. I guess I am not very fair to my neighbors at neighboring tables: they come here day after day and year after year, chew eternal rubber chicken, lose dollars and make cents. Maybe they are much more susceptible to dog beauty than a visiting a onlooke, just not so talkative.

The career of professional messengers is short, and more recently, dogs who went off the track and not approved to a melt were eliminated by injection. In today's America, this is no longer possible, and therefore the owners are looking for dogs in retirement. In the three hours that we sat on the track, the reproducer shouted the names of the adoption ten times, praised their meekness and devotion. A woman with a pack of dog documents went between the tables: sign and take it away.

My mistress in Sarasot is just such a messenger, a veteran on vacation. Her name is Magic, “magic”, although this is rather a surname, the first part of the double name, inherited from the ancestor-record holder. When you look into her eyes, you are almost blushing, realizing that you were loved instantly and obviously not deserved. On the inside of her ears, she can see blue tattoos: a year of birth, the names of the parents, the number of the litter.

In this quiet backwatement with her emphasized well-being, where even the news of the sensational results of the presidential elections in New Hampshire comes to the Surdinka, sometimes you seem to yourself almost an alien from another planet. Everyone deserves a beautiful life built with their own hands, but in this imperfect world, only a voluntary hearing and vision defect will provide complete beauty and peace. Sometimes it seems that this is how it happened.

In the journal "New Ripablik" I read the note of Fuad Ajami, who paradoxically complains about the excessiveness of American well -being, that the economic triumph overshadowed almost the whole world for the Americans, much less successful, but comfortably hidden behind the ocean. America, according to him, becomes a province - not in the Russian Chekhov sense with longing for the capital, but American, wealthy and self -sufficient, indifferent to everything that happens beyond the horizon. Ajami is a prominent specialist in the Middle East, a native of Lebanon, and he tries to recall the existence of other continents and hemispheres to his current compatriots.

"The outside world gives this provincialism an additional sanction. If the whole world is Americanized, at least from the surface, with what on earth to bother and try to explore it? If Video clips in India and young businessmen in Cairo imitate our own, why do we show curiosity? Americanization, if you like, kills anthropology. There is no place for reading in this new world order and in this new world order. The interpretations of other societies, we have been distinguished by foreign affairs and foreign countries that once occupied the talents of our people.

In these words - more sadness than exhortations. Well -being isolates, success harms understanding. In Mozambique, for some three weeks, the whole country was washed off in the ocean - who will complain about the stubborn fifteen Celsius there, in whom will you have a participation to the dog’s hound out in the circulation?

My mistress from Sarasota, the original resident of New England, moved to Florida relatively recently, either out of the desire to expand the business, or from the same need, which, upon reaching a certain age, unfolds us face to warm edges. Her sister followed her example. On the day of my departure, we went to visit her - only for ten minutes, to love what real estate is in Florida. In the end, old age is not wealth in the lottery, happens to almost everyone.

The sister lives in an apartment tower - for wealthy Americans atypically, but more convenient in years, because the care of the house is bored and becomes beyond its power. Convenities are ordinary - in the courtyard the pool, in the basement garage, in the basement of the laundry. The house stands on the shooter of a long flat island, the apartment is on the ninth floor.

Glass walls open a panorama like those who loved to portray in the last century, before the spread of photography, but without battal scenes. The Gulf of Mexico goes east, it would be more correct to call it by sea, but the Americans have their own scale. This blue flows right from under the legs, as if hanging in the cabin of a helicopter, and boundless miles stretch. In the West, where Florida herself lies, as if the hunch tongue, a land with her tiny vanity is perceived as an annoying comma, and it seems that if not this winter haze, would have seen the Atlantic. But to the evil Cuba, encroaching on a miraculous boy, will no longer reach vision. In this world, there are no mosambic, nor Angola, nor Kosov from two soldered blue hemispheres. The imagination hits the end of the hut, trying to draw a horizon some former city in a green mountain basin, with its canceled inhabitants, with houses-appraisers-almost twins, ghosts forever, with empty eye sockets, fixed towards.