Czechmatediary

If you have not heard of those Czech tongue twisters, you have not lived your life to the full yet. It is truly an experience! My Czech Republic blog has them even recorded (in a fast and a slow motion) so you can get the real taste of those sounds! My favorite one is “Strč prst skrz krk”, meaning “Stick your finger through your throat”. I bet you burn few hundred calories just by repeating this one couple of times!

To listen to the recordings click here.

CZ: Je na case zopakovat si ceske jazykolamy a zlamat si par jazyku. Mam takovy dojem, ze kdyz si jich par zopakujete  nekolikrat dokola, tak taky par tisic kalorii zpalite. Ano, ano, odvolejte ‘gym membership’, sednete si pred zrcadlo, uvolnete si blicejove svaly a dejte se do jazykolamu!

Nahravky ceskych jazykolau jsou k mani na blogu My Czech Republic (kliknete zde).

Imagine you get invited by your acquaintance for a cup of tea and when you come to his house, there are strange paper bags hanging all over the walls. First, you realize you don’t know this person enough and you wonder if you should start slowly backing out of this very strange place and call the police. Then you decide to be brave and take a closer look at those walls and you realize they are covered with  barf bags!

We are talking here about Milos Kubista, a Czech dude from Plzen who owns  a collection of more than 1,500 air sickness bags (some framed) from all over the world. It took him close to 40 years  to collect all those ‘valuable’ items and the numbers are still growing. (more…)

The American moms affirm the trust relationship with their babies through breastfeeding on demand, while some Czech parents do it by juggling their little ones in the air. What do I mean by that? They take a parent-baby course which is called “Baby flying”.  The mother (or the dad) hold on to the baby’s arms/legs and variously twist them in the air, all to the sound of loud, dancing music. The course instructor, Blanka Kolarova-Sudikova, claims that besides affirming trust in between him and the parent, baby-flying helps with other problems such as if the baby is colicky or too hyperactive.

This unusual course has had so far about 1,500 graduates and numbers are growing. Only the doctors don’t like it one bit. They say that it can simulate the so-called “Shaken baby syndrome”, which leaves a serious health defect on a baby. (more…)

The local hospital in Ceska Lipa is in a big trouble. A father of a newborn child has filed charges against this institution for negligence, since his wife gave birth to their first-born right into a toilet bowl. How could this happen?  The 23-year-old expecting mother was admitted with stomach pains. After an agonizing night without any help from the hospital staff, she had decided to relieve herself in the bathroom and..uppsss…out came a baby! The poor kid has now a big bruise on its head.

CZ: Nemocnice v Ceske Lipe to v dnesni dobe nema lehke. Otec jednoho novorozenete totiz podal trestni oznameni proti teto instituci a to proto, ze mistni porodnici pry zanedbali peci. Jeho 9 mesicu tehotna zena prisla do nemocnice s hroznymi bolestmi ‘zaludku’. Nikdo ji v nemocnici nezkontroloval a nastavajici maminka trpela celou noc v krecich. Pote odesla na toaletu, aby si ulevila, a – splouch! – a na svete bylo miminko! Uhodilo se do hlavicky a na pamatku z toho utrpelo velkou bouli.

Source:

http://www.radio.cz/en/article/127490

http://www.lidovky.cz/zena-v-nemocnici-porodila-na-zachode-pribuzni-vini-personal-pq5-/ln_domov.asp?c=A100426_182924_ln_domov_ani

Josef Lada is a phenomenal, self-taught  Czech writer and an illustrator. Born into a poor cobbler’s family, Lada’s love for drawing made him a self-taught prodigy of a unique style of drawing. In fact, his style is so ‘Lada’ that it is almost impossible to make a mistake when identifying his drawings.

One of his more famous drawings is called “Hospodska Rvacka” (‘Bar Fight’) from 1943, in which he depicts about 50 individuals fighting in a local pub. Why are they fighting? Maybe the innkeeper told them there was no beer left to serve? Who knows… (more…)

You are not going to believe this. A certain Prague traveling agency is launching world’s first holidays for stuffed animal toys! For only 90 euros (and up) you can send your favorite teddy bear for a week trip to Prague. You know how boring it is for him to sit in the same bed for years? The poor thing wants to live a little too!

So once you send your dear one off to Prague you get a daily e-mail updates from him with pictures attached: teddy at the Prague Castle, teddy sitting by the Jan Hus statue at the Old Town Square, teddy having a typical Czech dinner…..

The creator of this ‘teddy bear tourism’ is a half-Czech, Prague-based enterpreneur, Tomio Okamura. “There are 1.2 billion teddy bears around the world, which is of course a very big group of potential clients,” says Tomio. (more…)

You can get this miniature pot-bellied pig  (also called a “Tea-cup pig“) for 500 to 5,000 Czech Crowns, depending on their size. The smaller they are, the more expensive they get. Yet the price did not stop them to be one of the new favorite pets in the Czech households. They are supposed to be smart, affectionate and very clean! Watch the video below:

CZ: V Cechach se tyto miniaturni prasatka prodavaji za 500 az 5,000 Kc s tim, ze mensi prasatka jsou drazsi. Chrochtajici milacci tam jdou jako na dracku, stali se totiz novym oblibenym zvirecim mazlickem v ceskych domacnostech. Divite se? Maji pry byt velmi chytri, pritulni a take cistotni! Podivejte se na nize uvedene video: (more…)

Breaking news! The most popular Czech car fragrance is the vanilla-scented Wunder-baum tree! Second place belongs to the “Black Classic” scent which copies the man’s cologne and third place is taken by the “New car” scent (which is also my personal favorite). Out of the liquid car scents the “Anti-Tobacco” is the winner since it covers up the smell of cigarette smoke, something that many Czechs have to deal with on every day basis. (more…)

The Czech ZOOs in Usti had an interesting visitor for a few days. An exhausted albino doe was caught by the local cemetery where she was chased and finally bit by some dogs. She was moved to Decin and became part of the animal crew that represents the unique geographical region of so called Czech Switzerland.

Albino does are very unusual in nature. Unfortunately, their unique coloring brings them much trouble. Not only  they are not liked and trusted by other animals but their lack of eye pigment causes problems with their sight and they are also very sensitive to light.
(more…)

Daniela Lazarova from Radio Prague always digs out such interesting stuff. This time her article targeted the Museum of Records and Curiosities in Pelhrimov. We already know about fakir Petr who was planning on overcoming his past record at the museum by laying on hundreds of glass shards for 72 hours. This time the museum is exhibiting a 2  by 1,35 meters tapestry made by an amateur! This late-bloomer is a 46-year-old machine engineer from Slovakia who was unable to work for 4 years because of a work accident. Bored out of his mind, he kept watching ‘dumb’ TV channels until he came across a tapestry maker and decided to try it. He tried making Czech castles and various caricatures from the daily newspaper and then went on doing – now his life achievement – the Last Supper. This tapestry has over a million stitches and took him more than 9 years to finish. (more…)