geowench | Entries tagged with praha

Well the year is not yet over and I haven't done my Dec recap, but I've got time, so I'm stealing this year in review thing from M. Basically you take the first few lines of the first post of each month. I think I managed a monthly recap each month, so I'll sort of summarize that instead.

Jan: E went to Japan for two weeks, so I did a lot of socializing, plus we had my work conference.

Feb: "February was a long, dreary, and very cold month. "

March: We arrive in Prague and go nuts with the site seeing. We walked across Charles Bridge and up to Prague Castle, then walked back down and to the Astronomical Clock/Tower in the Old Town Square. We went Vyshera and a Botanical Garden. We visisted Folimanka, which is a cold war underground bunker, and went to to the National Technical Museum (twice). And then because I was clearly overdoing it I reinjured my Achilles tendon, BOO.

April: We spent the Easter weekend with E's colleague in Pek Pod Snezkou (the mountains). Back in Prague we went to the Agriculutural Museum and the Transportation Museum, as well as the Klementinum, with its amazing library. Also I was anxious.

May: We went to Strahov Monastery, Olansy Cemetery, City of Prague Museum, the Beer Museum, Konopiste Castle, and perhaps my favorite thing in Czechia: I saw Hrdliska's collection.

June: We went back to OK for two weeks, and when we came back, we moved into our new apartment. E went to Japan for two weeks, leaving me alone in Prague, which was kind of lonely, although I did try to get out and about some.

July: We traveled around Czechia, including Kutna Hora, Karlstein Castle, The Museum of Decorative Arts, The Alchemy Museum, and the Mala Strana.

August: We went to Vienna, we went back to OK, it was very hot.

Sept: Greece! Also E's dad/girlfriend visisted.

October: We went to Berlin for five days and to the Prague Zoo.

November: I was sick, we went to Milulov and Dolni Vestonice and my friend M visited!

December: I haven't written my December recap yet, but spoiler alert: Mostly I was very sick.

So this year has been amazing and I will probably write plenty about what it has mean to me, but we are more than ready to head home on Friday - back to Oklahoma and back to reality.

I'm currently about as sick as I've ever been with a nasty flu or something, very congested and hard to breathe, was wondering if I'd have to resort to a Czech ambulance last night ... but I seem to have come through the worst and am hopefully on the mend, so let see what happened in November:

We spent first full week in the little town of Mikulov in Southern Moravia because there was the big yearly Czech/Slovenian radiation conference and E was informed that he was to attend. The conference was literally held in a bloody castle, which was kind of a trip. Our pension was one of the nicest accommodations I've ever stayed in. The pics don't do it justice; it was lovely, plus we were shown the wine refrigerator and told to take whatever we wanted and just tell them when we checked out how much we'd had. I worked for a lot of the time we were there, but we also took some time to explore the town, which is really lovely.

The town is also near the site of Dolni Vestonice which is the oldest known permanent settlement ever found and one of those groovy mammoth hunter sites complete with their own venus statue. So you can imagine my disappointment when we got there to find it closed! They were filming some stupid movie and no way no how could we see the museum. BUT, the conference organizer M is also E's boss and she said, this is a small town and everyone is friendly, let me see what I can do. So she arranged for us to visit not the museum but the actual research institution and meet director! So after the conference ended, M drove E and me plus an older professor out to the research center where we met the director of research. I was a little shocked at how young he was (about my age, so not that young, actually). At first he addressed all his comment to E (grr, they always do that), but both E and M made a point of saying that I was the one with the PhD in archaeology, thank you very much, and once it also became clear that I was the only one who really knew anything about the site, he talked mostly to me. So he spent about an hour and a half with us and showed us several artifacts and the research premises. I tried to get him to tell me what his overarching research goal was, but he said he didn't know yet as he'd only taken over as director in the last year. So all in all very cool, although I still would have liked to see the museum!

The following week, E left for Japan and my good friend M from grad school arrived for a visit! I took him around to a lot of the sites and a couple museums, and we generally had a really nice visit. We talked mostly about books, and did some souvenir shopping and also visited the plague cemetery and in the evenings watched The Umbrella Academy, which pissed us both off. The same day he left E came back (E was supposed to be home earlier, but his trip got extended), and it's been pretty quiet ever since.

Last weekend we ventured out to Old Town to check out several crystal stores (Czech crystal is a THING and we wanted to get some gifts). We'd both been feeling somewhat under the weather and even went to a Dr. on Wed who basically said we were fine and gave me some allergy meds for my congestion. Of course after seeing her, I got significantly worse, to the point where I was worried about pneumonia, but E is definitely on the mend and I think I am also, although I'm still in pretty rough condition. I'm hawking up all sorts of disgusting crap, but at least it's coming up and not settling in my lungs, so I have hopes that I'll recover with having to negotiate the Czech health care system any further.

We are in the home stretch now, less than 4 weeks before we head back to OK and our Prague adventure ends. We contemplated taking a final trip to Athens (we were invited by friends), but then we really started feeling crappy and decided that if we got a sudden burst of energy we'd do a more local weekend trip.

Current Mood: sick
Current Location: Praha

July was a really good month. There was uncomfortably hot days, but we didn't get hit as hard as western Europe did - I don't think it got over 100F/40C, although it came close, and without AC, it was pretty tough - I was once again reduced to shoving packets of frozen veggies down my knickers to try and stay cool, and sleeping with another packet under my neck. But there were also lovely cool days, and overall, we really enjoyed ourselves.

The first weekend of July we hopped a train to Kutna Hora, which is an old mining town with some impressive gothic churches, but more importantly, the amazing Sedlec Ossuary, which is out of this world amazing and not at all creepy. Honestly it felt like I was fulfilling one of the things I was meant to do. An incredible experience.

The next weekend we stayed home, venturing out to visit Praha's Museum of Decorative Arts. Although the building was incredibly gorgeous, the museum itself was kind of disappointing. We are running out of Prague museums, largely because E doesn't want to do any of the art museums.

The following weekend we went to Karlsteijn Castle, which at one point housed the crown jewels of the Holy Roman Empire. We took a really interesting tour of the castle, and I was once again convinced that these people who wish htey lived in the middle ages are out of the ever lovign minds, especially if they are women.

The next weekend we again stayed home, though we went to the Alchemy Museum, which was frankly terrible, and way overpriced. Ah well, we had a nice wander through the Mala Strana afterwards.

And now it is August and we just got back from a really nice trip to Vienna, which I will talk about later.

Things I Miss

My garden and my fresh veggies
The birds, especially the summer hummingbirds
MY BOOKS
My sewing machine
Knowing where/how to buy whatever I need/want
Lunches with my work friend M
Larger sizes of food at the grocery store

Things to accomplish in 2020

Make the porch a comfy place to sit and read/relax and also to have a meal
Restart my veg garden
Trellis my roses
Make more clothing for myself
Visit my CA pals and/or visit my friend in Seattle
Look into becoming a Master Gardener
Consider taking a writing class

Things to accomplish July 2019

Take another out of Prague trip
Find/buy some walking shoes/sneaks and break them in
Visit the National Gallerie Art Museum to see the visiting Impressionist Exhibit
Figure out one or two new dinners to make in our minimalist kitchen

I had been wanting to go to the Museum of Medieval Torture, and E did not want to go, so I went alone on Monday. I thought it would be super cool and that I would really enjoy it. I surprised myself by finding it overwhelmingly depressing and sad. It's amazing what humans can do to each other. It's amazing what is happening in my country right now, with so many people being treated as subhuman. And now old Japanese interment camps are being used again to house migrant children. Unbelievable, but it is true. It just sickens me. And apparently the Obama administration did the same thing ... how did I not know that? What has happened to the world? Previously I would enjoyed the Torture Museum in the same way I enjoy learning about Plague and gruesome diseases, because they are more or less in the past. But people being unthinkably horrible to each other is most definitely not in the past.

We've been back in Prague for about ten days, following our two week trip back home. I was NOT looking, forward to going back to OK, but I have to day, I really enjoyed being back home, and in a weird way it was like a vacation. I saw my friends, I ate a lot, I bought some clothes, and I didn't do any exercise. It was great!

Coming back was rather rough. It's a long journey - even when all goes smoothly, it's still over a 24 trip, and plus, we've both had a rather more difficult time adjusting to the time change this time. Our new apartment is quite nice, although I was rather miffed to discover that our "fully furnished" apartment did not have some basic necessities - like toilet paper. The apartment *is* fully furnished and comes with bed linens and basic kitchen neccessities, but no towels, and other basics things like soap and TP were also missing. This meant that instead of being able to clean up after our long journey, we had to immediately go back out and buy shit. Thankfully we knew just where to go and how to get there, and I had remember to bring a big shopping bag this time, so away we went to Tesco, where we bought towels and a bath mat, TP, soap, laundry detergent, and a few groceries, including the ever important coffee. We then immediately showered and were so exhausted that we napped for a few hours before getting up and going out for some dinner. Next day E went back to work, and I went back to my normal routine of working.

Physically the apartment is much more comfortable than the old place. There is a proper table for me to work at, and the couch and armchair are quite comfy. It has been very hot, and there is no AC, so I bought a fan, and manage to not overheat with the use of ice packs in the afternoon and evening. But today it is lovely and cool, which is a nice change.

E left on Friday for a week in Japan. So I am on my own. Saturday I went to a farmer's market on the Vlatava, which turned out to be quite a disappointment, although the walk along the river made up for it. Today I am not sure what I will do. I may take an Uber to and from IKEA, as there are quite a few things I'd like to get for the apartment, things that are not necessities, but would make life easier, like a toothbrush holder and some extra trash bins, and more hangars, etc. Or I may just pick them up one by one from Tesco or other places. There are a dozen small neighborhood markets within a few blocks (including one with really nice produce), of our apartment and also many nice places to eat. However, a proper grocery shop requires getting on the tram, and the Super Tesco is the easiest to get to. If I don't go to IKEA today I will make myself get out and take a walk, at the least. There is a splendid park just a few blocks away, complete with Italian renaissance fountain and water cascade, a pond, pavilions, sculptures, and artificial cave, and a wine bar.

My tummy is growling now, so I will go make myself some breakfast. I'm going to try and be better about posting more regularly, so that I have a record of our time here.

Tomorrow we head back to the little house on the prairie for two weeks. The last couple have weeks have been both very busy and very slow. The beautiful weather of April vanished and it has been much colder and often rainy (although, "storms" here are terribly cute compared to storms in OK - most of the state is closed today in anticipation of Category 5 tornados).

The biggest news is that we rented a lovely apartment in Vinorhrady, which is in a much nicer area than our current AirBnB. We got it through a "luxury" rental site, so it was a bit more than we wanted to pay, but considering it's furnished, utilities and internet are included, is in a quiet lovely area on a tree lined street, but just one block off a main thoroughfare, has a second bedroom, and we have it through December, we decided it was worth it. Our current apartment has been somewhat of a disappointment, largely because the furniture is just so dang uncomfortable. There is nowhere but the bed to comfortably sit (the couch looks cool but is ridiculously uncomfortable), and the table is a hip looking little "bar" with high stools, which isn't too terrible to eat at, but is pretty uncomfortable to spend hours working on my computer, which is my job. So the new apartment has a comfortable couch as well as an actual dining room table where I can work. I might also just buy a cheap table and chair from Ikea or a flea market to have a dedicated office work space, since the flat is large enough.

Since I last posted we have seen several more amazing places, let's see:

We went to Strahov Monastery, largely because we wanted to see their two medieval libraries and "cabinet of curiosities." We walked around Olsany Cemetery, which is close to our current apartment, and started out life as a Plague Cemetery. Dvorak and Kafka are here, I think, although we did not see their graves, as it is enormous. We went to the City of Prague Museum which is probably my favorite museum so far, largely because it talks about the city from an archaeological and historical standpoint.

The highlight of the trip so far has been seeing Hrdlicka's collections - it is not truly a museum since it is only open a couple of days a week and is just two rooms at Charles University, but OMG it is an amazing two rooms. I took a ton of pictures and will probably go again next time it is open to the public.

We also went to the small but very interesting Beer Museum where we tasted some Czech beers (not to be confused with the Beer Museum pub, where we have eaten a few times and is within walking distance of our new apartment).

And then yesterday we went with the director of E's institute to Konopiste Castle, about 30 km south of Prague, which was the residence of Archduke Franz Ferdinand d'Este, whose assassination is credited with starting WWI, or as the say here, simply "the war." The castle actually has all its original furnishings, and we took a tour of the living quarters, which makes is probably the most interesting castle I've seen.

And now today I'm packing. And trying not to fret about OK - it's is 6 years to the day since the horrible tornadoes that leveled huge swathes of the state. Because of EU laws, I cannot access the local OK stations to see how things are going, only the national and international news sites. So I am compulsively updating FB b/c honestly, that is the best way to see local news at this point.

And the first leg of our Praha sojourn ends in less than three weeks. I am looking forward to going home for a few weeks. It's amazing how much you learn about what you love when you are away from it.

Anyway, since my last post, we spent a long weekend in mountains at a villa/chalet/lodge, whatever you want to call it in Pec pod Sněžkou. We had a nice time, although as my friend oldblack commented, the "friend/family" situation was a bit rough. It's quite pretty up there, and we took a funicular up to the top of the mountain where we were able to step foot into Poland. This was also very pretty, but I must say, I am super spoiled having spent chunks of my childhood in the Sierra Nevadas. All of this was reminescent of the mountains I already know and love but honestly, not as spectacular. But don't tell anyone. On the way home we stopped at the village of Kuks to be touristy and have a big meal with a bunch of Czechs.

The next weekend we stayed in Prague and went to the Agricultural Museum (interesting, but smaller than expected) and the Transportation Museum (which just a bunch of old cable cars), and then walked for awhile in Mala Strana along the Vlatava River, which was extremely pleasant.

Tuesday Eric stayed home from work so we could go look at some apartments to possibly rent in the fall, but it was put off, so instead we went to the Klemintinum, which OMG is the pretty much the most amazing thing in Prague. You must take a tour to see any of it, and you can only stand at one end of that spectacular library and peep in for a few seconds, but it is absolutely worth it. After the library bit, you climb and climb and climb up to the astronomy tower where you get a fabulous view of the city. Now quite sure how I managed to make it up and then back down (which is always hte more difficult part for me) those treacherous, spiraling, wooden staircases (you'd never take tourists up/down such a thing in the States) without killing myself, but yay me, I did it.

Then yesterday was a national holiday. We didn't want to brave the crowds for anything touristy, so we took a short walk at Rangherka, which is near our apartment. It is a former silk factory and has some small gardens to walk in. I had overdone it the previous day, so was not up for much more than a very short excursion. Today I will stay home and work, except for getting groceries.

This weekend we were going to go out of town, but not sure that will happen now as our apartment viewing is now rescheudled (for the third time) for Friday morning. If she puts us off again, I will give up on this agency.

I am still having bouts of overwhelming anxiety but doing my best to breathe through them and hang in there. I feel like I am wasting my time here because I can't go out every day and walk for 10 kilometers exploring, but documenting here what we have done is actually the best remedy for that feeling.

In the coming days I must find us a place to live, which is also making me anxious. June/July are the height of hte season and I probably waited too long, argh.

So it turns out that even if you pick up and travel around the world, your anxiety follows you. Not gonna lie, last week was rough. Even in one of the most beautiful cities in the world, my old bedfellows depression and anxiety came to play. My physical health was at least partially responsible - I'm supposed to be menopausal, but a period decided to show up and laugh in my face, argh. I didn't fight it too much last week - I needed to stay in and rest my Achilles tendon, and so I just allowed myself to feel crappy and to wallow. Plus the weather turned bad last week, and it was cold, windy, and rainy. But one week is enough, and this week I am trying to be more proactive about getting outside and getting a few more steps in. It's beautiful outside so far this week, and even though I have to spend most of the day indoors working, I've made a point to go outside both yesterday and today and will do so the rest of the week.

On Saturday, we went to an old cold war underground bunker, which was creepy/depressing/cool, and on Sunday we went to the National Technical Museum for the second time. This coming weekend we are spending the Easter holiday weekend with one of E's colleagues and his family in the mountains at a chateau owned by colleague's sister.

I am trying to come up with a few things that I want to accomplish during our first leg of the Prague trip. There are still six more weeks to go, and I definitely don't want to spend them sulking inside and nursing my injured Achilles tendon and being anxious and depressed. I can do all that shit in Oklahoma.

Current Location: Praha

So March ... was all about preparing for Prague and then finally getting here. I'm not gonna do a real March recap, instead I want to set some intentions for April

Mainly I want to get myself out of the apartment for more than my quick daily sojourn to buy a few groceries. However, I re-injured my damn Achilles tendon yesterday when we were out being touristy and climbing hills, so that is going to cramp my style. So goals for April:

1) At least one solo excursion (that is not grocery shopping) each week while E is at work.

2) Continue ab workouts 2/3 times a week.

3) Buy some shoes that are (more) comfy to walk in (with the injured Achilles tendon, all the flat, comfy shoes I brought are too flat - I need to find something with a bit of a wedge heel), and possibly find a walking stick, or just suck it up and get a trekking pole, if I can find one.

4) Journal a couple of times a week, and also start my writing project.

5) Plan a weekend excursion to an ossuary.

6) Buy, write, and send postcards. Also write a real letter to my Auntie, replying to her last bombshell of a letter.

So I forgot to mention in the last entry - after all that nonsense with getting our visas ... NO ONE LOOKED AT THEM. We entered Europe via Madrid, and we went through customs there. Our passports were stamped, but not even looked at long enough verify that we were who we were supposed to be. So when the plane flew into another EU country, there was no customs, no looking at passports, no nothing. There were signs pointing to immigration control, but only a single dude in a uniform watching us leave and not interacting with anybody!

However we did have to go to Immigration Control in Praha to register our presence - although if we had not, I don't think anybody would have known/cared. I think *they* might have looked at the visa, because when I told the woman that our visas weren't looked at when we came in to Prague Airport, she asked if they were looked at in Madrid, and the only way she would have know about Madrid is if she actually looked at the damn passports and saw our Madrid stamp, and presumably the Czech visas. So anyway, we are finally here and even legal.

We both got yearly metro cards, which was another silly thing, requiring two trips to the central metro station downtown, and help from one of E's colleagues, and both our passports, and interactions with yet another grumpy Czech bureaucrat. And then E had to open a bank account which *also* took two separate trips and help from a colleague and apparently the approval of the bank president, since we are not EU citizens. Currently the bank account has a grand total of 100 Kr (about $5) because E hasn't been paid yet. They are paid "usually around the 10th of the month, but it can vary." Yikes. Oh and also you can only withdraw $10000 Kr a week, which strikes me as really strange.

Being a stranger in a strange land has pointed out to me that after being there for 14 years, I no longer feel so out of place in OK. I mostly blend in. And until someone tries to speak to me, I pretty much blend in here, also, which is a relief. So far I haven't noticed any of those "what the hell are you," looks.

I hope it doesn't sound like I'm complaining, because I'm not, and I'm certainly not bent out of shape about any of this Czech stuff, I just think it's interesting and kind of funny.

Current Mood: amused

(I know y'all don't need a by blow over every day, but I've pretty much written one for myself because I haven't done any journaling yet and I don't want to forget.)

Well, we are here at long last! Arrived Wednesday after about a 24 hour journey. Thankfully we were picked up at the airport by one of E's Czech grad students (he is not teaching, but is supervising a couple of PhD students here). He dropped us off at our AirBnB and informed us that we were due to have dinner with some people in 2 hours, yikes.

We checked out our apartment, which is quite nice, and larger than expected, and freshened up a bit, then checked google maps and headed down to the tram station (about a 7 minute walk) to go to the restaurant which was chosen to be easy for us to get to. So we ate with a bunch of E's colleagues.

Let me take a minute to write a love song to the marinated, fried cheese that is a Czech speciality: Cheese, I love you, and I expect to return to OK twice as fat and twice as happy.

I was absolutely dropping after two hours, so we cut it short and came back and crashed into bed.

Next day E had to go to work! We had no food, but I had brought some instant Starbucks coffee, so we drank that black and then he headed off to the Czech Academy of Sciences, and I was left to try and figure out how to get us some groceries. After wandering around a bit, I found the local grocery store and bought as much as I could carry in the one bag I had brought with me. Even though it's a small neighborhood grocer, they had a good 30 or so types of fresh bread/rolls, and three aisles of cheese. OMG. Did I mention the fatter and happier thing yet? Then I tried to log onto work, which I was unable to do. Ah well. We went out to dinner that night, and had a mediocre meal at a local pub.

Friday E again went off to work and I had to figure out how to work long distance. Eventually I was able to get myself logged onto the server longlong distance and so got my hours in. I also bought a few more groceries so that I could make dinner that night.

Saturday we did the touristy thing and took the tram to the center of Prague where we walked across Charles Brdige and up (and up, and up) to the castle, then walked back down and across the bridge again, then walked to the astronomical clock. Even though it's still March, the numbers of tourists are astonishing. I'm glad we did this excursion when we did because I cannot imagine doing it at the height of the season. Anyway, it was only midafternoon after all that, but I was exhausted, so we took the tram back home and took a nap. (I am not as spry as I used to be, but I am definitely in much better shape than I have been the last two years -- I would never have been able to do all those steps on our last two European adventures.) I again cooked dinner.

Sunday our big adventure was to take the tram to the big Tesco Extra (an English chain, go figure) to stock up on groceries. So this place was like a Walmart or a Target, covering 2 floors (with cart escalators, very exciting to us Okie yokels). It was just part of an enourmous shopping mall. We walked around a bit and bought a coffee maker and then went in to Tesco for some groceries. We had both brought our backpacks (you have to pay for plastic bags at grocery stores) to carry the groceries home, plus I bought a cute little burlap shopper for my local shopping excursions. After another nap (jet lag is real), we went out for dinner at a very nice place that was a big improvement over the previous place. I anticipate this place becoming a regular spot for us.

So that brings us to today, which is Monday. E is at work, and I am here at the apartment, working away. I took a nice long midway walk, and made myself some lunch. I've got dinner (chicken thighs and potatoes, plus a salad) prepped and ready to go in the oven in bit. My plan is to make myself leave the apartment every day (unless it is storming) to take a walk and explore a bit and get some exercise. On today's walk I found a pho restaurant and two donner kabob places, which I am thrilled about.

So that is life in Prague. Very pleasant - more so than I expected, actually. Spring is definitely here and my winter gloom and doom seems very far away. I need to set some goals for myself, because there are definitely things I want to accomplish while I'm here.

In the meantime ... there are already four varieties of cheese in my fridge, and they are asking to be eaten.

Current Location: Praha

Well we bought our plane tickets and I have reserved and paid an apartment for 2 months. It is this one if you are interested. I have ordered a big Delsey suitcase from Amazon and bought a new laptop and accoutrements to use exclusively for work. I still need a new phone (my current one has had a terribly cracked screen for over a year), but other than that, hopefully the money hemorrhage can slow down now. It's fine, I've been saving for this outlay, but still, it's a bit of a gulp to throw all that cash around at once. So far I've managed to resist the temptation to buy a bunch of new clothes, although I did order some new bras and a swim top that all had to be sent back. But I really don't need anything except a good raincoat, which I can't seem to find, so I'll just make do with the crappy one I already have.

Am home today because the university is closed again due to "extreme wind chill." It was 7F this morning, although it's warmed up to nearly freezing now that it's afternoon. SO tired of this winter, but I shouldn't complain - at least no tornados like they had a few states over in Alabama.