Lauren Bardin -- Czech Republic

February 2008


Ahoj everyone!! If you find that in my email I am rambling or making no sense at all, I'm sorry, it's because Doug is going to be here in less than 2 days and I can't make myself calm down, I am so excited and anxious!!! In less than 2 days we will begin our journey over Central Europe! I am meeting him in Prague on Friday afternoon then we're taking a long train ride to Krakow, Poland. We'll stay the night there in a hostel (for $16, pretty nice, eh?) and possibly visit Auschwitz. Then we'll make our way to Výsoke Tatry, which are some mountains in Slovakia. The next night we'll stay in Bratislava and the next two nights we'll be in Budapest. Then one night in Vienna and then back to good old Trebic. I'm really excited to introduce Doug to my host family, old and new, my friends, and my way of life here; I really think he's going to love it. After two nights here we will head to Prague for two nights, and then a last night in Dresden, Germany because Doug has to fly home from there. It's going to be a lot to do, but we're ready for it, we can't wait! I haven't been able to fall asleep at a normal time in a week and I don't feel tired from it yet. I have a feeling I'll be running on excitement and adrenaline until Doug leaves.

Other than planning our trip, I have been doing a lot of other things. I mentioned before that I had recently moved to my new host family and I was very scared about what my future would hold. But, this house has been spectacular! I've seen a completely different side of my YEO and I'm really glad they took me in here. The mother is so caring, funny, loves to joke with her son and husband, and is a fantastic cook. My host dad is also a fantastic cook; he made mexican food one of the first weekends I was here and it was delicous! Definitely not Mexican mexican food, it had a little Czech twist to it, but it was great. He's also helped me a lot with my traveling plans with Doug; he has a lot of insight because he is constantly driving all over the country for his work. (Which I have yet to discover what it is...here they just say "businessman" and leave it at that.) My host brother is also great; he's a lot of fun, usually pretty talkative, always making jokes, and has a lot of silly, entertaining friends. We go to the same school but hardly see each other inside the building, which I think he likes, because he's not big on the whole studying thing and I don't think he wants me to see that first hand. I hadn't, until just recently, when his English teacher asked me to come and help out every Wednesday. So now, I get to help teach that class too, and spy on how well my host brother is doing. hehe. Of course, his english is almost better than mine because he was in Maryland as an exchange student last year and he's a bright kid. I am living about the same distance away from the main square as I was at my last host family, but here I walk everywhere. And...I love it! I think I'll be going home a walk-aholic. Usually I ride to school in the AM with my host mom but sometimes I walk, then I walk home and everywhere in between. It's about a 25-30 minute walk to my house but I'm really enjoying it now and I even have massive hills to conquer. Every time I walk home after school I mean to take pictures because the sun is usually going down behind the buildings and the sky is pink and it's perfect, but I haven't done it yet because there's always people out walking and they might think I was strange (or obviously a tourist) if I took photos of the communist buildings in Trebic. So yeah, I did enjoy the long walks very much....until 2 weeks ago. Not last weekend but the weekend before, I went to a semi-formal for a school in my city. The dance forum was so full of people and tables and chairs and it was impossible not to be squeezing through people when walking from one place to another. So, the dance floor was a million times worse and I was sacrificed in the mix. A man...a big man...crushed me. He crushed my left foot. He stomped on it while doing the polka...and more than once! I'm hoping it was because of drinking too much wine and not because he was such a horrendous polka dancer, otherwise his wife's feet must be permanently obliterated. I didn't think much of it at the time because I didn't want to believe it could have really hurt me, but the next day I looked at it and realized OUCH! I couldn't walk on it at all the first 2 days but I didn't want to say much about it to my host parents because I knew they'd insist I see a doctor and there was no way I was going to the doctor because there are still complications from when I went in October! And I'm sure all the doc would have said was, "Drink tea and stay home from school." Apparently tea solves everything in the Czech Republic; they'd put their own lives in the hands of tea. It is yummy... Well, now my foot is better, I can walk normally yet I'm not ready to go running or play basketball or anything. Ouch. I feel pretty tough though; it's been the closest I've ever come to breaking a bone in my body.

I went to another ples (dance) last weekend and this one was for a school where I didn't really know anyone except 2 other exchange students. Luckily, word of who is from America gets around fast and all of a sudden you have a bunch of friends! Or at least people telling you they want to come visit in NYC and see the Statue of Liberty and eat hamburgers. They always turn out to be a lot of fun and I usually see people at these balls that I don't get to see every day in school, so that's fun too.

A few weekends ago I went with my host parents to meet my host dad's sister and her family. They told me we'd all go and spend one night there because they had to go to a Rotary ball and didn't want to drive home. They said I could hang out with their neice and nephew who are both about 20 and it sounded like fun to me. I guess I assummed that both my host parents and the other set of parents were going to the ball together, because I was very very surprised when at 4PM my host parents said they should probably get going to the ball and they got up and left. Oh, just another extremely awkward night to add to the many I've accumulated since becoming an exchange student, it's all good. No, it wasn't so bad, the kids were super super nice and a lot of fun. We went to a smaller village for a "mask party," supposively celebrating some sort of Christian holiday, although I saw no signs of religion, only old men drinking beer and couples dancing the polka in a tiny volunteer-firemen/community-type-building. I got to know the son and daughter (my host cousins) better and we had a lot of fun, I was even forced to dance polka, the Czech national dance, in the middle of all the crazy dancers.

Oh! I got my haircut! I was really scared about doing it but my friend was dying her hair so I just made the appointment and hoped for the best. Czechs don't have the best style....especially hair style and espeically in my city, so I was more than nervous when the scissors cut of more and more of my hair. When she finished, I was a little heartbroken that so much of it was gone and I thought the style looked very very Czech and I was scared I wasn't goign to know what to do with it, but I'm now used to it. It's definitely got some Czechness to it, but I guess that's cool because well, I am supposed to become Czech.

I hope everyone back home is keeping warm and keeping safe from all the snow and ice, I'm hearing you're getting more and more! I hope you're all doing well, miss you all, take care!! Laurinka

ps-I have a jungle in my bathroom and all the way up my stairs to my room.