Terror Threat Taken in Stride

Yesterday there was terror scare. Security was stepped up after the Parliament met all night on Friday to decide what to do about the threat. There was some indication that this was linked to the foiled plot in Norway to blow up Israeli and American embassies there.

Reaction from the populous was muted. A few chuckles in the local pub about avoiding the Metro did not prevent me from doing what I had to do. I drove through the center of town and crossed the major bridge without incident. In the evening a good size group of us went to a local free concert. The square was packed with people enjoying honey liquer, beer, fresh wine ("burchak"), and lots and lots of pork. The climax was the performance from the 4th placed contestant on "Super Star" Mr. Petr Bender. Then, of course, there were fireworks.

Some would call the general reaction to the terror non-event "complacency". I would call it "logical".

Half a dozen Czechs will die on the highway this weekend, but no increased effort to provide security on the highway will be taken. There will be no all night meetings to try to save these poor six people, and they will surely die.

At the end of the day, the Metro is still safer than the highway. I'll take my chances with the former.

UPDATE: There were 6 seperate anonymous bomb threats received by police yesterday after the threat was announced. One of them indicated that the bridge I drove accross had a bomb planted on it. Another caused a nearby hotel to be evacuated. All of these threats were bogus and not actually that unusual in Prague, although six in one day is pretty over the top.