the importance of czechness

*supposed to be like oscar wilde's "the importance of being earnest" but not quite as clever.

i'm almost reaching my two-month anniversary in prague - ironically, that's the day i'll be heading off to rome - but i have to say, once again, that i am in love with this city. after watching the sweet 16 games last night until 4am (butler > syracuseeeee), i missed the 10am showing of alice in wonderland, but made it to wenceslas square by 1pm to go to the "be free" ("za svobodu") exhibition in the new part of the national museum (národní muzeum) with my multiculturalism class. after that, i sat behind the little park in the museum, did a little reading. then i got ice cream (vanilková zmrzlina) and walked to old town (staré město) again, which was PACKED. the weather was beautiful so i spent as much time as possible outside - i wrote this entry on the steps of the rudolfinum - my new favorite place. i also got some THAI FOOD for dinner, major plus :)

the main reason why i wrote this entry is out of my own frustration. i want to be more "czech" and immerse myself in the culture but it's much easier said than done.. i started making a list of my favorite czech words (such as zítra (tomorrow), dům (house), and tak-tak (barely), but not čtvrtek (thursday) - yes, that is a word with just ONE vowel), like i have done in english, and my elementary czech class is still my favorite class by far.. but i still depend on english to get around and to communicate with people in prague, which seems counter-productive.

to be fair, i have been trying. i've asked for directions plenty of times in czech, including that time when i asked "kde je "jiřího z poděbrad"?" in the middle of a street to a police officer upon leaving radost at 1am after a rough night... and i usually order in czech when i can. plus, i've only been learning czech for a month-ish. still, when i bought my fanta at a potraviny today, it was dvacet devět korun - 29 korun. i understood this but then the guy proceeded to say "twenty nine" in english... sad. maybe i should pretend not to speak english, but i'm not sure if that will help. a lot of my study abroad peers don't care about czech - we're here for four months and czech is only spoken in one country. still, whenever i'm surrounded by a swarm of tourists (which is bound to happen so much more often now that the weather is warmer) - i don't want to be mistaken for one of them. nothing against tourists - i was definitely a tourist in amsterdam and krakow, and will be for an entire week in various italian cities and possibly in france (getting around in my broken french). but i'm not a tourist in prague. i live here. i buy groceries at alberts. i go to school. i study czech. já tady bydlím. nakupuju v alberts. jdu škola. studuju česky. well. i'll just have to keep trying. one thing i love doing is reading advertisements on the metro - i can usually pick up a couple words, which always feels awesome. we learned three really important verbs last week - to be able to, to have to, and of course i can't remember that third one. but "to be able to" is in a lot of ads. and now i can say things like "nemůžu studovat" (i can't study) and "musím pít pivo" (i must drink beer). you know, all the important stuff.

finally. the concert at the rudolfinum last night was AMAZING. worth way more than 50 crowns. the liszt piano concerto was not only beautiful, but the guy playing the piano made it look so effortless. going to concerts is for sure going to be a regular event in the next two months.

destination: krakow, poland

over 16 hours on a bus + zloty + dragons + pasta = three days in krakow 

ah, the long-awaited krakow post. (by long-awaited, it means i've waited a week to write it because who knows how many people actually read what i write). the trip got off to a rough start for two reasons - i left the house without my cell phone and realized this when i left the apartment, so i scurried back, and then speed-walked to the metro station. last thursday was the first day of GREAT weather so i was wearing my fleece but the combination of my backpack + speed-walking + the fleece = uncomfortably hot. i was practically out of breath by the time i got to cerge.. but it turns out i rushed for nothing. we didn't end up leaving prague until after 6pm because a couple people forgot their passports.

>> side note/rant: okay, i know forgetting stuff is a common mistake and i forgot my glassescase. but come on, people. your passport. isn't that obvious when we're leaving the COUNTRY? i was a little enraged by this. but i think i was more enraged than usual because i had only slept five hours the night before (and in prague, i usually sleep 8+ hours a night) and i had class all day. ugh. <<

to make the long story short, it was a really, really long bus ride. people were noisy, per usual, and the bus was not comfortable. we arrived in krakow on friday morning at 2:30am. the beds in our hostel were extremely squeaky so i didn't sleep much.. but we had to get up a few hours later to go on our city tour of krakow.

my EU professor came on the trip (at least on friday) and led one of the tours of krakow. when i asked him how he knew so much, he said he had visited krakow over 20 times - he came to study there for summer school and fell in love with the city. we visited wawel castle (pronounced va-vel), the cathedral, and walked to the center of the city in the morning. krakow was surprisingly pretty - and the weather was great! plus, there were dragon souvenirs everywhere. apparently the dragon is the city mascot because of an old myth that i, of course, no longer remember. well. here are some pictures to make up for my short attention span.

 

fyi, that dragon is breathing fire. the picture right above this is a statue of pope john paul ii, the first and only pope that is not from italy. he is everywhere - from statues to pictures on buses.

in the afternoon, there was an optional tour of the jewish ghetto, once again led by my EU professor. we went to a few synagogues (one which had a cemetery in the back) and then walked across the river to schindler's factory. it was a long, long day of walking and it was exhausting, but krakow is a very navigable city. 

my teacher (teehee). all the boys had to wear kippahs before entering the synagogue.

>> side note: fyi #2, i am TERRIBLE with directions, map-reading, anything that requires getting from one place to another (unless it is from the wesleyan campus to main street for thai food). but in krakow, i proved my map-reading prowess not once but (at least) TWICE by navigating my way from wherever we were back to the hostel. major win!! <<

on saturday, we drove an hour outside of krakow to go to auschwitz and birkenau. i decided i'm not going to really describe this, because nothing i say could properly convey how i felt when i was there. one thing i will say is that being at the concentration camp really made me question humanity - how one person (or a group) could put another human through that kind of torture. one of the eeriest parts was seeing a room with a display case the length of a wall in a large room filled with human hair - the nazis shaved womens' hair and sent it back to germany to be used in making products like blankets. it was awful. overall it was a really difficult  and extremely moving experience, but i'm glad we went. it's something everyone should see at some point, though it feels surreal. 

 

we continued to explore krakow on saturday afternoon and night (following a much-needed break after auschwitz), walking around old town square and eating delish kebabs for dinner. krakow's old town reminded me of prague's old town, complete with a beautiful church in the center. i still prefer prague, though (obvi). i bought some postcards, my favorite pastime, and we had a chill night at the hostel that involved getting another kebab at 1am. good times.

 

sunday - we left krakow and our cozy hostel (well, cozy might be a bit generous of an adjective) and headed to the wieliczka salt mine. to be honest, i had NO idea what a salt mine was until we got there.. but apparently it's just a place where salt is produced. not that special. but it was extremely cool because all the walls were lickable (which i did not partake in) AND there's a cathedral inside. completely made of salt. including the chandeliers. AND there was a salt statue of pope john paul ii!! apparently people get married in this underground salt mine (which, btw, was like 400 stairs below ground). very cool. also, the salt mine had little people (midgets) made out of salt. carved by miners. what more could you want?

we made it back to prague later than expected, and pranadhi and i didn't get home until a little after 11pm. overall, krakow was a good trip. a couple noteworthy things about poland:

-the currency is called "zloty." WIN!

-a lot of words in polish are the same as czech, but the "v" and "w" are switched in the spelling through pronunciation is the same. for instance, wine is "vino" in czech. but it's "wino" in polish. beer is "pivo" in czech, but "piwo" in polish. very very cool.

-i ate some really good pasta in krakow. random, but true. what i would do for some spaghetti carbonara right now! 

congrats if you made it to the end of this blog entry! it's 11:20pm on a thursday night and i am vegging out at home. getting ready to watch some ncaa basketball. then i'm getting up early to go watch alice in wonderland tomorrow! woot. midterms this week, then spring break!

next destination: rome, italy :)

oh, what a difference a week makes

possibly the best tuesday ever :)

i'm supposed to study for my in love with power "midterm" on thursday but instead i am blogging because that's how dedicated i am to letting my legions of fans stay informed about my life.. either that, or i'm procrastinating. take your pick. the krakow trip update will be coming in the next blog post over the weekend but i had to write because today was WONDERFUL for many, many reasons.

1) i woke up at 7:45am for my 8:20am class. granted, this was an accident, but i still made it out of the house and to czech (my fave class, duh) in time.

2) SPRING IS FINALLY HERE! last week i was still wearing my winter coat and gloves.. but today i wore a fleece and flats. it was fantasticky. after i got out of class, i had three hours and normally i go home but today, i mailed some postcards and headed to old town square for the easter market festival. it was great because i love it when there are things in old town, plus i got to eat a hot dog and drink beer outside. man, i love prague.

3) after old town, i walked to rudolfinum (where the czech philharmonic performs) and bought a ticket for a concert on thursday! i've been meaning to do this forever but i finally got around to it. the concert was sold out except for standing seats, so i got one of those for 50 czk (about 4 bucks). after that, i sat on the steps of the rudolfinum and did some reading before going to class. PLUS. i bought new flats from h&m today.

new shoes & view across the street from the rudolfinum 

4) after i got out of class at 3, i decided to try walking home.. but of course i got lost. instead of ending up at home, i walked to karlovo namesti, which is two subway stops in the opposite direction. oops. but it's okay, because i sat in a park and enjoyed prague spring before i went home :)

so. that was my day. i guess it's time for homework now (?) - no big plans this weekend, but the international film festival is in prague this weekend so i'm planning on going to see a few movies. and maybe going to some museums. and perhaps a little studying, since i have three midterms next week. but then it's spring break!

summer plans and st. patty's!

GREAT GREAT GREAT GREAT NEWS :))))) 

i finally have some semblance of a plan for the summer. after a 50-minute interview on tuesday, i got offered a public policy internship at a nonprofit in dc called people for the american way so i will most likely be there from early june to mid-august before going back to wes for HR training. SO. PUMPED. see, obsessively worrying does pay off. i'm currently looking for a place to sublet so if i can find somewhere to live, it's a go! i'm planning to leave prague on may 24, spend a week and a half at home, then fly out to dc on june 3 to start interning on june 7. this means:
1) i'll be able to visit wes before august!!
2) i'll most likely be going to ann arbor over the summer!!
3) i won't be spending a summer working at baskin robbins!

major win all around :) 

yesterday was st. patty's day, which apparently isn't celebrated much here in prague. well, we made the most of it. and some ridiculousness ensued, but it was a lot of fun :)

 

photo cred: karin eastby :) 

ridic story of the day: so in my "in love with power" class today, my professor wasn't sure how to use powerpoint on his computer (which in itself is embarrassing) but then he asks the only guy in our class, to help him with his computer because he's "the only other masculine in the room." seriously. because women don't know how to use technology or something. and then he told us we have a midterm next week where we basically have to write down everything that we know about the different theories we've learned. but it's not going to be graded. and then he also said we shouldn't be ashamed if we don't know stuff. great. off to krakow in a few hours!

wesmaps > homework

i spent more time looking through wesmaps last night than on my reading.. but i picked out a baller schedule for next semester:

reli 377: worlding the world: myths from ancient greece to the multiverse
reli 259: islam and/in the west
reli 279: liberation theology and pentecostalism in the americas & africa
govt 203: american constitutional law

not sure if taking three religion classes in one semester is a good idea but i feel like i have to make up for lost time (this semester, i am religion-classless). plus, only two semesters left at wes. i really wish people would stop asking me what i'm going to do with my life after i graduate.. because i don't know. still jobless this summer. let's start with that first.

a quick win/fail tally:
(+) i had another great day at TOL yesterday, writing summaries of grants for the newsletter... for some reason i didn't take my lunch break though so when i got home, i was starving. see, the work is so great that i even skipped a meal! major win. 

(-) our stove doesn't always work. when i got home from czech class and wanted to make an omlette, the flame didn't light up. FAIL. anything that gets in the way of me eating is a major fail. i went to the potraviny to get a lighter so i think this is an avoidable fail for the future.

(-) greg left. FAIL (on his part).

(+) finalized spring break plans and got my return ticket from paris to prague on april 9. i'm sure i'll write that itinerary again somewhere so i'll save it for a rainy day, which leads me to...

(-) it's supposed to rain ALL WEEKEND in krakow this weekend. it's also still cold here. ugh spring, where are you??

(-) i miss my friends. even if your picture isn't here, i probs still miss you.

(+++) i really love prague. i was walking home from class today after buying more postcards (one of my favorite pastimes) and sometimes, i am still in awe that 1) i am here and 2) i get to LIVE here for an entire semester.

wesleyan reunions and cold weather

greg in prague = major major win :)

after i came back from amsterdam, i had about three hours at home before greg arrived from frankfurt. greg is studying abroad in bologna, italy this semester and he traveled around germany before coming to visit me in prague. i have been missing wes more than i thought i would so it was absolutely fantasticky to have him here for a few days :) we didn't do all the things i wanted to do but we did get dessert (twice), eat thai food (twice), go to prague castle, buy postcards, and listen to a lot. of. kpop. right now, sarah, max, and audrey are in prague, so there's another piece of wesleyan here (though it's across the river since they are staying in a hostel). i feel very very fortunate that i could see some of my friends while i'm here.

i am finally almost better from this freakish cold, right in time for our group trip to krakow, poland this thursday. this semester is going by very very quickly and i don't want to miss a beat, but i spent all day today relaxing at home, watching grey's and friends, and eating some korean noodles that i grabbed from my uncle's. there's so much to do and see here but i think it's also important for me to take time to relax and get some rest. pranadhi went to budapest this weekend so i am excited to see her and hear about what they did.. i don't think i'll be going to budapest but i realized that spring break is about two weeks away and i have such incredible plans so i am pumped. i'm leaving for rome on april 2 and meeting julie at the airport, and we're spending friday, saturday, and sunday morning in rome. since she goes to notre dame, i'm going to tag along to a few of the catholic-y things like easter mass on sunday and the tour of the vatican and the sistine chapel (both things which happen to start at 8am, lucky us). on sunday, we're taking a train to florence, meeting greg, then spending the day there before heading to bologna. on monday, we're taking a day trip to either cinque terre or verona, and then we leave for paris on tuesday afternoon. i'm SO excited to see italy (and to have greg cook again, haha) - ever since i read "eat, pray, love" sophomore year, i've been dying to go to italy.

in other news, i love my internship! last week, i got to research different fundraising techniques/methods and tomorrow, i'm going to start putting the newsletter together for january and february. i like having different tasks because it never gets boring and i feel like what i'm doing is actually making a difference. all my classes are going okay, and i still love my czech class :) 

i'm also looking forward to returning to wes in the fall. i LOVE prague and i am so so so glad i chose to study abroad this semester but there are so many things i'm looking forward to about wesleyan and senior year. for one thing, we have an incredible staff for reslife next year that i am excited about :) i'm also SUPER PUMPED ABOUT CLASSES because i am a nerd. the religion department hired a new islam and gender professor, plus i will hopefully be taking a class called "worlding the world" with my favorite professor ever (!!!!!).

last thing - it's still cold in prague. it snowed last week and it's been pretty cloudy and cold, so it makes me even more anxious for spring. i'm going to be patient though, because when it gets here, it's pretty much going to be the best thing ever.

some people just suck at living

reunion = weekend in amsterdam 

after that last entry, i ended up getting super, super sick. like sick enough to miss class for the whole week (and anyone who knows me knows that i value perfect attendance in classes)... i spent last week buying four different types of european medicine, sleeping, and coughing endlessly. i was sick when i departed for amsterdam on thursday afternoon, and stayed sick through the weekend - but one week later, i am feeling a little better.

i got to amsterdam on thursday night and went to my uncle's apartment. my uncle works for korean air and it just so happens that he got transferred to amsterdam last august, so that's where julie and i stayed. i had the BEST. MEAL. EVER. on thursday night, consisting of leftover korean food in the kitchen. heavenly. i didn't sleep much that night and on friday morning, i took the bus to centraal station to meet julie at the train station!

julie and i were both sick over the weekend but we still had fun (or at least i did). the last time i saw her was in august at the missoula airport but it wasn't weird at all when we saw each other. in fact, we got right back into the swing of things with inappropriate comments (hence the title), midget jokes, and awkward photos. we went to the van gogh museum on friday where i learned that van gogh really WAS crazy. he was only an artist for 10 years but in that time, he produced over 800 paintings and drawings! ridic. he also felt like he was turning into a failure which is why he committed himself to an asylum in saint-remy. some of his art from his last few years were really dark, so naturally julie liked those the best.

the one on the left was her favorite.

the weather on friday was cold and rainy, so we took a canal ride to stay warm. the view of amsterdam wasn't as great through wet windowpanes, and julie fell asleep on our romantic date.. but i still enjoyed the ride because 1) canals are cool and 2) our tour guide had some quality commentary. after the canal ride, i bought some cough medicine and we went home to cook some dinner. quality stuff.

 cool-looking, but kind of gloomy because of the weather :(

 people playing chess outside, in the rain. now that is true dedication.

before julie fell asleep and after i decided to move to a different bench since i was being neglected on our date anyways.

saturday was super nice and sunny, but still cold. we went to the anne frank house and then spent the rest of the day walking around and taking a ridiculous number of photos. i'm getting sort of lazy with my blogging so i'll post some pictures and call it a day. i'm still sick, if i can use that as my excuse. 

 gorgeous day!

 horses! a staple in every good european city.

reunited!

 trust me, this was a struggle.

all in all, it was a really great trip and i'm happy i went, but i was extremely glad i was coming back to prague. amsterdam is ridiculously expensive (every time you ride the tram, it's 2.60 euro) and though it's a cool city, i think prague is way more beautiful. PLUS czech is cooler than dutch. just sayin.' it was nice to see a familiar face and i am really excited to hang out with julie again in rome, florence, bologna, and paris!

ALSO. GREG IS NOW IN PRAGUE AND WE ATE THAI FOOD LAST NIGHT. WIN.

reflections: month one.

per usual, i have approximately 17000 things i want to blog about, but i have some reading to do. i also had some freakish 24-hour cold/flu/virus last night because after i got home from my first full day at TOL, i made soup, did some czech homework, and literally crashed at 6pm until this morning. actually, that's not completely true because i woke up at 9pm with serious body chills and then again at 10:30pm because i was hungry.. and then at 4am because i was thirsty. but you get the point. thankfully i'm feeling a lot better but i'm going to try to take it easy since i'm going to amsterdam (!!!) on thursday.

today marks the one-month point of my study abroad experience in prague. to celebrate, i bought a TON of bread, including baguettes that had just come out of the trusty albert oven. the last month has been really interesting in many, many ways. my life in prague is so different from life at home or at wesleyan in almost every way. for example,
-i cook all the time here instead of depending on a meal plan.
-i have a roommate, which can be a good and a bad thing.
-i am not stressed out 99% of the time from school. 
-i have trouble with simple tasks (such as doing the laundry or buying cheese) because of the language barrier.
-i have to speak czech, not english, to get around.
-i take the metro to school.
-sometimes, i have no idea what's going on. ok, this was also the case at wesleyan, but moreso here. i can't read billboards, buy thai food, or go somewhere without having specific plans.
-i get lost. a lot. but that's not exactly new.

i'm learning a lot from the experience already - in fact, i'm starting to realize that i am capable of doing more than i thought i could, and being able to navigate my way around a foreign country with limited language abilities and terrible map-reading skills gives me a bit of hope for the future. but let's not get too ahead of ourselves here. i still have a long way to go before i can be a functioning adult in the "real world."

anyhow.
on friday and saturday, we went to cesky krumlov, a beautiful, picturesque small town about three hours away from prague. it was hard to wake up at 8am on a friday (for several reasons) but it was an incredible trip. we saw a labor camp before we arrived in cesky krumlov, which was quite an eye-opening experience for me. sometimes i have trouble believing how human beings can inflict such pain and torture on other humans. we're going to krakow in a few weeks, and seeing/hearing about the labor camps was hard so i can't imagine what it's going to be like to visit auschwitz. 

we got to cesky krumlov around 1ish (i think) and ate a DELISH LUNCH at a medieval restaurant. it was probably the best meal i've had since i've been abroad and i got some onion soup in a bread bowl, chicken steak with potato pancakes, and apple pie with vanilla ice cream. WIN. after that, we checked into our hostel and went for a tour of the city, hearing a bunch of ghost stories. we napped in the hostel afterwards, and that night, i got to use my czech and ordered ice cream (zmrzlina), then headed to a pub to listen to some live gypsy/roma music. it was awesome!

 

trust me, it looks even better in person!

one more thing: yesterday was my first day at TOL and it was awesome! i got to read and edit an interim report, in addition to a grant proposal. both of the things i read were related to free press and new media workshops in azerbaijan, and it helped me figure out what types of projects TOL organizes and why they need/apply for funding. in some regions of azerbaijan, the concept of free press doesn't exist. the government monitors and controls all of the media sources so it's impossible to get information out to the public. TOL, in conjunction with trainers, helps put together different workshops for journalists, students, and NGO reps that address this issue, along with "new media" - how to use blogs, internet security, etc. it was nice to do something substantial instead of copying and pasting biographies of state reps all day like i did this summer... i did have to do some office work (scanning documents) but i didn't really mind. plus the TOL office is only 10 minutes away so i came home on my lunch break and had some tea before going back.

well if you made it to the end of this blog post, CONGRATS! sorry this was a little text-heavy (normally i like to add more pictures but today i don't have the patience for it)... i already have the title of my next blog post ready so stay tuned!

p.s. i changed the pictures on the sidebar with pictures that i've actually taken (as opposed to stealing them from google images). my photos may not be as great, but i've been to all those places on the right. the pictures are: inside st. vitus cathedral, the view from prague castle, and at cesky krumlov :)