Czechmatediary

The ‘golden’ Czech hands are making us proud this time in Boston. A 40-year-old plastic surgeon, Bohdan Pomahac, has recently finished a second complete transplantation of the face. Bohdan, along with other 30 surgeons, has done so in a record time of 14 hours. The receiver was a 30-year-old man who got his skin badly burnt while in contact with an electrical wiring. [continue reading…]

Babies and Maxipes Fik go so well together! That’s why I designed a pair of pants just for them! They are cute, unique and made out of 100% organic cotton.

The price ranges from $21.99 for the littlest peanuts to about $24.99 for the older babies (plus $3.99 for shipping and handling).

Adult sizes (maybe a pair for your dear hubby?) – although a bit more expensive – are also available.:). [continue reading…]

Czech Republic is suffering with floods again this spring and it’s pretty bad. The following video is comes from Frydlant, a Czech quaint (or used to be quaint?) town in the north of the Czech Republic.

CZ: Ceska Republika opet trpi vaznymi zaplavami a to vsude. Nasledujici video pochazi z Frydlantu, malebneho mestecka na severu Czech.

Last night I took a long look at our fat cat. And then I started thinking about how did she become so fat (we give her the same food but then she is getting older…) and that train of thought made me ask myself: “Who eats cats?”. Certain nations eat dogs but I had no clue about cats. So I asked my smart husband and he didn’t know either. And so we started a long quest that took us days to accomplish….just kidding! [continue reading…]

My 3-year-old daughter completely fell in love with Czech Elmo. I mean it is the same American Elmo from Sesame street but with the Czech voice-over. She likes the original, English-speaking Elmo too but for some reason, she thinks the Czech-speaking Elmo is funnier. What’s even more interesting is that the Czech Elmo sounds EXACTLY the same as the American one. I am attaching a YouTube video of both so you can judge for yourself.

By they way,if you are interested, the DVD series are called “Svet Elmo” and they are virtually not available anywhere anymore. I don’t know why :(. Fortunately one of my Facebook buddies recommended ‘ulozto.cz’ and I was able to download some of those series. These videos are great to learn the Czech language – for young or old.
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Little Scott with his Czech grandmother

And it is guest-post time again! This time the author’s name is Scott who grew up in Cleveland, Ohio. After several years of tedious searching Scott came to learn that his ancestors were some of the very early Bohemian immigrants to settle in Cleveland. While  in 1910 Cleveland had a Czech community  of about 75,000, when his ancestors came to this city they were among the first 19 Czech families there.

How I Got to Milevsko

I began my genealogy ‘travels’ when my son and his wife informed us that they were pregnant with our second grandchild and if it was a boy they were going to name the baby after my father, William.

Soon I ‘needed’ to know more than the history of my dad’s name.  I accessed every site I could — Ancestry.com, Footnote.com, Myheritage.com, LDS, message boards at Delphi and Roots.com, etc. In my earliest readings I noted every ‘How To’ genealogy article started with the admonition to speak with elder family members for their firsthand information.  Thinking I knew better and that the Internet was a powerful tool, I ignored that advice.  It was not long before I became so muddled and confused by names, surnames, place names, and dates that I was on the phone to every senior member of our family. [continue reading…]

If you say ‘To je skoda‘ in Czech it means ‘That’s a shame‘ or ‘That’s too bad‘ or simply just imagine a sad face. The word ‘skoda‘ means ‘loss‘ or ‘harm‘ or ‘injury‘; but it is also the name of the biggest Czech car company which cranks out a new Skoda model almost every year. Why would someone name a car ‘Skoda’ or “Harm” is beyond my comprehension but it did not seem to slow down the business a bit. [continue reading…]

The following list is definitely worth printing out or even memorize if you are planning on visiting the Czech Republic. If you were indecisive about what places to visit, your problem is solved! Here are the top 12 nature landmarks in the Czech Republic. If you want to see a picture of each of them, click here (although the text is in Czech, do not despair,their list has the same number order as mine so go by the numbers). And in case  you want to find out more about these places, just click on each one and it will link you to a more-in-depth resource.

CZ: Novinky.cz zverejnily moc hezky list 12-ti nejkrasnejsich prirodnich zazraku v Cechach. Clovek by si je mel asi vsechny zapamatovat, aby mohl nejenze imponoval sve neceske zname, ale aby je mohl vsechny v tom svem kratkem zivote navstivit a pokochat se jimi!

1. The Southern Bohemian desert in Trebonsko (Poust v Jiznich Cechach)
2.The Prokop Valley (Prokopske udoli)
3. Primeval forest in Beskydy (Prales v Beskydech) [continue reading…]

ATTENTION to all fellow Czechs and Slovaks (or anyone who likes  good chocolate): You will be happy to know that Target now carries Milka – the best German chocolate ever. Unfortunately, it carries only one type, which is the ‘boring’ milk chocolate Milka. My all-time favorite is yogurt Milka, which still has not made it to the US.

I took that picture in Target so that you know I am not making things up 😉

CZ: POZOR, DULEZITE HLASENI! Target nyni prodava cokoladu Milku. OPAKUJI: Target nyni prodava cokoladu Milku!!!! Je to sice jen ‘nudna’ mlecna cokolada, ale snad nam brzy dovezou zajimavejsi prichute, jako je napriklad jogurtova Milka – moje oblibena!!