Overview of Week One

I've been planning on updating ya'll for about four days now, but I swear, each day has been even busier than the day before it! I can now semi-confidently say that I am beginning to become more comfortable with the city and the life in Praha, and that's not just because I've literally taken the wrong metro/tram/bus at least once a day, which often result in me landing myself somewhere off the map of Praha itself ( story to come later in the post.) This whole week has been a orientation/ get to know the city type of week, with mandatory intensive czech classes for two and a half hours a day as well as various lectures and tours around the city. I've been making my rounds at the grocery store, everyday goods store where I was able to get shampoo etc. as well as to the cell phone store where I unlocked a phone given to me by my dear friend Jesse who was on tour around Europe and happened to have an extra cell phone ( this new phone is called the Bullet, due to its Bullet like appearance). I have been eating out a lot ( A LOT of mexican and italian, as czech food really isn't that great. But I will give a shout out to fried cheese, that stuff is gooooood!) , as food is very cheap in restaurants due to the exchange rate.  I've explored a bit of Praha's history through its architecture and landmarks, as well as experienced a bit of the nightlife.

NYU in Prague is located right in the middle of Old Town Square, one of the main tourist destinations for not only the beautiful buildings, but because of this super cool clock called the Astronomical Clock, which is really fascinating, so you should read up on it (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prague_Astronomical_Clock) !

           (Some pals, Grace and Kelly, or Grace Kelly.)

On Tuesday, I was incredibly happy to be able to hang with my friend Jesse and his band(s) Snuffaluffagus and Witt. Not only are they really talented dudes, but they were so much fun and I had a blast exploring Praha with them. For the past month of so they had been touring Europe, so on their way home they made a bit stop to SEE ME ( as I like to tell myself) and Praha, and were welcomed to the city by not only getting their rental car window smashed but by a amp being stolen as well. Nothing says " Enjoy your stay" like filing a police report! It was with the boys that I experienced my first "Czech" food, which were potato dumplings that were very thick and took a very long time to chew. I also tried a bit of "knee", whose knee I do not know, but I'm not gonna lie, it was tasty!

  ( Presenting Jesse Kranzler. Cutest couple in the Czech Republic.)

( Knee.)

 ( Presenting Snuffaluffagus and Witt. After Czech meal, Before drive to Germany, With taped window.)

Throughout the week, I've been doing a lot of activities in conjunction with my school. On Tuesday night I went to the National Theatre to see the ballet  " The Nutcracker/ Christmas Carol," a combination of the two stories. With my luck, I got shut out of my seat for the first half of the performance because I was standing in a ridiculous bathroom line, and as soon as I got out of the bathroom, BAM! doors closed, no re-entry. But from what I saw, it was lovely. Ballet always is. It's so pretty and it brings me back to my childhood days where I thought I too could dance ballet and go to Juilliard like in Save the Last Dance so I would steal my cousin's old pointe shoes and dance around my house. One of the most special things I have done is go on a tour of Jewish Prague around Josefov ( The Jewish Headquarters), where we visited several synagogues and a cemetery world famous because it is "layered," housing over 12,000 tombstones with as many as 100,000 burials in all. 

 It is really powerful yet heartbreaking to hear Jewish History. The majority of my best and closest friends are Jewish, and living in a predominately Jewish community in Florida as well as attending a predominately Jewish summer camp in Canada for over 9 years, I have always had a fascination of the Jewish religion. Although I  don't consider myself a very religious person and I don't really support organized religion, I have my own personalized and individualized beliefs that carry me through this life. But although I wouldn't be able to identify myself as one type of religion over another, I have always found it so incredible beautiful that no matter how religious or unreligious a person who identifies as Jewish is, they are always very passionate about their religion. I had noticed this since at summer camp most friends went to Jewish Academies, but on the Praha Jewish tour it was the first time that I was actually able to see the passion, feel the passion myself.  In a famous synagogue called the " Old New Synagogue" that was modeled off of the fallen temple in Israel, my tour guide, a Czech culture attaché in Israel, sang a beautiful prayer song that literally brought me to tears because in those few moments I felt the synagogue come to life. It was in this song and in the vibrations his voice was making off of the temple walls that I was actually able to feel the pride, love, and passion of the Jewish religion. It was in this song that I was finally able to pin-point why the Jewish religion has always fascinated me, why I have always been interested in the religious lives of my Jewish friends, and it was because of the undying devotion and belief to the religion that many of their grandfathers, great grandfathers, grandmothers, uncles, aunts, brothers and sisters had to unfortunately fight to the death for.

Something they introduced to all the students was the Velvet Revolution, and the impact it has had on the country. They screened the documentary " Power of the Powerless," an American made documentary covering the Velvet Revolution, but because I have an unbeatable illness called "falling alseep everywhere and anywhere I possible can /having to fall asleep every time I'm either sitting in a classroom with a talking professor or  in a dark warm room with comfortable chairs AKA old man's syndrome" I missed a lot of the documentary. Interested in what this "Velvet Revolution" was all about, I came home that night and did hours of research that extended to reading about communism, Stalinism, totalitarianism, etc. The Velvet Revolution was basically a two month non-violent revolution in Czechoslovakia during 1989 where its people, mostly the youth, fought to end communism and overthrow the communist government. Taking a step back, how absolutely breathtaking is it to think about how a country who had been under a communist regime for over 40 years as well as under Nazi rule was completely changed to a democratic nation in UNDER TWO MONTHS? Another point that completely baffles me: How did the people who had been repressed for almost if not all of their lives develop a voice that they believed would be heard? What gave the 100,000 Czechoslovakia people who had been protesting the hope, courage, and belief, that a demonstration was needed in order to change the nature of its country? For a nation of people who had always had their voices and individual rights kept from them, it is incredible to digest the reality that it was those two things that gave them back what was rightfully theirs. My czech class and I had an hour or so discussion with my beautifully sweet and kind czech teacher Petra about the Velvet Revolution, the after effects of it, and the reality of the country. Speaking very openly and candid, Petra explained how her family was as active as one could have been during the communist regime without completely being thrown to jail for life. Her father fled to Britain during World War II, which eventually led him to jail. After being released, he worked as a chemical researcher in Praha. Her father once again saw the insides of a jail cell when he along with a few other of his colleagues and friends were caught with British books they had smuggled back into the country. Petra's oldest sister would type up and distribute radical pamphlets, although Petra never got to ask what was in them because not only was speaking about any revolutionary action forbidden, but her sister sadly passed away two months before she would have seen what all her hard work and her fight had done: given her people freedom. Petra herself was 17 years old when the Velvet Revolution occurred, and she is proud to say she participated in it. She still recalls when at age 12 she was caught by her teacher passing a note to a friend that said she was listening to American radio the night before, an illegal act in all communist countries at the time because there was a censorship by the government on all news, all media.  Petra introduced the reality that many people, especially the older generation, have had a hard time adjusting to this democratic government even 20 years after it has been in place because they have never known the freedom that comes with making decisions. In their earlier lifetime, they had one yogurt and one yogurt only and were lucky if they even got a yogurt, but today they have different flavors, different companies. The older generation also does not like to discuss the communist regime nor do they enjoy teaching it in schools because many are still very ashamed that they did not do anything sooner or they are ashamed that in those hard times they did some things ( such as give information about others to the secret police) that they are also not proud of. Petra herself admitted that she was once very angry and disappointed that her parents did not fight earlier  and harder for freedom. By having a little more knowledge of the Czech history, I can now begin to understand many reasons why Czech's are the way they are. Czech's are very reserved and very quiet, especially in public, and that partially stems from the fact that merely 20 years ago, they could not trust anyone, thus speaking in public would only further jeopardize them.

Going hand in hand with my new found fascination to the history of the Czech Republic, I had the most interesting thing said to me at a local bar the other night by a older Czech man, Michael. While discussing his short lived residency in Australia, Michael turned to me, pivo in hand and told me with the most sincere look in his eyes how much he, as well as many Czechs, appreciates and admires the United States of America for its strength, its presence and dominates in the world, as well as for the ability to stand as a role model to all other countries. I was perplexed. As an American, I have very rarely if ever looked at the rest of the world admiring what my country has done for them over what they believe is destroying the economy, deteriorating the world in general. It's as if as Americans we are subconsciously convinced that the rest of the world hates us and wants to see us go down. I am guilty in saying that even at times I rarely see the positive that my own country has done in the world over the negative. Michael's  words truly touched my heart, as I am still moved by it. I was once again given hope that this world will become a peaceful place before the blood stops flowing in my veins and my body lays to rest.

On a happier note----

I have discovered how I'm going to beat this freezing winter: pivo. I am not exaggerating when I say that pivo has almost become more dominate in my diet than water. I was not lying when I said I was having pivo not just for me, but for all of you! I am just so into the here and now that I'm not thinking of what's going to happen to me ( well, mostly my body and figure) if I continue to drink pivo at least three times a day as well as stuff my face with fresh warm baguettes, fried cheese, and enchiladas. Although staying healthy to me is very important, I'm not going to let it dominate my life right now, now in this experience. I am not holding back on anything, not the nutella, not the KFC chicken sandwiches that taste oh so delicious when one is drunk, not the incredibly hand rolled pasta.  I'm not going to think about calories or trans fat, but instead just continue to do daily exercise such as yoga and aerobics,  and just enjoy myself. I am excited to share that I tried absinthe for the first time, and although lighting sugar on fire and placing it inside my shot was exciting, I saw no green fairy.  But do not fear, I have hope in this European treasure. All it means is it just needs a second chance to prove me wrong. My new friends and I have been exploring the nightlife of Praha without overdoing or overwhelming ourselves. So far we've done the big club thing at a place called Mecca, a two floor club with a techno floor and a 60's/70's/80's/90's floor, where it was a mix of young NYU kids and creepy old Czech man checking both us and adult "dancers" out. Although the techno got to me after a few hours, I've never been so happy to hear things such as Backstreet Boys, "I Get Knocked Down", and Modonna  being played. Mecca made me realize that next to my sister Sandy, Kelly is the best dancing partner ever. That girl can dance, brah. It's probably a Berkeley bay thing. Along with exploring night time hang outs,  I, along with Kelly, have  had to unfortunately ( or fortunately?) explore the Praha transit system by getting constantly very lost on it. Although we have often taking the wrong trams or gone in the opposite direction, nothing can yet top off our journey which involved a tram going the COMPLETE opposite direction of the city that got us off the Praha map,  a bus which we believed would take us the way we had come from but which actually took us up and around a mountain giving us a complete view of the city ( during this bus ride I believed that we were not only heading towards Germany, but I truly thought I would  never get home), until the bus finally heard our request to Stop which coincidently was the end of a subway line. With luck on our side, it was by this point 5 a.m. which meant the metros were up and  running again and we were able to take the subway (with a transfer) all the way home. What an adventure!

                            ( Only in Europe.) 

I'm already beginning to feel that feeling of disconnection. Not permanent disconnection, just a temporary disconnection from my real life back in the USA. It's really hard for me to be here in my all of my mind and body if I'm constantly pulling myself back to my old world. This is why I'm kind of grateful that I didn't even try to keep my blackberry connected. I'm living in a new world where I just kind of do whatever I want, with no social obligations to text people, call them, or try to avoid them. I'm living back in a world where everything is a lot more simpler- although I have a cell phone, I never hear it ring. I just feel such a sense of freedom from the ability to disappear for a little bit, not run away from anything, but just kind of put whatever I was dealing with into a  perspective outside of my own perspective. Although I have meet some incredible people thus far and have danced, enjoyed myself, and laughed harder and more genuine than I think I ever have in the past few years, I'm finding real comfort in the fact that I am truly in this alone. And being in it alone means putting myself truly and with all my heart into this new world I am exploring and discovering with not too many outlets back to my old world. 

                    ( Me and a new friend.)

( No matter where I go, I will still manage to be Silly Illy.)

Most importantly, I am feeling very happy here. And I'm excited to start school this week and regulate myself, establishing more of a daily lifestyle here instead of feeling like a tourist that is overstaying their welcome. 

As my sister had reminded me yesterday, Do One Thing A Day That Scares You, God knows I am. 

xoxo,

ivd