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march friday things
hi guys, time for a friday things-style post. i don’t know if it is just that winter has gone on for what feels like unbelievably too long, or if it’s so so close to spring break, but i’m just not having it lately, guys. it’s hard to summon up the ire for my work, i need way too much coffee, and my enthusiasm is starting to wane. (alex and i have a joke that whenever one of us uses the the word ‘wane’, the other person has to say, in a garth algar voice, “waaaaayyyyne?” because this is who we are. alas, it’s one more week ’til our prazdniny (holiday)…
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in the bleak mid-winter
fair warning: this is not exactly a “feel good” holiday post, but one full of “living life vibes”. this year has been one i will remember. mostly for good reasons, but it’s been a sad past week. this was the year that i went to my first czech wedding (reception), first celebration of new babies that were born, and sadly, also my first czech funeral. (hopefully my last, but you never can be sure). what i think it means is that i am living life. life is happening right now. i celebrated new life, i celebrated the joining of two lives, and mourned the loss of a friend and student of mine.…
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musings on identity & being an american
at one point, i thought that the longer i lived here, the more immersed in all things czech i would be to the point of “no going back”. and sometimes that feels like the case. the way i was wondering what i was doing getting on the airplane going back to the states this summer (that thought actually occurred). but then another thing happens: the longer i live in europe, the more thoughtful and also grateful i am to be an american. this is not to say another place is somehow “less than”, but rather, that i truly realize all the ways in which i am so american, but wouldn’t…
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a time and a place
this time of year always gets me thinking around my time studying in berlin, incidentally, ten years ago. this time of year when it would get dark at four o’clock and the sky would turn from neon-grey to a shroud of black. it was the coldest novembers i have ever lived through. so cold and dark, but i was deeply inspired and knew full well time was of the essence to make the most of my semester. this is my berlin – the short days, the long nights. although the summers are fantastic and are like a prize for making it through the other eight months of the year, cold,…
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autumn dreamland
one thing i really like about living in české budějovice is its proximity to some pretty interesting places. we are only two hours from both prague to the north and linz, austria to the south. of course, because of international public transport tariffs, prague is by far the more affordable place to head of the two when you’ve got a free day and wanna soak up some big(ger) city lovin’. especially if you are a loyal české dráhy (czech trains) customer like i am and rack up enough points on the regular to earn free train tickets (public service announcement: if you live in the czech republic and frequently travel…
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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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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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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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life lately /on pursuing your hobbies
hi all, did you have a nice halloween and first week of november? this was our most low-key halloween celebration to date as we were in moravia for the big “halloweekend”, as it’s come to be known, and that meant no dressing up for us this year! that’s just how the calendar days fell. i’ve learned when you get a long weekend, you don’t take it for granted! more from moravia coming very soon – i have just been too ding dang busy this week to even think about writing more than i already have, in my last post about my first day in the czech republic. a full schedule…
