Czechmatediary

If you don’t like to go mushroom picking you are simply not Czech. As most of us have  experienced, summer in the Czech Republic (or Slovakia) can be very rainy; sometimes it rains for weeks! It is unfortunate for  tourists but for mushroom pickers it is a time for celebration. As the forest soil sucks in the moisture, various mushroom types  emerge but you have to have a trained vision to see them as they are really good in camouflaging themselves. When I was about 5 years old I went mushroom picking with my neighbor’s family. Since I was the youngest one in the pack I was sent on the most obvious and boring trails. Discouraged, with my basket being completely empty compared to the others, I slowly lingered on my assigned trail. All of a sudden I see this suspiciously big pile of leaves. [continue reading…]

HAPPY MEMORIAL DAY! And thank you to all of the veterans that have served this great country and faught for the freedom of other countries as well. To help us appreciate what many of them sacrificed, here is a great top 10 list of war movies you should put on your must see list.

CZ: Uzijte si Memorial Day! A dekuji vsem valecnym veteranum, za to jak pekne ocharnili/ochranuji tuto krasnou zem. Jestlize vas toto tema zajima, zde je vyborny  list 10 nejviznamnejsich valecnych filmu vsech dob.

I was searching for some YoTube videos about Czech and Slovak moms and ended up looking at the World War II videos, specifically the town of Lidice. So here we go, from Czech moms to Lidice. Its history is, indeed, is incredibly tragic:

CZ: Pokousela jsem se na YouTube najit video o ceskych a slovenskych maminkach, ale skoncila jsem se divat na videa z druhe svetove valky a to hlavne na filmy o Lidicich. Historie tohoto mestecka je opravdu neuveritelne smutna:

LIDICE is a village in the Czech Republic which is built on the site of a previous village of the same name. As a part of the Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia, it was destroyed under the direct orders of Heinrich Himmler in reprisal for the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich (the Nazi deputy protector of Bohemia and Moravia) by a couple of Czech guys during World War II. [continue reading…]

A 60-year-old Czech-American millionaire, Ivana Trump, is planning on buying some real estate in the Czech Republic. Since she is making 14 million dollars every minute (that sounds a bit high), a purchase of couple of 9th century buildings in the Old Town Square should not be a problem for her. “The financial crisis has affected the whole world, but I think the Czechs are still doing pretty good. That’s why I would like to buy something here; I still have to think it over,” said Ivana Trump. During her visit Ivana also took a trip to the local house for abused women and donated 500,000 Czech crowns to them.

Ivana Trump is a native of Zlin who began her life as a professional skier in Czech and ended up as a millionaire living in the United States. Although she has quite the entrepreneur’s spirit she is mostly known for her plastic surgeries and young lovers :o) [continue reading…]

I was thinking today that although communism is gone I still experience some remnants of it. The good things were hard to buy during communism; when bananas or oranges arrived in the store people were just about to unpack their tents in front of the store so they could get some; when there was a decent trip to Yugoslavia available, people really did sleep in the sleeping bags in front of the traveling agency to purchase a ticket (and I am talking from a personal experience here). If a kid brought some Western candy to school he would better watch out not to be torn into pieces. And the list goes on…you get the point: good things were scarce, most of it was just junk.

Now that I live in the beautiful United States of America I find it quite ironic that i miss this ‘junk’. What ‘junk’ am I talking about? Let’s say that one of my friends comes back from Czech and brings a box of Fidorka, or Bonpari, or – God forbid – Lazenske oplatky (!!). [continue reading…]

Ctyrlistek in Czech is not only a four-leaf clover but also an ultra-famous children comic magazine. Just the glance on this image above puts me right back into my childhood, when I would read each issue over and over until I had each line memorized. The magazine was named Ctyrlistek after its 4 main characters: the smart cat Myspulin, the pretty doggie Fifinka, the happy-go-lucky Bobik and the cheeky rabbit Pinda. They live in a house together, experiencing different kinds of adventures, fighting for righteousness and protecting the weak. It is also important to mention that they  love goulash and ‘buchty‘  (sweet bread)!

While comics have always been very common in the Western world, the socialists dismissed them as a “capitalist trash”. The only comics that survived the 1970s and 1980 were children comics as they had an educative character and were supposed to enhance childern’s interest in technology and sciences (to develop the nuke later in their life, I guess). When the borders opened in 1968 the Ctyrlistek‘s creator, Marin Nemecek, went on vacation to the Western Europe. “Looking around the shops I noticed something that was completely absent on our market – colorful comic books. So I thought for a while  that we could somehow import them to our country. But then it occurred to me, why should I try to import something  when I can write and draw my own things.” [continue reading…]

Most of us who grew up in Czech/Slovakia or  were raised by Czech/Slovak parents were raised quite strictly. There were rules and if you failed to follow them there was punishment. Sometime it was the wooden spoon, sometimes the belt and sometimes the smack on the head or one got grounded for a long, long time….. Different households had different rules but most agreed with one thing: no one wanted to have a spoiled brat in their home.

Now that you have your own children (or are planning to have them), how are YOU raising them?

CZ: Vetsina z nas, Cechu a Slovaku, byla vychovana dosti striktne. Pravidla se musela dodrzovat a kdyz se nedodrzovala, zacaly litat facky. Kazda domacnost trestala jinym zpusobem, ale jednu vec meli spolecnou: nikdo totiz nechtel mit doma rozmazleneho haranta. Jak vychovavate (nebo planujete vychovavat) VASE deti?

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Remember those ugly-looking commie cars like Lada, Dacia, Trabant or Skoda? Well, Skoda has recovered quite a bit! The original Skoda automobile was originated back in the early 1890’s in Mlada Boleslav. Even despite the glim post WWII political conditions Skoda has always been known to be a reliable car. Its dated image had been a subject to many jokes (see the image above), but  Škoda remained a common car on the roads in the UK and Western Europe throughout the 1970s and 80s. After the Velvet Revolution it became subsidiary of the Volkswagen group – the greatest thing that has ever happened to the Skoda company. The car’s looks as well as performance has been improving ever since including the new sport model Skoda Yeti. [continue reading…]

I found a really nice report about Brno, written by this guy who is originally from there and recently came back to Brno for a short visit as a tourist. The article is short, sweet and entertaining (read the article right here). Now, all of you Moravians out there, tell me if you agree with him!

CZ: Nasla jsem vam moc hezkou reportaz o Brne, napsanou clovekem, ktery v tomto meste vyrostl a po dlouhe dobe se do nej  vratil na par dni jako turista (clanek si prectete zde). Ted mi, vsici Moravaci, musite rict, jestli s nim souhlasite!