Na shledanou v Praze.

112 days later and here we are...

I returned to the states on Wednesday the 16th. I have been back for a few days and am just now writing this post. Why? Putting it off like I have many other times. This time I am probably putting it off so I can ignore the fact that it is all over. I am learning to accept the fact that I am not in Prague and that I will not be returning there in the foreseeable future. Don't get me wrong- I am happy to be home. That is probably the one question I have heard the most the last few days. "Are you happy to be home? I bet you aren't." I am happy! It is just hard. I think it is always hard to leave a place that has become your home. It was hard to leave Edmonds the first time I was going down to Monmouth. It was hard to leave Monmouth after my first full year of school. But with both of those departures, I knew I wasn't leaving forever and I knew I would be back in a matter of months. This time it was different. I can't tell you that I am going back. I can tell you that I want to, that I think I will, that I plan on returning. But I cannot tell you for certain and I cannot tell you when that will happen if it does. So that makes this departure harder. But I am happy to be home, to be with my family, to see my old friends, and to be in my own home.

My time in Prague and the rest of Europe was truly amazing. There is not one word I could use to describe it. I was truly blessed with this incredible opportunity and I thank everyone that had a part in making this experience possible. If any of you are considering studying abroad, DO IT! Follow your dreams and go. You will not be sorry. Two of my other good friends from WOU were also abroad this semester and we all had different but great experiences. And, although I can't speak for them, I will say I don't think one of us will ever regret our decision to go. So to any of my young cousins out there, keep your grades up and start begging your parents now to let you have this experience. When else in your life will you truly get the opportunity to travel around carefree? Studying abroad will forever be a time in my life that I will look back on with big smiles.

So to sum up my past semester I have made an "ABC's and 123's" style list. It was a fun way for me to think of some of the great (and some less than great) parts of my last few months. If you have further curiosities on any part, let me know and I bet I can tell you some great stories!

So here goes...
A- Absinth
B- Burčak
C- Chapeau Rouge
D- Drinking
E- Eurofood stands
F- Fried cheese sandwiches
G- Gulaš
H- Hostels
I- Insect infestations
J- John Lennon Wall
K- Karlovy Lazne
L- Legalized peeing in the streets
M- Moravia and Mikulov
N- Night tram
O- Overnight train rides
P- Potato pancakes
Q- Quirky techno music
R- Random meetings with people at hostels and bars
S- Singing Czech Christmas carols
T- Traveling
U- U Sudu
V- Visitors and Visiting
W- WizzAir
X- eXperience of a lifetime
Y- Yellow Student Agency buses
Z- Zany good times...

0- Regrets
1- Amazing semester
2- Cameras
3- Great visits to Chapeau
4- Roommates
5- Story club
6- Christmas markets visited
7- Caves in U Sudu
8- Countries seen
9- Trips away from Prague

Other fun facts...
5106 or 14GB of pictures and videos, 112 amazing days, 13 cities slept in, 24 cities seen



I went through all 5,000+ pictures and tried to make a cool slideshow. I failed. Apparently I am not as tech savvy as I thought. I might have even lost all my pictures in the process... We are still working on the data recovery. If I ever figure out a way to make this slideshow happen, I will post it. If not I will just post pictures in a seperate entry.

But otherwise I will say na shledanou to the blogging world! I gave it my best effort and I hope you all enjoyed it.

The Little Ging and The Tall One in Spain

The final trip... Where was I headed? To meet Kate Arnold. What was our destination? Barcelona.
Side note: Kate is one of my friends from WOU that is studying in Oviedo, Spain this semester.

We both flew into Barcelona on Friday and had quite the adventure trying to find each other. We had plans to meet at either my gate or at baggage claim. Well I sat at my gate for a little while. There was no Kate. I went to baggage claim. No Kate. I went outside the secured area, a risky move, and looked among all the people that were meeting long lost friends and lovers. No Kate. I sat and waited there for a while thinking she would eventually find me. When I began losing hope in her I decided to walk to the other baggage claim area. In the middle of this long walk, in a big open area, I saw my little ginger friend, with a frantic and worried look on her face. I ran up to her with my arms in the air! It was a joyous moment.

After getting on a bus into town and wandering to find our hostel, we decided to go walk around a little bit. We walked all over but to be honest, I can't tell you where we went or what we saw because we were just talking and catching up after so long apart.

Saturday morning we tried to find a walking tour but failed. Instead we made our own. We wanted to see Gaudi, so Gaudi we saw! We went to Palau Guell which was some of his early work. Not that awesome but free. Then we went to the port and saw the boats and wandered around there. We decided after this that it was time for some lunch. We found some seafood paella that was pretty freaking delicious! After lunch we went to La Sagrada Familia (The Sacred Family) which is Gaudi's unfinished masterpiece. It is meant to be a cathedral but is still unfinished. I think it is supposed to be done in a year or so. I don't know. It was pretty sweet looking though. After this we went down to Casa Batllo, also a product of Gaudi. This place was freaking sweet. It is this house that Gaudi renovated and designed everything after the sea. VERY cool. I really enjoyed it. After exploring this house, Kate decided it was time for another Spanish delicacy. Churros and chocolate. Imagine a plate of churros served with a small sized coffee mug filled with melted, hot pudding. There you go. They were pretty bomb. After churros we went to rest at our hostel for later when we met up with some guys from CouchSurfing. It was very awkward meeting.

Sunday we went to the Picasso museum with some people from Kate's program in Oviedo. Since it was the first Sunday of the month, the museum was free. It was interesting but there was not alot of well known pieces. Or even pieces that you look at and think "That is Picasso." But It was still very cool. After the museum we went to Park Guell, out last Gaudi destination of the weekend. This is a big park that had pretty views of the city. It also has two houses, by Gaudi of course, that were modeled after gingerbread houses. The other amazing thing about Park Guell, and the true reason I wanted to go- ANTM was there! That is right folks- Tyra Banks and the America’s Next Top Model crew went to Barcelona one season and the final runway challenge was at Park Guell. Pretty freaking sweet. We had a little catwalk session and took some pictures. We made Tyra proud. It was just like my Sundays back in Monmouth when I would sit and watch ANTM all day, but it was in real life! It was fun. After Park Guell we headed back in towards the main part of Barcelona and decided to hit up the beach. Well whenever you take Anna for foreign waters she will, of course, have to go in them. So the second we hit the sand I started kicking off my shoes and rolled up pants and ran right into the Mediterranean Sea. I only went in knee deep, but I went in! After splashing around for a little while we decided to just sit and enjoy an evening on the beach. It was nice to just sit by the sea and listen to the waves. Later in the evening we went and got some more Spanish food. We enjoyed some delicious sangria and tapas. It was quite delicious.

Monday morning Kate and I decided we were going to spend some time popping in and out of shops near La Rambla. Later on we met up with two of Kate’s friends and decided to go to “The most beautiful man made thing ever.” This was in the words of one of Kate’s friends. It was this big and pretty beautiful fountain. And as if being told it was beautiful wasn’t enough, it was another ANTM spot. I was sold, we were going. It was pretty sweet. ANTM filmed a mock commercial there so we of course did an ANTM photo shoot. We got some pretty awesome pictures too. We sat and had some café con leche at a small outdoor café by the fountain and then made our way back to La Rambla. We had one last stroll down La Rambla and got our fill of the performers on the street. We then got our bags from the hostel and headed to Plaza Catalunya for me to catch the bus back to the airport. Kate and I said our farewells to each other and parted ways.

It was a very nice weekend. I really enjoyed Spain and the Spanish culture. I think I would enjoy spending more time there someday.

Catching Up... For real this time.

OK! I have decided to do a hard core Readers Digest version of the past month or so...

-Leah came to Prague! We had a superb time! We did a free walking tour of the city which ended up being really entertaining. We went to the Zoo. We did a Pub Crawl. We went to the castle and all the other big sites. We had a fantastic time hanging out together!

-Leah and I went to Vienna with my friend Kate! That was a good weekend. Vienna was a nice city. The highlights from that trip would definately be seeing Schonbrun Palace and eating weinerschnitzel!

-Leah went home. That part was sad. It was very fun to have her come out and visit me!

- I went to the Jewish Quarter of Prague! I had been in the Jewish Quarter before, it isn't like it is closed off to the world anymore, but I hadn't been inside any of the sites. I went to the Pinkas Synagogue which is very cool. On all the walls of this synagogue are the names of all the Jews in Prague that were taken to Terezin Concentration Camp which is nearby to Prague. Also, in the upstairs of the synagogue is artwork by kids from the same camp that was done as art therapy and later found when the camp was liberated. It was very cool.

-I went to ITALY! I spent just under a week in Italy with my friends Kate and Mikaela. We flew into Milan and spent an hour or so there before hopping on a train to Venice. We spent about two days in Venice. We rode a gondala. Ate some pasta and seafood. Saw the sights. Went to a big fish market. The depressing thing about Venice? The Bridge of Sighs (which I consider to be semi famous) was under some sort of construction! It kind of killed it for me. Construction has been plaguing my European experience. After Venice we got on a train to Florence. We got in there pretty late and met up with some couchsurfers that were hosting us for the two nights we were in Florence. They didn't have a place for us to sleep that night however, so they offered to stay out with us all night. After a drink at one bar, they took us to a secret pastry shop. Then after our pastries, they took us to a place with a pretty view of the city at night. Then realizing how tired we all were, it was decided that we would sleep in their car which was named "The Car of the Dreams." And folks, it really was! It was tiny too! The five of us squeezed into the little car and slept inside the car when it was parked in a random parking lot in Fiesole. It wasn't as shady as it all sounds though. I promise! The next day we toured Florence and saw The David! As well as some other sites. The David was pretty amazing though. That night they hosted us at their "House Near the Sea" for dinner and drinks. We slept there and the next morning they were nice enough to drive us and drop us off in Pisa where we spent about an hour. Just enough time to take some cheesy tourist shots with the Leaning Tower and then get to the train station! From Pisa we headed to Cinque Terre. This is a set of 5 small towns built into cliffs right along the sea. They are all connected to each other by some intense hiking trails and a train track. They are all gorgeous as well! We hopped around from town to town. Ate some delicious pesto for lunch and some fantastic seafood pasta for dinner. Also sipped the local wine. At the end of this long day we got on a train headed for Rome. It was an overnighter that got us into Rome at about 5am. We arrived and since nothing was really open yet we decided to take a nap on the floor of the station. At about 8 or 9am we woke up and headed to the Colleseum and Roman Forum. Those were both very cool to see. It was one of those moments where you are standing there and realize that you are staring at the Colleseum. Something you have seen many times in books and in movies, but never really thought you would get the chance to see in person. It was awesome. After those sights we went in search of a place to sleep. We found a hostel, dropped our bags, and headed to see more of Rome. We went to the Spanish Steps where we sat and felt cool chillin' on some steps. We went to the Trevi Fountain where we each tossed three coins in and drank some of the water. It is said that if you toss three coins in or if you drink the water it ensures you will one day return. We did both. Better safe than sorry. We went to the Pantheon which was pretty freaking sweet as well. After all this we went back to the hostel, showered (which we hadn't done in a while) and then hung out. Our hostel was having a bruschetta and sangria night so we stayed in and had a great time meeting people from all over the world. That is probably one of my favorite things about hostels. You can literally meet people from all over. I have friends from 5 continents now! We are still working on meeting someone from Africa. The next day we got up early and headed to The Vatican! I was very excited for this part of our trip. We went on a guided tour of the Vatican Museum which was very benefical as there were no signs up to tell us what we were looking at. We went into the Sistine Chapel which was GORGEOUS. And in case you were curious Kim, no one needed to trash their bag afterwards. We then went to St. Peter's Basillica. First stop was to the grottoes where we wandered among the tombs of past popes. Then we went into the actual basillica part and wandered around. It was very big and very pretty. After we had our fill of The Vatican we went for more pasta and then went to our hostel to get our stuff and then headed to the airport. Italy was pretty sweet. I liked it there alot.

So that portion of this post ended up being alot longer that I had planned.

-After I got back from Italy I enjoyed being back in Prague. As you have now seen, I was running like crazy all over the place. So it was definatelly nice to be back home and sleeping in my own bed for a while.
Enjoying Prague consisted of hanging out with people from my program, going to a Slavia-Praha vs Brno soccer game, and Thanksgiving! It was very hard to not be home for Thanksgiving, but luckily I was surrounded with other people that have become like family and who also were having a hard time being away. Along with 4 girls from my program, a Czech girl who is friends with one of those girls, and one mom, I celebrated a Czech Thanksgiving! I was in charge of dessert and people wanted somthing chocolatey. So I made French Silk Pie, one of my favorites. Then I found out there was going to be no stuffing. Thanksgiving without stuffing? Not ok. So I decided to be ambitious and make stuffing. Fun fact: The Czech Republic does not have any kind of premade stuffing like StoveTop. So I truly was ambitious and made stuffing, for the first time in my life, from scratch. It ended up being quite delicious. And the pie turned out great too. We also had salad, rolls, mashed potatoes, gravy, sweet potatoes, and chicken. No turkey, it isn't common here in Prague and when you find it, it is really over priced because the stores know only the Americans will be buying it. But Thanksgiving was still pretty good, different but good.

-The other exciting thing that happened was April's parents Sandy and Gary coming to Prague! April is my brother's girlfriend and I had the chance to see her mom a few times while she was visiting. We went on a ghost tour and a boat tour or Prague. Both were pretty neat and it was fun to get the chance to know Sandy.

Well that just about sums it all up! I have caught up! However, I will have a great post about my last weekend coming soon. I promise! Now that I am close to caught up I refuse to get that far behind again!

2 Fraine's and a Connearney in Frankfurt

What up world, it's me again. I have been seriously lacking at blogging and failing to fulfill promises of new blogs to you people. And you have all been so kind as to remind me quite often. I am sorry. I am still trying to play catch up with life but I think I have almost done that. Look at me being behind at the blog as a sign that I am out living!

So we are still playing catch up here, and we are on to one of the most exciting parts of my time here. The day that LEAH stepped foot back onto European soil! That is right folks, my sister got some big kid, fancy job and decided to buy a plane ticket to see me! And within days of her booking a ticket, our cousin Jessica, who is studying in Finland, decided to book one to see us for a weekend! That is right, three Fraine kids decided to hang out in Frankfurt for a weekend. Germany is still trying to figure out what hit it! So after leaving Bruges I hopped on a bus and got to Frankfurt. I got to the hostel and as I was trying to get my bag into a locker for the day I heard Leah and Jess coming down the stairs! It was a very exciting moment, as you can imagine!

Leah, Jess, and I had a fantastic weekend together. We arrived Thursday and stayed until early Monday morning. The weekend was full of crazy stories, crazy adventures, and crazy people. We met more people than I can really count. There was our roommate Doug, these peace corps guys that had just been evacuated for Guinea, some crazy people that worked at our hostel, some people that actually LIVED at our hostel, and then the random people we met going out. We toured around Frankfurt on Friday which was nice. It was fun for us all to get to experience a new city together. Saturday was Halloween and we went to a small town nearby called Heidelburg. They have a nice castle grounds and the world's largest keg! Standing at over 220,000 liters (or over 55,000 gallons) it was pretty massive! We went out for Halloween and had fun. We also met up with our "German Cousin" Johanna who lives in nearby Wiesbaden. Sadly, this was the first Halloween I can remember that I did not dress up. It was a little strange and didn't quite feel like Halloween, but it was a fun night regardless. And we even sang some karaoke! Sunday the country of Germany essentially shuts down! But we took a train out to Mainz where we thought we could find a few things to see and do. We were mistake and we instead wandered around a little bit. We got back to Frankfurt and had one last dinner together. Then we went to bed early so that we could get up early and catch our buses and planes home. It was awesome to get to spend a weekend with Jess. Leah and I hopped on a bus and she came back to Prague with me!

Mid Term Break!

Hello world. It's Anna. Do you remember me? I know it has been quite a long time...
Sorry for the lack of posting. The past month has kept me so busy it is crazy. So get ready for a series of mega posts to inform you all (or whoever still cares) about my adventures. We are going to break these up into probably 4 seperate posts so none of us are sitting here staring at a computer screen wanting to stab our eyes out.

Round One: Mid Term Break
First off let me say that midterm break is a genius idea. Whoever thought it was a good idea to give you a week off in the middle of term is just amazing. WOU should introduce one of those. So being in Europe and without classes for a week just screams opportunity to travel to somewhere. And somewhere that deserves more than just a weekend. So where did I go? I went to 3 countries (4 if you count the Czech) and 9 cities (10 if you count Prague) in that week! Ok, now some of those cities probably shouldn't really count since it was just an airport and then got on a bus to another place, but still- that is some serious travel right there.

AMSTERDAM: The Land of Legal Marijuana
Friday afternoon Katie and I got on a plane and flew to Eindhoven where we then got on a train and went to Amsterdam! I really liked Amsterdam. I already want to go back. I wanted to go back about two hours after we left. It was just so pretty! It was full of canals and boats and bikes and alot of character. Here are the highlights from that leg of our journey...
-Hot waffles with hot chocolate poured over them are amazing.
-The Anne Frank House and The Van Gogh Museum are both very amazing.
This is the actual annex that Anne Frank and her family hid out in during WWII. It was very cool to see it. Anne's father, Otto Frank, was the only one of the family to survive and after the war he agreed to work towards turning the annex into a museum for people to see but said he didn't want any of it to be furnished again. So what we saw was how it was left after the family had been taken and after most of the annex was cleared out. So it was really like a few empty rooms but the pictures and magazine clippings that Anne had glued to her walls were still there and parts of the kitchen were still there. It was very interesting. We also saw her original diary as well as some of the added pages she had written. After the Anne Frank House we went to the Van Gogh Museum. This is the largest collection of Van Gogh's work in one place. The museum houses over 200 paintings as well as many letters he wrote to family and friends. It was very cool. There was so much to look at! If you ever make it out to Amsterdam these are two things that are definately worth seeing.
-There are bikes EVERYWHERE in Amsterdam. It was crazy and I thought I might get hit by one!
-We slept homeless the second night. That was an experience. Don't worry mom- We were perfectly safe the whole time!
-Wooden shoes are seen around every corner and you can find them in every color with every kind of design! I was slightly obsessed with them.

After two nights in Amsterdam we got on a bus and rode down to...

BRUSSELS: The Capitol of Europe
Brussels was a nice city. We arrived Sunday morning and immediately found our hostel. Then we went to wander the city.
-The best gelato in all of Europe that I have tasted thus far was in Brussels. I don't know that it has been mentioned but I am on a mission. To get gelato in every city I go to. Krakow was holding the top rank with their disaronno and their tiramisu. Amsterdam had some really good homemade chocolate. But Brussels had an amazing butter pecan and some kind of amazing vanilla with chocolate swirls and chocolate cookie, crispy, gooey, goodness. So if you go to Brussels, go the the Austrailian Home Made Ice Cream shop and get the one I just described. You won't regret it.
-Belgian waffles are AMAZING! The ones that have the sugar baked into them are like a little piece of heaven! Gooey, sweet, goodness is what they are...
-The Mannekin Pis is a cute little statue that is very tiny but attracts alot of attention. I completely forgot about wooden shoes and got hooked on that little guy in Brussels!

We only stayed one night in Brussels. We got up on Monday and went to the train station to figure out our best option as to where to go next. We decided to buy something called a "Go Pass" that allows you to make 10 train trips within Belgium and you can share it with as many people as you want. So we split one and hopped on a train to...

BRUGES: The City of Romance
Bruges, the place for lovers and the place the Collin Farrel movie "In Bruges" was filmed. I've never actually seen this movie and I had never heard of it before going to this town, but Katie had heard of it. Bruges is a tiny town that was very cute. It was easy to walk around and we saw all of the town in about a day.
-We met some Austrailians the first night that were travelling and we had a good time hanging out with them.
-I had a 57 year old man by the name of Stefan approach me the first night. He said, "You have beautiful eyes." Then it became, "You have a beautiful heart," which quickly became, "You have a beautiful personality and I just don't want to see you give it away to just anyone." Yah. That was really said. He also told me that he had been waiting 30 minutes to come tell me that he thought I was beautiful. That's right folks, 57 year old (older than my father) was sitting a few tables away watching me for 3o minutes! Not creepy at all!
-There is a chocolate shop on every corner in Bruges.
-With our "Go Pass" we also went to Antwerp and Ghent which were pretty neat cities as well.
-Katie and I were going to stay up all night so that I could catch a train at 4am to get to a bus to Frankfurt but we didn't want to spend money drinking all night. When the bartender at our hostel saw us sitting in a corner he came and gave us a free beer. Then when he got sick of listening to the drunken locals he begged us to come sit at the bar. He kept giving us free beer all night. That is my favorite kind of drink. Eventually I missed my train so we just went to sleep but I was able to stay up all night the next night and actually made my train and made it to Frankfurt!

Frankfurt is where I met up with Leah and Jessica! But That will have to be saved for another blog post. It was a pretty epic weekend.

There are no pictures to show of Amsterdam/Belgium because I didn't have a camera with me. But Katie did take alot of pictures which I do plan on stealing from her. I will post some once I do!

The Bones, and the Cold, and the Bears. Oh My!

Well it has been quite the week here in Praha! Here are some of the major happeneings...

-Alana had her 21st birthday so we went out and celebrated on Sunday. It included a tasty dinner, a disgusting shot (which I intend to bring back to the US), and finally alot of dancing!

-I went to coffee with a random Czech connection. Ready for the tree here? My friend Kaitlyn, her stepdad Jerry, his friend Lin, his stepdaughter Draza. Did everyone follow that? I met Draza last week for coffee. She is 33 and lives here in Prague with her 4 year old daughter and her husband. I was put in contact with her through Jerry and his friend Lin. She is very nice and agreed to meet with me. She brought along her mother and daughter. She was pretty adorable. Her husband came and met us later. They were all very nice and it was fun to meet with some local people. They also asked me if I would be interested in a weekend in the countryside with them!

-I had my first midterm on Friday. I think it went pretty well. I have another one tomorrow and then I have a paper due on Thursday. Fun times lie ahead! But midterms means its almost midterm break. And midterm break means time for TRAVELLING!!!

-The heat in our apartment was finally turned on! On Wednesday at noon it was 39 degrees farenheit here in Prague. At that same time it was 3am in Seattle and it was 48 degrees farenheit. I have the weather on my desktop so I know I'm not exaggerating! It was cold last week! It also sleeted a little bit. Everyone was calling it snow, but being a true Seattleite I know the difference between snow, sleet, rain mixed with snow, and snow mixed with rain. It was a decent sleet or a snow mixed with rain. But we survived are in the high 40's and low 50's this week.

The other events of this weekend are a little bit bigger...

On Friday (after my midterm) I hopped on a train and headed out to Kuntá Hora. This is a small town 72km east of Prague. What is Kutná Hora's claim to fame? The Bone Church. What the heck is a 'bone church'? It is a small church that is completely decorated with bones. Human bones in fact! It was incredible! There were bones everywhere and all of them were incorporated into statues of some kind. And the focal point of the whole place was the chandelier that hung from the center of the room. It was stunning in a weird, morbid, creepy sort of way. The town itself was not that amazing. It was very cold outside and we could not figure out the public transportation. But we were able to wander towards town and then find a small restaurant to eat dinner in. Then, even in the cold, we stuck to my goal of having zmrzlina (ice cream) in every city I go to. I have to test them all out and see who has the best! So far I think Krakow is the winner, but the journey is far from over. There is still much ice cream to be had! After our ice creams we headed back to the train station and got back into Prague.

On Saturday our program took us to Český Krumlov. This is a small town in southern Bohemia. It was a very cute town. They took us on a tour of the castle which was nice. The coolest part about the tour? In about every room there was at least one, if not more, bear rugs. Full bears. I really wanted to bring one home, and they kind of reminded me of the animal skins that Grandma and Grandpa used to have down at the beach house. But bigger and bears and still had their heads. And their eyes which was a little creepy, but cool. Little did I know that it is likely these bear rugs came from the bear pits on the castle grounds! In the 16th century the Rožmberk family decided to put a family of European brown bears on the castle grounds and today you can still see the bears in their bear pit! I was not lucky enough to see these bears, but rest assured I did try! The rest of the day in Český Krumlov was spent having lunch and wandering the small town. It was gorgeous and full of very cute little shops. We played at some playground. We took alot of pictures of random things. We just had a fun time wandering aimlessly. Definately a fun trip.

That essentially covers this past week in a nutshell. I am very excited for the upcoming week. My roommate Katie and I have some exciting travel plans. Want to know where? What fun is it if I just tell you? You can guess, but here is a hint- we are heading west. Oooh the possibilities! I am even more excited because a week from Thursday I will be hanging out with my sister and cousin in Germany! Stay tuned for Three Fraine's taking on Europe! Watch out!

Na víno zemi!

This last weekend I went down to Moravia. This is the southern region of the Czech Republic and is typically referred to as the wine country. I have heard that the people in Moravia have an elitist attitude about themselves and their wine. They say that the people in Prague don't know what good wine is so they send all of their bad wine up here and keep the good wine in Moravia. So basically, if you want good Czech wine you are supposed to go to Moravia.

I left Friday after class and took the bus to Brno. From Brno I had to travel one hour farther south to Mikulov where I was staying for the weekend. Since none of the people I was travelling with had class on Friday they all left in the morning, but being the good student I am I left later. This meant that I would have to figure out getting around Brno and into Mikulov on my own. After spending close to an hour in search of the bus station in Brno I tried to go buy a ticket. I quickly learned that they do things differently here. You don't buy a ticket at the station. When you are getting on the bus you hand your money to the driver and he prints off the ticket for you. Well I was not aware of this so when I went to tell the lady at the window that I wanted a ticket she snapped back at me. I think what she said to me was, "You're in the Czech Republic, we speak Czech. No English!" But I can't really be sure. I tried my best to ask her in Czech where I catch the bus and she told me. At this point I decided to leave and try to figure out the ticket part later. I then had an hour to wander and explore Brno. The city is not that big but when you have a small map it can be hard to find certain sights. I tried to find the Old Town Hall but I passed the street and ended up at the Town Square. This is when I heard the voice of an angel! The square had quite a bit going on. There was a floor hockey court set up with a pee-wee league playing and there were a bunch of new cars sitting around it. As I was standing in the square I heard the song "I've Got To Break Free" coming from some speakers nearby. I went to watch and was thoroughly amused and entertained. He danced, he sang, and he even stopped mid line to pose for cameras and make jokes with people in the audience. Needless to say I enjoyed my time in Brno.

After watching two songs by this handsome devil, I decided to turn back to the bus station and head to Mikulov to meet my friends. Once the bus arrived I got on and told the driver where I was trying to go. He said something in Czech to me and I just replied with "Anglicky" (meaning English) and so he shook his head, mumbled something to himself, and took my money. I grabbed my ticket from his machine and I went to find a seat. As I started to walk away he said to me, "Arrivederci!" I laughed, said thank you, and sat down. The ride to Mikulov went fairly quick and painless. It was when I arried in Mikulov that the problems began to arise. I didn't have a clue which stop I was supposed to get out on. So after debating with myself for quite some time I finally chose one and hopped off the bus. It's a good thing too because I think if I had stayed on much longer I might have ended up in Austria.

Once I got off the bus the search for my friends came. That was tricky but after some wandering around the tiny town I finally found them! We went and had some wine and dessert at one restaurant and then decided to go to the sports bar by our hostel. While we were there we watched Czech Slovakian Superstar. This is essentially the same as American Idol. After that the bar changed the channel to MTV which was showing the Beyonce-Justin Top 20 Countdown. It was really fun to watch that!

On Saturday we got up and were getting ready to check out of our hostel. About a half hour before we were going to leave, the old German lady that ran our hostel brought us a plate full of apple pastries for breakfast. She was such a sweetheart. She spoke no English but was really nice to us and gave us the entire flat in the upstairs of her hostel/house. After we checked out we went and walked around the castle grounds and then went to the edge of town to some caves. The caves were really cool, but I kept bumping into the walls and low ceilings. I was a little concerned that I might bump into something and the whole place would come tumbling down. Luckily I came out alive and the cave is still in tact. Cool parts about the cave: There were bats, there was a mammoth bone, there were some weird statues one of which was a weiner dog, and one of the pockets in the cave had been flooded. After the cave we went back into town and had lunch. Some delicious goulash!

When we finished lunch we went on a hunt for some wine tasting. Unfortunately all the cellars in town were closed due to harvesting. But we still had some good wine throughout the weekend. And a few of us bought bottles to take home to Prague. And we all bought some burčák! Now, you may be wondering, what is burčák? Simply defined it is delicious! It is commonly referred to as the impatient person's wine. It is extremely young and not fully fermented. It is only left to sit for five to ten days and after it is pured you have about four to six hours to drink it before it goes bad. We all bought a liter, which was served to us in big plastic bottles, and we hit the road back to Brno. When we got back to Brno we had about 2 hours to kill so we went in search of Old Town Hall. We found it and this is where we saw the Brno Dragon and the Wagon Wheel. The Brno Dragon is really an alligator hanging from the ceiling that was given to the city by Archprince Matayás. And the wagon wheel was created by a carpenter that said he could cut down a tree, make a wheel, and roll it to Brno from Lednice (40km) all in one day. The townspeople didn't believe him so he set out to prove them wrong. He did it but after that the people of Lednice were convinced he had assistance from the devil so they never bought his work again. Sucks for him. The other crazy thing we saw in Brno- a McWalk. A walk through window for a McDonalds. It was amusing.

After we had wandered as much as we could we went to catch our bus back to Prague and got in late Saturday night. It was a very nice and relaxing weekend. I decided one day when I retire I will move to Mikulov and own a winery. I will sit around drinking wine all day. Any of you are welcome to join me!