January 5, 1998

Japanese Porcelain

I had read about a special exhibition of Japanese porcelain on display until mid January at Sternbersky Palac (Sternberg Palace).  The palace was built in the mid 1700’s by Franz Sternberg.  He founded the Society of Patriotic Friends of the Arts in Bohemia in 1796.  Noblemen would loan their collections to the society to be displayed here.  It was given to the state prior to World War II and now contains European paintings and sculptures.  It is considered the most comprehensive of the Czech National Gallery members.  They are grouped by country and century.  Get this - they have paintings that date back to 1350.  They have Rousseau, Rubens, Rembrandt, Gauguin, Picasso!  It is on three floors of a building that has a large central courtyard where you could sit and rest (in warmer weather).  It is not tiny by any means. 

We decided to go today.  The one thing we noticed, not just in Praha but in Vienna and Belgium, is how cheap entrance fees are to museums and galleries.  Today my ticket cost 80kc and Jack’s was 40kc because he is over 60 or about $3.50 for both of us.  The paper had listed this price in advance so I assumed it meant that this was the price for the exhibition. It wasn’t, the price included the porcelain exhibit and the entire art gallery!   Had I known we would get to see the whole collection I would have gone after lunch.  Instead we arrived about 11am.  This meant we could make it to maybe 1pm before Jack would have to get some food in him.  Three hours is the most I have ever got out of him in an art museum anyway.  With only two hours we didn’t fly through it, but I didn’t get to spend as much time as I would have wanted under different circumstances.

The Japanese porcelain exhibit wasn’t as large as I had expected, but it still was worth seeing.  Some of the vases were four feet high.  Other pieces were miniatures with great detail.  Most of the pieces were in the traditional blue or deep red.  One water basin was of a farm or country scene in a dull yellow.  The bowl itself was about two feet in diameter and maybe six inches in height.  Very detailed. 

Television in General

We also learned that even harder than trying to figure out what the news is about is watching a comedy routine.  Comedians doing impressions are next to impossible because we are not familiar with movie or other famous personalities.  Everyone in the crowd thought the guy was hilarious.  The only reason we kept it on was it is part of their version of the “Funniest Home Videos” show.  It is a stand up comedy routine, not just an intro to the next set of videos.  Our best guess is that they don’t have enough videos to fill the program, or they think this is a way  it will not look like a complete copy of the American program? 

Because of the holidays there were more movies on than normal, or so we were told.  A lot were the great old movies from Hollywood.  Too bad for us they were dubbed in Czech, I would have loved to watch them.  They also showed the fairy tales that Shelly Duval (I’m not sure I have the name correct) had made.  If anyone recalls those, they always had popular stars in the leads.

TV also has very few ads.  In fact, one station announces that the ads are to start and when they finish.  Of course they aren’t very accurate for when the next program begins.  It’s never exactly on the hour.  More often than not a new program starts 3-4 minutes before or after the hour.  Sometimes the program finishing goes as much as ten after then a minute or so of ads, and then the next program starts like 12 minutes after the hour.  We don’t have a TV schedule so we’re not sure how they are listed but Mike says he has be creative when there is something he wants to tape as to when he programs it to start and stop taping.  

Because it is in English we watch Euro News in the morning.  They have been advertising Expo ‘98 that is being held this year in Lisbon, Portugal.  I didn’t know they even had the Expo’s anymore.  It must not be every year as they include the phrase “Come see the last expo of the century”.  Lisbon looks very interesting.  The expo grounds are on the coast and the theme is “The Oceans”.  The world’s largest aquarium has been build for it.  I’ve marked that as one of the hundred or so places we want to see.  That is if we ever find a dog kennel. 

Dog goes to Vet

Dog had a bit of diarrhea so we have been giving him rice.  I didn’t need to take him to the vet for that.  It was when he jumped out of the car when we went to the park and aggravated his tendinitis problem that did it.  We had hoped (stupidly) that it would go away on its own.  We finally had to take him in.  There is a walk in clinic close to us and it is open until 10pm.  We tried Monday night, but there were so many waiting that we knew it would be at least a two hour wait.  So we tried again tonight.   He knows the smell of a vet half a block away.  He started getting low to the ground and walking behind me instead of ahead.  Once inside he just started shaking, he hates them so much.  Kind of embarrassing.  There was a poodle and a Doberman in the waiting area when we walked in.  Both were just lying on the floor.  Shep can’t sit still and keeps whining.  The biggest dog there and he’s the one making a scene. 

There was the vet and an assistant.  All the vet did was start pressing his side starting at the back and working forward until the dog would start to edge downward and away from her.  That alone would have cost $30 back home. They gave him a shot of an anti-inflammatory drug and B1 vitamin.  The B1 is to calm him.  Gee, wonder why they thought he needed calming?  You won’t believe the price - 160kc - $4.75  total! 

Now the bad news - Mike was with us because they did not speak English.  He asked them if they knew of a “pes  (dog) hotel”.  They knew of one but did not recommend it.  They gave us the address anyway.  In the country the size of Czech its only four hours at the most to the farthest border from Praha.  Families live relatively close by; even in the not so common instance of moving away from their home town.  Still it’s hard to believe there aren’t any places to board a dog.  There are just too many foreigners in this country who don’t have relatives nearby to take care of their dog while they are away.  There are just too many dogs to think none of these foreigners don’t have one.  I got the number for the Chamber of Commerce from the US Embassy and will try them one of these days.

1-7-97

Bus

We are getting more aquatinted with the bus routes and schedules.  Today we went to the post office over by Mike’s to pick up a package of mail Dar had forwarded to us.  So we have getting over to Mikes down pat.  From the hill where we stand to wait for the bus we can see the area Mike lives and the complex Hanka’s pharmacy is in.  It’s not all that far as the crow flies, but, by bus it’s a good ten minutes. 

When we were coming back we decided to go to a shopping area in the general direction of Mike’s old apartment that we have seen.  We would need to switch buses.  We could have gotten off at the regular stop we use, but we decided to get off at the Bila Hora stop.  No particular reason.  For reasons unknown it didn’t stop at Bila Hora.  So we ended up going to the next stop and catching a tram back to Bila Hora. 

We haven’t figured it out yet, but there are two routes numbered 108.  One makes a stop between where we generally get on and Bila Hora. It then proceeds straight towards town, not turning to the left and stopping at Bila Hora.  The other doesn’t make the stop in between.  It goes from our stop and then turns left at Bila Hora.  It’s also the end of the route.  From now on we won’t take the scenic route.  We will keep it simple and get off at the place we get on.

I’m sure you are saying, “Why not just get off at the stop in between?”.  If there is no one at the stop waiting, or if you don’t get up and move towards the door, all the driver does is slow up, he doesn’t stop.  So if we don’t know if this is the bus that stops there or not it would be silly to get up and stand there at the door only to find out this bus doesn’t stop there anyway and then we would be left standing at the door of the bus for several blocks until it turns at Bila Hora.

Just as we got off the tram we hit it lucky as bus 164 was just pulling up.  So we explored the area.  I found a larger purse with a long strap to replace the backpack.  There is a nice little store that sells all types of baskets.  I probably should get one to use as a bread basket.  The post office is there also.  This is the post office we will use to mail letters to the states.

We also found yet another grocery store so we did pick up a few things.  Price wise I’s like any other, cheaper on some items, more expensive on others.  Carrots seem in short supply.  Those that I have seen all this week are long and real skinny or if they are of decent size they are getting too soft.  As we walked we went past an outdoor fruit stand.  They didn’t have carrots, but the cauliflower and tomatoes looked okay.  But-t-t-t-t I decided I would pick it up on the way back.  Whi-i-i-i-ch I forgot to do.  So we go vegetable buying tomorrow. 

Hubbell / Hubbellovi

 Mike and Hanka have Hubbellovi on the label by their door bell.   Hubbellovi, is plural or married but only when it is to indicate themselves.   When address them it is Hubbell.  Not only can a word be pronounced six different ways depending on how it is used in a sentence, the written word can be different that the spoken word. 

To make a word plural is also confusing.  There is one way of pronouncing the word if it refers to two or three, another way if it indicates four or five, and a third if it is over five.  Still we have to remember how many strange ways English can be.