Classes are going fabulously. I went to Lidice with Jan Wiener for my class. Lidice is one of the Czech towns that was completely demolished by the Nazi's in WWII. All the men over fifteen were shot and all the women were hauled off to an all women's concentration camp in Germany. The children who were blond and blue eyed were put into foster families in Germany to "assimilate" while the dark haired/eyed ones were sent to a concentration camp. There was over 500 people in the village and those who lived and came back found absolutely nothing there. The Nazi's had completely tore down an entire town! That's really crazy for me to think about since I come from such a small town. I think there's like a little over 1000 people in the entire county I'm from. The town got a lot of funding for rebuilding so there is a small village there with a nice museum. All the inhabitants of the village who are descendants of the old victims live there tax free, kind of like our Indian-reservation system. Other villages weren't so lucky and didn't receive any funding to rebuild.
I just finished reading Darkness At Noon for Jan's class and have to write a paper on it tonight. It's the first book I've read about communism here that really studies the mentality and philosophy behind communism. It's pretty interesting. Living in the Czech and reading everything I've been reading makes me so much more interested in eastern Europe than western Europe. It's more interesting to watch and be a part of to me. I think the main thing about western -vs- eastern Europe for me links back to the differences in the Czech and Italy. Italy has been used to tourism for hundreds of years. The Czech Republic and other parts of eastern europe have been open to tourists for less than two decades. Things in eastern Europe are changing so fast it's really an exciting time to be here. It will definitely be interesting to see how the west influences eastern Europe in the future.
My alternative lifestyles class is so rad. My professor played at this huge festival that was a revival of all these underground Czech punk bands from the 80's---when it was still banned. How cool is it that my professor is/was the lead singer/guitarists of an all chick punk band in the 80's, and was banned! She's so rad. I've been doing some really interesting reading from her class. Everything from the use of hallucinogens in psychotherapy to women/gender and feminism in Czech music vs western music. I had to do a presentation on Czech underground literature and the whole movement of Egon Bondy and the Plastic People of the Universe. It was so much fun because in my Czech and Bohemian literature class we're reading all the mainstream Czech writers like Kafka and Kundera. In my alternative lifestyles class and for my project I've been studying underground Czech writers who had a more beatnik style like Vera Jirousova, Alexandr Grin etc.... The styles are completely unlike anything I've ever seen because they were sometimes collaged together, confusing and mutated because of the authorities and bans on literature. There's an entire library in Prague dedicated to banned literature----how cool is that.
All we do for that class is talk about the readings, watch documentaries on go on field trips. We have lecture and then section once a week. During section we just discuss the readings and then Pavla, the prof, takes us on field trips around the city to cool places. Last week we went a graffiti site where the city permits graffiti. It was so beautiful. It was the first nice graffiti I've seen in this city, which was refreshing because a lot of the graffiti on the buildings here are just crappy signatures. I can understand adding decoration to a beautiful building with some colorful 3-d graffiti but just tagging your name is really lame.
My Czech and Bohehiam lit class is rad. My professor is so smart, english is like his 4th or 5th language and he uses words that I don't even know. We read Gustav Meyrink's The Golem. I think it's one of my new favorite books. It's set in the old Jewish ghetto of Prague and is ten times better if you are actually living here and are experiencing all the places mentioned in the book, but it's a great book without all that too. It has a ton of Jewish folk lore/religion/philosophy in it and I loved it because it incorporates a lot of my meditation teacher's teachings--Joy. I think I'm going to write my final paper about it because of that and compare it with the communist books I've been reading because the mental philosophy regarding the human as a beautiful divine being is so dramatically different in the comparison.
Now I'm reading Kundera's The Joke for that class. The funny part about the joke is that it's NOT funny. It's really depressing and, like most of the stuff we've been reading, it just points out how much communism screwed people's lives up. I really like it though and am totally loving Kundera's narrative powers. He's amazing! He's such a smart narrator you just feel his authority in the book. I'm hoping to gain some sort of "contact high" from reading his stuff and work it into the novel AKA my thesis.
As for my language class, well, I definitely miss my old professor at the UW---Jaro. They put me in a class that's too easy here so I have a hard time paying attention because it's so damn boring. It's not challenging at all so when I do get called on I'm not paying attention but I really don't mind looking like an idiot if I know I'm not being one. I have been dating this Czech guy, Krigl, on and off for the last few months and I get to practice whenever I'm around him. Also, I'm volunteering for the Big Brother's and Sister's program here in Prague. So, once a week I will go and meet with "my buddy" and we'll go do field trips like walking around the city, canoeing, biking or horse back riding out in the countryside of Bohemia. It will be a really good chance for me to practice Czech because my buddy probably won't speak much english.
I'm going back home for a month for Christmas and then I'm back here in Prague, hopefully living with a Czech family or in a flat with a Czech. I'm going to start a six month long yoga school when I get back. My yoga instructor is starting an interdisciplinary yoga school here. It will be certified through Yoga Alliance so once you graduate you can teach anywhere in the world. The cost is about 1/3 of what it costs in the U.S. The coolest part is that it's interdisciplinary (us CHID majors like these things). I'll be studying ALL different kinds of yoga from hatha, iyengar etc, Sankrit, Nidra, Anatomy, Women's issues, Yogic philosophy and history and the list goes on.... School will be once a month on Friday, Saturday and Sunday and you are required to do most of your work at home (like college). I think it'll be awesome to step up my practice. You have to do like 60-90 minutes of home practice yoga a day and meditation for 20-30 minutes of meditation a day (ewww, scary;). I'm really excited about it. When I move back the states I might try and volunteer and teach at some community centers or something. My yoga teacher did that and even got some grants to do it.
Other than school, I've just been enjoying beautiful Prague. Fall here is one of the most beautiful things I've ever experienced. The quarter is winding down so I've been doing lots of homework. I might go to Osava with Krigl this weekend for a music festival.
I went to a rave this last Saturday with Noel and our friend Lori, Tiesto headlined and it was hist Central and Eastern European tour. There was 15,000 people there. It was definitely a beautiful experience and I'm glad that I can say I experienced a european rave since they are so huge here but I concluded that I'm definitely not a raver. It was so crazy I honestly can't even type about it.
A lot of mom's have been coming to visit. I really wish my mom would come but it's nearly impossible to get here to come visit me in Seattle AKA "the dark side of the state". It's so interesting how you can tell so much about a person by meeting their parents. All of a sudden you realize how that person came to be the way they are. For instance, Noel's mom is in town. She brought more clothes for 8 days than I think I own in my entire wardrobe. After meeting Noel's mom I can totally see how Noel stays out until 4 every morning drinking whiskey and STILL makes it to class--and gets good grades! Noel's mom parties like a rockstar only in designer clothing. She's a blast. I'm 22 and she's 48 and I can't keep up with her, it's crazy.
Meeting people's parents reminded me of this old email I got from my parents. I forwarded the email to my old boss Kathy and she told me that it made her understand me a little more.
I definitely get my whacked sense of humor from my parents, especially my step dad. He's so funny, I LOVE hanging out with him. Anyway, my step dad's name is Gary and he turned 60 not too long ago. Him and my mom and their wiener dog, Montana, live back home in eastern Washington. Montana is the most spoiled dog on the planet. He sleeps with my parents and eats better than I do. Anyway, some kids parents send them emails about work and local events, these are really the only kind of emails my parents send me. This is the email that my dad sent me after his birthday:

SO...Mom can't sleep when the dog snores. She goes to the Vet - DorisBacon. Doris says to tie a ribbon around the dog's testicles and he willstop snoring.Yeah, right! Mom says.

A few minutes after going to bed, Montana begins snoring, as usual. Mom tosses and turns, unable to sleep. Muttering to herself, she goes to thecloset and grabs a piece of red ribbon and ties it carefully aroundMontana's nuts. Sure enough, Montana stops snoring. Mom is AMAZED!

Later that evening, Gary returns home drunk after spending the night out drinking with his buddies and celebrating the BIG birthday. He climbs into bed, falls asleep and begins snoring loudly. Mom thinks maybe the ribbon might work on him too. So she goes to the closet again, grabs a piece of blue ribbon and ties it around Gary's nuts. Amazingly, it also works on him! Gary wakes from his drunken stupor and stumbles into the bathroom. As he stands in front of the toilet, he glances in the mirror and sees a blue ribbon attached to his privates. He is very confused and as he walks back to the bedroom, he sees the red ribbon attached to Montana's gonies. Gary shakes his head and looks at Montana and whispers, "I don't know where we were, or, what we did, but, by God, we took First and Second place!

As my boss Kathy said, now you know where I get it.

I just got back from Terezin with professor Jan Wiener. Terezin is the concentration camp I had been to previously. It is a camp that was made in an old fortress known as "the little fortress" although it is anything BUT little. It was built to fend off Frederick the Great and his aggressive strategies. It is a massive place with many tunnels and moats. The Nazi's turned the camp and the entire town into a sort of show for the Red Cross when they came there from Sweden and Switzerland. They said it was a camp they had given to the Jews and made propaganda films about how great the Jews life was there. They completely fooled the Red Cross.
It was the concentration camp that his mother parished in. His father committed suicide when Yugoslavia was invaded by the Nazi's and came under their occupation because he was well aware of what was going on in the concentration camps and did not want to live in such dehumanizing circumstances. He told Jan that he was going to kill himself because it was his last act of freedom. This suicide came after months and months filled with weekly trips by Jan and his father to the British and American embassy in which they asked for passports to American and/or Britain. They were always denied because they had Czechoslovakia passports with giant J's in them for Jew. Hardly any Jews were awarded passports into the states or Britain.
Jan remarked on how many Jews who survived the holocaust thought that the allied countries were concerned with the treatment of the Jews and their persecution. He does not think so. " If they were," he questioned, "then why did the allied countries not bomb the railroad track that led to Auschwitz?" Good question. I don't think any western country cares about another human beings situation unless it will financially benefit them. If they were, how come we didn't do anything about Rowanda and aren't doing anything now about Sudan?
This reminds me of a situation the other night at the tram stop. It was late at night and I was at a popular stop frequented by many people because it has a metro link and is next to Tesco---sort of a European Wal-mart. Tram's require tickets but inspectors only come and check them ever so often. The tram line I run on is different because I live behind the Prague Castle which is a tourist hot spot, of course. I sat there at the tram stop and noticed a group of Roma's (otherwise known as gypsies) huddled in the corner to the left of me. To the right of me was a tram inspector walking around waiting for people to get on the 22 or 23 which lead to the castle. A lot of drunk college students get on the stop there and it's a good way to hit up people who forgot their passes or don't have one. I looked back over to the Roma group because one fell to the ground. A young guy, perhaps a few years younger than me was standing over the fallen one, shooting up. Most of the people in the group around him looked pretty tranquilized. The person that had fallen on the ground was very happy to be there and was enjoying the break his legs were getting from standing. I looked at the tram inspector and then at the group of Roma. He didn't care about whether or not he could help them but he most certainly cared about getting drunken tourist and college students money. It's a very popular attitude towards the Roma---nobody gives fuck.
Jan pointed this out today when we were at Terezin. He pointed out that the Jews were lucky to have had a tradition of priding themselves in education. It is because of that that they are such a thriving people. Roma, according to him, have never had that tradition because it is their culture to travel and practice a more nomadic lifestyle. They have also never been afforded much opportunity for education.
Today Jan wanted the class to understand that hating Germans as a race was just another form of Nazism. Nazism and racism must be despised, he said, because they must be stopped. This was pretty intense coming from a guy who's mother was killed in the concentration camp in which he was giving us this speech.
We just finished reading All Quiet on the Western Front, which I think everyone should read, by the way. The point of that book is that an entire generation was lost in an unnecessary war that was zealously jumped into by the older generation. An entire generation of people around my age were completely lost and impossible to fit back into society. This is the generation that became the Nazi's. They knew nothing but war and were quick to dehumanize after the horrible things they had witnessed in the war numbed them completely. Jan wanted us to understand that.
It's a very harsh reality but necessary to understand and appreciate life. I am glad my mother taught me to appreciate what you have. She used to threaten to burn my Barbies and other stuff if I didn't take care of it. On one occassion I think she did.
A few weeks ago I was walking around the Tuscan hillside drinking wine with my roommate thinking that it was the best day of my life. It very well could be but in my day and age, and with my nationality and situation, I think every day is the best day of my life, especially since Joy came into it. She makes everything so clear....and fuzzy at the same time, which is the way it should be. Going to a concentration camp with a guy who spent years of his life in one and who's mother died in one is a good reinforcer of this.

Anyway, Italy was beautiful and I loved it. It really made the contrast of Czech people apparent. I would love to live in Italy but I am much happier that I came to Prague to study. You can actually SEE the history in people. The older generation walk around with their heads down and paranoid glances fleet their eyes with every sudden noise. People aren't nearly as friendly as Italians. They also don't have the money to be so incredibly fashionable and centered around beauty. I swear, I have never seen so many beautiful well dressed people as I did in Italy. We spent two days in Venice, four in Rome and four in Florence and it was the same everywhere----beautiful scenary, art, architecture and people. The architecture here is just as gorgeous though, if you ask me.
Anyway, I hope everyone who reads this has a great day.

Last Thursday, Iris and I went to the opera. We were joined by her roommate and her roommate's boyfriend. We went and saw an opera by Smetana, a Czech composer. It was called Prodana nevesta. It was nice because it was a comedy and all of the opera's I have seen up to this point were depressing. We had pretty decent seats in the middle on one of the top rows. Luckily, there were subtitles. Our tickets cost 40 crowns, which equals less than two dollars! I couldn't believe it. Iris and I are going to start going to the opera regularly because it's so cheap and so good. The opera house was amazing. I'll post pictures as soon as I can.
The next day, Friday, Iris, Noel, our friend Jeff and I went boating on the Vltava River. It was so nice. We were blessed with a beautiful day. After boating Iris took us to all to this gothic store because Noel and her were searching for a corsette. At the store, we found out about this festival called Prague in Dark Festival. It was going on the following night, Saturday. The owners of the shop were really nice and the festival sounded like a good opportunity to find out what the European gothic industrial scene was like. I don't really listen to gothic industrial stuff and am not very into the scene in Seattle. I prefer death metal and drum n bass but I'm always down to find out about a scene. You never know if you'll like something until you try it. So, us girls decided we were going to check it out on Saturday after we got back from Terezin.
After we left the record shop we wandered around and stumbled upon this huge outdoor medieval festival. The festival was in celebration of borcak, which is premature wine that is considered a delicacy here. It is only in season for like two weeks because they don't let it ferment all the way. It doesn't have as much alcohol as normal wine and it kind of tastes like juice but it will give you a nardly hangover so you have to watch out. The festival was really awesome. We wandered around it for hours until dark. When dark hit the whole place turned into a gigantic outdoor rock concert with thousands of people. It was crazy but it was a lot of fun.

The next day Noel and I got up bright and early...well I wouldn't exactly say bright but we were up. We loaded the bus with about fifty other kids and headed northwest to Terezin, and old concentration camp. As soon as we got there my camera died because the battera went out. My friend let me borrow hers and take pictures but we haven't figured out how to transfer them onto my computer because my software doesn't work for her camera. I will be going to Terezine again with Jan and my history class so I will get pictures then.

Terezin was really intense. We went to the Jewish Ghetto museum there and watched a film about how few people survived and how the Nazi's made propaganda films about life in the ghetto. Apparently, these films were used to show Red Cross and mask the real purpose of the camp. People lived in extremely tight quarters with no privacy and poor nutrition so if they weren't flat out killed in the camp they would most likely die of disease because epidemics spread rampantly. It was really intense to see and I felt like I was going to bust out crying several times. For the first time since I've been here, nobody in the group talked. We all walked around in complete silence.

We were taken to an underground synagogue where Jews would secretely pray. The guide told us about how a lot of Jews felt that they had surely done something wrong and that God was punishing them. He also told us about the immense guilt that some felt for surviving after having to watch their friends and families around them die. We were then taken on a walk around the town. We saw the reinactors who collect old WWII weapons, trucks and tanks and what-not. It was really bizaare to me to see a concentration camp and then see reinactment people walking around in 1940's soldiers uniforms with old guns and bazooka's. The walk ended at the end of the railroad tracts, a place that is supposed to be really intense for survivors because it marks the "end of the journey". I've never seen railroad tracts abruptly end like that. It made me so sad. Sometimes it's so hard to believe how incredibly cruel humanity can be to one another.

After the tour of the camp we were given free time to walk around. In the middle of the town a carnival/fair was going on. It was such a stark contrast to visit a concentration camp and then see all these happy little kids running around screaming and mowing down on cotton candy. Noel, Lorrie, Sophie and I went and sat in a park and talked. The carnival was a little too wierd for us.

After Terezin we drove up into the mountains and went for a hike. It was a really beautiful place. The road going up to the hiking spot was super narrow and twisty and we were in a huge tour van. Noel gets squimish whenever she has to drive up or down a hill (she's from Florida and I don't think they have those there). I thought she was going to vomit on me the whole trip up. The drive was really beautiful and the hike was amazing. It was the first time I had seen mountains and hills since I've came here. It reminded me a lot the foothills outside of Davis, California in the spring, when it's still green....or southwestern Oregon.

We came back to Prague and changed quickly to go to the Prague in Dark Festival. The festival was really cool. There were six bands from all around Europe. The goths there were some of the most friendly people I had ever met. Goth's in Seattle are usually snobby and won't talk to you because they're "way too cool" for anyone. The goth's here were super nice and cool and so were the bands. The musicians were just walking around and partying with the crowd after they played. It was really laid back. I don't usually like clubs but the club where it was held at is the coolest club I've ever been to. It had multiple floors with tons of different rooms that had all sorts of games in them. There was like four different bars. Some of the tables had clear glass tops that were actually tanks/cages that had scorpions in them---really wierd but cool.

I came home early because I was exhausted from the day and didn't really feel like drinking. Noel and our friend Mark stayed there and went to the after party, which was held at the record store. They partied with the bands until 6pm the next day.

Sunday was the day of rest.

Monday was the day I had been waiting for. The band Kylesa was playing here. It was their first European tour. They totally kicked ass. Noel went with me and we ended up partying with band afterward. They were all super nice and chill, which was really cool because normally, as a female, I wouldn't go party with the band because that domain gets super sketchy and scandalized. It wasn't like that at all though. They were happy to meet some people who spoke English and were kind of familiar with the city. One of the guitarists/singers is this super cool chick. I talked to her a lot and she gave me some really good ideas for some tattoo's I've been thinking about getting.

Metal shows here are so much different than they are in the states. There was no mosh pit and everyone stood pretty far apart from one another. It was so watered down compared to American shows. I bet Europeans who come to metal shows in the states think that Americans must be fucking crazy. Shows back home are so much rowdier.

Lastnight Noel and Mark took me to the goth record store with them because one of the guys, whom they had met the night they partied after the Prague in Dark Festival, was having a birthday. I met a lot of really cool locals, which was refreshing. I now have more people to practice my language with. There was a lot of hot Czech boys there and I was super stoked to finally figure out where they all hide. This really hot Czech boy name Krigl ended up talking with me all night. He studies history at Charles University. We're supposed to go out this week and he's going to help me practice my Czech.

Today is a holiday--Wenceslas Day, so we don't have any school. So, I figured I would catch up on my journal and look for plane tickets back home for Christmas. This weekend I'm going on a yoga retreat up to the mountains. Sophie and Noel are going to come with me. I'm excited to be checking out Spindleruv Mlyn because it's the nearest ski resort so I was thinking about hitting it up for some snowboarding this winter.
After going to five different camera stores and not finding a battera I'm now on a hardcore mission. I have to go find a battera for my camera. How can I go to the mountains and not be able to take any pictures!