a czech week

A few nights ago myself and a group of others got very lost late at night looking for a restaurant in the Hradcanska (castle) district. It took hours to find the restaurant, but we found beauty everywhere, including an overlook view of all of Prague. All the castle grounds looked like fairyland.

Yesterday we had our "drop off" to complete missions in Prague. The four people in my group went to a Soviet-era metro station, a dimly lit basement creperie with a vegan (!) waitress, the Narodni gallerie (National Gallery) where we gaped at Miro, Picasso, Schiele, Klimt and a lot of Czech artists I was unfamiliar with. The museum is in a former Communist-era mall and all the security guards smile at you and try to get you interact with the art. (Smiling is rare here. You have to "earn" your smiles.) Then it was off to the park where we played on an old Communist-era playground with a Sputnik slide.

Last night I met my homestay "mother," Kristyna, at a party for all the homestay families. She is the most lovely person; very smart, open-minded, funny, easygoing. Her children are Anna (12) and Ondrej (10), but she said Ondrej prefers to be called Andrew because it is more "worldly" than Ondrej. They live in an apartment flat, but they also have a cottage out in the countryside where they go on most weekends, so I will get to go and meet all the extended family as well. Nicely enough, Kristyna is vegetarian, so it's a non-issue, AND I will get to learn how to make Czech poppy-seed cake, which I think is rather exciting.

I get picked up in an hour to go out to lunch with the family.

I miss all of you.