good news

Vana conquered the world again! / Vana zase dobyl svet!

One of my friends recently enlightened me on some major Czech news regarding Czech horse racing. I have to admit,when she told me, I was staring at her like a deer in headlights, completely embarrased that this news has escaped to me. Good thing that I got such good, well-informed friends! The 119th Velka Pardubicka, ran on October 11th of this year, will be marked as one of the greatest ones in history. The winner became Josef Vana, at 57 the oldest proffessional jump jockey in the world. Vana has won the Pardubicka 5 times previously as a jockey and the 6th time as a trainer. Before this victory he considered his 1997 victory on Vronsky his greatest.”The year before I was diagnosed as clinically dead for 15 minutes after a fall at Baden-Baden…I lost 3 quarters of one lung and broke some ribs on my right side”, recollects Vana. [click to continue…]

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Tagged as: celebrities, good news, sport

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Are the Czechs going to win the Davis Cup again? / Zvitezi Cesi opet na Davis Cupu?

For the first time after 29 long years, the Czech Republic has gotten into the Davis Cup finals! The Czech doubles pair (Tomas Bedrych and Radek Stepanek) beat Croatia in incredible 2 hours adn 15 minutes. “This is a great victory for our country…We did not expect to win over Croatia on their own soil with a score being three to zero,”, proudly comments the captain of the team, Jaroslav Navratil. The former Czechoslovakia won the Cup in 1980 by beating Italy with a team lead by the incredible Ivan Lendl. [click to continue…]

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Tagged as: good news, sports

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Great Gift delivery services in the Czech Republic / Vyzkousene Dorucovaci darkove sluzby v CR

gift flickr image You desperately want to send your mom flowers or some nice chocolate for her upcoming birthday. But you got a problem: your mom lives in Czech and you live in the US (or elsewhere). What do you do? One of our readers, Martina, gave me the greatest tip ever:

Her favorite gift delivery services are www.zlasky.cz, which deliver anything from chocolate, candles, flowers and teas to jewelery, underwear, toys or anything else you can think of. She also said to check out “ptakoviny” (or “silly things”) which offer some unusual gift options ;0))

The other gift delivery website Martina recommends is called www.krasnekvetiny.cz. These people are mostly about flowers, wine and stuffed animals.

So you don’t have to drag heavy packages to the post office and pay $100′s of dollars in shipping fees just to send your mom some chocolate and coffee! You don’t have to be afraid that the Czech mailman eats through your box of chocolates! Now your mom receives it personally at her door and you don’t have to move a finger (besides the one that clicks the computer mouse)!

Thanks so much for the tip, Martina! [click to continue…]

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Tagged as: good news, practical, relatives back in CR

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Watch Czech movies on-line!! / Divejte se na ceske filmy pres internet!!

Hrisni lide mesta prazskeho /www.ceskatelevize.cz image I have great news for you! Now you and your kids can watch Czech movies on-line! One of you guys, the awesome readers of Czechmate Diary, contacted me and fed me this tasty morsel (thank you Katka)! It is really simple:

Log on to the Ceska Televize website (click here)
Download the Video Download Manager (it’s free)
Register
Charge your virtual account with an amount of your choice
Watch a Czech movie!! [click to continue…]

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Tagged as: good news, movies

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The best christmas present ever / Nejlepsi vanocni darek na svete

This is the season to give….but what am I going to buy this year??? Another set of pens for my mom? And yet another electrical razor for my dad that he doesn’t really need? And a bunch of chocolate for my friends so they can blame me for their weight gain after the New Year is over? The past couple of years our family has done Christmas a little differently. I actually bought couple of chickens ($25) for my friend Jenn and 5 ducks ($35) for my other friend Leslie. Last year we bought one of our friends a goat. No, they don’t live on a farm, just the opposite.So what am I talking about? [click to continue…]

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Tagged as: Christmas, good news

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Breaking news: the Czechs and Slovaks are visa-free! /Dulezite oznameni: Cesi a Slovaci muzou vyhodit viza konecne do kose!

It’s official! Starting in November, the Czech Republic, Slovakia (and also Estonia, Hungary, Latvia,Lithuania and South Korea) will be able to travel to the USA without visas. The exact date will probably fall on the 17th of November, which is also the 19th anniversary of the Communist regime collapse in former Czechoslovakia. Bush annonced it today at the White House conference where one of the invited participants was also the Czech Ambassador of the US, Petr Kolar. During his speech president Bush explained that Michael Chertoff, the US Secretary of Homeland Security, is scheaduled to travel to Europe – Prague being his first stop – where he will officialy announce the exact date. (so let’s get it going!)

CZ: Tak uz je to tady! Ceska republika, Slovensko ( a take Madarsko, Litva, Lotyssko, Estonsko Jizni Korea) konecne splnili podminky pro vstup do americkeho bezvizoveho systemu a obcane techto zemi tak konecne budou moci cestovat to USA bez viz, a to jiz pristi mesic. Presne datum pravdepodobne padne na 17. listopad, tedy 19. vyroci Sametove Revoluce. Pred chili to tak v tiskove konferenci v Bilem dome zverejnil president Bush. Mezi velvyslanci cizich zemi byl rovnez nas velvyslanec Petr Kolar. Bush ve svem proslovu oznamil, ze presne datum bude oznameno americkym ministrem vnitrni bezpecnosti Michaelem Chertoffem, a to pri jeho navsteve Prahy planovane zacatkem pristiho mesice.

Source: http://www.ceskenoviny.cz/index_view.php?id=339259

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Tagged as: good news, travel

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How do you watch Czech DVDs in the US? / Jak se divat na ceske filmy v Americe?

I don’t know about you but I love to watch Czech movies. Up until recently I thought it was impossible to watch them here in the US; I thought they had to be converted from the European system to the US system first. Well, now I don’t think that anymore and I want to share this exciting news with you! We found a DVD player that actually plays Czech (European) movies as well as the American ones! [click to continue…]

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Tagged as: good news, movies

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“Czech beer, please!” / “Ceske pivo, prosim!”

Czech beer is so popular these days that the EU is most likely going to allow the Czechs Republic to use the “Ceske Pivo/Czech Beer” trademark. The beer is very unique because it is “brewed using specific technologies in a specific latitude”. I don’t know if you knew this (I certainly did not), but the “Czech” beers like Staropramen or Pilsener Urquell are also made in Poland, Russia and Slovakia (i.e. different brewing technologies and different latitudes), hence the taste may not be exactly the same. [click to continue…]

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Tagged as: beer, EU, good news

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The best Czech bread recipe! / Nejlepsi recept na cesky zitny chleb!

I know how everyone of us poor Czech/Slovak souls living abroad, suffer without real Czech bread and that is why I went on a recipe hunt. And I found one. When I first read it though, I thought I was going to either faint or have an anxiety attack. It looked so complicated!!! “Well, I will at least give it a try, just for the heck of it”, I told myself. And I have to tell you, it was actually a lot of fun! Sure it takes couple of days to prepare the sourdough, but it really takes up like 1 minute per day – very easy and very worth it! When my first loaf came out of that oven I just couldn’t believe the fact that it looked like a real loaf of bread! And when I tasted it I became even more amazed as it not only looked but also tasted like a REAL Czech bread!

PS: FOR A QUICK VERSION CLICK HERE [click to continue…]

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Tagged as: food, good news, traditions

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Bird flue vaccine developed in Czech / Vakcina proti ptaci chripce vyrobena v Cecach

A new vaccine for a potential avian flu pandemic has been recently developed in a Czech town Bohumile. The US-owned production company is called Baxter International and their new “mirracle child” vaccine, Celvapan, has been more promising than any other such vaccines. Why? Because the researchers decided to use monkey cells instead of the traditional use of hen’s eggs. [click to continue…]