elbeszelesek [3]

The tale of the leach hunters

by Laszlo Fulop

Some time ago, in a war-story of poignant ending I recalled how our little gang of warriors anticipated the invention of target seeking shells by some forty years. Recently, the noted TV program leader, one of the few who are striving for objectivity, Lou Dobbs gave a report of a medicating process, whose commercial value, our team leaders recognized decades before the report. Let me tell you about that.

 

Late spring of 1943 could have easily passed for mid-summer in Máramarossziget (now: Sighet, Romania) up there in the Carpathian Mountains. We attended a school run by nuns and most of the students were girls. The school year was winding down, but most afternoons we 8-9 year-old Catholics were attending classes that prepared us for Confirmation. In retrospect I have to admit my enthusiasm for the afternoon classes never rose above the lukewarm. I did not quite understand – as long as we had already attained the sacrament of confession and Holy Communion (of which I’d have rather skipped the confession part) – why did the wholeness of Christian life need Confirmation. The nuns and a priest explained – to be sure - the importance of accepting the Holy Spirit in the process of spiritual renewal, yet the moment of Confirmation just did not attain the necessary prestige in my mind. Of course, accepted, although didn’t understand how, that The Holy Spirit was part of Divinity, but we already had the contact with Jesus who was younger, exciting and did so much, I reasoned. True, He died, but what an interesting life he had. And, Lord forgive, the Holy Spirit appeared only in the shape of a dove. Just did not know how to relate to Him or to the idea of spiritual renewal.

So, when my friend and currently captain in our team, Joe Kérai came to me with a scientific trivia: “did you know that some time ago doctors treated people, who had high blood pressure, with leaches? You know, the overweight ones…” and explained how that was done – it took me only minutes to recognize the vast money-making opportunity available to us.
“Just think”, I told Joe, “we catch the leaches, clean’em and sell’em to pharmacies in the city. They’ll sell them on to doctors and overweight people, who have too much blood. And I know where we can catch leaches, - an almost inexhaustible supply".

All along, while explaining the opportunity of the century staring us in the face, I knew we had to look for leaches during daylight otherwise we couldn’t see the dark bodied, slithering, little animals, and that timing of the hunt would likely conflict with our afternoon classes. The lack of conviction in the importance of confirmation helped me to arrive to the decision of skipping a few afternoon classes. “I’m sure we can figure out a legitimate excuse” I assured Joe.

“And, just think - there are plenty of heavy people. Maybe more than leeches… The pharmacists will ask us to bring more…” I must admit I was rather proud of my prompt perception of such golden opportunity. But, this is why I was one of the leaders of our team - organized by me – to make the most out of information gathered by an intermediate officer, like Captain Kérai.

Joe was interested in the venture, so the plan was followed by action.
We “borrowed’ a couple clear glass, canning jars from my mother’s pantry, and only enough of her cellophane sheets to cover the container openings, I pocketed a roll of strings and – with anticipation and excitement in our heart - off we went to our hunting and commercial venture. The hunting ground was a muddy ditch near the slaughterhouse. I had waded into the murky waters some time earlier and a couple leaches indeed bit me at the time. Irritated then, I did not know the mishap would materialize great fortunes in my life now. Yeah, I’d heard my parents say that people seldom realize the rich prospects lying under their nose.

On the way there we agreed to split the money we are to receive evenly.
We hardly settled into the “leach-hunting”, that is, walked into the muddy waters knee deep, when some schoolmates passed by, on their way to the Confirmation classes. Darn it, there went the “legitimacy” of our excuses. We had already caught a few leaches, the girls wanted to see them, plus they admired our courage for wading into the dirty water for leaches, so we had to tell what we were doing.

“It is not easy to catch leaches,” I said, “but we are doing this to help sick people,” I added piously, conveniently setting aside the commercial motivation. “We’ll join you later.”

Of course, we had no intentions of going to class that afternoon. We caught about a dozen leaches for each bottles and headed for the nearby fountain. There we washed the leaches, then ourselves: our mud-covered legs regained their original skin color. rinsed the containers and refilled them halfway with clean water leaving some air for the leeches. We tucked in our shirts, even wetted and combed our hair neatly. In other words, we prepared for the finishing, perhaps the most important part of the business venture.

The first drugstore we went to was on the main plaza, the Mandics Pharmacy. When we entered the store we were glad we had the foresight to clean up for everything in there was squeaky clean and even the air smelled antiseptic. Holding onto our treasure we stepped up to the counter.

“Well kids, what do you want?” asked the pharmacist.

“We brought medication for sale” I said courageously and pointed to the leaches in the container. “Good for people suffering of too much blood”.

The pharmacist leaned over the counter to take a better look. He took the glass container, lifted it up to see the merchandize better in the light and scrutinized the leaches hanging onto the side of the glass. Then he curled his lips.
“Nowadays, doctors don’t employ this kind of medication” he said.
“No-o-o?” and Joe and I looked at him then at each other in shock.
“Most certainly not” - the pharmacist handed back the glass jar.
Stunned we turned out to the street, but, hey… there are other pharmacies in town. We went to the Béres Pharmacy, then two more drugstores; the result was the same. In one they even laughed at us. Finally, at sunset we went home completely discouraged and buried the unlucky leaches in a hole in our garden. Then stole into the pantry and returned the glass containers.

Next day our teachers, who somehow learned why we missed classes, heaping unflattering and reprimanding words on us, – the leach-hunters admired just a short day earlier for their courage of daring the leach-infested dirty water– ordered us stand in the corner of the classroom.
We did get confirmed, ‘though. The confirmation ceremony was impressive with lofty speeches declaiming the renewal of the spirit. The bishop, who performed the Confirmation came from another town and could not tell who among us attended classes diligently and who did not. And, apparently, our teachers did not tell’m of their wayward students or leach-gathering adventures.

But today we have finally received our just amends! As Lou Dobbs reported, physicians had come to recognize the value and use of leaches in certain medical cases. The nuns and pharmacists, who could not appreciate our perception of the situation given opportunities and sense for marketable product, would surely be repenting for not endorsing our insight.

Come to think of it, I got into more trouble on account of ideas Joe generated in me. I sure would love to remind him of that, but I don’t even know if he’s still alive.

(2004) Resurrected medications-LGF-e