Cell Phones, Spelunking, and SPERMs

It's incredible how quickly feelings can change, how easily I can have a mediocre night followed by a stomp-your-feet-clap-your-hands-damn-this-world-rocks-and-my-life-is-changed night.

Friday was one of those annoying nights. After I posted (and let's face it, I was getting kinda mushy at the end. Whats up with that?), I decided I should try to find this pillow fight thing on Myspace to make sure it was actually going on. Mission accomplished (which is really incredible considering how difficult it is to find anything on that crappy site) - unfortunately, it wasn't happening till Saturday. Soooooooo what to do with my time?

Hung out around the house for hours, had dinner with Zuzana, tried to get a hold of people and did with varying success. No one knows how to pick up a phone. It's true - Dan agrees. I could go into a long explanation of the evening (which included me, frustrated, writing a really elaborate blog post in my head, and watching a man with a mullet dance like Michael Jackson. And watching two Eurotrash girls "dance" by hooking their fingers in their belt loops and swaying back and forth.), but I'll spare you the details.

The real point of this post is Saturday, an outstanding day in the life. Woke up around noon (yay!) for another incomparable lunch courtesy of Zuzana. Then, me, Tomas, and Zuzana drove about 30min outside of Prague, where the scenery completely changes into something resembling Pennsylvania. We visited a really great little village, thousands of years old, that was home to a monastery and a great hike to the top of a high cliff. And I didn't bring my damn camera!

Got home just in time to showoer, change the clothes, and head out to the pillow fight. I thought I was going to be late, but managed to get to the Astro Clock about 3 minutes before it all began, only to find...nothing...wait a minute...there are people, gathering, holding pillows! Sure enough, at 6:06, a whistle blew and the pillows began flying. It only lasted about a minute, but it was still awesome to witness something from nothing but a Myspace page! And the mountain of feathers that remained was blown into the sky by the wind, making it seem like it was snowing. (Flickr pics and a YouTube video to come). Met up with Paige and Maggie, and followed them back to the hostel they were staying at for the night (it's a long story), where we prepared dinner and had some deliciously cheap wine.

At about 10, we began the trek over to Abaton, where the infamous second-annual Sperm Festival was being held. The place was not easy to find - about a 15 minute walk from a Metro stop in Prague 8 (basically about as far from my house as a place could be). When we thought we might be lost, we asked for directions from a random guy who seemed like he was going our way - turns out John (that's him) works at an Internet cafe while finishing his studies at Charles University and was going to the same place.

It will be difficult for me to describe the scene at this festival. It was a cavernous warehouse, each room filled with smoke, well-placed beams of light, images projected on walls (on the wall near the entrance, just the word "Fertility"), and thumping techno-ish music. Surprisingly, there wasn't a suffocating number of people there, which is nice for a person who spends most weekends at clubs looking at and smelling peoples' armpits. Of course, one of the reasons for this was the large number of rooms - there were four stages, including a "cinema stage", on three different levels. Not to mention, bars in every corner. I took a bunch of pictures, which will be on Flickr soon.

By far the highlight of the evening was the festival headliners, a duo called Mouse on Mars who've been DJing together for about 15 years. I've never been to a concert like this, but I hope I can get to more. A floor completely packed with people, all dancing in place, but not with each other - such was the effect of that awesome kind of music that just envelopes you and forces your body to bounce up and down. (And most of them were probably on drugs, which could also explain it.) As a backdrop to their cooperative beatmaking, they projected a sketch of a skull with text running through the eyes saying things that essentially amounted to an indictment of America and all other governments for...well, existing (Anarchy, woo!). A multi-media experience of glitch-y, bass-y, fun-filled music and video.

After that, we hung out at another stage and listened to another headliner - Deadelus. Another sweet DJ, this one with a more mellow sound, and from the US (though he too had some anti-American stuff projected behind him. Made me realize - alternative culture means going against the mainstream, and the US is it now...). After his set, we took a short rest, then back upstairs to catch Czech rapper/beatmaker WWW, who raps like you'd expect Al Pacino to - eating the walls. As an added plus, I ran into Daedelus during this show, and we chatted for a moment. Turns out he's a USC grad!

So by the end of the evening (beginning of the morning? middle of the morning?) I had seen some fantastic performers, hung out with some great people (Prague is a very small place - my friends from FAMU were all at this festival, of course, but one of them apparently hangs out with Milo, the DJ from that great 80s night at Nebe. Not to mention, I met the guy who organized the pillow fight - he wants my pictures), danced enough to make my knees ache a bit, and stolen a poster for the event off of a wall (not like they need it any more). Rather than finding my way home on public trans (which would have been difficult for a few reasons), I took a too-expensive cab ride home. Eh, I don't pay for meals, I can afford it.

Today has been recovery day, for the most part. Another four hours of rehearsal went by like slow death, especially considering the headache I had forgotten to take Tylenol for. But to cap it off, Dan and I grabbed dinner at Radost F/X, a club/bookstore/music shop/lounge/printing press/veggie restaurant known as one of the best in Prague, and watched Lost.

Good thing I've got such an uneventful life. I'm gonna go pass out and start next week's adventures.

Self-meditation, all the time

Thursday was yet another beautiful day here. It's beginning to feel like spring already, complete with some girls venturing to wear flip-flops again. That's probably sounds insane to those of you in the Midwest right now.

So my producing class was, as always, ridiculously awesome, and the Contemporary Culture class that followed was just as good. Afterwards, I bought my ticket to Sperm Festival, which I'll be attending with Paige and Maggie, and maybe even all those people from dinner the other night. It should be a ridiculous evening.

Spent some time at the Museum of Communism, too, which I was supposed to do with my friend Mona, but couldn't get a hold of her. The place is pretty interesting, famously located above a McDonald's and next to a casino and started by an American business man who thought he could make a buck off the idea. They have some neat artifacts there, and I learned some interesting things. Like, for instance, since groceries were hard to find (to say the least), when stores got shipments the workers would save some items for people who they knew would pay them more. Butchers started to trade their meat, which they received once a month, for other goods, so a kind of barter economy was born. On top of that, something I thought was really strange was the Czech system for foreign currency during communism. Foreign money couldn't be exchanged for Korunas (Czech currency), only for a new currency (the name escapes me now...). This new currency was actually worth EIGHT TIMES as much as normal currency - so women would whore themselves out to Germans or Americans, take their foreign money and exchange it, then sell their exchanged money on the black market at an 8x profit.

On my way out, I bought a postcard and a red candle in the shape of Lenin's head. Such kitsch!

Speaking of things that are more valuable because they're tough to find, I got this email from my mother yesterday:

"So-Dad doesn't want me to tell you this-but- I got a Wii !!!!!!...as we speak, Dad is connecting it up downstairs. Will let you know how it goes!"

Jealousy ensues!

I also had the chance this week to start looking at classes for summer school, and was slightly enraged to find out that one class I have to take starts May 16, only four days after this program ends. So it looks like I'll be coming home much earlier than expected, and won't get the chance to travel much, if at all, after the program ends. It's kinda made me feel foolish for being in this play, since I probably won't get the chance to see everything I wanted to, but at the same time I think I've managed to organize all my remaining free weekends well enough that I'll get to see a bunch. I think things are really going to change once I can travel more; right now, after the play I've scheduled trips four weekends in a row, and I don't plan on leaving it at that.

Today has been relaxing, as all days have been lately. Czech class, followed by lunch at a place I've been meaning to find for a month - an American-owned, Chipotle-style burrito restaurant. Wow. I didn't realize how much I missed Mexican food. I took my time, savoring the burrito, spanish rice, and refried beans while reading this week's Prague Post (really, a great, intellectually written newspaper).

I think this week has been a time for me to really see why I'm in Europe for a semester. Of course I'm experiencing another culture, and that's one huge part of this whole deal. But in talking to some of those people at dinner on Wednesday, I was realizing how nice it would be to be able to spend a year here - long enough to not have to worry about what happens when you get home, to really disconnect. (I'm doing fairly well in that respect, I think, but all the same...)

Anyhow, I had intended to make this semester my time to try to relax for once in my life and see what happens. I kinda talked about this already this week, so I'll suffice it to say for now that my nights out with people from my program (which are fun-filled and more frequent lately, at Scott's shrewd suggestion) and my large amount of free time for reading, thinking, listening to music, looking at Centuries-old sites, museum browsing, and talking to my constantly interesting host family...they've all combined to start giving me a much better sense of...stuff, to be exact. So there you have it.

I'm gonna try to find a decent torrent of this week's LOST episode. Then I have a pillow fight to attend to.

Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh sigh of relaxation.

You know those times when it seems like you just do everything right? Case in point: the last few days.

I haven't really talked much about what's going on back at home, but I have to mention that me and Andrew made the Indiana Daily Student for the event we're (he's) promoting at IU next week. Very cool, I'm really excited to see what happens!

My shopping excursion yesterday was surprisingly successful. I forgot that European people like their clothes smaller, so every store had stuff that fit me!

Last night was also a great time. I went with Dan and some people from his program to a Mardi Gras party on a boat that had been advertised by cheaply-made fliers written in English. Sketchy? You bet. But we had an amazing time. (see my late night Facebook wall posting for evidence)

Which made getting up this morning a bit of an issue. I managed it, though the incredibly foggy weather was strangely mirroring my internal state. The weather got a lot better as the day went on, however, and for some reason all my classes had a really nice, careless vibe to them. had a nice tour this morning for my architecture class, and managed to get a good lunch afterwards. We laughed our way through Czech class, then my boring film class was actually interesting (we played with color temperature meters). The prof then didn't show up for my Cinematography class, so I grabbed a coffee with Evan, Sari, and Alana.

The highlight, of course, was my European Film Analysis class which, as boring as it sounds, it amazing. Last week we watched a Godard film, 2 or 3 Things I Know About Her. Today, we spent an hour and a half just...talking about it. Awesome.

Awesome-er: after class, I struck up a conversation with another American student, who subsequently invited me to dinner with some other FAMU International ladies. Recognizing the wonder in the impulsiveness of the whole situation, and relishing in the fact that I had found some people who really loved to talk about the paradox in Godard's distancing his audiences while preaching to them, I quickly accepted the invitation. What followed was a mass of fantastic conversation, great food and drink, and general excellence. One girl was from Sweden, one from San Fran by way of Taiwan, one from Oregon, a guy from Germany, and the original girl I had talked to was from NYC. New friends all over the globe!

And I now have some plans for the weekend. Apparently Friday, at 6:06pm, there will be an official pillow fight in Old Town Square, the "Prague Pillow Fight." I will be there. There's also a big music/cinema festival going on in Prague right now called Spermfest, the main show of which is this Saturday. Prolly be there too. All night. Better get to sleep now so I can save up for it...

Goodnight

Just thought I should say hello before I check out for the evening. It was a nice day, despite the newly foggy weather, the end of which was filled with some interesting introspection.

JC and I have been talking for the past day or so about the wonders of svičkova (the lunch I had yesterday...and today). Don't worry, I've already been promised a recipe (there is no definitive version), so it will be made at home! The first step of Zuzana's version involves wrapping the meat in bacon and cooking it for a bit, then cooking the meat with vinegar and vegetables for about 5 hours....mouth is watering currently...

Had class this morning, followed by homework I had forgotten, more class, then four hours of rehearsal that actually went by quite quickly, for once. I'm starting to mess around with new bits and stuff, and it's always fun to make people laugh.

The highlight of my day has been the evening though. For those who don't know, I love public transportation, and taking it home was yet another chance for me to spend some time with myself, something I really don't get the time to do when I'm in LA. It's nice to have that kind of self-reflection.

Got home and was happy I had made the decision not to go out again tonight (just seemed kinda worthless to go pretend I'm better friends with these people than I actually am...I feel like I barely spend time with anyone on my program now, with Dan being here and us being in the play. Oh well). Instead, I ate leftover svičkova and had a nice long conversation with Tomas and Zuzana while we polished off about a bottle of wine (they were proud to point out that it's even legal in the US for me now...yes I will talk about that in every post from now on, thank you very much).

Also booked the return flight from Budapest for the weekend my parents are here (I'll be driving there with them). I love booking trips...can't wait to nail down spring break. It's strange - I find myself constantly waiting for the next thing to happen here, anticipating my next adventure and hoping it comes soon. This blog has certainly been fueling that to some extent (seriously, I narrate my life in my head now. I'm narrating this to myself right now (WHOA!)), and I don't mind it. It keeps me making the most of my time here, I think.

Tomorrow I have one class and then I have to do some shopping, since I'm getting tired of my limited wardrobe (I underpacked, as suggested, which was good, but it's time to mix it up a bit). Who knows what adventures the day might hold. I'll tell you all about it.

A beautiful, relaxing, lazy Sunday

Finally posted new pics on Flickr! Including Krakow stuff. So check it out!

Woke up late, had some coffee, hung out for a while, then enjoyed a feast for the ages prepared by Zuzana to celebrate Dan's and Vaclav's birthdays (both today). An awesome meal of one of my favorite Czech dishes (I forget what it's called now, but it's beef in a sweet cream sauce, served with jam and bread dumplings....oh wow...), followed by a compulsory nap (seriously, nothing could keep any of us awake). Rest of the day has been emails, posting pictures, and reading the news...glorious.

Tomorrow is more class, then rehearsal. I've been trying to get some shopping done, maybe I'll do that too...

A few busy days

Phew! I just got back from nearly eight hours of rehearsal, and they were some of the slowest hours of my life. When Dan and I are on stage together, all's well and everything goes quickly, but our very particular director stops often and makes sure every line (EVERY line) is said exactly as he wants it. Not too enthralling a rehearsal process.

In other news, as of yesterday, I have been living in Prague for one month. My first month here was filled with lots of fun, occasional anxiety, and several trips around the city with absolutely no clue where I was or where I was going. I've seen almost all the sites here that I wanted to see (minus the museums, which I've really got to get to), and many sites I haven't meant to see but feel privileged to have seen them (was that English?). I also don't think I've gained any (or very much) weight, which impresses the hell out of me. My next stop on the Prague tour will probably be restaurants...but it's tough to convince myself to try to get people together for a meal, when I get free homecooked awesome meals right here, every day...

The past few days have pretty much been defined by the visit of a good friend from home and two of her good friends, all of whom are studying in Barcelona right now. Carrie, Sarah Z, and Sarah S spent Thursday and Friday touring Prague, with me and Dan as their tour guides. That meant another visit to a lot of the sites I had already seen (which I don't mind. Stuff's pretty damn nice around here), and a LOT of walking (seriously legs hurt again). They are three wonderful girls and we had a lot of fun together. Also, I've been getting over my sickness (after the sinus infection, the cold kicked in...ew stuffy nose. Apparently it's rude in Czech culture if you sniffle...but I doubt they started that custom knowing how loudly I blow my nose). I truly hate being sick, if for no other reason than because it's taking a toll on my (newly legal!!) tolerance-building.

For the past few days, Dan has been acting a bit strangely, and last night he opened up a bit as to why. Turns out he's feeling like he's in the same kind of "funk" that I felt when I had been here for about the same amount of time he's been here for. Good to know I'm not alone in these things! It's also kinda annoying for us to be here while everyone on our programs is off traveling (I had to sell my ticket to our program-sponsored trip to Vienna this weekend). We're kind of assuming that these rehearsals will pay off when there's a crowd laughing in front of us. It's his 21st birthday tomorrow, so that should perk him up.

Yesterday, I booked my trip to Amsterdam, for Easter weekend. I'll be going with Dan, Josh Kaplan, Mike Breen, and their UM Pike-mate Marty. I don't think I've ever been more excited for anything than I am for that weekend...ohhh the stories that will unfold.

In a related story, I don't think I'll be getting to Greece after all (at least for now). The guys I went to Krakow with are all going to Italy/Croatia for spring break and, while I've been to Italy, my late spring break departure (I have to be here for the play) should mean minimal time seeing things I already have and maximal Croatia-ness (a place I probably wouldn't go otherwise, and Phil Eastman has honestly been telling me to go there for a year). So that should be fun as well (though nothing's booked quite yet). Maybe I'll witness some more hanky-panky. Or another roundhouse kick to the face.

Tomorrow, I have the whole day to myself and I am determined to get pictures on the Flickr if it's the last thing I do!

Happy Valentine's Day!

Kiss 'em if ya got 'em!

I should start with Monday night, when we had our first rehearsal for this play. As expected, it was a completely surreal experience being in a rehearsal with Dan and not being at GBN or in his basement or in my living room. The director is a nice guy; he's originally from North Carolina (and still has that fantastic accent, one of my favorites in the US), and he's been living in Prague for the past year working on assorted films (some major, in the SFX dept), but he'd like to get out of here soon. He's taking this whole thing more seriously than I (or Dan) had expected, which might get annoying since I certainly am not.

The script is pretty good (I might have mentioned that before), and it was fun getting it on its feet. Dan and I both have to make out with women significantly older than us, though my nearly-forty-year-old British woman definitely takes the cake. Dan's "wife" reminds us a lot of Natalie Boccumini.

I started running a fever during rehearsal, came home and slept, and you know all about yesterday (except that I watched Lost last night! A great episode!).

Which brings us to today. This holiday is very different in Prague, and not just for the expected reasons. Of course, everything people say about this holiday in the US is true: it's not even a big deal holiday, but gift/greeting card/candy companies have managed to make us believe it is (but is it so bad to have a holiday about love?). But there's more to it.

My study center (where my non-film classes are held) sits on the site of the magnificent Vyšehrad castle, site of several former Prague Kings and of course, home to a magnificent cathedral (which they light up at night like the Empire State Building). Apparently, every cathedral in CR (or maybe the world? not sure...) holds the remains of a particular saint (not necessarily the saint to whom the place is consecrated), and those remains are taken out and put on display one day every year.

So today, about 20 feet east of my classes, the remains of St. Valentine himself were on display all day. Unfortunately, I didn't get a chance to check it out, but it's definitely put a new spin on this holiday!

Today was the usual busy, lunch-less Wednesday, including my least favorite class, but ending with a great surprise. The one class that was canceled last week seems like it's going to be awesome. The prof told us all we were going to do was watch and talk about "non-Hollywood" European films. We started today with a Godard film, which I really loved and would never have watched otherwise, so I was very happy.

All of my classes were canceled tomorrow (love it), so I'll probably spend the whole day sleeping or walking around while it's still nice out (the weather here has been really strange lately...sunny and amazing until about 6pm, then rain all night). Or maybe I'll do homework. Meh, maybe not.

Krakow: Day 2-3

NOTE: This is part 2 of 2. You should read them in order! The first one is the post before this.

We woke up at 10. And went back to bed. We woke up at 11. I checked my mail to see how the Trojan Men had fared at Absolut, and took some Tylenol for my RAGING headache (damn you, vodka...). I went back to bed. At noon, we finally did get up and started to execute our plan for the day: check out the city, then a tour of the legendary salt mine.

We began where every day should begin, with a bagel at Bagelmama, a restaurant that allegedly sits on the site of the birth place of the bagel (literally 10 feet from a massive synagogue). Awesome bagels, and for cheap! From there, it was a short walk (as everything is in Krakow, seriously the place is tiny) to the magnificent Wawa Castle. The place is such a cool mixture of different types of architectures, and it's all open to the public, just like Prague Castle. We toured the armory...cuz you know, we're guys and all.

The city itself, as we found on our walk back, is magnificent, but you can check out more of that on flickr. And the salt mines are salty and really neat as well, but that'll be on the flickr as well. Suffice it to say we had a big day.

Which of course, could only be matched by a bigger night (after all, it was my birthday). And oh, what a night it was...first, dinner at an outstanding restaurant (Martin's recommendation again. That guy rocks), which included two 5L towers of beer (awesome beer). It was then time to hit the club, along with the other CIEE people who had visited Krakow this weekend (we didn't really see anyone we knew for the majority of the time we were there. Which, for the most part, was actually really nice). I'll spare you the details of the evening and give the highlights:

-Towards the end of the evening, I found Dave in a corner of the club near the exit, asleep and almost completely unresponsive. As I was sitting there, Evan walked up and joined him, in a similar state. I walked away for a moment, trying to see if anyone else was left to hang out with, and when I returned they had mysteriously disappeared....I found out later: Dave had vomited...everywhere...and had been kicked out, and Evan went with him. On the way home, in a drunken stupor, they passed some Brits, to whom Dave said something (he can't remember what it was, but it was probably something about the US bailing them out of WWII. He's a history major.) The Brit passed Dave, turned around and ran at him at full speed. With a huge leap into the air, the guy performed a Bruce Lee-style roundhouse kick and jacked my 6'4" friend in the face. Dave, slightly shocked (mostly at the fact that the guy just kicked him IN THE FACE, as opposed to something, anything lower), paused a moment, but Evan charged at the guy. Dave held him back, realizing there were eight of them and fighting would be a very lost cause. They returned home.

-!!HIGHLIGHT OF THE TRIP ALERT!! So, not finding anyone to go home with, I decided to walk back to the hostel on my own (in the freezing cold). I found Evan and Dave in the lobby of the hostel on the internet, where I heard the aforementioned roundhouse-kick-to-the-face story. I checked my email again, and retired to the room, where Evan and Dave had already passed out. On the bed next to me, I discovered Danny G under his blanket. Oh wait. There are 4 legs there...I walked out to brush my teeth, came back in for a towel, and saw the same lump, but with Danny's ass sticking out of one end. I left. Came back. Danny is sitting up at the head of his bed, but still there's this lump in the middle under the covers and now it's pulsing. I stare at him a moment in disbelief, wondering if he can see me. He gives a small wave.

The next morning we had a very unwelcome wake up call at 9am. At 10, we had to catch a bus to tour Auschwitz. Not many words to describe this one...everyone should get a chance to see it. The weather was exactly what you'd expect to tour a place like that: freezing and foggy. It looked like there were ghosts hanging in the air everywhere. After our tour, we were given some time to walk around on our own, and me, Dave, and Jon set out to find the pond in the north side of the camp that, to this day, is gray with ashes. Quite dramatic. Unfortunately, Auschwitz is a very big place, and we were 20 minutes late getting back to the bus, which had almost left without us. So I almost got stuck in Auschwitz...

We lounged the rest of the day (it was a 6 hour tour, and we had to recover), then had a fantastic dinner of authentic Polish food - tons upon tons of pierogi (AMAZING) and of course, some beer to help us sleep on the train.

Which would have helped, had the train not been so small that we got stuck in a smoking car with two Polish guys who were hilarious. After asking if Evan W was in al-Qaeda, one of them tried to bargain with Dave (in Polish, remember...we think he was bargaining) to get rid of some zlutys (Polish currency) and exchange it for Korunas. At least we think that's what he was trying to say...

So I didn't sleep much, and woke up with a sore throat and stuffy nose that has since matured into a full-on sinus infection. Oh well. At this point, I'm done writing, so you'll have to hear about the first day of rehearsal some other time!

It's been so long!

NOTE: This is part 1 of 2. Read this one first!

WOW there's so much to talk about! I'm sick (sinus infection, always happens around this time...), so I'm taking the rest of the day off (easy when I don't have any classes). I'm gonna post now about the incredible adventures I had in Krakow (of which there are many), but I'm afraid the Flickr photos might take longer (I have about 200 pictures waiting to go up there).

Allow me to begin with a description of our key characters:

Evan W: My good friend with a fantastic first name, and a fellow Trojan. He's tall and lanky with a huge head of curly hair and a beard (that will be important later). Always dressed well, Evan is the kind of guy who takes great pride in his individuality.

Dave: 6'4" and probably about 250lbs, Dave plays O-line for Williams. Everything about him is huge. Speaks in a low, throaty voice and snores incessantly (even while he's awake). He loves women.

Jon: Also a football player (at Amherst), but not as gigantic as Dave, John kinda declared himself the leader of our rag tag bunch of misfits. He had done some research on the place, had booked our hostel, and generally was in front whenever we were walking.

Danny G: Born and bread New Yorker going to school at Tulane. The kind of person who never ceases to surprise you, he seems really frat-cool when you first meet him, before you find out that A) he's a literature major and LOVES it and B) he can quote Dragonball Z.

Danny: Remember the guy I talked about a while ago who I really didn't like? Yeah, him. The guy's actually really nice, just didn't make the best first impression. But partying is his deal.

And thus, the trip began. We managed to snag an entire compartment to ourselves on the way there, which was really nice to have when we all started to try to sleep. I had some great conversations with Evan and Danny G, about assorted topics, and Dave, all 6'4" of him, slid onto the floor and passed out with all of our legs on top of him.

Not taking the night train on Friday was the best idea anyone has ever had. We arrived in Poland at about 10pm, plenty of time to find our hostel and still hit up the night life. Of course, we got lost on the way there (well not lost, just off our maps), but we finally arrived at the dilapidated parking lot where, in one corner, the back door of our hostel was located. The Stranger (we pronounced 'stranger' like Busta Rhymes pronounces the word 'danger"), our home away from home, was a really nice palce that was basically empty, aside from the group of 20 English guys (more on them later). We got an entire room to ourselves.

That night was still Evan's birthday, and at midnight it would be mine, so we took a recommendation from Martin, the guy working our front desk, and set out with nothing but a name and a list of drinks and shots we should order (Poland, after all, is the land of sweet vodkas...like the 100 proof honey vodka that tastes like candy). The place we ended up at was a tall building with a different club on every level, and was a lot of fun. Especially when, after introducing myself to a nice Polish girl, she informed me it was a gay club.

Despite that, three members of our party managed to do just fine, and I ended the night walking home with Dave, Jon, and Danny (not G. that's gonna get confusing). It was a glorious ending to an evening, complete with me laying down a beat for a professional break dancer in the middle of Krakow's Old Town square. We found some Polish girls who spoke English and they led us to some late night food (but not before Jon managed to kiss one of them. It was impressive), and we headed back to the hostel for the evening.

I'll continue in a new post....we'll be right back after this short break.

holy crap!!

What a night! We begin on the tram, when I got a phone call from the director of the play I auditioned for, who informed me that me AND Dan had both made it! So we'll be appearing on stage together again. It's so surreal...

Then, there was the crazy karaoke that followed. I haven't been writing much about my evenings on this blog, but this was awesome. The bar we went to was great, with cheap drinks and a good DJ. And the karaoke, while it required a long wait, was fantastic. each person got an entire stage to him or herself, with the lyrics projected behind them. People were singing American songs in Czech, which was as hilarious as it was at the Maturity Ball, and everyone was dancing and singing along to everything.

I looked for a great song to sing, and found Queen's Somebody to Love. Such a long wait later, I grabbed the mic. And proceeded to rock out. Air guitar. Yelling the high notes. Going nuts. It's been a long time since I've sung in front of an audience, so I had a lot of energy to release. It's also been an even longer time since I could just sing loud without caring about losing my voice. So I did. And at the end, when someone told me to crowd surf...I couldn't resist. Damn, that was fun.

So I went home happy and woke up early (7:20am, with some difficulty...) to get to the class I've been looking forward to, Producer's Craft. It was worth the early wake up. The prof is fantastic, he teaches the class like it's something he's produced himself, which means organized and informational. And the stuff we're learning about is exactly what I've always wanted to know: film business, law, and marketing. I never thought I'd say this...but I guess I should take some classes that have math...

Unfortunately, it looks like I won't be able to switch out of that class I don't like (at least not without a lot of drama and having to take another class I won't like). Oh well. One uninteresting class out of six won't kill me.

Fortunately, it is starting to look like I'll be able to get to Greece for spring break. I've found some folks who are going, and I'm going to try to meet them at some point (the play performs during the first weekend).

This will probably be my last post until Monday, since I leave for Krakow at 2pm tomorrow. I'm looking forward to an awesome weekend (with about a million of my new closest friends...a bunch of Americans are going this weekend, from our program and others), and a memorable 21st birthday.

Changing more classes...

So no callback after all last night; the director couldn't get everyone together for it. Haven't heard from him since. Oh well - I would have turned down the role if Dan didn't get in with me anyway! (Kinda a jerky thing to do. But I never really thought I'd actually be up for a role). Instead, Jonas had me come along with him and two friends to see a movie, Trsitram Shandy: A Cock and Bull Story (it was in the US a while ago), which was fun. Hung out at Dan's apartment afterwards. It is wonderful having him here.

More of my first week of classes today, and so far I've only had one disappointment. The day started late(r) again, with a tour through Old Town, including seeing the interior of the Town Hall (and the inside of the Astronomical Clock, which was sweeeet). It was really interesting, but we went 40 minutes past our end time, leaving me zero time to get lunch, which was a problem (as anyone who has seen me hungry can attest).

Czech class was its normal self, and afterwards I headed to FAMU for my first film classes. Turns out, Principles and Technology of Photography isn't as great as I had thought it might be...the prof gave us permission to get up and leave if we ever thought we were uninterested...I gave the class a decent chance. He talked for about 45 min about the physics of light, complete with slides of graphs showing things like the Stephan-Boltzman law. Interesting stuff, but I don't know about a whole semester of it. Plus there was this guy behind me who kept asking the most ridiculous questions in a Greek accent..."The sun makes UV rays?"..."So if we can't see infrared, how do they make films that can?"...and the prof kept answering with these long detailed answers that didn't apply to the lecture at all.

So, me and Jenn (who goes to UW Madison) left together (with the prof's blessing) and went next door to the awesome cafe across from the National Theater. I have no clue how my schedule is going to change now...

Tonight is karaoke night. Needless to say, I will be making an appearance.

a big few days

Where did I leave you? Ah yes, the Super Bowl.

A fun night. I had dinner with Dan and his friend Max (who's studying here on another program), then we went to a bar for the game. Dan was a bigger fan of the place where Max's program was watching (across the street from where all 2834723 people in my program were), so I just hung out with them. Interestingly enough, I ran into a girl who was on my Birthright trip to Israel! Small world...

At half time, I was ready to go home and watch the rest of the carnage on my computer, so Dan and I left to head to the tram. He had to pee, so we went down into the metro station looking for the WC. Now, allow me to describe the creepiness of a metro station when the metro is closed. What is normally a bustling area, filled with Czechs going about their days, is an eerily quiet hall of marble, lit by oppressive fluorescent lights. It's like every horror film you've ever seen. We found the WC in one corner of the place, and found two guys sitting in front of it, one of whom had a paper towel pressed to his eye and looked like he was seriously injured. Sketchy. Dan attempted to go around him and the guy looked up and asked him something, I think in Czech.

The guy had no eyes. He was offering Dan cocaine. We decided to turn around. (I'll hear from Mom about that one!)

So yesterday, audition day and the first day of classes, was as eventful as it sounds. It was the kinda day I like having, where there's always something to do. I had Czech language in the morning (only for an hour), then went home for lunch, a nap, a shower, and some photo editing before I came back to class.

I should go back a bit. This audition does seem like it was some sort of providence. They asked for a headshot and resume, if you had one, so I printed my resume but needed a photo. Lightbulb! At the Museum of Cubism on Sunday, my friend Elena had snapped some pictures of me (using her outstanding Canon DSLR camera) that had looked really good! I had her email them to me.

So after my classes, I met Dan and we went to a photo place near Wenceslas Sq (damn I spend a lot of time near there) and had our photos printed. He went to dinner with his program, and I decided to walk around for a bit rather than go alllllll the way home, only to come alllllll the way back. I dined in a too-expensive restaurant showing MTV Europe (I watched Pimp My Ride!). I'll make a long story short: what Dan had said would be an hour-long dinner with his program turned into a two-hour-extravaganza. My legs still hurt this morning from all the walking I did waiting for him.

The audition went surprisingly well. There was only one part I was really good for, in a play called Stewie the Stoic, where the main character, Stewie, was described as a "shorter than average 25-35 year old" who was preferably thin and WASPy. Well, 1.5 out of 3 ain't bad. It's a comedy, and Dan auditioned for the role opposite me, so we had a damn good time acting together again.

Today has been great, I woke up late(r), since my only class is 10:30-12, and have since been doing homework, having lunch, and blogging. The class this morning was Contemporary Czech Culture: Alternative Music, Film, etc, and it's as cool as it sounds. An interesting sidenote: we all introduced ourselves, saying what our focus was in school, and I found it interesting how much more well-spoken and self-assured all the USC kids were. Where others said "Finance. Banking. Sociology." each USC kid had a specific area s/he was focusing on: interrelationships of art and finance, African-American poetry and society, interactive media (me). Interesting...

Got an email today from Jared about The Trojan Men, who are busily preparing for their big weekend of competitions. I am very jealous - I miss singing with them a lot.

Went to lunch and got a call from the director we auditioned for, who wants me and Dan to come for a call back tonight. Score! This could be like high school all over again!

happy birthday Lisa!

eh, might as well

A nice day so far. Woke up late, returned the skis, and browsed the museum of cubism with some nice people from my program. Cubism here is really cool, mostly because Prague was the center of bringing the movement from canvas into three dimensions. So there's a lot of sculpture, and a bunch of architecture too.

Had lunch and coffee at the museum, the browsed some souvenir shops with two of the ladies I had been with. I was killing time, waiting for Dan, who arrived this morning and was taking a ridiculous boat tour of the Vltava (only for tourists). Once found, Dan and I came back to the house and hung out for a while. It was great to talk to him again. He's not looking forward to adjusting to a roommate he doesn't know (he's never lived with someone he hasn't known previously), nor to having to introduce himself to a million people again (sound familiar?). We're going to dinner in a bit, then SUPER BOWL time!

I picked up a copy of the Prague Post today, just for a kick (that's a link to their website back there. I'll add it to the side bar too). There were some interesting articles, but most interesting was an ad I found while I flipped through. Turns out they've been having a contest for new plays (in English), which they'll be putting on in March. They've picked the plays, and they're holding auditions tomorrow. So I think I'm gonna go, and convince Dan to come with me. Now THAT would be an adventure.

the opera and the slopes

What a sweet two days! Our Czech language instruction ended with a scavenger hunt written by our teacher (the wonderful Bara). The hunt took us up Petrin hill (an area I had yet to explore, and was planning on it) to the 1/5 replica of the Eiffel Tower and a sweet mirror maze, ending at the world famous Bohemia Bagel for lunch and declaration of winners (I had a bagel, lox, cream cheese, capers, and onions, and it was amazing. My dad is proud, I'm sure). You have to love a country where your teacher can give a bottle of alcohol as a prize.

In the remainder of the afternoon, I went to the train station and bought my ticket to Krakow for next weekend. As it turns out, I'm going on what seems to be the "in" trip to take next weekend, which I have mixed feelings about. I bought my ticket with 6 other guys (including Evan W), most of whom I wouldn't exactly be best friends with. But, as Mom said, we don't have to be best pals; it'll still be nice to take my first trip with other people. It will be interesting to tour Auschwitz (on my birthday) with all million people who are going. It will be a story.

That night, the program treated us to some very cheap seats at the State Opera House, where we saw Verdi's Nabucco. The building is ridiculous (pics soon...I actually think that's the building in The Living Daylights, not Municipal House). Of course, the opera was sung entirely in Italian, but there were supertitles. In Czech. I still managed to stay awake the whole time, probably because the orchestra was awesome (and so were most of the singers), and because I bought a 47Kc English summary.

Afterwards, Steph Beren (Taryn B's friend and future roomie at IU) and I grabbed some dinner around the corner. Steph is awesome. I drank my beer and half of hers and was feeling toasty (seriously, I've been here for almost 3 weeks, drank nearly a liter of beer a day, and still have no tolerance).

I went home early, because this morning I woke up at 6:10am to catch the bus (with Zuzana and Jonas) to a ski slope near the border with Poland. Zuzana called today a "demanding day" and I would have to agree, especially coming from the guy who hasn't skied in a very long time (...and who's not athletic. There, I said it. Happy?). When Jonas and I got off the bus, I didn't really get what was going on - the bus was stopped in the middle of the street, and it didn't seem like everyone was getting off, so I sort of hung out there with most of my gear, and watched as the bus drive away with my poles...a looooong walk in ski boots later (wow painful. At one point, BOTH feet fell asleep in the boots), and I had a new Czech friend, and a new Israeli friend (from near Haifa) who studies at Charles University and speaks nearly perfect Czech.

The mountain we went to was really nice (though I've been horribly spoiled by my trips to Colorado/Utah/Tahoe), but unfortunately the weather this morning was not. At the peak, the snow was falling in big pellets, like small pieces of hail, which would have made a nice powder had it not been for the wind howling like a hurricane. I would have been afraid of falling down the hill, but the wind honestly could have pushed me back the other way.

After two trips down the slope in this weather, I was already ready for a break (it made me feel ridiculous saying that to Jonas and his friends). My legs are still adjusting to the amount of walking I'm doing here, and the hike before the skiing wasn't helping either. (Yeah, I'm making excuses. I can hear my mother and sister calling me a wimp already. Let's face it folks, Evan has had a storied history with skiing...). A quick recharge and I was back in action, though. The weather cleared up, and the skiing was, as Jonas would say, "quite nice."

I also got the chance today to get a good sample of Czech chocolate and Czech cookies, which I have been eating the entire day. Hells yes. I'd have to say, though, my favorite part of the day was the trip back home, which we did on public trans, carrying all our gear from the tram, up Baneofmyexistence Hill. Czechs make you have to deserve their cookies.

happy birthday zuzana!

Kicked out

Not a particularly interesting day, I suppose. Tomas is sick, which is not fun (he's coughing right now...I think there's a Prague bug going around, a lot of people in the program are sick too).

After our last day of language class (yay! just a test tomorrow), we took a trip to the National Library for a tour. It was about as interesting as it sounds. Afterwards, I took the very short walk from the library to the Jewish quarter to make good on my plans.

I got there at 4, paid my admission (not cheap, but I got a student discount), and first walked through the Holocaust memorial - a nice synagogue, walls covered with the names of Czech Jews murdered. I like those. Upstairs was the really neat part, though - an exhibit of artwork made my children in concentration camps. I've never seen anything quite like it, and it was really interesting to see their interpretations of all of the terrible things happening around them.

But the real impressive stuff came after this. There are a lot of fantastic sites in Prague, but so far, the Old Jewish Cemetery is the only one to take my breath away. It's a tiny space in the middle of the old Jewish ghetto that, according to gravestone ages, has been around since at least the early 1400s(!). They didn't have much room to bury people after a while (they could only expand it so much, and they weren't given any more space to live), and in Jewish custom, you can't touch the bodies of the deceased (which would be why there are no bone synagogues in Kutna Hora). So, they began stacking coffins on top of each other, eventually piling more dirt into the cemetery to raise the level of the earth and make room for more people. Over 12,000 people, all in about an acre of land, all with their own gravestones. Quite the dramatic site (Flickr soon).

So you could imagine my state of mind when the security guard yelled "excuse me," making me think I had stepped somewhere I wasn't supposed to. He turned away, I started another way for a bit, and then I heard "EXCUSE ME...WE'RE DONE" loud and angry. The whole cemetery? I asked. "GET OUT!" Damn. Ok. They closed at 4:30, turns out (that exchange happened at exactly 4:30, not a minute after), but they guy was still a jerk.

This weekend, I'm going skiing with the fam on Saturday (though we might not, since it might be raining in the mountains), then museuming/Brian Urlacher worshiping/welcoming Dan on Sunday. Next weekend, it really does look like I'll be going to Krakow, which will be amazing I'm sure. It also really does look like I'll be turning 21 next weekend...