Day of Festivities and Excitements...

Well... as the title will prove to you, maybe there's actually none of the above which you will find in this posting, but it sounds cool... huh? So... this last weekend has been a bit of a special one... why you might ask? Well, because it's obvious that the school year is now ending, and it's a bit saddening. We have an array of holidays starting at the beginning of April which makes us only have a few weeks where we go to school all week. And right now we are in the heart of this celebration of festivites. We come to the unofficial holidady on April 30th, but that holiday which everyone will make an attempt to celebrate, known as Čarodejnice, or maybe you better know it as Witch-burning Day... What?... What's that?.... That doesn't ring a bell?... Hm... ok, so maybe it's not better known as anything because in America, I think we stopped believing in witches after the Salem Witch Hunt. But then again, this is another one of my strong points for "Uncivilized People". No no no... I'm just kidding here. They don't really believe in witches here, but this is a real celebration. Perhaps it's only in name. But it's more of a welcoming of Spring... a final welcoming if you will. Please explain more, you say... Oh? Your interest has been peaked huh? Super, so I'll continue... Well... there's really not much to say about this holiday of unofficiality. Well... we have it due to the fact of the wonderful Labor Day holiday that follows on the first of May (which I will say a bit about in a second). So... this is more or less just another holiday in which is a time for people to go (in the middle of a nation-wide, yet unobserved as it is, fire ban due to the lack of rain) and burn fires in every possible place you could imagine and bring sausages and liquor and drink the night into oblivion. It's quite an interesting celebration really.... although I really saw no difference in this celebration and my friend's bday party the previous weekend. Apparently it's about what your heart feels I guess. (Sometimes the fires can get way out of hand, but luckily, we just had a small little campfire... but i mean, c'mon, seriously, how impressed would you have been to see a wussy little campfire)

MAY 1
This day is the Czech Labor Day first instituted under the Communist Era. I think it was originally a day off, but everyone was supposed to attend city parades to celebrate their "Communist Nationalism" or something like that. But now... it just serves as a day off work, so it's nice. It also serves as a kind of "Czech Valentines Day" if you will, with couples gathering for a short romancing (only a kiss) under a blooming tree, for there surely are a lot of them over here right now. It's kinda absurd. but anyways, the girls will in turn, after this action, be more beautiful and healthy for the upcoming year. So... every year May first is a national holiday and 7 days later, the 8th, is also, celebrating VE Day. So as you can see... it can make for a long time to not see students if you have them on the day of the week that this falls on. Anyways... things are good and i only have school 3 days this week, and 4 days next week, and then i'm coming home for Cathleen's wedding for a week. That's all I got for now. Talk to you soon.

Oh... and I was trying to think what we do for "May Day" in America. I just know the day is called this, but i don't really know what happens here. Ok. later

The End of the Peterson Era

Well... it's finally happened. It's a sad day. But it's a happy day. Our boy Adrian Peterson has moved on to the pros. He'll be suitin up as a Viking next year after having been chosen 7th in the NFL Draft yesterday. Those Red and Whites will turn to Purple. It'll be fun to see how he rocks it out in the next level.

Never again will we see you as we've enjoyed, as our fellow Sooner, as our fellow wolf among lambs...

The Car Ride

So, today was a beautiful day outside and I decided to join two English teachers, Jarda and Zdenek, for a BBQ at Jarda's. He picked me up and we went to his place, and I even took Benji because he has a yard and Benji can run around. The small problem is that Benji doesn't like cars so much. He gets really nervous and scared. So usually we put him in the trunk, but today we didn't and he was sitting on my lap and i rolled down the window so he could get some fresh air and not be so scared. I didn't really think that he would be so stupid as to jump out the window... but i was wrong. Benji was so scared he jumped out the window while we were driving and i was still holding the leash and luckily we stopped rather abruptly and no one was injured, but it was quite an interesting situation. Needless to say, we put him in the trunk for the rest of the journey. But anyways, that the big news for me today. Enjoy your day, as I will also. The BBQ was really great and lots of fun, but i'm quite tired and maybe I'll take a nap now.

The End of the School Year Rush

As things begin to mutter down to an extravaganza of peacefulness, things, though they seem be coming to a simmer, still seem to have some life left in them yet. To start things, I should tell you about the last two of my immediate family who made it out for a visit. My mom and my oldest sister, Christina, were the lucky winners of two rountrip tickets to Prague last week (due to technicalities that could not be resolved, they ended up paying for them). So... anyways, it was quite a pleasant occasion to have them come over and visit for a while at least. They were able to come over and see the way life works over here, and the just how true of a dog Benji is. It was great, they were quite impressed with Prague, Vienna, and seemed to enjoy their time in Kralupy also. They were even able to visit some of my classes which i think they were able to enjoy quite a bit. It was a fun time, when all was said and done. I can't say really what I thought our best time to be, but for my mom it probably wasn't all the running around. One funny story that happened was when maybe my mom would want to say hi to every person she came across on the street. Besides that, everything went fairly normally. It was a good time had by all. In addition to this crazy extravaganza of fun, we had a fun English party for the students who are taking graduating exams in English. It was a fun time and I believe most of the people really enjoyed themselves and had a great time. We were all happy and enjoyed all the English leisure time :)

In the weeks to come, it seems to be fairly low key. We have some free days from school due to holidays and other stuff like that, and we have Seniors graduating and then I'll be in America for a week for my sister's wedding, and then pretty much the year will be finished. It's quite sad actually, but that's how the year always ends, so you just have to get used to it. So... until something else exuberating happens, see ya on the other side.

A Familiar Scene Never to Be Seen in America

So.. over the time I've been here, I have frequented a local pub next to my school called "The Green Tree". Well, i've made a lot of friends since being there and even made quite good friends with the owner. (Don't worry he won't get mad at me for telling this story due to the fact he doesn't know any English). So... anyways, it just so happens that him, being the owner, is always the only waiter at night times and seems to quite enjoy it, and even sometimes, like last night, enjoys it a bit too much. I was having my Wednesday night class there as usual when we start to notice Zdenek having a good time. And then he starts coming over and more or less telling us what we wanted and then bringing it out to us :) He seemed to just not understand the phrase "no". Anyhow, he pretty much started harrassing me and getting all in my face telling me I wanted another beer (not in a mean way, but a friendly drunken kind of way). It was really strange to see a man sit down next to you and act completely billigerantly drunk and then see the same man serving you. Something just doesn't seem to add up in my account. But it was funny nonetheless. That's really it. Just wanted to point out this quite big difference. Thanks

Travelling Around the Town

So... last Friday we didn't have school cuz of Easter, So I decided to invite a few American friends up to the Kralupy region to do a bit of some sightseeing. Near Kralupy are two really nice cheateaus. They arrived in Kralupy and we immediately boarded a bus bound for the small village of Veltrusy, which would be our only automotive transportation of the day. In Veltrusy is quite a beautiful chateau that has a really big park you can walk around and it's just really peaceful and pleasant. Here's a photo :

Next we decided to walk the 3 kilometer journey along the mighty Vltava River. The second chateau is in another village called Nelahozeves. This village is even more famously known as the birthplace of the famous Czech composer Antonin Dvorak. So by the time we had left Veltrusy, we were getting fairly hungry as it was high noon and the urge was upon us. But we didn't come across any kind of restaurant at all on our journey. We stopped at a rundown pub for a beer which tasted a bit on the extra yeasty side, but it did the trick for a bit. Here's a pic of us before we actually realized the atrocity about to be bestowed on the elite of mankind...

We continued walking a bit more and we came to where "I thought" we were supposed to cross the river. We had previously passed the car bridge, but i was almost certain that there was a big blue pedestrian bridge, and I was right... sorta. This bridge when we came to it was locked and had big signs saying "Forbidden" blah blah blah. Something about electricity and dangerous injuries. But it was what I was looking for, so we risked our lives and jumped over the door and very cautiously made our way to the other side.
This is us after we made the treacherous journey. Oh yea, if you don't know. The sign says "Entrance Forbidden. Dangerous Injury".


So all of our bodies made it across alive and luckily I can continue telling this story. But... unfortunately, it really doesn't get much more interesting. We made it to Nelahozeves and... well... remember how I told you that we were still looking for some good grubbin? We finally found a restaurant under the chateau, but it would have it that it just so happened to be closed this day until 5 or something horrible like that. And the other pub near it was closed and had a dog barkin its head off at us. So by this time I was feeling a bit sick and had a headache and life was just about suckin. (Here's a pic of me and my dissatisfied look after realizing that the truth of the matter was that food was not a luxury that we were going to have today. But we did the tour of the chateau and then we made the final 3 km walk back to Kralupy along the river on a trail and it was quite nice and the weather was amazing and we got back about 3 and went straight to a restaurant where we satisfied ourselves with abundance. I then went home and slept for a bit and i awoke and i was feeling much better :) It was great. Here's a pic of Nelahozeves to wind things up with.

Ready to Keep it a Rollin' with 20 more Pages

So... a beautiful thing happened to me yesterday. You might ask yourself... "Wow, I wonder what happened? Is he going to tell me?" And then i might answer in a subtle voice.... "yea, sure." So... because of the wonderful 5 day break that we have here for Easter, i didn't have school yesterday, and also today! and on Monday also. So... yesterday I woke up quite early, as usual and was in Prague by 730. I made my way for the first time in the Czech Republic to my home away from hom, the US Embassy. It was actually kinda strange, cuz i don't think hardly any Americans work there. Everyone was talking to me in Czech and didn't even think twice that an actual American would come to visit their embassy. But I did. But anyways, the reason I came. Well, first of all, I've been traveling across borders quite a bit in the last two years, and therefore, my pages in my passport are completely full and if I want to come back to the states or get another visa for next year, I'd need to do something about that, thus, I went. And the problem was that this part of the embassy is only open mon-fri 830-11 excluding CZ and US holidays, so... this was like my only chance. the experience in itself was quite nice. Can't say I had any problems, but... it was fun. And now I have 20 more pages to work with and with only 3 years left on my passport, I don't expect myself to be in trouble of doing this again. Although, I could in theory do it one more time if I really wanted to. And the brilliant thing is that it was a free service, and took abour 30 minutes. Ok, so I'll fill you all in on the next extravaganzas here to come.

Trip to Okoř... Take Two

Maybe you remember this picture from last year. This is a ruin of a castle... So... got all that soaked in? Ok, good. If you remember a bit about this place, I said that every year, thousands upon thousands of people make the 8 mile trek (walking on railroad tracks and walking trails, sometimes quite muddy) starting in Kralupy and ending at the famous ruins. It's nothing more than a fun experience that usually starts in the wee hours (i dunno, about 7 or 8, whenever you want to) and ends whenever you want. It depends how slow you are or how many breaks you take, or how much you drink perhaps as well. This is another thing. This trip brings about quite an array of people. There's the trampers who are always lookin for a good hike and fun frolick through the woods, there's the families who have decided to bring their youngins out for what could quite possibly the longest day of their life, and then there's the youth of Kralupy (our pride of the future, if you will), who come bearing gifts of "happiness" and "joy" in liquid form. They all come with their backpacks filled with their blankets and beverages of all sorts (sometimes it's water, but not on occasion). But sometimes it makes for good conversations on my part. As long as their not disgustingly drunk, it makes for some good laughs. But... like I mentioned last year (though my experience wasn't as strong as last year's) it is a bit sad to see just everyone sitting around being rather drunk at 1pm.

For me, my day started around 7ish when i woke up and walked with Benji. I really didn't have anyone that i was planning on going to Okor with, but I heard some people were leaving from the train station, so I went there, and met some students that I went with last year, and started walking with them. We started quite a bit later than last year, so this year was a bit more pleasant and a bit more awake for me. We walked and talked and had a good time. We met up with some other people after about 2 or 3 miles and continued walking as a larger group. About halfway, we decided to take a break, cuz we were tired and it was an exceptionally nice day with the sun out and everything, so we stopped in some field and played frisbee and ate the snacks that we had prepared. We were relaxing for a bit and then we continued walking. I stopped to say hello to a few different students and then a few more and then I had lost my group, so I stayed with some of my Sophomore students. They weren't as daring as the other students. They were always wanting to take these longs breaks and I thought we'd never get there. But finally, at about 1pm, we finally got there. So... after 5 hours, I made it. That's roughly 1.5 mph that I had averaged. I'm pretty proud about that. So... anyways. We got there, and played frisbee, ate some sausage, and relaxed, talked and napped in the sun. I know maybe I copped out, but I wasn't really in the mood to make the walk back, and I wanted to get back to Benji (who I had decided not to take with me. Which I'm glad I didn't cuz there were about a million dogs there). So, I bummed a ride back with one of my friends who had come to pick up some other people and what had taken me 5 hours to get there only took me about 15 minutes back. It's a beautiful invention, the car, you know.

So, my day at Okor was another success and full of fun. I really like this time. But the day wasn't over yet. I got home about 330 and walked Benji and ate dinner and did some other things, but then we had a school function. Our annual MusicFest! Last year was in this strange hall in the train station, but this year it was at this restaurant that I quite like Lidovy Dum, and it was a lot cooler I thought. Student bands come and perform and different music classes sing some songs. It's strange really I think because the only teacher that is there is the music teacher and me (last year also Mike) and I guess our principal came after a few hours. But there's really no supervision at this school function (which I need to stress is always held at a bar or pub or somewhere) and so most of the students are again drinking and smoking, and it's almost gotten to the point where I don't notice it anymore, but it's just funny sometimes about the differences here and in America. But it was a fun evening, but I had to go home quite early cuz i was exhausted and I needed to get some sleep, which sounded like quite a nice idea to experiment with.

So that's it folks. Today is the First day of April! Wow, that's kinda crazy to think about, but I'll take it. The weather is great and I'm quite enjoying it. Hope you enjoy. Talk to you soon.