Shouzer

I’ve had the opportunity to do some pretty cool stuff in the last few weeks:

First off was the Paddle to the Symphony event. The Detroit Symphony Orchestra played a concert in the park one evening, and a charity group held a dinner and canoe event as a corresponding fundraiser. It was really cool. We had dinner, and then paddled the canoe across a lake. Then, we sat in the canoe while the orchestra played a collection of marches. It was fun to see a symphony in such a relaxed environment.

The day after that concert, I took off for a two week trip to Thailand. I hung out mostly in Bangkok visiting old friends and returning to all my favorite places. Got a nice massage, saw a few movies at the fancy theater with recliners, and ate tons of good food. Walking around Bangkok felt odd because it is so drastically different from America, but at the same time, it felt like home.

I also went to the beach for 4-5 days. I stayed on a small, remote island called Koh Mak. (Koh = island in Thai). The resort was very secluded; it was basically in the middle of the jungle. The beach had the jungle on one side and the ocean on the other. The water was crystal clear as well. I saw quite a few sea urchins when I got in the water though so I didn’t swim much as my previous encounter with that animal was rather painful. I don’t think the island I was on had a hospital either. I would have sucked to take an emergency boat ride with needles sticking out of your body.

I got back to Detroit on Sunday, and then I went to Green Day’s 21st Century Breakdown concert on Tuesday night. Considering my jet lag, it probably wasn’t the wisest decision to go to that concert. I almost fell asleep at the end of it. It was a really great concert though. Billy Joe is a really energetic guy. They played a 3 hour set, and he was going full out for the duration. I was really impressed.

Following my trip to Thailand, I accumulated enough frequent flier miles to achieve Silver Elite status with Northwest. The main perk of this is I don’t have to wait in line any more. I now have access to the first class check in counter and the priority boarding lane. I can get on the plane first when they call for Skyteam Elite passengers, though I have no idea why anyone would want to get on the plane first. I have always felt the last one on first one off is the best policy as I don’t want to be on the plane longer than necessary. I also get complimentary upgrades to first class on domestic flights if that section is empty. I doubt I will see that happen very often, but it’s still cool that it could happen.

I took my first vacation time of my career last week, flying to Rome for a much needed vacation. I found a great deal, and I just couldn’t pass up the opportunity. I spent about 7 days in Rome with a 2 day side trip to Florence.

By the end of the week, I was saturated by beauty, becoming numb to the abundant Italian eye-candy. Their culture puts an extreme emphasis on the aesthetics, la bella figura. Art museums there are full of masterpieces; even simple, out of way churches, would be considered behemoths of marble in other countries; and the people themselves look like they walked out of a magazine and on to the metro. The saturation caused me to change the way I looked at the beautiful world around me. Walking through and art museum, I found many great artworks to be bland and uninspired. Only world famous works like Michelangelo’s David could take my breath away. While strolling through churches with marvelous mosaics and marble, instead of standing in awe of the magnificent frescoes on the wall, I stood in pain, focusing on the soreness in my feet. These smaller churches simply could not compare to the size and scale of St. Peter’s Basilica at Vatican City.

Similarly, the food was indescribably good. Suffice it to say, everything lived up to the hype. The freshness and quality of the food was incomparable. The fresh fruits, vegetables, cheese, and bread that I bought at the market was bursting with flavor, making it easy to understand how the restaurants could make such great food.

The tiny effort I put in to my appearance became glaringly obvious to me. Walking around in short and old T-shirts amongst a nation of cover models made me question my lifestyle and fashion choices. I am a guy who has sported the same hair style for more than a decade. Maybe more like 1.5. I’m not even sure any more. I stopped in a shop at the airport to kill some time, and while browsing sunglasses, I was not sure which were for men and which were for women. Are they unisex now? How can one tell? As I stood there trying not to look foolish as I browsed the eye-wear, I realized that I needed a makeover. I know the queer eye guys don’t do that any more, but maybe they can come out of retirement for a straight guy with no fashion sense.

In the engineering world, appearance receives very little notice. It is not uncommon to see such travesties as white socks with dress shoes and slacks. Some people look like they go out of there way to look unfashionable, but I would like to distance myself from the stereotype of engineer. Perhaps it’s time to finally start worrying about the superficial.

The food aspect is worth considering as well. I do fairly well here, eating a lot of “fresh” fruits and vegetables. When I say fresh, I mean I bought them raw at the grocery store. After eating truly fresh food though, I think I need to seek out farmers markets for fresh produce. Partially green bananas and prepackaged tomatoes just don’t seem good enough any more.

I love traveling because it changes me. Thrusting myself into another culture and perspective forces a reevaluation of life as I know it. When I see other people who live life in a different mindset, I like to adjust, fine tuning my own outlook on life.

This is not to say that everything about Italian culture is fabulous. I got frustrated at times by the hours of operation on many of their shops. Many small places opened late, closed for 2-3 hours at lunch, and then shut down early in the evening. I think they were open about 5-6 hours a day. It became inconvenient. It is easy to shrug such problems off as a traveler, but it gave me a greater appreciation for the most convenient place on earth, America.

So will I turn into an Italian supermodel who only eats the freshest of foods? Probably not. I’ll probably gradually slip back into the status quo of American culture. Frankly, I’m not too worried about it. It doesn’t diminish the fun and excitement of exploring and experiencing a different way of life.

Last weekend, I went on my biggest meetup yet. I went to the Upper Peninsula of Michigan with the camping and outdoors group. I have to be honest, I was pretty scared about going on a trip of that magnitude with a bunch of people I didn’t know, but I figured it was pretty similar to going diving or on a day tour or something.

I left after work Friday, carpooling with two people I met that afternoon. We stopped off in this cool little restaurant on the way up called Iva’s Chicken Dinners in Sterling Michigan. It was hillbilly classy, and I liked it a lot. It was nice to take in some culture on the trip.

We got to the cabin around 1am after getting lost a few times. One of the guys in the group had opened up his family cabin for us to stay it. It was a pretty nice place, though it didn’t have electricity and the toilet didn’t flush. I met all of the people I would spending the weekend with at that time, and I was way too tired to make much conversation. I was also pretty nervous too.

Saturday we went to Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore on Lake Superior. We hiked for a bit and went to the beach. Then, we took a boat ride to see the pictured rocks. Afterward, we went to this local restaurant called the Bear Trap to sample the local specialty, the pasty. Unfortunately, they were sold out. I ate one on Monday morning, though, so it’s ok.

Sunday was pretty much a lazy day. We chilled around the cabin and the river it was on, and took a brief trip to a fresh water spring which had crystal clear water. Then, we had a nice campfire in the evening.

Monday was just driving back home. Michigan opens the bridge between the UP and the lower part of the state on Labor day for people to walk across it. My car decided to go on home, but a few people from the group did the walk. I never did understand the novelty of walking across a bridge, but whatever.

The highlight of the weekend was easily the people I was with. They were an incredibly interesting and diverse bunch. I really enjoy meeting people outside the usual circle of engineers at GM.

When I moved here, I knew that making friends would be tough so I tried to look at the problem as an adventure. I would honestly say that it is a bigger challenge for me than learning to live in a foreign country. I have come to appreciate other people a lot more in this journey, though. I have found that almost everyone I meet has something interesting to say, and it is fun “exploring” them in conversation to learn more about their lives. I think I have also become much more sociable as well, but much of that change happened in Prague and Bangkok.

I still haven’t made a lot of friends here, but I am enjoying the process of finding them a lot more now.

Well, I’m finally getting around to writing this post now. Sorry for the long absence. I’ve been terrible about keeping in touch the last few months. According to Juvers, it’s been two months since my last post, so I’ll start there.

The term ended at the end of February, and we’re on summer holidays now. I already miss my kids a lot, and I also miss the routine of going to my schools. Since then, I’ve been doing a wide assortment of things, including teaching holiday programs at schools, holiday club at the office, volunteer teaching, and teacher training. I suppose that’s all a bit boring though, so I’ll skip the details.

Last week was Song Kran, which is the Thai new year’s. They celebrate in a variety of ways, but the most fun is by having a nation-wide water fight. You walk down the street, and people just shoot you with water guns. I didn’t go anywhere special within Thailand for that, but I did get shot by some kids on my street. I guess you could say I enjoyed it.

I went to Malaysia and Singapore during the week I had off. During this trip, I visited Penang, Kuala Lumpur, Melaca, and Singapore. Penang is an island in the north of Malaysia. The highlight there was an Indian restaraunt which was highly authentic. KL is the capital of Malaysia, and the highlight there was the Petronas twin towers. They are featured in the movie Entrapment. Melaca was an old capital of Malaysia, and it had lots of historic stuff. Singapore was pretty cool, though it was insanely expensive. I was excited because they had Mt. Dew, and I have been craving it.

The big news, though, is that I will be starting work at GM, probably in July. I am going to be a controls integration engineer in a team working on the 6-speed transmission. Don’t ask what that means, because I don’t really know to be honest. I’m going to be in Milford, MI, which is just outside of Detroit. GM’s test facility is there. It’s called the Milford Proving Grounds.

I’m not sure when I’ll be coming home. It’s the million dollar question. I finish my contract here on May 30th, and I will leave Thailand shortly after that. I would like to go traveling for a month, but I don’t know if I’ll be able to afford it. I’m trying to find some work at a summer camp or something, but it doesn’t look promising.

Well, I’m once again really late writing about this, but I had a nice Christmas holiday season. The office decided to give us the week off between Christmas and New Year’s so I went traveling. My parents and sister were here for the first part of that. They came to Bangkok to visit for a week and a half. We decided to spend Christmas and the weekend preceeding it on Phi Phi island. It’s a dreamy tropical island with a great beach. Actually, The Beach was filmed on location there, though it was on the unihabited Phi Phi island quite near the bigger one we were on. I did a little scuba diving and mostly laid on the beach all day.

The beach we were on was amazing in that was shallow and sandy for several hundred meters out. As the tide went out, the water would drop, and it would change colors throughout the day like a blue sunset. By mid-day, it was ankle-deep pretty far out, and on one day, I decided I needed some swimming to cool off. I moved out trying to find some deep water to swim in.

On the way out, I got tired of walking, so I decided to swim, even though the water was too shallow to really warrant it. As I was swimming out, I accidentally kicked what I thought was a rock. Turns out, it was a sea urchin. I pulled my foot out of the water to find half a dozen 4 inch needles sticking out of my big toe. I can only describe this experience as painful. I limped/swam/walked back up to the beach, screaming under water along the way to seek assistance from my father and sister. It can sure be handy having relatives in the medical field, that’s for sure. Of course, neither of them had much experience dealing with this sort of injury as it doesn’t occur often in southern Illinois.

They take me back to the hotel, and talk to the owner while I go to clean it in the shower. The owner, a rather dramatic fellow, insisted that I go to the hospital, “You go to hospital, NOW. Sea urchin very poisonous. You foot swell VERY big.” I needed my passport, so my sister ran back to the room to get it while the owner instructed an employee to take us to the hospital.

There are two important things you need to know at this point. 1) There are no cars on Phi Phi, people walk every where as it is a small island. 2) Thai people do not ever get in a hurry.

We are walking to this hospital, and the lady taking us is moving incredibly leisurely. I’m walking far faster than her, and I have a bunch of needles sticking out of my toe. Along the way, she runs into a friend who joins us on our stroll to the hospital.

When we finally arrive at this hospital, the nurse instructs me to sit on a table. She pokes at my foot a bit with some tweezers, and then declares, “I no take off.” I am freaking out a bit at this point at the thought of my toe being removed from my body to stop the poison. However, what she really meant was that she wasn’t going to remove the needles. She treated it the toe with ammonia to dissolve the calcium needles and it basically took care of itself. It turned out to be a pretty minor inconvenience as I was still able to go diving the day after this happened.

After my parent left, I went up to Chiang Mai, but nothing too exciting happened so I doubt that I’ll be posting about it.

I got back from a one week vacation to Vietnam last night. I find the whole concept of me taking a vacation at this point in my life quite ironic as I consider my foray to Bangkok to be a one year holiday. And why would anyone need a break from their holiday? That just makes no sense.

What is even weirder is coming back to Bangkok at the end of the one week vacation. It was one of those semi-exhausting traveling vacations where I saw loads of stuff at the expense of basic human comforts like sleep. This is the type of vacation where I would normally come back home and collapse into the warmth of my home’s embrace. I wanted to do that when I got back to my apartment in Bangkok last night, but I laid there pondering the feeling at the same time. I in no way consider Bangkok to be my home, and yet here I was relieved to be back in my faux-home’s warm embrace. After that realization, it felt more like a pat on the shoulder.

I had a great time in Vietnam though. To say that it is beautiful would be an understatement. I saw magnificent limestone mountain peaks jutting up out of the ocean at Halong Bay, terraced rice patties carved into the sides of rolling hills in Sapa, and more limestone peaks lining a stream at Perfume Pagoda. Normally, I’d have a rolling narrative of my splendid adventures, but I’m tired of writing those. I’d also normally have some pictures as well, but a pickpocket stole my camera in Hanoi. I’m not upset about it though, these things happen.

I’m pretty much going to throw down an open invitation for people to come visit me in Thailand. Actually, I think I already did that, but I’m doing it again right now. The biggest excuse I have heard from people over the last few weeks is that it is too expensive. It is true that visiting Thailand will be expensive, but it’s not as bad as you might think.

Consider these two vacation options for the dates of Sep 12-26, a 2 week vacation. I assumed the visitor would be flying from St. Louis. It would be cheaper if you lived on the west coast, say in Seattle.

Option 1: Ft. Lauderdale, Florida
This is a fairly common vacation destination, right? I sort of picked it randomly to illustrate a point. I went to expedia.com to find a vacation package. The cheapest airfare/hotel combination for this trip was $1098. Now you are probably going to have to rent a car, that’ll be about $25/day if your lucky, adding another $350 to your trip. Then there is the food. Even if you only eat out one meal a day, you’re probably looking at $15-20/day, and there’s another $250. You total cost for this trip to a mundane vacation destination? $1700

Option 2: Bangkok
Your only real expense here is airfare. For this trip, I found roundtrip airfare on www.bt-store.com for $767 on American Airlines. Your lodging will be free because you can stay with me. The food in Thailand is insanely cheap; you will actually be saving money on your grocery bill by being there. Expect to pay about $5/day to eat out for every meal. There will be a minimal transportation cost for riding public transport. I don’t know what it is yet, but it will be cheaper than gas for your car. So total cost is $767.

Yeah, I know I’d rather pay an extra $1000 to go to Florida instead of Bangkok.

I do have to be fair though. Most people do not go to Florida for two weeks by themselves, so the hotel and car would probably be split, and that’s assuming you fly instead of drive. I think my point is made though. Don’t discount visiting Thailand because of the cost until you consider the alternative.

I’ll leave you with some tips:
Fly on Wednesdays. It is way cheaper.
Avoid peak travel times. Notice I picked the middle of September instead of the week of July 4. January-February is supposed to be the best time to visit, and that’s the worst time to be here. How convenient! Plus, I would guess that airfare would be cheap around that time.

Well, I think this is my last post about my trip to Prague. Frankly, I’m getting a little tired of talking about it, so I’m assuming that means you are sick of hearing about it. However, I promised that I would write this one, and I’m a man of my word.

Food in the Czech Republic is pretty Germanic. They eat lots of sausage, schnitzel, potatoes, dumplings, etc. I tried to be fairly budget-conscious in my dining, so I ate from food carts quite a bit. These were actually pretty good meals. You could get a huge sausage in a homemade roll with a drink for about $3. They had hamburgers (often made of pork) and the aforementioned chicken schnitzels. The also sold these potato cake things, which I think had meat in them. They were basically like a big hashbrown. I didn’t care for them.

The thing they did have that I really liked, though, was fried cheese. It was a thick slice of cheese, breaded and fried, and then served on a roll. It was pretty similar to fried mozzarella sticks on a bun, except they were one big piece of cheese. You could also find fried cheese as an entry in cafes. I ate it once while on my trip to Karlstejn castle. I sat in a little cafe with a great view of the castle up the hill, and ate as I did a little work. I really wasn’t the hungry when I stopped there, I just didn’t want to leave the city yet. I’m glad I did because it was one of the most memorable meals of my trip.

On a side note, a cafe is not a place that serves food in the Czech Republic, it is a place that serves coffee. Bars serve alcohol, and restaurants serve food. The difference is often explicit, and you will see places that advertise themselves as cafe/bars, meaning they serve booze and coffee. Similarly, cafe/restaurants specialize in coffee and food. Often, in this case, the two will be separated. I ate in one restaurant which was in a Gothic vault in a basement, and there was a cafe which served coffee and light desserts above it. I saw this restaurant in a Gothic vault theme several times, although that was the only one I ate it. I thought it was a pretty cool concept, and added a lot of ambiance to the restaurant without a bunch of ridiculous flair on the wall.

Let’s talk about dessert. The budget choice was once again found at the street vendor. They made these cinnamon roll things which were really good. Basically, they roll this dough around a 2″ pipe and bake it. They then remove the pipe, and you were serve a barrel-shaped pastry. I might have a picture of this somewhere in my collection, but I don’t feel like searching at the moment.

The other option for dessert was the bakery, although this was more of an early morning thing. They had bakeries all over the place, one at my metro stop, and two at the school’s metro stop. I can’t speak highly enough about these places. They had amazing breads, pastries, and sandwiches. It was all homemade, and it was all cheap.

The final option on dessert was getting it at a restaurant. Once again, it was amazing to do this. I never buy dessert after a meal, but I opted for dessert over dinner a few times. I never regretted it when I did. This is obviously more expensive than going to a bakery or a street vendor, but the quality is just so much better.

I hope you have enjoyed my short series of posts about Prague and the Czech Republic. Look for my next travel-related posts in about a month when I will be coming to you live from Bangkok. Until then, I’ll try to come up with something entertaining for you from time to time.

These stories focus mainly on my communication problems. The all come out of the diary that I kept for the first week or so. I got bored of talking to my laptop once I had real people to speak to. I copied an pasted straight from the diary to maintain the original voice, but there are some transitions which don’t make a lot of sense.

When I first got there, I assumed that no one spoke any English. This was untrue, most people spoke English better than I spoke Czech. I was initially very scared to speak Czech to people for fear of butchering the language. People kept telling me that it is better to try and fail than to just speak English. Eventually, I bought into this theory, and things went much more smoothly.

As I was walking up the hill, some men tried to ask me a question. I replied by saying either “I am not a Czech woman” or “I am not the Czech language.” The difference between the two is a long ‘a’ and a short ‘a,’ and I can’t ever remember which is which. He chuckled, and I went on my way. Later, when I realized my mistake I had a good laugh about it.
(I found out later that I said, “I am not a Czech woman.”)

Well, back to the story of my travels. After the visit to St. Nicholas, I walked across the Charles Bridge back to the part of Prague I visited yesterday. I wanted to purchase a 30-day Metro Pass, which can only be done at a select few stations. I got lost while walking to the appropriate station, twice. Then, I got there and had to ask for help from the information booth. They were quite helpful. I then walked to a department store to get a passport photo for the ticket. I had incredible trouble communicating with the girl. I felt like an idiot. Normally, I try to plan out what I am going to say when I approach a business situation such as this, but she engaged me while I was reading the sign above her booth. Then, I walked back to the metro station, and I had to return to information because I could not fill out the form they had given me. Next, I went to the ticket booth to buy the ticket, but I went to the wrong booth. Apparently there are 2 parts of this same station, 50 meters apart. I had no idea. The conversation with this girl was also fraught with confusion. I intended to hand her the form and some money and get my ticket. Not so much. I made it to the correct ticket booth, and my form was not filled out entirely. I didn’t sign the back, and it I needed to be dated. After the woman, who spoke almost no English, showed me what I had to do, I put the wrong month on the date. When I had checked into the hotel, they crossed out the date I wrote and replaced it with a 4 instead of a 3. This confused me at the time, but I thought it was some nuance of Czech culture, apparently not. The form in which the 3 was changed to a 4 said “sojourn date.” I was quite certain that the woman at the desk said to write today’s date, but maybe she meant 1 month from today’s date since my stay is going to be about a month. I am still not sure. Anyway, the whole metro ticket fiasco was quite humbling. I realized that I communicate on the level of a 1 year old.

I went to the grocery store tonight, and it was more of the same. Some women tried to talk to me, but I didn’t know what to say. I was afraid of a repeat of the morning’s declaration that I am not a Czech woman/Czech language. I replied with smiles, laughter, and ‘ums.’ I am sure that I was incredibly rude to them. I really must learn to say, “I do not speak Czech.” It would save me great embarrassment.

I had one of my first victories on the Czech language front. I went to Tesco to buy a notebook and an umbrella, and the checkout girl never realized that I didn’t speak Czech. Of course, I only said “Good Day” and “Thank You,” but it was still nice.

Right after that though, I had a bad experience. I ordered a sandwich from a little shop outside of the Tesco, and I thought it came with a drink. She didn’t give me one, and I was too afraid to ask for it. As I left, I realized that she might have been asking me what I wanted, but I left my fear control me. It bothered me most of the day because I was consciously trying to keep fear from controlling my actions. As it happens, I walked by the shop later, and I realized that I had not paid for the drink. There were two prices for each meal, one with and one without the drink. All I could do was laugh at myself. I must stop allowing these little trivial matters to disturb my peace.

I’m dedicating my next three posts (Untold stories 1&2 and the obligatory food post) to Stephanie because she is the one that insisted I write them. If you don’t like them or if you are tired of hearing about my travels, you can blame her. Hopefully I haven’t posted any of these stories before. I tried to screen them, but I have honestly forgotten who has heard what.

The loneliness
I arrived in Prague on Wednesday morning, and my first real contact with other people was on Sunday afternoon. This meant 4.5 days of almost complete solitude. It was really hard, but it was also somewhat cleansing. The Sunday afternoon was very nice though. The school organized a tour of the suburb it was in and the downtown. We ended up downtown at the end of the tour, and some of us decided to go out for dinner. Incidentally, I opted to go with desert instead of dinner, and I had an amazing pastry filled with some sort of fruit. It was fantastic. Anyway, midway through the dinner, one of my new friends starts talking about his arrival in Prague, “Bra, I got here, and, like, my roommate and none of my neighbors were here yet. I was so depressed; I wanted to die. It was the worst four hour of my life.”
To which I snidely commented, “Four hours? Try four days you wuss.” (I may have used a stronger phrase than ‘wuss’.) I don’t think he actually heard me, but the other guy from my building that was there with us did, and he was laughing about it for the rest of the course.

You wanted food?
I went on a day trip one Sunday to a little spa town called Karlovy Vary. Link to some pictures in case you missed them the first time around. This trip included a 3.5 hour train ride which left Prague at about 11:30am. The only thing I ate before I left was 3 bananas. So I pulled into this town at about 3pm absolutely famished. I walked around for a little bit, taking in the sights, and looking for some food. I found a little Greek place, and my stomach growled in anticipation of the delicious Mediterranean food. I walked in, and took a look at the menu. I though to myself, “Awesome, I can actually read this because it’s the same as an American Greek restaurant.” The waitress came over, and I said, “Shawarma a Pepsi prosim” all while feeling very satisfied with myself for properly ordering in Czech without pointing to a menu. The waitress brought my coke, and I pulled out my book. I sat there for a long time, and I was getting really hungry. After about 45 minutes, a couple comes in, and they order. Then, I notice that the waitress went over to the man that I had previously assumed was her boyfriend to deliver the order. He got up, and went into the kitchen. I could see it from my seat, and he was the only one in there. This guy had been sitting there for almost as long as me. Then, the waitress brought the new couple their silverware on a plate (a very common way of delivering utinsils in the Czech Republic), and I had yet to receive mine. At this point, I knew that she did not receive my food order. I flagged her down, got a menu, and ordered again in my usual mix of broken Czech and English. 5 minutes later, my Shawarma was in front of me, and I devoured it.

Yeah, those are trash bags
In my time in Prague, I was only able to find one laundromat. It catered to Americans, and it was incredibly expensive. I did not want to go there. The first time I needed to do laundry, I took my clothes to the hotel next to the school, where they did laundry for about $5/load. It was a bit high, but it was my only choice. Incidentally, I was rocking dirty underwear for about 4 days that week. I ran out of clean clothes on Saturday, took the clothes on Monday, and got them back on Wednesday. Yeah, I’m rough like that. I had to sort my clothes before I could take them in, so I couldn’t use my laundry bag to transport the clothes. I borrowed some Hefty bags from a friend, separated the clothes, and hopped on the Metro. I got the dirtiest looks that day carrying those bags. You would think those Czech people had never seen a stupid American carrying two Hefty bags full of dirty, smelly clothes onto the Metro before. Unbelievable.

I really don’t know why people go to Amsterdam. Prague has all the same late-night amenities at lower prices, plus it’s really nice in the day. I suppose Amsterdam probably is too, but I’ve never been there. Incidentally, my return flight was through Amsterdam, and the US customs officials decided that I must be a raging alcoholic as a result. They searched my suitcase for Absinthe. They didn’t bother to realize that I was only in Amsterdam long enough to take a leak and get on the plane.

Speaking of Absinthe, it was invented in the Czech Republic, except it wasn’t the Czech Republic back then. It’s pretty common there. I think I mentioned a while back that it was sold in my grocery store for around $12/bottle. I thought that was pretty funny.

Wenceslas Square is sort of the main night life part of town. There are tons of bars and restaurants around the city center, but that area in particular is dense with them. It is also dense with tourists. Preying on these tourists are prostitutes, drug dealers, and solicitors. It is my suspicion that these people are mostly pickpockets, but there are whores and drugs to be found elsewhere. The last night of the course, we all went out to bar in the area to celebrate. I was getting claustrophobic because it was quite packed so I went for a walk. Along the way, I was solicited for sex 3 times, drugs 2, and strip clubs 4.

The prostitutes walk up to you and simply say “Sex?” Normally, I would take it as a compliment if a woman walked up to me and offered to have sex on the spot, but these particular women were hideous. It was dark outside, but I could tell that I would throw up if I even tried. The drug dealers just say, “Marijuana, Coke, Ecstasy?” Always those drugs and always that order. The solicitors were usually for strip clubs but sometimes just for regular bars. On a side note, one of these solicitors convinced us to go into a bar on the night after my Playing Cupid story because the birthday girl wanted to do karaoke. They weren’t doing karaoke in the bar, and it turned out to be a gay bar. We probably would have stayed, but the waitress was incredibly rude. I don’t think she wanted us there. And that’s the story of my first trip to a gay bar. Back to the main point though, all of these night predators were very persistent. They would walk with you down the sidewalk for 10-15 feet trying to peddle their wares. I was shocked at how forward they were about the whole thing.

I’ve heard rumors about all kind of crazy clubs in Prague such as a place where you can have sex with a prostitute for free if you let them broadcast it on the internet. I’m not going to talk about any of these places here because I didn’t go to any of them. I might have inadvertently walked by, but if I did, I didn’t even know it.

One thing I did experience firsthand though, as I mentioned in a previous post, was Eurotic TV. This was one of my 60 TV channels, and I think it hailed from Germany or Austria. The entertainment of this network, as far as I’m concerned, was the hilarity of it. There were 3 of us at the hotel where I stayed, and we always showed our guests this channel because it was so ridiculous. Basically, there are about half a dozen girls in a studio which is made to look like a gym. There are treadmills, weights, those big exercise balls, oh, and a stripper pole. They played music continuously. The girls all had Bluetooth headsets on, and they were always talking to people on them. We presumed that they were doing some sort of live sex chat, but there was really no way to tell. They could have been talking to their moms or ordering a pizza. There were SMS messages displayed at the bottom of the screen. I guess people sent messages in for a sort of live chat session. I don’t know what kind of person participate in that sort of thing, but I have no idea what else it could have been. Did I mention that the girls on this program were not very attractive? Well, they weren’t. I have a link for you. It is NSFW, and I wouldn’t really recommend following it. I just feel the need to post it for completeness: Link

Prague

They are in the same album, but there’s more of them now.

Here’s a link to my photo album:

Prague

Here are some highlights I have picked out of my travel diary. Yes, I’m keeping a diary. I don’t have anyone to talk to at the moment, and I wanted to share some of this stuff so I wrote it down. Now I’m sharing it. It’s kind of long, but I did try to pick out the more interesting parts. I hope you enjoy.

6:42 pm CST somewhere over the Atlantic

I am in the middle of part 2 of 3 of my trip (St. Louis->Detroit->Amsterdam->Prague). Being the transatlantic portion, it is, of course, the longest, 7:03 to be exact. My triumphant return to Detroit was exciting.

I arrived at gate A9 10 minutes after my connecting flight started boarding. I glanced up at the monitor to find that I had to get to A54, first mistake. I power walked up to the train thing that goes between the gates. It had, of course, just left, and wouldn’t be back for another 3 minutes. I didn’t think I could wait. I glanced down the concourse, and I figured I could make it faster than the train, mistake number 2. Detroit must have the longest concourse in the world. They put a ridiculous amount of space between the gates. The train passed me on the way there. I finally made it to A54, and the lady at the gate nervously told me I was at the wrong gate. There was a later flight to Amsterdam, and that was the one displayed on the departure board. I was in such a hurry that I didn’t check the departure time. Anyway, the kind lady told me that I had to go back to gate A24, and that I had to run because they were in final boarding. I nearly knocked over 3-4 old ladies on the moving sidewalks while running past them. Why people can’t stay to the right on those things I can never understand. I just hope the baggage handler moved my bag over with the same veracity. Obviously, I made it on the flight because here I am, on tape delay from over the Atlantic Ocean, watching Dream Girls.

7:36 PM 3-14-07 Prague Hotel Room

My transport from the airport to hotel was with a company called Cedaz Transportation. My driver was the first person in Prague that I encountered who did not speak English, or at least, he did not speak any to me. He was not a crazy as I expected, but he was still out there. He drove the minibus through a narrow street lined on either side with much faster than I would have even in my car. I would have been terrified of hitting one of them, but he seemed unconcerned. He punished the poor suspension on that minibus by mercilessly speeding over cobblestone roads. The ride in the van was fairly smooth though so maybe European cars really are better made.

The initial drive through Prague was breathtaking. The pictures on the internet did not do it justice. I wished that I remembered the Czech phrase for “What is that?” which I had learned earlier from the language tapes, but it escaped me as so many phrases from that course do. We passed so many magnificent structures that left me in awe, and I had an overwhelming desire to know as much about them as possible.

My afternoon consisted of wandering around downtown, or I guess, Old Town Prague. This is the Prague you see on the postcard. Ancient, amazing buildings now house modern shops on their first levels. Sidewalk cafes line Wenceslas Square. As you walk around, you see some glorious building down the street that begs to be seen. Then, you arrive at the building and find that it is no monument, but rather a fancy housing for some cafes. There is no need to fret though because by wandering to this pseudo-disappointment, you stumble upon some hidden-away church with ornate gold appointments. Old Town Prague is a wonderful place to get lost.

3-15-07 9:01 PM

The highlight of St. Vitus’s (Cathedral at Prague castle) was the stained glass. All throughout the church was the most beautiful stained glass I have ever seen. One wall in particular stunned me. Sunlight burst through vibrantly colored glass, casting colorful rays onto a gold encrusted fresco which glimmered in its reflection. It was simply poetic.

9-16-07 8:11 PM

The metronome was an interesting place. It sat on a hill at the end of a major road, overlooking the center of the city. It sits on the spot that used to have a statue of Stalin. I imagine that when that statue was there, it was a great focal point of the city. Everyone who came there saw it, and they made a special trip up the hill to pay homage. Now, the site is overrun by punk kids on skateboards. Graffiti is everywhere on the surrounding walls and surfaces. There is a stone courtyard behind the metronome, made up of tens of thousands of square stones roughly 2 inches wide. (These same stones make up most of the sidewalks in Prague.) Patches of stones are missing. Weeds and grass grow intermittently between stones and up around some of the larger stones surround the courtyard. Stone stairs lead up to the courtyard, and I noticed that at least one was missing. A small fence surrounds the metronome (which is not turned on), but some of the pylons have fallen over. In short, the area is in disrepair. I loved every bit of it for its irony.

I’m off to Prague tomorrow; pulling out of Herrin at 8am. I’m really excited about my trip as you can imagine, and probably read elsewhere on this site. I figured I’d throw up one more post before I go.

I saw two movies this weekend, Breach and 300. Breach was about a leak at the FBI, and it was based on a true story. I liked it except for the true story bit. I remembered the even in the news, and it felt a little dirty to be watching a movie about it. 300 was pretty awesome. Obviously, it was overdone and ridiculous, but that’s why I liked it. There’s nothing like digitally enhanced abs in the morning, that’s what I always say.

The other purpose for my posting tonight it to try out Picasa. I plan to use it as a means for sharing all of my trip photos. I created an album tonight showcasing screenshots from my senior design project. The other members of my team are still working on it, so if you have an comments, I’ll forward them along. I’d appreciate the input to be honest. They updated the menu screen this week, but I don’t have the new stuff. Anyway, here it is:

Senior Design Screen Shots

People have been asking me all year what I’m going to do when I graduate. The official end of exam week Feb 22, so it’s coming up pretty soon. Well, I am hear to answer that question once and for all.

I have enrolled in a program to train me to become a TEFL teacher. TEFL is Teaching English as a Foreign Language. The program, which is in Prague, lasts one month, starting March 19. Afterwards, I will get a job teaching English somewhere, hopefully. I obviously have some preferences, but it will depend heavily on where I can land a job. There is a lot of demand in Asia and Eastern Europe, so I might end up there. Western Europe is difficult because most countries want EU citizens.

Most TEFL teachers make enough to support themselves and maybe save a little. I’m certainly not doing it for the money as I got job offers with much better pay than I would ever get as a teacher, even in the US.

After the year abroad, I plan to go to grad school, hopefully in robotics with a specialty in autonomous vehicles. I know you are thinking that I should have applied for grad school for this upcoming year, but I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do yet. Autonomous vehicles is something I have always been interested in, but I was really leaning towards alternative energy in the fall. I couldn’t find any programs in alternative energy that I liked, and I was unable to land a job that had any kind of interest to me. I don’t want to be a corporate monkey.

Here’s a link to the program I am doing: http://www.teflworldwideprague.com/

I will, of course, document my adventures here on Shouzer, and I will take solace in know that I will be done with that program before any of you graduate.