Cold Cold Cold, But Settling In

As you may have guessed from this post's title, cold has settled in to the Czech Republic.  But, of course we aren't letting that hold us back.

The weekend was a lot of fun, and I really feel like I'm getting the hang of the city and public transportation now.  By far, the best place I think we've gone at night was Lucerna Friday night.  Right off one of the main shopping areas in Prague (Wenceslas Square, like the Times Square of Prague, for another NY reference), Lucerna is just like a club you would find in the U.S., but with people from 50 different countries all speaking different languages.  Friday nights at Lucerna are 80s nights (again, the obsession with the 80s music), and attracts a huge and diverse crowd of foreigners and Czechs alike.

Saturday, our new flat went to Tesco together, which is like an upscale Target in downtown Prague.  I'm pretty sure Tesco is somehow related to Costco, but on a slightly smaller scale.  We stocked up on some food, laundry detergent, and some basic house supplies.

Sunday night we watched the Super Bowl of course.  It started at 6:30 ET, which was 12:30 am on Monday our time.  But, we could never miss out on an American holiday.  Somehow, the majority of people on my program and a TON of other Americans all ended up at the same Irish sports bar to watch the game.  When I say that there were probably 40 people from Michigan there (mostly sorority girls of various sorts), I'm not exaggerating.  Not exactly what I expected from Prague, but it was the Super Bowl, so being around Americans was great.  Obviously, we all sang the national anthem as loud as we could as they sang it to start the game.  We left at halftime, but luckily the game was on tv at our flat...well, it was German tv, but watching the second half of the Super Bowl in Prague, in German language, is surely a memory I'll have for a while.

Sophie and Andrew, two of my new friends from Tulane who obviously are happy with the Super Bowl result.  I had to sport a football shirt of sorts, and Michigan is always classy.

Monday morning, we (tiredly) started Czech language classes.  The hardest part of Czech language for me so far has been pronouncing the different sounds that Czechs use, that we do not have in English.  There is a lot of teeth clenching involved and your tongue gets tired quickly.  I'm sure this will improve as time goes on.  After morning Czech, we had a couple lectures about communism and culture shock, one at the main building at CERGE and another a decent metro ride away in the CERGE Humanities building at Jinondice, towards the outskirts of Prague.  Highlights of the culture shock lecture include the fact that adjusting to a new place is like a roller coaster, so apparently in a few weeks I should expect to hit a low and be frustrated that I'm not in America (but then get over it), and that if a Czech girl looks at me for an extended period of time, that is like an open invitation (I guess like America?), so be careful.

The coolest thing to happen since my last post was on Monday afternoon.  A while back, I got an e-mail saying that if we wanted to be paired up with a Czech student, we could.  I thought this was a great opportunity, so replied that I want to have a Czech partner.  Well, Monday afternoon I met Tereza, a Czech university student my age who was also interested in meeting an American.

We walked for a little bit and ended up at one of her favorite cafe places in Old Town near the Charles Bridge.  After staying there for a couple hours, we walked a little bit more towards my flat across the river and had a glass of wine at another small place near home, where she said a lot of Czech students hang out.

The experience was awesome.  I'm pretty sure I was the only non-Czech in both places for starters, and all along the way she pointed out some fun places to go, none of which I had ever heard of from Americans who had been to Prague before.  These includes Jazz clubs with live music, cool coffee shops, and a hugely traditional Czech bar that we poked our head into, which was filled with smoke, long benches with chairs, and older Czech men drinking and gossiping.

The bottom line is this:  American and Czech 20-year olds are not all that different.  She likes to go out to get drinks, or dance, or hang out with friends.  Her family lives in a suburb of Prague, and her dad, like most Czechs, enjoys typical Czech food and beer.  She actually studied in American during high school, in Las Vegas of all places.  We basically talked about everything, from my university life to her interests and interests of typical Czechs.  I really want to continue learning about Czechs my age, and maybe make some new friends in the process.

 

Ahbra, Doug (Dougie), Sophie, and Me with the Charles Bridge and Prague Castle in the background.

That brings us to today (because after we got together yesterday, I basically passed out and caught up on sleep).  We continued our attempt at learning Czech language, focusing on some verbs and some basic phrases.  Hopefully I can impress some people back in Ann Arbor next year.  We then had the coldest of the coldest tours I've ever gone on.  Our tour guide was awesome, and it was really the first time we were taken through Old Town from a historical perspective.  But it was so cold I even bought a scarf (I swore I would never wear one, but everyone here does).  I have plenty of new places to explore in Old Town alone.  It is so easy to get lost among the streets and find something spectacular.

Tomorrow is Jewish Day of our general orientation period, after morning Czech of course.  We are having a lecture about Jewish legacy in Prague and the Czech Republic, and then getting a guided tour of the Jewish Quarter in Prague.  I'm extremely excited to see this part of town, which I haven't ventured into at all yet.  So much history and beauty here...this semester is going to be gone before I know it.