I’m taking a quick breath in what has been a very full week
to try and update this blog. This weekend my history class had a trip to Cesky
Krumlov in southern Bohemia with stops in Trebon and Tabor as well.
The trip was a giant success. Aside from all of the stuff
you would expect on an education trip (a little touring, clamoring through
underground tunnels, attending lectures, climbing church towers, and visiting
castles), we saw one of the oldest extant Baroque theaters in the world, had an
intimate dinner on the banks of the Vltava river (which runs south to north by
the way), and made a fort!
Let’s take these one at a time. The Baroque theater in the
Cesky Krumlov castle is over 200 years old and is only rivaled in its completeness
of artifacts (from costumes to stage props) by a theater in Stockholm (which
actually already starts to introduce features of classicism. It was so cool to
see this theater! The stage was designed in such a way as to give the
impression of incredible depth even though it was maybe only 30 feet deep and
they had sets that could be changed in and out to create 13 different
environments. While it would sometimes be necessary to take an intermission to
change the environment, the stage was able to have two “pre-loaded” so that
they could change in under 20 seconds. I know I’m not doing this theater
justice with my description, so here is a professional photo, they wouldn’t let
us take any (and in fact the tour guide yelled at me when she thought she saw a
flash coming from my direction – even though my camera and flash were turned
off and my lens cap was on my camera) - Theater Stage. The
stage also had trap doors to get props into (or remove them from) the middle of
the stage quickly, including people.
On our first night in Cesky Krumlov, we ended our lessons at
the foot of the castle just before sundown. I and a few other students decided
to walk around the castle a bit and see it before darkness descended. The
castle of Cesky Krumlov is really quite fairy-tale like. (Warning: Geek moment)
with tall spires, bridges and gardens, I felt almost as if I were walking
through Rivendell
– though the architecture was a bit heavier than the Elves would probably use.
Being in Cesky Krumlov at the onset of Autumn as the sunset was really special
and something I intend on remembering for many years. The warmth you felt even
as the sun receded behind the hills was… I don’t even know how to describe it -
it was simply special. As we descended from the castle and reentered the town,
dinnertime was fast approaching and so we began looking for a restaurant. Finally
settling on a little mideival-esque tavern, which offered riverside seating, we
were pleased to discover that several of our friends had made the same choice
and were already seated, enjoying hot wine under warm blankets. We joined them
and together feasted on Pheasant, Chicken, Duck and Rabbit accompanied by hot
wine, grog and mead (I have to admit – mead is not my favorite, and I’ll be
sticking with wine in the future).
And finally I arrive at the fort. I roomed with Devin and
Cyrus for the weekend and it turned out to be a great decision to take the only
triple for the guys. They gave us a five-person bedroom. Since I have a single
at my flat, I offered Devin and Cyrus the Czech version of a full bed (really
two twins next to each other with an uncomfortable gap). The first night we all
slept in our beds as would be expected, but by Saturday night we had grander
designs in mind. Creating a horseshoe out of three beds and placing two more on
top as a roof frame and blankets as thatching we created our fort. I had a very
nice and relaxing evening in the fort watching Superbad with Laura (it was her
first time) and Carey while some others who had been taking pulls of absinthe
and rum went “do klubu” (to the club).
Story time! When Cyrus and Devin returned from the club
around 1:30, we were just finishing the movie and so started preparing for bed.
Cyrus helped me to dismantle the fort (so that I could sleep on a mattress
without fear of sitting up and hitting my head on the “roof.” We didn’t want to
exert ourselves too heavily however and so we left the bed frames in the most
convenient location which happened to be between the beds and the bathroom.
Devin was the last to brush his teeth that night and as Cyrus had turned off
the lights on his way back from the bathroom, I reminded Devin to watch out for
the beds so that he didn’t hurt himself. Sure enough, thirty seconds later when
Devin got up to brush his teeth a huge bang resonates through the room. Devin
had forgotten my warning and tripped right onto the mattress-less bed frame. He
wasn’t hurt (thankfully) but still was displeased that someone had left the
beds between him and the bathroom. When I reminded him that I had warned him
not a minute before about the beds, he denied any such notice. As the
conversation continued it became clear that Cyrus also did not remember helping
me move the beds. At this point, it might seem that I was in fact the
inebriated individual, however, I verified with Carey the following morning who
it was that had helped me move the beds. These events have only reinforced my
distrust of absinthe.
Since returning to Prague, I have been busily preparing for
a presentation on Charles IV (which I gave this morning). The assignment called
for a 15 minute presentation, but as I have made it through two years of
college without having had a presentation (or not one where I felt like I had
to speak for 15 minutes) I had no idea how much material was necessary. While I
don’t know exactly for how long I presented, Devin told me that I was in front
of the class for nearly 50 minutes. I think I included too much background if
that is the case, but still I feel much better about where I am in terms of now
needing to convert the material I have into a paper.
Phew. That’s a quick run down of my week. Tomorrow I’m
having dinner with my Czech buddy at his flat (Lukas, not Mira) and this
weekend is Krakow!
Also, I started another blog (why not?). This one is focused
on photography and music and I’m trying to have at least one photo a day to
post along side a song of the day (which I’ve been doing for nearly a year on
my Facebook). If you’re so inclined, please check it out at www.shuttersandsounds.wordpress.com,
leave thoughts and comments, and enjoy (that’s the important one)!
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