Czechmatediary

Christmas is time to have parties and we happened had one too. Besides the White Elephant gift exchange the hit was also the famous Czech plum brandy named Slivovice which one of our Czech/American friends brought as a gift. Seeing an unknown alcohol product, the American male half (about 4 guys, including my husband) finished the bottle in circa 1 hour. Result? One guy puked on our lawn, one guy got pulled home by his angry wife before he had the time to puke, the third guy turned red as and apple and became a non-moving sculpture for the rest of the night. And my husband? He ended up in the bed all day next day. [continue reading…]

Hi guys,

I am now a regular contributor to a new around-the-world blog called The Opinions Post and wrote two articles there. One is in English and the other one is in true Czech – with ‘hacky’ and ‘carky’!!!!! It took me about 5 hours to add those things in but it is done.

The English one is called ‘Critical thinking? What kind of education is this?’ and the Czech one is ‘Vanoce za velkou vodou’. Hope you like it!

All right, I like John Stewart, I think he is funny. But one of the latest reports did not do well with the Slovaks and I kind of feel for them. I feel for them because I still feel like one of them and even if I didn’t, I would still feel empathetic to their negative reaction. Watch the skit and let me know what you think. Should we just lighten up or did he go to far?

CZ: Slovensko se bouri nad nekdejsim skitem z The Daily Show s Johnem Stewartem, ktery si tentokrat udelal srandu prave z neho. Co myslite? Zasmat se tomu anebo se bourit?

This is an acrylic painting of the Charles Bridge and its magical lamps.

Size: 14″ x 11″

Price: $70.00

– price does not include shipping

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I found this really CUTE idea for a Christmas gift (or you can use it as a decoration if you like) in the December issue of Better Homes and Gardens magazine.  It is a Gingerbread city in a glass jar. I figured to make it a little more Czech/Slovak you could make your house template in the country baroque style.

Here is the exact description of what to do when you want to have your jar look exactly like the one on the picture.

CZ: Tady je krasny napad, jak nekomu vyrobit napadity darecek anebo jen si hezky ozdobit vas domecek. Jestli chcete, tak si ty domecky trosku pozmente ve stylu selskeho baroka a mate krasny CESKY/SLOVENSKY darek!
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I was reviewing a very, very old post of mine called The problem of critical thinking, where I said: “What I brought from my high school experience in the Czech Republic was a solid set of cheat sheet inventions. What I learned in the US schools was to know where to look up the needed information but must importantly, how to logically think for myself.” Good thought but it brought me on a tangent of……. cheat sheets.

If you grew up in an American school system you probably did not use very many of them, right? Or maybe only after you read my post, you will agree with me. Us, the Czechs, could not exist without them. Do you know why? Because at the gymnasium (a difficult type of high school) I went to we were forced to memorize SO MUCH information that – unless you had a photographic memory – it just wasn’t humanely possible to do so. So here is my list of cheat sheets. And please, feel free to pitch in if you have a special recipe of your own!

1. The classic palm. You just wrote the info on the palm of your hand. No biggie. [continue reading…]

There are a number of people who would love to learn the Czech language while experiencing the Czech culture. They want the full package. Then there are people that love the Czech culture but could do without the language. Let’s be honest, our language is not exactly one of the easiest ones, right? How many years of studying does one have to undergo before flawlessly saying “Trista tricet stribrnych strikacek”? About 20? Or more??

Anyway, I am not sure if you are aware of it, but if you are a young English speaking person, you can study in the Czech Republic in your native language and get your degree that way. Isn’t that cool?
Wait, now that I said it, I can just see all of the beer-loving surfer dudes packing their bags, telling their buddies:”Duuude, I can get my liberal studies degree in Prague, duuude! Hang out with all the hot Czech chicks and drink the best beer every night duuude!!!” Oh well, perhaps they get more civilized that way.

If you are interested there is a handy-dandy website called Education.cz  that lists all of the universities all over the Czech Republic that offer courses/degrees in English. I was surprised how many there are out there!

CZ: Vite, ze cizinci muzou v Cechach vystudovat jejich obor a to v anglictine??To je pohodlicko, co? Popijet si ceske pivecko, povidat si s krasnymi ceskymi slecnami, ale take nemrhat casem a dostudovat. Tomu rikam servis. Education.cz ma o tom veskere informace.

The CNN news released their list of Top 10 winter destinations and guess what – Prague is no. 1!!! See for yourself:

10 best cities for a winter vacation

PS: The article doesn’t tell you what happens when there is no snow during winter months. Then it becomes the most depressing place ;). But that is probably true for any other winter city.

Vceli uly – or Bee Hives – are a pain in the neck to make. These Christmas cookies are mostly made out of butter  (what a surprise?) which makes the dough/filling melt and then it sticks to everything including your fingers which makes you lick the fingers all the time, which in turn makes you gain about 3 pounds only during the process of making the dough. HOWEVER, if they turn out good, they are goooood. My American friends love them and can’t get enough of them.

The following recipe is from my blogging friend Lenka. The only thing I added are the ground walnuts which improve  stability of the cookie. Whatever you do, please make sure that your dough is cold, right out of the fridge when you start working with it. Otherwise your cookies will melt and will not look good. [continue reading…]