travellingczechia

[travellingczechia]

The Netherlands (Amsterdam pt 2) 

Školní Vylet 22-26.6.2018

We drove by bus overnight to Amsterdam, arriving there around nine am. (Riding buses long distance with the Czechs was very different from the bus rides on Eurotour. It was much easier to sleep!) Once in the city, we immediately had a tour of the main sites in the center. Our guide was a Slovak-speaking Ukranian, which made understanding the tour a pretty intense challenge for me. Surprisingly though, I was able to understand a lot of what I heard. (I also borrowed for the journey an excellently written book on the city by Russel Shorto called Amsterdam: a history of the world’s most liberal city.)

Amsterdam is a very old, historically rich city with Catholic roots. It was a miracle at the St Nicolas Church in 1345 which first brought medieval tourists and wealth to the city, and then the protestant reformation in the 1600s turned it inside out and allowed Amsterdam to define itself as a sort of birthplace of independent thinking and individual freedoms. Of course now, the city is mostly infamous for its redlight district, and illegal-but-openly-unenforced marijuana and prostitution. Indeed, both of these industries were very visible on the tourist-packed streets which we walked through, although I’m willing to bet most of the people frequenting Amsterdam’s “coffee shops” were not native to the city. 

However, Amsterdam is also the city of Van Gogh and Rembrandt, of bicyclists and flower-boxes and UNESCO-recognized architecture. We had a lot of free time on the trip to wander and simply enjoy the cities we were in, which I appreciated. 

We also spent a brief time in Rotterdam, which felt strange to me because it was perhaps the first time in a very long time that I had seen the medium-sized, steely-gray skyscrapers typical to my hometown. We visited a little model-village displaying some of the first industries of the Netherlands, cheese, chocolate, and windmills, and visited a cheese factory. 

Interestingly we also drove a long way to see the crypt of Jan Amos Comenius in Naarden. Comenius, I learned, was a Czech philosopher and is considered the founder of modern education. He lived in the 1600s, at a time when the Catholic Hapsburgs ruled over a mostly-Protestant Czech population. He took his reformist ideas and left Moravia first for Poland, but eventually ended up in Amsterdam, where he was free to write and advocate as openly as he wished. 

We also saw the Hague, the Peace Palace there and an art museum containing famous paintings including Vermeer’s Girl with a Pearl Earring. (I had never heard of it before, but my classmates had. It was nice to see.)

The trip ended at the coast, where we dipped our feet in the frigid north sea and squinted towards the horizon, towards the unblocked pole. I had a wonderful time with my Czech classmates, and the Netherlands were another beautiful place which I never thought I’d see. 

[travellingczechia]

Amsterdam (pt 1)

Školní Vylet 22-26.6.2018

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“The Road goes ever on and on Down from the door where it began. Now far ahead the Road has gone, And I must follow, if I can, Pursuing it with eager feet, Until it joins some larger way Where many paths and errands meet. And whither then? I cannot say.” (JRR Tolkien) (at Mill Run)

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Ekologický Záhradnictví (Gardening, cooking, and generally living green in the Czech Republic)

(above: some herbs and garlic on my host family’s kitchen counter.)

HERE’S something I’ve been meaning to write about for awhile: environmentalism in the Czech Republic, and in Europe in general.

Now, the Czech Republic doesn’t have the eco-friendly reputation that some European countries like France or Austria do. However, from the perspective of someone from the US, the lifestyle is still a LOT greener. Here are some differences I’ve noticed:

1. Transportation. Mainly, public transportation. For a city of 100,000 people, České Budějovice has a remarkably convenient and efficient bus network, one vastly superior to the one in my home city of over 800,000. The whole country is well connected by trains (yeah, there are delays sometimes, but it’s better than nothing) so I could travel to any city in the country or even abroad for a pretty low price. South Bohemia also has fantastic bicycling paths, which in many cases are as well marked and maintained (if not better) as the roads. 

Speaking of roads, Czechs don’t like to drive. So when possible, they make use of all these public services, as well as private bus lines. (Also, shoutout to neighboring Slovakia, which provides free train service for students. Good idea Slovakia.) 

(above: some vegetable leavings in the compost box.)

2. Waste

Czechs are so, so diligent about how they handle waste. With a few exceptions, almost every Czech household I have been in has sorted out plastic, paper, and biodegradeables. Even when a household doesn’t have its own compost, there is often a city-provided compost box to dump your stuff in. However, my second host family composted their own, and used the wonderfully rich soil in their garden. 

Another way that Czechs (and Europeans in general) reduce waste is by simply not buying as much. Rather than always trying to be stocked up on everything and anything, they buy ingredients as needed. The only time this can result in a loss is with fresh bread. Almost no one eats packaged sandwich bread, bread is NEVER frozen, and so a fresh loaf often goes stale before it gets eaten. However, all my host families have then saved that bread, dried it out, and fed it to birds or given it to people they know with farm animals. 

3. No electric dryer.  I thought it would bother me, but honestly, I don’t mind at all hanging clothes outside (especially with my view now- spot the castle turret in the background.) In the winter, we hung our clothes on a rack next to the fireplace. 

4. Gardening culture! This one is my favorite. 

One of the very few pieces of information I picked up before coming to the Czech Republic was that Czechs like to garden. When I arrived in August this didn’t seem to hold true, but now that spring has come, it certainly does. Gardening just looks a little different here. Rather than rows of identical houses with a big green lawn and a large rectangular planter for colorful, decorative flowers, Czech gardens feel more practical. Many avid gardeners live in city apartments, and hold property elsewhere for gardening. For example, my host grandmother lives in a flat, but bicycles about half an hour to her garden near our house. This allows the garden to be much bigger than if it were tucked onto a city street.

And rather than filling planters with frilly, brightly colored seasonals, most Czech gardens I have seen have been mostly edible. (Don’t get me wrong, seasonal flowers are beautiful. But I personally like the Czech way better, because if I’m going to go to all the trouble of cultivating a plant, it’s much more rewarding to have something to eat in the end.) On their garden plots, Czechs grow cabbages, cucumbers, zucchini, sweet peppers, lettuce, potatoes, pumpkins, raspberries, blueberries, currant fruits, strawberries, and apples. They plant herbs and spices to use in the kitchen, and then they actually use them in the kitchen. (My family has a bay leaf plant in the living room. I had no idea what it was until my host mom told me to go get some of it for the soup.) 

I recently read Michael Pollan’s In Defense of Food, and it has given me a lot to think about. But I think many of his ideas would seem painfully obvious to a Czech grandmother. Pollan argues that gardening and preparing fresh food inevitably improves both the quality of what we eat and the impact we have on the environment. I am convinced, after reading his book and after helping in gardens here, that it would be a thousand times easier to make people care about soil and water quality and climate, if those people were paying attention to all those factors and how they affected the raspberries they wanted to put on their waffles. 

This year in the Czech Republic, the winter was extremely mild and spring came early. Everything is blooming and becoming ripe a full month in advance. This is a big deal, because people expect to eat things when they are fresh. Last week, cherries became ripe, and I immediately noticed that every fifth person seemed to be carrying an enormous number of cherries down the street with them. Before that, it was strawberries. Soon, Czechs will go out to the forests to harvest blueberries, and in the fall, mushrooms. 

(above: freshly picked mini-strawberries and some early forest blueberries on a poppyseed cake.) 

I’ve found it difficult to express this observation of greater connection to nature to Czechs. Much of the younger generation, for one, doesn’t garden or forage, and isn’t nearly as interested in the seasons as their parents or grandparents. When I have gushed to older Czechs my admiration for the freshly cooked meals, the carefully tended gardens, the bakeries with cheap, whole grain bread, and the composts, their reactions are generally along the lines of, “um... thanks?” To most Czechs I’ve spoken to, local, unprocessed food isn’t some kind of hipster luxury- it’s just what makes the most sense. That isn’t to say that Czechs don’t import pineapples year round or eat processed things, they definitely do. But there is a recognition that what is better for the environment is also healthier and tastier. I firmly believe that, for the long-term health of the planet, that is a subtle culture difference which matters. 

5. Forests. Disclaimer: Slovaks will laugh at me for being impressed by Czech forests. Also, I googled “Czech forests” to find statistics for this post, and this was one of the first results: http://www.radio.cz/en/section/panorama/environmentalists-ringing-alarm-bells-over-ailing-czech-forests

That said, the World Bank estimated that in 2015 34.5% of Czech land was forest, and that percentage is increasing. Numbers aside, Czech forests are great because they are accessible. Trails are numerous and well marked. Every castle I have visited- and there are many, many castles- have at least a small woods around them which someone living in the castle used as hunting grounds at some point. It is never difficult to get to the woods, living in South Bohemia. That is something I appreciate a lot, not just for the climate benefits. 

[travellingczechia]

Be alone. Eat alone, take yourself on dates, sleep alone. In the midst of this you will learn about yourself. You will grow, you will learn what inspires you. You will cultivate your own dreams, your own beliefs, your own stunning clarity. And when you do meet the right person who makes your cells dance, you will be sure of it because you are sure of yourself.

Bianca Sparacino (via purplebuddhaquotes)

romantic advice aside, this is one of the #1 lessons of exchange

Exchange is lonely. It stays lonely, even after you make wonderful friends. No matter how well you adapt, in some ways, you will still be a stranger. That’s a good thing. Strangers bring a fresh perspective, and just as you will shed new light on whatever country you go to, that country will shed new light on you, and you will see yourself completely differently by the end. 

[travellingczechia]

Poprad! 11-14.6.2018

With just a month left of this adventure, I made my way to one of the places I had been most eager to visit all along- the High Tatra mountains in Slovakia. (Several other exchange students live there, pictured here is Antoine from Quebec and Andrew from my own district in the US, whose great travel writing and photography you should check out at eastwardexchange.com. Unlike me, he uses an actual camera, and he uses it well.) 

If I have one thing to say about the Tatras, it is that two days there is not enough. My first day there started out rainy and cold, and the forecast was bad enough that we were almost scared inside. But my friends know the Tatras well by now, and they assured me that the weather at the bottom is never a good indicator for the weather at the trailhead. Sure enough, by the time our train pulled into the last station, the weather was sunny and the woods inviting. 

Our hike wasn’t lengthy, but it took us up to Popradske Pleso, a lake so clean I was tempted to fill my water bottle from it (I did, later, drink from a stream) and so picturesque it is used in the ads for the alcohol Tatratea. Then, a short walk above the lake brought us to the Symbolic Cemetery. This is a moving site, full of painted wooden crosses and plaques dedicated to hikers who have died in the mountains. People die in the Tatras every year, and the hikers who love the mountains know this. They also, however, know that fully experiencing life involves taking risk. That mindset was visible in the way the crosses were placed in such a beautiful part of the mountainside, surrounded by steep rock and deep forest and not accessible unless one was willing to hike there for quite awhile. 

On our second day we visited a skanzen, or a historical village. I was able to see small wooden houses of the kind that rural Slovaks were living in up into the early 1900s. The houses were well preserved, and standing in them, one could really imagine living in an isolated Slovak village a century ago, tending goats and following village customs that still exist today. 

Sometimes I feel like all the travelling this year has just given me an even longer list of places I’d like to see. I certainly hope to return to the Tatras, next time with more water and a bigger backpack, and spend a lot of time there. 

[travellingczechia]

Křízanov- 31.5-3.6.2018

OUTBOUND MEETING! (and many goodbyes)

We Czech exchange students finished May (which was already half a month ago, whoops) by all meeting outside of the small Bohemian town of Krizanov. This meeting was designed for the current (foreign, inbound) students living in the Czech republic to meet the Czech (future, outbound) students planning to go abroad. It’s a pity we didn’t meet them more often during the year, because it was fun and exciting for everyone for the inbounds to meet the outbounds who were going to their home countries. District 2240 is sending 3 Czech students to Ohio next year, and I wish them all the best! 

These pictures are from our games on Saturday. In groups made up of inbounds from a given country and the outbounds going there (so, our group was American inbounds plus a Canadian and the outbounds going to the US) we were handed a map and sent from station to station completing tasks ranging from building a bridge to cracking eggs over our heads to carrying water in our mouths while a partner carried us like a wheelbarrow. We had the best weather imaginable, and I loved wandering through the fields with my teammates. 

If I put a photograph of South Bohemia and southern Ohio side by side, they might not look so different. But actually standing in those fields, it felt like very different scenery, and acutely Czech. Perhaps just the fact that we could stand in it- that it wasn’t fenced off or separated from the world by enormous highways- or the stands of old, healthy trees dotting the distance, or the wildflowers and other natural plants lining the fields instead of dead grass, or the birdsong. Whatever it was, it was beautiful, and I wished I could bottle up the feeling of walking in a line through the young wheat plants with these people, half of them friends I’d grown very close to over the year and half of them strangers who reminded me so much of myself a year ago. I wish I could take that feeling home with me and open up the bottle whenever I feel like the world is closing in on me- because out in those fields, the world felt wonderfully vast. 

We had a bonfire at the end of this meeting, which felt very strange because it reminded me of my last (which was the first of the next year) outbound meeting at Camp Mary Orton back in August. There is nothing like a bonfire, a group of near strangers/old friends, and a starry sky to make one feel nostalgic for the past, present, and future all at once. 

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Český Ráj (Bohemian Paradise)- 27.5.2018

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5.6.2018- Četla jsem tahle knihu celé rok! Na začátek jsem potřebovala překladač každým slovu. Už to mužu přečíst skoro normálně :)

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Bavorovice- 4.6.2018

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this post is really interesting because it is actually crazy how strong cultural eating norms can be. For example, I’ve been living in the Czech Republic for nine months and am only now beginning to accept the idea of eating a savory thing (maybe vegetables and cheese) in the morning and a sweet thing in the afternoon, as opposed to the opposite. My host family here has a savory breakfast AND a savory breakfast makes me feel better, but I had it so driven into me that vegetables did not belong before ten am (unless in an omelet) that I continued eating sweet things I didn’t want. 

there should be a campaign to raise awareness about how your own culture can screw you over for no reason, be flexible with yourself guys. This has been a PSA. 

sometimes I’m like “my therapist doesn’t really tell me anything I don’t already know” but then I remember that I used to eat scrambled eggs every single morning because I hated them but I hated them less than I hate all other breakfast food on weekdays (don’t @ me waffles are a weekend food and they Do Not start me on a productive path) and my therapist said, “why not eat a lunch food?”

and I said, “explain”

and she said, “you know you’re allowed to eat whatever food you want in the morning. you are not bound by law to the traditional american breakfast.”

my father’s insurance pays a hundred dollars an hour for a woman to give me permission to eat a pb&j at six in the morning 

[travellingczechia]

ITALY- selected artworks

(top: a view from the Vatican museums, middle bottom: a close-up of a fresco in Pompeii)

If Paris had whimsical charm and Barcelona had natural beauty, than Italy had incredible artwork. (I mean yes, we went to the Louvre in Paris and that was amazing, but I still think of Italy first when I think of art on Eurotour.) Because I am stupid lucky, and was visiting the Vatican museums for the second time, I chose to ditch the crowd moving like sardines towards the sistine chapel and focus on exploring the other museums in the Vatican. 

It doesn’t take much of this before one realizes that, while probably good business as museums, the Vatican is more of a vast storage space for an absurd amount of, I guess I’ll say capital, amassed by the Catholic church over centuries of conquests. Because of this, the diversity of the collection is impressive- there are tapestries, vases, cutlery, mosaics, sculptures, maps, masonry, cabinets, jewelry, and other artworks from a dizzying variety of cultures and faiths. The informational plaques mentioned places and dynasties I had never heard of. (Never have I regretted not taking AP European history, as I did during Eurotour.) One of the most impressive things to me in the Vatican by far, although it wasn’t worth a picture, was a room full of very old vases. In the corner of that room there was an informational board, and on that board was a photograph of a 19th century painting, which depicted the Pope at the time receiving those very same vases as a gift. It astounded me that I was looking at a painting, which in the US would be considered quite historical and valuable, of the Vatican receiving the historical and valuable vases that were still in those halls some 150 years later. 

In Pompeii, frescoes from the time of the inhabitants still linger, somehow having survived the fires that left the city empty and forgotten. And in Florence we visited the museum which houses Michael Angelo’s David, along with a nice collection of other religious artworks, mostly sculptures and paintings. 

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ITALY- some selected ruins from EUROTOUR

pictured above: Frescos in Pompeii, the Colosseum, spring wildflowers in the ruins of Pompeii, flowers growing from a bridge in Rome 

On Eurotour we spent several days in Italy and saw Rome, Naples, Pompeii, Florence, and Venice. We took an absolutely beautiful drive through the Tuscan countryside and ate as many tiny fresh tomatoes and hot paninis as we could stomach. For me, the main attraction to Italy is the history- the ruins as old as European civilization. I particularly loved Pompeii, because I have wanted to go there for a long time, and it is remarkably well preserved. When walking through Pompeii, I didn’t feel as though I was walking through a museum or even an archaeological site. I felt I was walking through an old, old city- albeit a very empty and quiet one. If I focused on suspending my disbelief and imagining store fronts and shoppers, it was eerie how similar some of the streets of Pompeii were to the square we were staying near in Naples. 

And truly, we were in Italy at the most beautiful possible time of the year. I am so privileged to have gotten to see Rome in both fall color and spring. 

[travellingczechia]

The sun will always rise and dogs always be happy to see you

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Omlouva Husam (The Goose Poem)

Geese, I have a confession to make.

I Am Earthbound.

 I know, it's... embarrassing. 

 Unlike you, I do not choose to waddle perilously in front of cars

I have no wings to unfurl

And no radioactive accidents or flowing capes

Will absolve my debt to gravity.

Geese, I used to call you devil-spawn

Rats with wings, I

Rolled my bicycle through your flocks 

Without so much as a "pardon me" I'm sorry

I was jealous

I envied the hollowness of your bones

I coveted the grace in your ebony wing

sAnd I was- am!- outraged

Every fall

When you reject that southbound instinct birdsong.

See, we are not so different.

I, too, have a call inside me

And I have struck a deal with gravity so THIS fall

When your blood begins to flow south

I will be flying, too

When you ruffle your feathers and say "eh, I'll pass"

When you choose another winter 'round these

Half-frozen retention ponds

I'll be soaring 'cross a pond bigger than you can imagine

(Not to, make you jealous, or anything.)

But geese, I have found friends with wings that span continents

And birdsong full of opportunity

And you can bet

That when I heard their call

In a dozen languages, through a dozen open window screens

I didn't say "eh"

I said YES

and they said YES

And my spine is stretching so my wingspan can catch up to my instinct

And my bicycle is rocketing around these ponds

And my tongue is a blur of birdsong

In a dozen languages

And my heart is ripped in quarters

And my lips are reaching around the equator

In a smile And I never used to smile.

Husy, musím se omluvit.

já... nelétám

vím, že je to trapný

křidla na roztažení nemám

a žadné radioaktvní nehody či pláštěnky

mě od spáru gravitace neochrání.

 Husy, vám jsem pomlouvala

krysy s křidly

hozel jsem kamení do každého hejna

 aniž bych říkala omlouvam se, tak mě to mrzí

prostě jsem... zářlila

na vás dutí kosti

na vás elegantní, ebenová křidla

a byla jsem pobouřená

každy podzim

když tady čekate

když jste mohli létat do jizních zemích, kdekoliv

proč odmitnáte vás povolání, nikdy netuším

 Snad, ani tak ruzní nejsme

já taky slýchvám volání

a tak jsem se letos dohodla s gravitací, že na PODZÍM

až váše křídla začnou mávat na jíh

já taky poletím

a až si přístí zimu strávite na malých rybníčcích

představte si, že letám nad největsími jezery, cos si mužete představit

 Prominte že tedy chlubim, ale husy

našla jsem kamarády jejichž křídla

se roztahují přes kontinenty

kteří pějí v mnoha jazycích

pisničky plná příležitosti

a věřte mi, že když jsem otveřela okna

neodmítla jsem

řekla jsem ano

a oni řekli ano

a hned me boli ramena, kde rostou křidla

a začinají roztáhnout stejně, jako moje obzory

a začila jsem také objíždět rybníky

a muj jazyk spivá pisně ptáku, v tucu jazycích

a moje srdce jest rozčtvrceno

kousek každych kontinent

ale moje rty objímají rovník

jako bych se konečné smála

 a to se běžně neusmívám.

[travellingczechia]

Barcelona, Spain

I had high expectations for Barcelona... and the main city of Catalonia exceeded them. We did perhaps the least sight-seeing in Barcelona out of all the cities, but funnily enough, I feel like I got the best sense of its character. My favorite memories from Barcelona are the sea in the morning drizzle, the icy water, the glittering of the sunshine in the biggest fountain I’ve ever seen, listening to music and sitting by the water, an intense round of cards in a cafe playing futbol, and racing through the crowds at night under streetlights, just to get churros before curfew. 

We  stayed in a hostel a very short walk from La Rambla, a wide pedestrian street stretching for three-quarters of a mile between Catalonia Square and the Christopher Columbus monument near the port. (According to wikipedia,) the poet Federico Garcia Lorca once described the Rambla as “the only street in the world which I wish would never end.” If that’s true, I might agree with him. Packed with souvenir stalls and expensive cafe tables and tourists, la rambla got a little overwhelming in the evenings, (and we had a run-in with some pick pockets,)  but that didn’t diminish my enjoyment of it. The smell of hot churros, music seeping from yellow-lighted restaurants, the comfortable shade of stately plane trees, and cool, early-summer weather all made for two fantastic evenings spent on La Rambla with friends, hunting for paella and an affordable place to sit. About halfway down it we ran across a huge market which called to my mind the mercadão municipal in Brazil, with its stands of fresh seafood, cured meats, traditional sweets, and fruits and vegetables selling for unbelievable bulk prices. (One of many reasons I would love to live in a place like coastal Spain, or Italy, or Brazil- fresh fruits and vegetables were the cheapest foods I could find.) 

Interestingly, also according to wikipedia, rambla is not a word associated in any way with the English word ‘ramble’. It comes from the Arabic word for sand, and refers to the fact that la Rambla was once a sandy, usually-dry sewage drain for the city. Because of this, the paving stones in the street are designed to imitate the pattern of flowing water. 

If spending three days in Barcelona piqued my interest in any one thing, it was in knowing more about the current strife between the city and the government in Spain. I had already learned a bit about the independence controversy in my spanish class, and have for awhile been of the (however modestly informed) opinion that countries are generally better off united and that Catalonia has little reason to be dissatisfied besides pure ideology and nationalism, considering the freedom and independence they’ve enjoyed as a part of spain since Franco’s death. 

Nevertheless, as one of our tour guides pointed out, Franco’s regime didn’t end that long ago at all, and it is undeniable that pro-independence sentiment is there. Catalan independence flags decorated many buildings all over Barcelona, and in Catalonia square, a large yellow-and-white striped tent provided information and paraphernalia and collected donations from anyone who was interested. 

Barcelona has it all- not just history and politics, but art and nature as well. We spent time resting on the beach, and were given time to explore the beautiful gardens designed by architect Antoni Gaudi. (We also saw Gaudi’s most famous work, the cathedral of La Sagrada Familia. It was remarkable, but I liked his gardens the best.) Gaudi’s buildings made the mosaics in the Louvre seem less special- the houses, walls, and sculptures in the gardens glittered with tiles of rich blues and fiery reds and yellows, and as if that wasn’t beautiful enough, the path provided an incredible view of the city and the sea. 

More than any of the other amazing Eurotour cities, I left Barcelona with a determination to come back, sooner rather than later. 

[travellingczechia]

PARIS- Eurotour 2018