The Bitterest Winter

BY a nasty turn of nature, the weather in Czechoslovakia this winter has proved to be as chilling as the political climate. From the frigid Danube to the snow-laden Carpathian Mountains, the unfortunate country is shivering under the most extreme cold in 40 years.

A severe fuel shortage adds to the country's gloom and discomfort. Because of slowdowns by the coal miners, the people have received only half of the coal that they need to keep warm. Private homes are bitterly cold. After work, many Czechoslovaks immediately get into bed under eiderdowns in an effort to keep warm. Even the hospitals are so poorly heated that doctors and nurses bundle up in sweaters while patients are covered with all available blankets. At first, many Czechoslovaks used their gas cooking stoves to heat their dwellings. Now the gas supply is so low that many Prague housewives cook lunch at breakfast time, knowing that later in the day there will not be enough gas pressure even to boil water.

In addition to the biting cold, Czechoslovaks must cope with annoying shortages of just about everything. Though no one is going hungry, food shops offer only limited selections. Last week Prague grocers had ample supplies of apples, potatoes, celery and tomatoes, but little else. Even beer and sausage are sometimes in short supply. Veal has not been available for months. If a housewife wants a decent cut of beef or pork, she often must bribe the butcher with scarce items such as ball point pens or a few yards of suit cloth. For months store shelves in Czechoslovakia have been bare of everyday items like flashlight batteries, warm shoes, bed linen and towels. Until the government authorized emergency imports two months ago, there was also a shortage of women's panties and men's underwear.

Otherwise heavily censored, the newspapers carry great numbers of letters from frustrated readers. One complained that there were no electric heaters to be bought in Prague. A smoker lamented that he could buy pipes but not pipe cleaners, which after all are "just a piece of wire with some rough string wound around it." Another reader beefed because the only shoelaces on sale were so coarse and long that they were suitable only "for elephant boots." Still another wondered if the government bureaucracy could not cut back on its quintuplicate forms so that the toilet paper shortage could be alleviated.

The Czechoslovaks realize full well that they have brought on much of their own misery. In protest against the 17-month-old Soviet occupation and the repression of the liberal reformers, the workers have gone on what amounts to a nationwide slowdown. Official exhortations to work harder and decrees threatening malingerers with fines and prison terms simply have not worked. Rather than buckle under to the wishes of the Soviet-backed regime by increasing production, an astonishing number of Czechoslovaks have chosen to thwart the government, even if it brings discomfort upon themselves.

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