Lentilky
Obviously “Lentilky” is the Czech translation of “Smartie”, because the Lentilkys were pretty much the same, except perhaps a little smaller. They were packaged in a cardboard cylinder, with plastic plugs at either end, like the tubes used to store posters.

My first theory about Lentilky was that they had something to do with lentils, but that is just me being Anglocentric about language I suppose. Still, they were very similar in shape to lentils; large, coloured sugar lentils. If I ever need to describe a smartie to someone who has never eaten one before (unlikely, but life is full of surprises), this will be my description of choice (and then I'll have to hope they know what a lentil is).

After I'd crunched through the Lentilkys, I deconstructed the packaging. I could see writing on the inside, and was curious as to what secret message was contained within. There were three multiple choice questions – one of which I could answer!

Co je to ptakopysk?

Divné zvire z Austrálie, of course.

The accompanying cartoon pictures a boy with a heavy beard and an Indian headdress, writing in a book. School students in the Czech Republic must come to class in dress-up. How novel. I think I would have learnt better in fancy dress; the closest thing to this at my old school was mufti day, where the trendy girls proved their trendiness, the weird girls proved their weirdness, and the girls whose mothers still bought their clothes for them were shamed.