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But, I’m an immigrant.
I have a wonderful student I’ve been teaching English to for ten years who is a retiree. The sweetest gentleman, he’s definitely become my Czech grandpa and loves bringing gifts to little M at any opportunity. However, we don’t exactly see eye-to-eye regarding politics so I try to avoid this topic whenever possible. The other week we were discussing the recent election here in the Czech Republic. He asked me if I was supporting any particular party and I told him although I’m not a citizen and can’t vote, I support whichever party is most sympathetic to immigrants. Him: But why? Me: You see… I am an immigrant. Him: Nooooo.…
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Week 45-48 of 2024 (Year in Review) – NOVEMBER + Reflecting on Being in the Czech Republic for 12 Years
Been thinking a lot about this whole life adventure this blog is named for lately, which is something I do obviously quite a lot, maybe too much. But I think, now, after twelve years of living here, for right now I’ve made peace with the fact that this, this right here, the adventure that I named this blog after thinking it was just, well, an adventure is actually my honest-to-god real life. It took me twelve years to get to this realization or at least feel it fully. I’ve lived in Ceske Budejovice in this flat longer than in any one residence in my entire life. It’s getting real. This…
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Weeks 23-26 of 2024 (In Review) – The Month of June
Happy summer, (Northern hemisphere) friends! I’m lumping the update together into a nice and tidy June bundle so I get on track with the seemingly impossible-to-complete Year in Review challenge. June has been lovely this year, with Alex off work, things are just going nice and slow. Lots of time for playing in the park, naps, cooking, visiting and just all the good things in life. But first, let’s get to the important thing as our little one turned two a couple weeks ago! We went to the zoo to celebrate and some friends of ours met us there on that completely rainy June Monday, still a perfect way to…
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Week 21 & 22 of 2024 (Year In Review)
I sometimes feel like laughing inside that I chose this year, this “last year of my maternity leave” year to do this blogging experiment. I suppose it’s because sometimes I feel like maternity leave feels a little bit floating and aimless a lot of the time, which means it always feels weird to write about, but I know, truly know that these are days I will look back on super nostalgically. As we get ready to celebrate our little Mouse who turns two in less than a week and I busy myself with gathering the presents (I am far too excited) and cake recipes together, I am definitely already feeling…
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Week 1 & 2 of 2024 (In Review)
I’m trying something new this year. Every week (or two) I’m writing in just to document the usual daily life stuff that went on this year, my last year on maternity leave. This might just be mostly text, not a lot of photos, but the point is just to document the little things in an effort to blog more. Let’s see how it goes. It was another quiet New Year’s Eve night for us new parents, eating nachos and watching The Big Fat Quiz of the Year while baby slumbered, and I’d been anxious (for months!) about him waking thanks to the war-zone-like New Years’ fireworks around the city center.…
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I Want You To Know.
Dear Our One-Year-Old Growing Little Mouse, This week you turned one! Your first year has both flown by and yet also I can recall every little step of the way, every week with every little new change that happened between last summer and now. It has been one of the greatest years of our lives, being together with you and seeing you grow. Your parents traveled to the Czech Republic over ten years ago – we decided to embark on a big adventure, partially because of the yet unsatisfied curiosity of wanting to experience living in another country and have some international adventures. I felt that there was always some…
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When You Miss the Country Right Outside Your Window (+ Holiday Plans)
Hello friends, hope you’ve been well. It’s another strange holiday season, thankfully a bit less strange than last year. They thought they could cancel all Christmas markets in the Czech Republic: the ordinance came out on Thanksgiving Day and we all scrambled to enjoy it properly one last time even though I forgot to even look at the stalls or buy anything! However, what ended up happening at least in Budejovice is that everything else remained open: the skating rink, the rides (yes, we have rides!) and even some beverage stands! It’s the Christmas market minus the market part, which is still being heartily enjoyed by everyone here in South…
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My Up and Down (Will it? Won’t it?) Vaccination Week
I have mentioned in what feels like every recent posts that the vaccination roll-out in Europe is sloooooow. In the Czech Republic up until now, it really felt like it could not be worse. Not even did it take until March before I actually heard of people I know getting vaccinated (then, just doctors or the elderly), there were reports left and right about how difficult it was for foreigners to get vaccinated. Whether it was that their foreign-sounding name didn’t fit into the system, or their private health insurance (not the public state insurance that Czechs use) was not an option when registering. I spent March and April in…
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A Time of Simple Holidays
Well, it’s hard to write anything without a computer, isn’t it? Fortunately I feel like I have an office again, a little home again, and my brain can sort of organize itself properly. (Note: Try to avoid ever having to purchase a new computer in mid-December. It is not the time.) Here we are in December, finally at the tail end of 2020. Funny about this year. As I’ve now been quite settled in České Budějovice for nearly eight years and counting, there isn’t a lot of expat stuff or cultural differences that I feel compelled to write about. Most of it is no longer so novel. Add to that…
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Upgrade Season
The end of summer is always upgrade season for us kids. It’s usually the time of the year that we come back from whatever summer adventures we’ve undertaken, walk in our house and say man, that table’s got to go or I can’t believe we still haven’t got that print framed. You see, we’ve lived in a furnished flat since the beginning of 2013. Most of our furniture is used and loved hand-me-downs (which I am so, so grateful to have been able to use!) or just whatever furniture that friends of ours don’t want anymore. Because we never knew how long we’d stay, I’ve always been reluctant to purchase…
