killer bees

so, this is the second week of classes... things are going pretty well so far. one of my most unique classes is my bees and beekeeping class on tuesdays, that lasts 3 hours. this week we took a field trip to our professor's bee lab.
when Dalibor, my professor, told us that we would be going to his lab, i expected a white building with microscopes and scientists wearing lab coats and performing experiments with bees. this was not at all the case.
first of all, to get to the "lab" we had to take a train 20-30 minutes outside of prague and take a small ferry, i use "ferry" loosely as it was barely more than a row boat with a motor, to the other side of a small river. after a 10 minute walk we made it to the "lab compound" which was actually a small conglomeration of houses, one of which our professor lives in, and a single row of man-made beehives.
behind his house he has a shed which is his lab, and he did have a lot of professional equipment like microscopes and other tools for extracting honey and artificially inseminating the queen bees. needless to say, this was not at all what i was expecting, but it was quite interesting nonetheless.
after a short discussion on what is done at this particular bee farm, we went outside to see the bees. Dalibor took a tray of bees out of the hive, and we actually saw one of the worker bees being born. that was actually pretty amazing.
after admiring the bees for a while, we went back inside to see more of the equipment and then to another room where they extract the honey from the combs.
before we left to return to prague, we went into their family store, as the primary product from their bee farm is mead, which is wine made from honey. anna bought some and i tried it later on that evening -- it was actually quite good. much better than the mead we tried in cesky krumlov!

anyway... so that was definitely the most interesting point in my week so far. but, i did go see the annie leibovitz documentary last night - i would recommend this to anyone interested in photography or annie leibovitz in general. i really enjoyed it, and so did everyone else that i went with.

no plans for this weekend yet... i had intended on going to Oktoberfest in Munich, Germany, but that unfortunately fell through. so, we'll see what i can get into around prague.

future trips ahead though:
9-12 september: Vienna
24-27 october: Berlin
14-17 november: Florence

and thrown in there somewhere i'd like to take short weekend trips to hungary and poland - of course, depending on money and time. this semester is already flying by!

risk of deportation

This weekend eight of us left Prague and went to a small town about 3 hours away called Cesky Krumlov. We intended to leave Friday morning and arrive before noon so that we could have a day and a half of exploring. But, it didn't quite work out as planned.
We left the pension at 7:45 for an 8:30 am bus. We made it to the Florenc station at 8:05 with plenty of time to wait. After sitting there for 10 minutes, Miller and I were looking at our tickets and realized that the station printed on them was not the same one we were currently sitting at. We took off running. We had to jump back on the metro and get off 3 stops later, then we sprinted up the escalator, and ran to the bus stop just to find out we were 4 minutes late and the bus had already come and gone.
We found out that the next bus wouldn't be there until 1:30, so we had to buy another ticket and then find some way to kill 5 hours.
We went to Cafe Louvre, which is closer to old town, and posted up there for a looooong time. It was actually really enjoyable -- we had breakfast and then everyone had their own activities. Ryan and John played chess, Mary knitted, Meredith and I read books, Kelly drew, Miller read the paper, and Paul surfed the net.
So, after a very nice and pretty extended stay at the Cafe Louvre, we made our way back to the Andel station (the correct bus station this time) and got on our bus at 1:30.
The ride was about 3 hours long through the Czech countryside. I slept the majority of the trip, but towards the end we were on so many winding roads that I was rocking side to side pretty hard. We made it into Cesky Krumlov around 4:30 and took a short walk into the old town.
We finally found our hostel, Hostel 99, and attempted to check into our room. The manager, from Brazil, showed us to our room, it was called "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs," with 8 beds lined up in two rows. He came back to check us in and asked us for our passports. Shoot. We didn't bring our passports. The Director of our program has all of our passports with the foreign police so we could register our visas. The hostel manager then told us that there was no way he could check us in and there wouldn't be anywhere else in the town that would check us in either. He also said that if we got caught without our passports we would be fined 20,000 Czech Koruna and then thrown in jail. He was not kidding.
We negotiated with him to let us check in as long as we could get all of our numbers from school. He agreed and then let us alone so we could figure it all out. No one had a copy or a recollection of their passport number, so Mary called Dana, the director of our program, for help. She was absolutely NO help at all and told us to find somewhere else to stay. Not possible. So we then called the pension we're staying at in Prague and they came through for us and had all of our numbers on file. Luckily, we were able to check in finally and then went to walk around Cesky Krumlov.
The town is really small and easily walked in a half an hour. So, after walking the main street we set out to find some dinner. We happened upon the Traveller's Hostel which had a really great place to eat with a fire beside the table. None of us had eaten since breakfast so we ordered 3 appetizers a main course each and of course some of the local beer.
After dinner, we walked around town and stopped at a few more bars-- each of them were very different with completely different clientèle. The last place we ended up at was a very bohemian pub-like atmosphere with live music and ladies dancing to the traditional music. Afterwards, the girls called it a night and the guys stayed out until 3 or so in the morning.
On Saturday, we all woke up in time to check out of the hostel at 10 am and then we went for breakfast and some more exploring. We went up to the castle, which had a great view of the town and the neighboring landscape. The eight of us walked around the castle grounds taking silly pictures and having a great time.
We went to lunch nearby and had a traditional Bohemian feast with traditional Mead (hot honey wine) outside with blankets. It was really nice, and the food was amazing. I'm not a fan of the Mead, it's really strong and looks like hot cider, so you're immediately disappointed when you drink it! Nonetheless, we all gave it a try. After the feast we headed back to the hostel to grab our things and on the way we stopped and got a cinnamon roll, but not the kind we have in the US. It's actually pretzel dough rolled into a cylinder, so it's hollow, and then it's rolled on sugar or cinnamon or almonds, whatever you like, and then served hot. It's really delicious and incredibly filling despite being hollow!
After our afternoon treats, we headed to the bus stop and got ready for another 3 hour journey, but this time back to Prague. We made it back to the hostel around 8pm, exhausted from a 36 hour trip to Cesky Krumlov.

first impressions

My first studio project was due Thursday morning and we had a mini review of everyone's work. I think I went about 6th or 7th out of 26 people? Either way... it was a good critique of everyone's projects as each person simply explained their ideas to the rest of the class.
Our instruction for the project was to create/ draw/ write/ photograph/ anything our first impressions of Prague.
Thinking back to my first few days here, I remembered that I had been particularly taken back by the underground metro system. This will be the first city where I will have spent a significant time that has a metro system that I can and will use regularly -- I already use it at least twice a day.

But, what was really remarkable to me, and I've noticed this in other cities as well, is the contrast in a centuries-old city and a fairly modern means of transportation. I think it's a great feat the Czech were able to accomplish by digging underground through ancient buildings and artifacts and install a streamlined means of travel around the city.



Above is the image of my final product.
There are three panels laminated together to form a long sheet about a meter long. The progression from dark to light (left to right) signifies my arrival in Prague where I'm unsure of my location and I am unfamiliar with my surroundings and then my departure where I have learned the city, I have explored the unfamiliarities and can make sense out of the urban landscape.
In order to portray this progression I copied various parts of a map and distorted the images with the blacked out parts, then to add to the aged quality of Prague, I dyed the paper with a dark tea, giving the paper an older appearance which was the sense of Prague I was trying to emulate. Interwoven with the strips of torn paper is the simple metro diagram that can be found on every metro car in the city. As simple as it is, it can guide someone around the entire city, and I found that to be very powerful. From cut strips of colored paper I recreated the diagram and I wrote on the strips my first impressions of Prague that I had originally noted in my journal.
I really enjoyed this open ended project. It was difficult to figure out at first what I really had gotten as a first impression. But with some reflection and journaling, I was able to articulate my ideas in a fashion that I hadn't ever tried before. All in all, I think it was a pretty successful end result.

first day of classes

My dad's probably thinking "Finally!"
But it's true... it really has been a while since everyone else started up school.
The only class I had today was a seminar on urbanism that is taught in conjunction with studio. For class, we met up at the astronomical clock in old town square. We went inside the building adjacent to the clock and sat in a room with the biggest site model I've ever seen. It was a 1:1000 scale model of the entire city of Prague. Martin gave us a brief history of Prague and the surrounding area of Bohemia. It was a pretty interesting discussion and afterwards we went up the clock tower to overlook the city. It was quite a view, but unfortunately it has been overcast and rainy all day today so the view wasn't as clear as it could have been.
So, that's pretty much all I've done today. A Monday with only one class that doesn't start until 2pm is a pretty sweet start to a week.
School in Europe is rad.

just another tourist

back in prague for just about a week now, and it's been great getting settled in and getting used to the city i'm calling home for the next 3 months. monday and tuesday of this week mostly consisted of unpacking, shopping for groceries, eating cheap but delicious food, and searching for good deals in the shopping district near our school.

wednesday we had our first day of orientation. it was probably one of the most pointless afternoons i've ever had, but, what could i do? our second day of orientation was on thursday and we got our desks and found out our first project for studio - it's called "first impressions" and it's entirely open-ended, so we'll see what i come up with by next thursday.

thursday afternoon we were actually able to move into our permanent rooms. kelly and i have a small but really cozy room on the first floor with a great view out over the city. we have plenty of storage, a fridge, and a tv (but we can't get it to work). the pension is a pretty interesting place to say the least... we have very interesting characters that work there including an angry czech woman that serves us breakfast - she's definitely my favorite. the pension's pretty historical too -- during world war II it was actually used as a birthing hospital/facility for jewish women who had gotten pregnant by nazi soldiers. the soldiers would give the babies german surnames and send them to families in germany, meanwhile sending the mothers to concentration camps. it's definitely surreal to think about what these rooms were once used for...

anyway, thursday night a bunch of us went out for pizza and hung out at a pool hall near the pension. no school on fridays! so, yesterday kelly, meredith, mary, julie and i went to do the usual touristy things like charles bridge and prague castle. last night, kelly had made reservations to eat at a restaurant supposedly run by architecture students called Klub Architecktu. it was underground in a cellar and they served really great and reasonably priced food. 14 of us went, so it was a really great time. today i did some more toursity things with miller, john, paul, and ryan. we tried to go the jewish cemetary but it was closed today. so, we crossed to charles bridge and walked along the river looking for the kafka museum. we decided to skip that for today and then headed north looking for a pedestrian tunnel ryan had heard about. before we got there, we all split up. ryan and miller went one direction and john, paul and i went up a hill to take a look at some ruins and a palace for queen anne of belvedere. afterwards, we found the pedestrian tunnel and took some pictures of that for a while. it was a pretty awesome space that pretty much comes out of nowhere. we found the castle uphill some more, and then of course in the most tourist-packed location in prague, we found ryan and miller. we toured the outside of the palace and the church (again, for me) and then headed back to the metro and onward to the pension.

tonight i think we're planning on going out for ryan's birthday celebration -- it's his 21st tomorrow... so hopefully i'll have some pictures to show for that!

back in praha

i wrapped up copenhagen 2-ish days ago...

copenhagen was a great city- very relaxed and easygoing. we rented bikes on saturday and rode around and saw all the touristy places. it's amazing how much ground you can cover on 2 wheels!

what we saw on bikes:
the fortress/castle
the little mermaid (she's actually pretty little):

the opera house
the black diamond (a library)
nyhavn (picturesque canal):


the stock exchange with a spire made up of 4 twisting dragon tails
a wind farm on the water with HUGE windmills:


christianshavn
year round christmas store
stroget (longest pedestrian walkway in the world -- it was a mad house)

i'm not really used to riding a bike in a city so it was a good experience for me... more than half the population rides bikes instead of driving. it's pretty amazing to see rush hour when all the traffic consists of bikes and not cars! i was pretty sore after riding and still pretty sick, but it was still really enjoyable.

overall, the trip to scandinavia was amazing. not at all what i expected. yes, it was incredibly expensive, but we made do. the people were beautiful, but also really diverse - not just blonde hair and blue eyes. logan's friend roger really made oslo for us... we were able to see so much off the beaten path that if we hadn't, we might not have liked the city as much. also, visiting the architecture firm snohetta and visiting their opera house was a major highlight as well.


oslo as a city was not my favorite, but the experiences we had there made it an amazing time. copenhagen as a city was absolutely my favorite of the two... it's what i had expected scandinavia to be. my parents were absolutely on point about it, and i'm glad i was able to experience it for myself. and traveling with meredith and ryan was really fun as well... we had similar interests and that made it easy to hit all the right places. the whole trip was well worth the planning and the money saved over the summer.

so, on sunday meredith, ryan, and i got on a flight back to prague. we made it to the pension just in time to catch up with kyle, kevin, and eric for dinner. it's kind of nice to be back in prague and already be familiar with a lot of the area where we're staying... it's our little home away from home now.

the last 2 days i've spent catching up on sleep and relaxing before the semester starts. yesterday we went to the grocery store and hung out in a park. today we've just been wandering in and out of stores looking for good deals.

tomorrow, we have our first day of orientation followed by an introduction to studio on thursday. then, classes officially start next monday the 15th. it's pretty strange not being in class in the middle of september. but i could definitely get used to this.

as for all those pictures i need to upload... they're coming. i promise.

copenhagen beginning

so oslo was pretty much an amazing city... and i will absolutely have to go into more depth soon, but once again my time is limited on the computer at the hostel.

right now, i'm in copenhagen, denmark. we took the overnight ferry from oslo two nights ago. it was pretty cool being on a ship... but we had a pretty sucky room. allllll the way on the bottom, below the cars! overall it wasn't too bad since it took care of our transportation and a place to stay all at the same time... but meredith and i did get a cold. so i've been trying to tough it out walking through copenhagen with my tissues and my fleece trying to avoid the chills!

but so far, copenhagen is SO much different from oslo... when i actually get to write about oslo you'll understand what i mean! 

but copenhagen is separated into districts that are each equally diverse with museums, shopping, restaurants, parks, and bars. yesterday after we checked into our hostel, which is called "sleep in heaven" by the way, we walked around a district called nørreport and we visited the botanical gardens, the national art museum (statisk museet for kunst), and the kings gardens. we went to dinner at a place called klubben.... SO much authentic danish food and really cheap too. then we walked to a 70s-ish bar called mckluud... we tried some cheap local beer and then called it a night. sleeping in a 14 bed hostel room is definitely an experience.... the bunk beds are stacked 3 high! (i'm in the middle, between meredith and ryan). 

today meredith and i decided to take it easy since we're sick, and just went to do a little looking through shops while ryan went and did his own thing. we stopped by a cemetary with hans christian andersen's grave as well. then we went to the carlsberg brewery this afternoon and had dinner at the same place as yesterday... it was still awesome.

tonight we're going to pussy galore's flying circus... not sure what to expect there, but i'm sure it'll be interesting!

so that's all for now... stay tuned.

so much to write!

okay, so i've been in oslo for 3 or 4 days now... i have so much to tell! but there's a line for the computer in the hostel, so i'll update soon enough, with pictures too :)

until then...