The Most Photogenic City I've Ever Met

Český Krumlov (CHESS-key KROOM-love), a city of castles and red roofs. Get ready for photo-overload because all my pictures of this locale were inexplicably good.

First of all, it is time to hand out the Most Adorable Hotel Room Award. Note that I don't usually waste my time with hotel pictures.

Like I always say, "You know it's a good hotel if there's a violin (viola??) on the wall."

They also had mini sculptures on their staircase.

[so I exaggerated on the "ALL my pictures were good" thing...]

On the first full day, Aidan and I decided to explore the ol' fairy-land. The place was beautiful, albeit a tad touristy. To my surprise, not a single person in our group complained about that. I believe it was because our regional stays were draining. Enjoyable, but definitely draining. We needed a cheery, touristy break.

Is that not what I just said? Gorgeous, yet the peasant clothes are clearly worn by people in the tourism business. I delicately framed it so that the car on the left would add a hint of irony. I have a very complex relationship with technology.

(Just kidding)

Here is Aidan, looking out upon the town. 

[Probably pondering the meaning of life or something.]

And a widdle biddle wiver! Ano, prosim! ("Yes, please!")

Even the stupid wall we were near was pretty.

 Plus I got to tour the tourists. 

Next we found a photogenic church. Sexy, even. (Am I allowed to say that?)

[I call zees one "Yin and zee Yang"]
 

WAIT a second!

Panoramic Interlude!

Then we saw another pretty building and another pretty building and a pretty wall...

['Tis a town of many pretty walls.]

Soon enough, our group--

 [Huzzah!]

--got together and went on a tour of the town's massive castle. It is the second biggest in the country only because it was illegal for this aristocrat to build it bigger than the king's palace.

["You may recognize me from other pics. I'm kind of a big deal."]

The outside walls have been painted on; it was totally vogue at the time.

[totally_fake_bricks@yahoo.com]

I saw this in other nooks and crannies in the Krumlov...

Oh and speaking of bears!

There were bears living in the moat! No lions or tigers, but still. 

An apparently this stemmed from a tradition that was hundreds of years old. When we were inside the castle, nearly every room was furnished with a bear-skin rug.

Sadly, we weren't allowed to take pictures of the inside. Let me appease you with these pictures of a fountain from the "front yard" instead.

So that was pretty. WAIT a second. This just in! I illegally took a single picture of a room from inside the castle. 'Twas the Baroque theater that is still in use today.

[The fancy columns are hand-painted on wood, there are other flat painted props and sound-effect makers too.]

This Baroque theater is rare because the directors during that time loved to incorporate fireworks into the show. This practice typically led to fires. 

Outside the castle was yet another photo-magic-calendar-worthy view.

[peep hole!]

The last bit of the castle tour was a walk through one of those castle gardens. You know, the ones that are almost too perfect and geometrically stable? Still pretty, but I like my gardens a bit more wild. 

That night, we went to a restaurant that served traditional Roma (or Gypsy) food. They played music too. 

[Joe and Claire featured in: the least blurry picture I have due to my stubborn avoidance of the flash setting.]

That is all for today, my fine-feathered readers. 

p.s.

I'm Sorry, but Fuck that Walk

(I have a great story to tell you, but only two (low quality) pictures. I guess I will revert to my old days of recreating my facial expressions at the time. You're welcome, of course.)

After Terezin, we returned to Rehlovice, Lenka's old farmhouse turned art studio and gallery.

Before Terezin, I caught a horrible coldish flu. I tried to set it free but it would not go. The night before returning to Rehlovice I was wearing all of my sweatshirts and shivering under two blankets. I felt a little better the next day, but still wanted to nap constantly.

In the morning, Lenka was running errands and her mom was left to entertain us. Remember how the first time we met her mother, she was wearing nothing but a black bra and underwear?

Her name was something Czech but her nickname was Bohous (Bo-hoosh). She was constantly talking to us but did not speak a word of English. Sometimes she was drawing pictures to tell us things and other times she was playing charades or motioning to objects in the room.

She also let us read her diary, which had a mini picture for each day. The pictures ranged from mini-doodles to elaborate, colored pictures to pages which utilized stickers and gel pens. 

Anyway, we woke up to this note:

 [Ignore Minnesota, that was me showing Julia the shape of Lake Superior]

Why the king was relevant, we had no idea. For some reason we thought the walk might lead us to pick up Lenka or else Bohous' grandkids (last night she had said the word "tomorrow" in relation to them during some mis-communicated story).

I had a sinus headache and slime dripping from my nose.

It was pretty hot out too.

We walked along the side of a highway, stopping constantly to learn the Czech words for grass, sky, horse, and anything else Bohous could point to. She made us stop next to an ugly bush and smell it for nearly ten minutes before we figured out that Pivo, pivo ("beer, beer") meant we were smelling hops.

At this point I may have felt something like this:

We also stopped at a tourist advertisement (in Czech) and learned where we were on the map in relation to historical places, but not why such places were historical.

Eventually we came to a park with a loonnngg path that lead to a statue of a plow. Of course, Bohous marched our sniffling faces right over there.

Photo number one.

I know, right? You can hardly see the tip of the plow. Bohous insisted it was a "tractor" (in English) but I knew better. She also pointed to the monument and said something about Vaclav Havel. We had no idea why this place was important, but it said 1945 on the side.

We walked, walked, walked walked.

Eventually, we came to a tiny bar in the middle of the countryside. (One can find alcohol anywhere in the Czech Republic.) There was a plaque on the outside; I think it was a historical bar.

Bohous obviously decided to buy us large beers at noon that day. A blonde three-year-old with ice cream smudges on his face carried them over to us. The bartender was so excited to see us there that he let us try a free beer with a really high alcohol content AND some port.

Now we were sick, hot, and drunk.

Delicious.

We thought at this point we would turn back or meet someone or...

Instead, we walked down a dirt road lined with cottages, yelling, "HALLO! HALLO!" (Bohous started it.)

"HALLO!"

"HALLO!"

"Why are we doing this?" I ask Julia.

"Why are we drunk?" A logical answer.

My last picture was wasted on a garden filled with kitsch. I was merely excited because the word was the same in German (Bohous is bilingual, just not in English) and English. The camera promptly died.

We walked and walked. Bohous pointed to some green gunk in a stream and asked Julia for the English word.

"Muck," she said, despite my argument that "algae" would have been more appropriate.

Next, Bohous walked up to a cottage and rang the doorbell on the gate. "Friend? Colleague? Boyfriend?" we asked in Czech.

Nope. A woman strolled out in her bathrobe and Bohous asked her for directions.
 Where were we going.

We made it to a little stone wall with a bronze lion head spitting water. Bohous told us to drink it. We weren't convinced until she drank it herself and washed her face. The water was refreshing, but it made my nose run to bend over and drink it.

Bohous pointed to the fountain and said, "Clean," to the river and said, "Muck." Then she taught us the Czech words for "clean" and "muck."

"Clean, muck." "Cisni, spinovae." said we. Over and over.

After doing some meditational pose per Bohous' request, we started walking back. It took a really long time if you were wondering. I was less drunk, equally sick, and more hot. 

On the way back, we wanted to learn the Czech national anthem from Bohous, but our only strategy for asking was to sing the American national anthem and then say, "Cesky??" This did not work. Eventually, she did teach us some sort of marching song. We sang it many times walking on the edge of a sidewalk-less road. Excuse me, marching. Bohous had us march, which is how we came to the conclusion it was a marching song.

When we returned, hours later, Julia said, "I'm sorry, but fuck that walk." I whole-heartedly agreed. Though now I love the story so much that I'm glad it happened.

Homestay in Roztocky

Hey everyone, I would like to start out by saying that I didn't fail my goal right away. I wanted to blog yesterday but my computer decided it hates the internet at my homestay. So I'm at school right now.

Speaking of homestay, I haven't told you about that at all yet because it started this week! Now I haven't taken pictures of my hostmom or her house yet because I have to ask her to make sure its okay to put them online and whatnot. But I can give you a snippet about the hostfam:

I live with Jarmila and her blind dog Homer north of Prague. She has a cute little house with a green gate. Homer bumps into everything and can't hear very well, but he's very fluffy which makes up for it. Jarmila has three older daughters who are moved out of the house. Two of them have kids, two of them live in England, and one lives in Amsterdam but is currently on an archeological dig in Greece with her Canadian husband. I met the middle daughter and her children over Skype and marveled at the wonders of technology.

Anyway, my class had a big dinner Saturday night where we met our families. The next day they picked us up.

Jarmila and I took a walk around her (aka OUR) hometown of Roztocky on Sunday. This is a place one might deem a "liddle widdle town" because its very adorable, contains cottages and is near a river.

We also walked down to this really old church as well, but we had no money to pay for the tours so I'll show you pictures of that later... SPOILER ALERT: WE WENT ON THE TOUR THE NEXT WEEKEND.

Monday morning my hostmom rode the bus with me to help me get to school. (Yes, this is real life and I'm 22.)

On the way home I thought I knew what I was doing alone but got off at completely the wrong stop. After wandering around a bit I caved in and gave my hostmom a ring. She told me how to get home of cours,e but my pride was a bit unhappy.

I took a (mediocre, frantic) picture of the right bus stop when I got home because I was so happy to see it.

On Wednesday we saw some art in my studio art class (no way!).

The only piece I took a picture of was this crazy wall-sized picture made entirely out of staples.

[detail]

[even smaller detail]

 Also, our kind teacher Jan (pronounced "yan" and I def. can't remember his last name at the moment) gave us plastic cutouts shaped like the Czech Republic. Awwww! I'm going to pull it out every time someone asks if I went to Czechoslovakia. 

Another night that week (Thursday, perhaps?), Jarmila made fruit filled dumplings. I discovered the key to making them really good: butter, sugar, cinnamon AND curd cheese. 

Brian, sometimes I think of your Europe travel blog, and I realize the only pictures I take of food are dessert.

Another day we went to the mall--not everything we do has to be traditional Czech--and I took a picture of this horse lamp at the (relatively) expensive cafe we went to.

[Both Naomi & Lee seem to be humoring me...]

On Friday we went to the Kampa museum to look at "pre-war art," which actually meant Kupka's art; he was one of the first abstract painters. We couldn't photograph his stuff, but they had a quality sculpture garden:

 ["Open Wall"]

[detail: there's paint in them bricks!]

 [reminded me of Lipchitz... not by him though]

Afterward we went to a cafe flanked by a lot of wall and not very much window.

On Sunday I went back to the Kampa, because we have to write a small paper about an art exhibit. It was the overachiever in me that made me go back whilst others are just writing about things we saw in class...

The artist I'm going to write about is Marian Karel, who currently has a big exhibit there.

[if Sten Nilsson read my blog he would totally relate.]

 I noticed more pretty stuff outside even though it was raining...

[get it, "pretty"?]

 

I also creeped on some Czech boys who were making a film on a pretty walkway where the trees thought it was autumn.

[or perhaps I should have told you they were in love?]

OKAY ALREADY, one more thing, this has been lengthier than I planned!

Jarmila took me to an exhibit of fair souvenirs from hundreds of years ago when "fair" mean pilgrimage or Christian processional.

[Mary of Madonna and Child can look rather manly in the wrong hands]

[Aha! So cheap/flimsy things are not unique to the modern fair!]

Damn it! That wasn't the last thing. Here are some photos from Levy Hradoc, a church that has been around since the 8th century or so... the oldest church in the area in fact. (Remember ages ago when your read something about a spoiler alert? THIS is what I was spoiling for you.)

[our tour guide refused to speak English for the self-centered American.]

[original stone foundations, below the current church]

Goodbye, cao, ahoj, na schledanou, until next week! 

(Or if I am wise it will be sooner because I take so many freaking photos each week.)