The last few weeks have gone by in a blur! It seems that after the travelling seminar time has sped up. Therefore, I will try to briefly catch you up on my life here in Prague.
The first weekend after the travelling seminar was our long Easter weekend! Most of the students in my program took this opportunity to travel, but I decided to save the money and spend Easter in Prague. Eva had a friend visiting so we walked around to the typical tourist zones like new town, old town, and the castle. It was our first taste of tourist filled Prague; the streets were full of foreigners and Charles Bridge was all but impassible. Despite the hordes of picture snapping crowds, the mood was festive and I couldn't help but enjoy myself. Old town was taken over by merchants and food venders all selling from little brown stands decorated with flowers, sheep, and eggs. The decorations were complete with several huge living trees temporarily planted in the square covered by colorful ribbons. We enjoyed some Eastern European treats (we thought they were specifically Czech but found out they are traditionally from Hungary) called trdelnik. It consists of a slab of dough wrapped around a metal pole spun over hot coals for a few minutes before being doused in butter and rolled in cinnamon. Needless to say it was delicious and I ate three in the course of two days. The Czechs celebrate Easter with a large meal with the family topped off with a traditional cake that is usually made in the shape of a bunny. The handful of CET students left decided to bring together our little family to have a large potluck feast. I made corn chowder and others added mac and cheese, veggie salad, and some other goodies to the table. After scarfing that down I pulled my dad's black bottom cupcake recipe out of the oven. I attempted to make the brownies in a rabbit mold to be festive, but the gooey cream cheese collapsed every time. We ate the remains of three bunny cakes and a few batches of mini brownies in record time. Fortunately I avoided the main Czech Easter tradition where boys whip girls with branches until the girls reward them with chocolate and eggs. Supposedly the whipping is supposed to keep us young... I think I'll pass.
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| Trdelnik in New Town |
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| Easter Market in Old Town |
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| Potluck Dinner |
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| Black Bottom Bunny! |
The next weekend I joined another Czech table with one of the Czech buddies who lives upstairs named Pavel. We took a train about 30 minutes outside of Prague for a beautiful hike to Karlstejn castle. We hiked for about an hour before we hit a little town and grabbed some lunch. We had planned to continue our journey from there but were tempted by a looming mountain. The group optimistically agreed to climb to the top only to find a long stretch of treacherous albeit beautiful stairs. We made it to the top and soaked in the spectacular view before hiking down and continuing on our planned journey. We hiked for a few more hours until we finally found the castle. Karlstejn is one of the most beautiful castles I have ever seen. My typical attitude towards castles and palaces is seen one, seen em all, but I'm glad I made the 10 mile hike out to see Karlstejn. We didn't stay at the castle long, and ended up running the last quarter mile to make the train home to Prague. A day in nature was exactly what I needed after beginning to feel gloomy in cold grey Prague. I came back feeling rejuvenated and ready to go.
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| Top of the Mountain |
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| Karlstejn Castle |
The next Wednesday a few of the other CET students and I jumped at the chance to do some community service with local youth. We joined with about thirty kids ranging from ten years old to seventeen and created teams for a soccer tournament! The guys on my team spoke almost no English, but they seemed excited enough to play. I laughed in one of my teammates's face when he told me to play goalie so that the other team wouldn't shoot. I asked why they wouldn't shoot on me and he responded with "they won't want to shoot on a girl." I said "oh hell no!" which of course he didn't understand, and quickly replaced myself in goal with some other guy so I could actually play. Though my team didn't win we had some fun kicking the ball around. After the last game one of the program organizers came up to me and said in a shocked voice "you can actually play!" to which I responded "I've played since I was four." It's like they've never seen an athletic woman before. Ridiculous, but still fun.
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| My Team |
So now we're up to the most recent, and perhaps eventful, weekend. On Friday I joined a group of other students to go on a CET sponsored trip to Kutna Hora. The town is about 40 miles East of Prague and used to be a mining town in the medieval times. According to our mine guide, the mines at Kutna Hora produced one third of all the silver in Europe during the medieval times. The town was really beautiful and quaint. It felt like a more authentic and less dolled up version of touristy Cesky Krumlov. The main event of the day was a tour of the mines. We dressed up in white robes, helmets, and grabbed flashlights before descending into the earth. I couldn't help but quote Lord of the Rings way too many times. The mines were really beautiful; they looked much more natural than the mines I had imagined. The walls were covered with limestone and clear water pools lay around every corner. At some points our group had to shimmy through the tight corridors and duck under the low ceiling. If there was any doubt before, I know now that I am definitely not claustrophobic after that trip.
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| Kutna Hora |
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| In the Mines |
On Saturday Jeanette and I headed to a cinema called Bio Oko to see a film called Orator. The cinema was hosting the Kiwi Film Festival which featured Australian and Indonesian films. The film we saw was Samoan and was the first film ever shot in the Samoan language. The movie was beautiful and extremely emotional and I came out wanting to know more about Samoan culture. I definitely recommend it!
Finally, on Sunday, I joined my last Czech table with my roomate Marketa to go to the Prague Zoo. We took the metro to a train to a boat to a bus to the zoo. I'm not sure if the goal was to use every method of transportation available, but I'm pretty sure we succeeded. In fact we even learned the phrase "Do zoo jeli skoro všemi dopravními prostředky - tramvají, vlakem, přívozem, a autobusem i metrem" which means "We took nearly all possible public transportation vehicles to the zoo: tram, train, ferry, and bus and metro." It was a really fun day, mainly because the weather had finally begun to feel like spring in Prague. I shed my jacket when the sun came out and went bare armed for the first time in months. Just feeling the sun on my skin made it hard not to have a good time. Other than the beautiful weather the zoo was pretty much the same as any zoo anywhere: animals hanging out in cages for humankind's viewing pleasure. I did get to see a tiger exceptionally close up and the polar bears were much more active than any I've seen before. One of them even did two splash inducing belly flops!
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| Tygr |
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| Lední Medvěd |
This week has been relaxing. Jeanette and I finally made our way to the bar and darts place across from our academic building. We were terrible at darts but had fun all the same. Last night some of us went bowling which was a blast. I got straight gutters for the first three frames but came back to be two ahead of last in the end. Today I went to a student favorite for dinner called Huny Bunny. The food was fine but the atmosphere was fantastic. The walls were covered in funny signs, Mucha posters, and even a campaign poster for Vaclav Havel that depicted him in a head dress holding up a proud peace sign with a cheesy smile plastered to his face. I went a little souvenir crazy and bought four small prints and a water color from a cute bookstore and a mini street sign from an even cuter antique store.
So that pretty much catches you up on my life up to now. This weekend I'm going to meander through the castle gardens which just opened up with the warm weather. Next week we're heading to Budapest on Thursday! I cannot wait to see the city and spend some time outside of Prague! It's hard to believe we only have four weeks left here. I feel like I spent so much time filling out applications, paperwork, getting a visa, packing, and mentally preparing for this trip and now it's all ending so soon. It is with a bittersweet feeling that I look towards the last days of my experience here in Prague. I intend to make the most of these last few weeks and leave nothing undone!
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