I've been Hibernating

It's easy to do here. It's cold outside. You don't want to go anywhere. The couch is so comfy. Plus what is there to do but go to the movies in the horrible cold weather. Nothing really. It sometimes feels like the city shuts down in the winter. Or that everyone is in the pubs drinking. But this weekend was the first real hint of Spring and it's made me feel a bit invigorated. I went outside. I went to yoga. Later I wore a dress. We did some shopping at an event that was all about local designers. And it's like everyone else came out of their caves as well. The trams were packed and not only were all the people out but they brought their dogs too. It was a good weekend to be in Prague. That doesn't mean that I want to go to work tomorrow but I'm feeling a bit less lazy than normal.

I'm also getting super excited because in 11 days G Unit and I leave for Thailand. It's our first trip to Asia. Score! And we get to spend time with our good friends Jade and Toby who we haven't seen in almost two years. Double Score! And spend time on a beach. And snorkel. And ride an elephant. And maybe pet a tiger. First I have to make it through the 11 days before our flight leaves. And then participate a pesky thing called a conference in Bangkok (which is the reason this trip came up in the first place). And then I get to do all that other stuff.

So the weather is getting better, a trip is on the horizon and there are brownies in the kitchen to eat. All and all a good outlook. I hope things are as bright and shiny in your part of the world too.

Ringing in 2012

New Year's is not my holiday. Too many drunk people, too expensive and too many expectations. I like it low key. So G Unit and I spent the day watching MI5 (is it 5 now?), going to the grocery store and then watching lots of stupid movies and the West Wing while eating dinner, dessert and sipping some sparkling rose. Laid back and lazy. Just the way I like it.

Then G Unit said he wanted to take me out to the bridge to watch the fireworks, which we had been hearing off and on for an hour or so. I wasn't too keen on leaving the apartment. One I'm lazy, two it was warm inside and the TV was on and three I'm lazy and four we periodically hear fireworks at our apartment throughout the year and can even see them if we stick our head outside the window. Couldn't we just do that now? But I wanted to make him happy and start off the New Year right.  and So he grabbed a manhattan to go from the home bar and we walked out our building and towards the river.

It was more than I expected. First it was packed, second it was 360 degrees of fireworks. Czech's don't do this halfway apparently. It's not like 4th of July in the States where you wait and wait and wait for 10 minutes of fireworks. Nope they start early here and it seems like it goes on for an hour before the Kaboom and an hour after. I should have expected all the fireworks. When G Unit and I were at the store I noticed that there seemed to be a stampede at a particular kiosk which just happen to sell fireworks. I guess I just thought that these fireworks would be set off outside the city, not on a busy bridge in between trams. So the reason that we had 360 degree views of fireworks as well as ones right over us  was becaise there were fireworks being set off all over the city by random citizens. It was pretty crazy.

Either way it was a great way to ring in the New Year with my husband and I thought you'd all like to see it too. I hope you all had a safe and happy New Year's Eve with your loved ones. Happy 2012.

Calling my name

G Unit and I went to the Prague Food Festival today. It was a glorious day. Sun, big fluffy white clouds, a nice breeze, food, booze and a lovely park setting. What more could a girl ask for?

An opportunity to wear my new dress from Paris! Funny story about this dress. Or maybe just a typical story. Every morning when I was in Paris I walked by a little store called Vincenzo on Rue des Petits Champs and a little dress in the window called my name. I stopped, I stared. I checked the opening and closing times. Not open on Saturdays?! I continued walking thinking I'll make it out of work early today. I'll stop by before they close. And then every evening after staying late at work I walked back to the hotel and looked in all the windows of the closed shops. And every night the little dress in the window taunted me. Just stared me in the face claiming I'd never be able to buy it.

So one of my last days in Paris I skipped out on lunch and told my colleagues I had to go see about a dress. There were of course a few other dresses calling my name but I ended up with the one that was in the window. And look how happy it makes me.

Or maybe that's the ice cream.

Or the shoes. I bought those in Paris too. At a store called Minelli. I'm all sorts of coordinated today

Or maybe it's just the company

And the best part of said Food Festival. They sent us packing with a six pack of beer. Yeah. It was a good day. 

Spring in Prague

The weather has turned gray since I took this picture last week but Spring is definitely here. Next week? Spring in Paris. It is officially a go with tickets purchased and everything. Only a week and a half instead of three weeks in Paris but G Unit will come for a weekend visit. Stay tuned

Bunnies and Chocolate

I have fond memories of Easter growing up. Mostly revolving around eggs. Painting eggs, easter egg hunts (while singing christmas songs - apparently my sister and I were confused children), posing with the easter bunny, cadbury eggs, jelly beans, so much chocolate I'm amazed I never feel into a sugar coma. The typical American experience, I would think.

Here in Central Europe there are many similarities. Images of baby chicks, bunnies and chocolate shaped everything are everywhere. Painting eggs is a tradition as it is in the States but it's done in an elaborate fashion here and is an art form in its own right.

Compare the above to the Easter eggs I made this year. I will admit I did not spend much time on mine. It was more just to do it.

Here in Prague they even have what I've heard is not traditional but prevalent Easter Markets. The below photos are from the market near our apartment.

The whole atmosphere in Prague around Easter feels to me like a celebration of the Spring season and it is even more enjoyable with the work holiday it provides for the Monday following Easter. Apparently Easter Monday is the true holiday in Central Europe, but it is my co-workers unequivocal least favorite holiday. When it came to deciding who would work the Monday holiday both co-workers said, "I'm working. I hate Easter Monday. I don't want to go home." When I asked why they mentioned being hit with a stick and/or drenched with water. Say what? How did we go from eating too much chocolate and painting eggs to being wet and beaten?

Apparently the Central European Easter tradition involves unmarried women being awoken by being drenched with a bucket of water or hit with a pomlazka which is a braided whip made from pussy willow twigs and decorated with ribbons. All this is supposed to bring luck and fertility in the new year. These willow whips are on display and available for purchase everywhere in Prague at the moment from the Easter markets to the grocery stores.

There are variations of this tradition. I've read that the ladies are whipped on the legs in the morning and then in the afternoon they dump water on the men. But in Slovakia the ladies get water thrown on them in the morning possibly combined with the whipping. And in return for this blessing the ladies are supposed to give them men easter eggs and chocolate treats. Either way to me it seems like the ladies are getting the short end of the stick. I can't really blame the girls for not wanting to be at home for these particular traditions. 

Thankfully for me my Easter traditions still just include painted or dyed eggs, chocolate and enjoying the Spring weather. G Unit and are will be making our first trip to the beer garden today in celebration of Easter. I think that's better than being wet, shivering and having whip stung legs, but maybe that's just me.

Happy Easter!

Delayed Coffee

So this past week has been kinda hellish so thanks for re-scheduling coffee with me.

I had a bad work experience last week and it kinda threw me for a loop as these things do. The week has slowly gotten better and with the weather turning absolutely gorgeous today I'm feeling more positive again. I'm hoping to make up for my silence with some more posts this weekend since G Unit and I both have three whole days off because of Easter. I like this holiday. It should be celebrated with a day off back in the States too. Stupid separation between church and state. Wait why is Christmas a holiday then? I don't get it.

There's not much to catch you up on in regards to my week besides the crappy work part, which really dominated my whole outlook unfortunately. I did manage to raise my head from my book while nesting in bed to go to brunch with G Unit. As many of you know we love weekend brunch. It was my favorite thing when we lived in Berkeley to head to La Note or Rick and Ann's. Prague is a little behind on the whole brunch experience. We've tried Cafe Savoy which G Unit finds a bit too high class in the clientele, so when he heard about a new french cafe across the river from us we decided to try. And I'm glad we did. I still like Cafe Savoy but Cafe Amadine is closer, less crowded and a more relaxed atmosphere. Oh and the coffee is great. I meant to take a picture of my latte for this post, you know for vitual coffee, but of course I forgot to bring the camera. But here is a picture of their display case instead. Mmmmm pastries.

While Cafe Amadine cannot live up to my memories of potato pancakes at Rick and Ann's or creme fresh pancakes and raspberry jam at La Note it does have pan perdu, croissants, tartines, croque monsieur and pan au chocolat and various tartes I have not yet dared to try. It will do just fine thank you. Plus they are not afraid to be bold and I love their green and pink signs. So anyone want to come by some Sunday for brunch? I hate that you are all so far away. It's the one of the really sucky things of living in Europe.

But what is going on with all of you? How is the weather in your neck of the woods? Are you doing anything fun this weekend. We only just found out that G Unit actually does have Monday off so I think we're going to try to do a day trip somewhere. It's a little last minute so we'll see.

I have to finish my coffee now. G Unit's co-workers are due here for dinner any minute. He is of course cooking up a storm. Risotto, chicken and I made no-bake mini vanilla cheesecakes. I hope they work out. I'll let you know and maybe take a picture or two. If I can sneak one in without anyone thinking I'm weird. 

Virtual Caffine

If we were really meeting for coffee today I would be on my 5th or so cup. It's only Tuesday and I'm ready for the week to be over. I'm not sure what's going on. G Unit and I had a restful weekend that included naps, reading and the zoo but somehow I woke up Monday with bags under my eyes wishing I could stay in bed. Today was not much better

Unfortunately this means that our coffee chat today has to be a little brief as it's already getting late here in Prague and I'm in desperate need of some zzzs.

So today I'll leave you with some photos from our annual zoo trip. I can call it annual since it's the 2nd year in a row right? There's also a video or two that you might enjoy of the animals.

Happy Tuesday everyone! Fingers crossed that tomorrow is a bright eyed Wednesday for me.

Random photo op on our way to see the elephants 

Baby Gorilla!

so cute! so playful!

This is what Willoughby looks like. Are all cats the same?

Bench with a view - Photo op!

View towards the river

G Unit refusing to pose with Polar bears because
of the glare 

Polar Bears playing (note minimal glare)

Orangutangs - He's so soulful - Can I mention to get here
you have to go through a "twilight area" and there are bats
FYLING FREELY. Freaking crazy. I ran through, hunched
over. I kid you not.

And now the videos. I give you Elephants:

And some sort of wild cat kittens. I wanted to take one home!

Find more interesting conversation over at Amy's

Spring, with a bang!

Spring has officially arrived in Prague and this past weekend was the kick off event.

G Unit ran his first 1/2 marathon. He's been training since January and Saturday was THE day. We got up early, I got dolled up and he got prepped to run. We left with plenty of time to get to the starting point. It was a gorgeous day, probably in the low 70s. I was comfortable in a skirt and light sweater. G Unit thought it was too hot. He's used to running in freezing conditions.

Man were there a lot of people at this thing. 9500 people running and then all their family and friends. It was intense.

G Unit packed up his stuff handed me his bag, took a mandatory pre run photo with the wife and then left me to go and find out where he needed to be and make sure he was all ready to go.

Then I pushed my way through the crowds and found myself a place to watch the start of the race. There were a lot of pushy people trying to get past me as they had to take a picture of their "friends". What the hell is my husband chopped liver? I unfortunately didn't manage to catch a glimpse of G Unit at the start. SO MANY PEOPLE but I did manage to catch the front runners and a lot of other random people

Look at those strides - crazy fast

After looking at all these random people, reaching the end of the group and not seeing G Unit, I grabbed my things and ran off towards work. I had a surprise. Secretly I had made signs. Oh Yes. G Unit had a "team building" dinner earlier in the week and it was perfect timing. I colored my signs while watching my tv shows. (side note: I think I may need to buy coloring books for myself. I found it oddly relaxing to be coloring in the lines.) Behold the genius of my signs, which I totally stole from other people. 

G Unit asked earlier where his sign was while traveling to the start

I played the horrified wife pretending that I had not thought to make him a sign
and now felt totally guilty at my lack of support - I'm sneaky like that

People at work totally appreciated my sign making abilities. I grabbed the signs and picked up Bara and Martina who wanted to help me cheer G Unit on. I was a little worried that he might have reached the bridge where we decided to wait for him before we got there, but I tried to relax while Martina and I held up the signs for others to read. 

This was probably the best part of the day for me. Lots of the runners going by smiled, smirked or out right laughed. I could see them reading the signs as they went by and they would then look up at me and I'd give them a huge smile. And Martina was cracking jokes next to me. It was great. All the while though we were frantically searching for G Unit. Do you know how hard it is to find a white with red trim shirt during a marathon? Practically impossible. I've already told him he needs to get a pink or purple shirt for the next one. And then Bara spotted him and then there he was right in front of us. He didn't even read my signs, but we yelled and screamed at him anyways as he went by. Apparently he could hear us giggling halfway down the bridge.

I had lunch with the girls and then headed over towards the finish. I got there around 2:20 which is about the time we thought he would finish. To make a long story short I had just missed him but didn't know it so I sat there with my camera waiting for him, hoping to get a picture of him finishing. I didn't get a glory shot of him coming in on the home stretch but I got these other random pictures.

And then I wondered where could hubby be. He should have finished by now. He said he would text me. And then I started to worry. What if he passed out somewhere. Who would I call? How would I find him?

This is me worried. I had my hand up like where is he?

And then I decided to text him. And then I heard a strange buzzing. Coming from his bag. Damnit! He had left his phone with me. So I ran over to where we said we would meet if I missed him at the finish. And there he was. Bad wife. I tried to cheer him on at the end and he ended up having to wait for me. {le sigh}. I'll do better next time. We got a picture of him with his metal even if it was delayed. Isn't he cute?

Now I'm trying to convince him to do the 1/2 marathon in Brussels. I've also told him he has to put a full marathon on his list. I want to make more signs. And get pictures of him finishing the race. And eat Belgian fries and gaufres. I like this whole traveling to cheer him on thing. He says he'll do the full marathon if I do a half marathon. I'm thinking I like the sidelines better.  

Zero or Nuala?

Did you know? Apparently Nuala in Czech means zero. Like in the number. Or lack of number. Seriously when you count it's nula, jeden, dva, tri.....

I'm not so good at coming up with new upset/worried faces

Is there an upside to this? I mean being known as zero. Well kinda. Everyone understands my name. I say Nuala and then they look at me a little funny, like stupid English speaking person doesn't realize I asked for her name and then I go, Nuala like zero. And I get a sly smile every time. Even with people smirking over the accidental czech translation of my name at least it's not being butchered and is recognizable. Even G Unit's started using my name for reservations cause zero is easier to get than Garren.

Will the level of meanings my Irish Gaelic name has ever end? I sure as hell hope not.

I'm a Degenerate

....so says Kept Man as I hold his beer on the metro as we head home because he's too embarrassed to hold an open container of booze on public transportation. It's his Puritan American side coming out. Did I mention that it's 12:30pm and he's tipsy?

We were returning from the Farmer's Market in Galerie Fenix at the metro stop Vysocanska. Some friends invited us to join them as they know we were interested in accessing local products. And Kept Man and Karel decided that 10am would be the best time to try the local beer being sold. The label on this particular beer 'was for men' and would probably 'not be allowed in the States'. Protestant sensibilities and all. I kept my hand over the label as we rode the metro home stealing a few sips here and there. While I didn't mind holding the open container the label was a little to likely to catch someone's attention.

All and all it was a fun morning. We managed to procure some fresh trout, bacon, sausages, smoked cheese, butter, pasta, wine and of course beer.

Along the way Kept Man learned some dirty Czech words and phrases and we had some laughs. Not a bad way to start the weekend.  

Sun! Oh the joys!

Spring is around the corner.

It was down right temperate today. A high of 54 F! The sun is staying out later and later every evening. Everyone is out and even the dogs are happy. I saw at least 5 dogs playing in the park today and when I was waiting for my tram this evening I saw a little shitzu prancing along the cobblestones like he was dancing looking as happy as Larry.

It's a amazing what a little sunshine does to everyone's mood.

Daily Grind

I've found that living abroad people always think you're doing wild, crazy and fabulous things. I even assume this about others (I'm looking at you Jade and Toby). I assume this even though I know that while living abroad sounds exotic, the truth is you're just living your day to day life as you would anywhere. A friend recently equated it to being on a roller-coaster where all the highs and lows of your normal life are strangely magnified. 

So in an effort to dispel you of the notion that we're constantly hanging out with fabulous foreigners, in exotic Czech bars drinking strange Czech beers and eating foreign delicacies, I give you a typical day in photo format.

I start my morning by getting up, rubbing sleep from my eyes and jumping in the shower

Kept Man in the meantime gets up and makes me a breakfast of oatmeal and bananas

Doesn't he look happy to be awake with me in the morning?

I make a coat selection

And bundle myself up

I walk out of our apartment building

And walk towards Andel

I ride the tram to Hellichova where I get off

And walk towards the back work entrance. The building in blue is a school. I grumble about all those damn whippersnappers take up space on the morning tram as I walk by

And I make the final turn to enter the hotel

And then I'm in the office

At my desk

working. with no window. sigh. fun times

And after crunching some numbers I leave the hotel once evening rolls around

And walk to my tram stop

Which is in front of a church

Once I get on the tram I look out the window

To see the people, cars and

shops passing by

Then I walk towards home

enter our building

climb up to our landing

And it's slipper time!

Where the man is waiting

As is the booze

and the food....mmmm chocolate fondant

And then after catching up with Kept Man and watching a couple of shows or a movie it's off to bed and in the morning it starts all over again.  And so I leave you disillusioned of our exotic Czech Republic life but hopefully smiling over a silly video of Kept Man cooking which is the best part of my day. He might soon have a job. I might go into serious withdrawals. I suppose I will survive. Wish him good luck.