Relovice: A Word That Contains No "R" Sound Whatsoever

It all started with a train ride.

There were compartments and everything. I felt like Harry Potter... Okay, let's face it, I felt like Hermione. And not even because she's a girl, but because she's a nerdy, overachieving, school-lover like myself. (If only my boyfriend Brian would stop dreaming he's Harry Potter and become Ron, we'd be set!)

We were traveling to Relovice in north Bohemia (still in the Czech Republic, in case you were wondering). There were 5 groups who all went on extremely different trips. Julia, Hannah and I ended up at some really old, beautiful art/community center owned by a woman named Lenka.

That's right, it was actually so pretty that I decided to break out the panorama setting on my camera once again. (Panorama would look so much nicer spelled with all a's. Panarama? Am I right? Maybe it started out as Pan-o-rama. Yep, that would explain it.)

When we arrived there was an outdoor feast and some cherry vodka shots waiting for us. (Apparently shots are the perfect way to welcome guests in the Czech countryside). We begun our tour that night, but I didn't take pictures until our second tour the next morning.

This place was pretty much your ideal, picturesque farmhouse that was once crumbling due to economic issues  in the former Sudetenland and is now well-kept and green. You know what I mean, right? No? Okay, photos ahead.

There was a pond:

There were dogs:

There were oodles of flowers and baths of sunshine:

 

And we were welcomed with shots and a European feast. What more could a girl ask for?

Our tour guide for the day was Jan, a man who inexplicably wore a scarf around his waist (Perhaps he has cold hips?). Not that I could complain, he let us go up on the roof and everything. (Where we climbed is to the left of that UTOPIA sign in the previous picture.)

He showed us a bunch of art from their last symposium, “Under the Rug.” Actually, he kept saying “Under the Carpet” but I know he was aiming for “rug” because things we don’t want to talk about are “swept under the rug,” not the carpet! I took pictures of my favorite pieces.

[Seriously, he translated all of the words and the only one I can remember is “angst,” which is both first and last. I’m sure the others were things like “hatred,” “repression,” etc. Just think of unpleasant words that one might spell with nails.]

[This guy took the symposium’s theme literally.]

One woman made a giant drawing and hung it from the opening in what used to be part of the brewery. It was once a room where they stored great barrels of beer and only a tiny amount of light got through the ceiling. The walls are so thick that there is a noticeable temperature difference when you walk in. Anyway, this had to do with ancestors, but I can’ t remember the title.

After our tour was almost done, Julia pointed to a window right above the place we were sleeping and asked what was up there. Jan led us up to the largest attic I’ve ever been in.

[Through that hole, it just KEEPS GOING.]

That afternoon, the farm’s owner Lenka drove us to the town her mother lives in: Litomeřice. They were having a Vinobrany. This means wine festival, people. 

During autumn a wine leftover called burcak (burr-check) goes on sale. It has pulp but is also really fruity, like alcoholic juice. I promise I didn’t get really drunk.

Lenka dropped us off and drove away to her mother’s house. She told us to meet her by the “tall thin thing with benches around it” at 6:30. She couldn’t think of the word in English but assured us it was not “steeple,” “tower,” “antenna,” or “pole.” (Note that we were constantly playing Catchphrase and Pictionary during this trip.) She also gave us strict instructions to take a picture of the "king" for her. What king? Apparently there was a parade, but we failed pitifully on the picture aspect. 

[Best I can give you is a sliver of the knights' outfits through a hat stand.]

Just to make Brian proud, I took a picture of our food AND drink. 

[Burcak tastes AND looks like grape juice.]

[So much delicious greasiness: the brown thing is fried cheese]

After pausing for a moment to ponder that caption as a cookbook title, you would be happy to hear that we did not have to make it through the whole fair without seeing that band that comes to every fair on earth. You know the band: it's made up of middle aged men playing classic rock cover songs and wearing old black band t-shirts from college. 

That's right. We got to hear Pink Floyd's "Just Another Brick in the VALL" and everthing. 

[Audience = fucking loving it]

This fair also had quote-unquote traditional things, like baskets and braided cheese and these cute cookies that say family names on them.

 

 [That there in that here pic is Lenka, our hostess.]

She showed us a pleasing view of Litomerice too!

That night we met some young German men that Lenka was somehow friends with, tried the local beer, and learned that for a small town, Litomerice has a damn good fireworks show. 

Later we met Lenka's mom, in her underwear. That was new. We slept at Lenka's mom's house and the next day went on a day trip to a wee town called Ustek.

What else happened on this trip? Pretty much everything. But I will save you the exhaustion by splitting it up. Coming tomorrow: "Devil in the Wee City."

My Prague Cottage

For some reason during week three there was a lull in my normally overactive picture-taking. Needless to say, I have not written a full length novel for you today.

One nice day, I shot a pic of the main square (namesti, if you will) of Roztocky. I was trying to go to the Post Office, which had sadly closed ten minutes ago.

After taking this, I decided to try and get a close-up of that couple on the bench to illustrate how strangely okay PDA is here... but unfortunately they were just cuddling and not making out or anything else these gutsy CR couples do.

Roztocky has an abundance of cute little shops, my favorite of which is "Dog Pet," though I have not yet ventured inside.

 

I also took a photo of the cottage I live in! OMG, motherfuckers!

That's okay to put this on the internet, right? No one knows exactly where it is. Wink.

Do you like the green and brown striped fence? Me too.

Oh! And don't let me forget my deaf and blind dog pet, Homer.

He doesn't really sleep on my bed this much, he only very rarely ponders it when Jarmila is gone.

Which leads me to... drumroll, trumpet blast... my BED! As they would say on every episode ever of MTV Cribs, "This is where the magic happens."

[And by "magic" I mean Homer slept there once.]

I have a pleasant view through the window every morning. Lets just say, there are flowers. Ready for it?

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I've also begun wearing air-dried clothes. So Prague. I know. 

Yep. That's my underwear and I am not ashamed. Also, we often see a pretty white cat in our backyard named Angie. Today I got her to let me pet her and found out she has one green eye and one blue eye. I didn't take a picture though... we don't know each other well enough yet. 

Let's see... what else to say? Jarmila has grandkids, as evidenced by her refrigerator. (Side note: I met some of these aforementioned kids on Skype the other day.)

The girl on the fridge is one of Jarmila's daughters. The English words are courtesy yours truly. 

I close with a picture of Naomi. She said, "I feel like such a bad-ass hipster right now, someone needs to take a picture!" 

Don't worry, she's not usually a hipster, it's just that she happened to be borrowing a guitar, wearing a scarf, AND smoking a cigarette she had rolled herself. The stars aligned. 

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.)