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back from USA + 10 things i love about home
hi friends, happy september. i feel like i’m just guiltily creeping back to writing after being m.i.a. for about a month because holy heck, it’s been a month. i’ve been back in the czech republic for just a couple days now and errrmahgerd, i am still jet-lagged as a mofo – this has got to be one of the worst instances of it i can recall. (case in point: it’s 9:15am on a saturday morning and i’ve already read, taken the dog out, had breakfast, read some blogs, then lounged around while loudly complaining about how tired i am) we just completed a five week trip across four states, and…
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slow pace or rat race?
happy june! we are entering one of the best times of the year and i couldn’t be more pleased with these light evenings and warm sunny days. not only that, we have now had our little dog for six whole months now (!!!) and next month we’ll be headed back to the united states for five weeks! life is so good. lately we’ve just been living the “south bohemia” life – nothing much to put on paper. in fact, i suppose that’s why i haven’t had much to say lately (that i haven’t already micro-blogged on instagram, that is – hah). i certainly have been around and not too busy (although…
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what i’ve learned about language learning after 4+ years abroad
“if i spend years in central europe without even bothering to study languages… what a waste of time that would be!” i had this thought shortly after a fateful conversation occurred, the one that spurred me to finally sign up for a czech language class. more and more, this statement continues to be so correct. since last autumn, i’ve kicked my language learning into high gear when my german group course was cancelled, taking it as a sign to sign up for an individual german tutor. so since october, i’ve had weekly german and czech lessons… but turns out, studying two languages simultaneously takes a lot of work. suddenly, it…
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one month of dog
alright, so it’s actually been over a month and a half now (hah) by the time i actually got this post out, so even though i’m stickin’ with my catchy title, it’s more like ‘over a month and a half with dog’. ferdinand’s first month with us was a lot like you’d might expect when you get a new pet. it’s a major adjustment period, especially from a dog that spent a year living on a farm in a kennel with other dogs to a flat in the city by himself. the bad the first two weeks of the house-breaking process. i guess because he was one year old when…
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a year of travels: 2016
2016 was (mostly) all sunshine and rainbows over in these parts: i can’t believe (unlike previous years) that we managed some travel in every single month of the year. it really goes to show what you can find in your own backyard if you embrace it. last january, almost a year from now, we experienced highly frenetic weather: the earlier part with a cold burst of snow (the only of that winter!) and in the latter part, temps around 12ºC, which made day trips to places like třeboň (above) ideal. we dined on “carp fries” at supinka restaurant (the best fish restaurant probably in the country – highly recommended!) and marveled in…
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those magical days
even though christmas is over, i do love that stretch of days between the holiday and the new year. nobody is really in town yet, everything is running slowly and mostly still, everyone’s playing, everyone’s happy… i am embracing it this year (as i mentioned in the last post) rather than feeling guilty for lack of productivity. if there’s any time to take it easy, it’s now! i hope everyone had a wonderful holiday! we started ours with a walk through krumlov and took ferdie on his first trip (with a bus ride longer than ten minutes). he did okayyyyy, until he upchucked on the floor of the bus! (mental…
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friday things: thanksgiving weekend
it seems that after the initial dust cloud settled after the first week of the american election, things starting to feel a little happier, thank goodness. so i bring you five happy things for the end of this third week of the month, from recent trips to expat life successes… 1. vienna! we enjoyed a long weekend in the austrian capital last week. although busybusybusy, it was so good! shopping, eating schnitzels as big as our ‘eads at figmüller, seeing the pointillism exhibition at the albertina (i do adore this museum), wandering around the innere stadt until our feet felt like falling off, and of course… plenty of cakes and…
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traveling is not everything
so you’re probably looking at this title thinking “duhhh”, or you’re in the “the more, the better” camp, like some many of us living abroad when it comes to travel. while it certainly can bring some much needed excitement to life (travel is accelerated living!), there’s something to be said for taking some time to be at home for awhile. after our big nordland adventure this summer, we have planned and gone on some great (shorter) trips, but the focus is, happily, more at home right now. what are the advantages to not traveling? 1. doing all the local things drinks with friends, going to the market, snuggly weekend brunches…
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so bad, yet so good
alex and i have talked before, half jokingly, about that if trump gets elected, i guess we’re staying here four more years. this was when we both believed there was not a single chance in a million years this would be happening to our country. and yet, here we are. i certainly never left the united states on any political ground, whatsoever. no, i just wanted to live in another country, study other languages, learn about other cultures, and work so i could travel and use central europe as my spring-board, if you will. then, the more time we spent here, we woke up to the fact that, “wow, life…
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indian summer
babí léto. altweibersommer. (both names relating to old people!) whatever you want to call it, we are experiencing one heck of an indian summer in central europe. it is now the perfect temperature for things like hiking! it occurred to me last week that i was not in a rut, per se, but forgetting that i live in europe and how much there is to explore around here. i promptly planned two local trips to celebrate st. wenceslaus day holidays that grace the end of september here in czechland. the first was finally climbing klet’ hill (last time, we took the chair-lift!) and hiking down into krumlov for some folklore festivities. what…
