Jack has found a scotch whiskey that he likes as well as the Ballentines. Nice part about it is its price, 190kc ($5.50) for .75 liters. The Ballentines runs about 390kc ($11.00) if we really shop around. We have always found Ballentines at the Plus store west of us that we walk to. That was up until three weeks ago. They have not carried it since then. Needless to say we have been price shopping for something comparable since. Seems like every time we walked past a store that had liquor in the window we would go in the hopes of finding the type he likes and come out empty handed. He bought something called White Horse, but did not like it.
Today we went to Plus for regular groceries. They still didn’t have it. Once we got home we checked the phone book for any other Plus stores and found one downtown. So we ended up going all the way into town for Scotch. We bought three bottles and once we were back on the subway we both said we should have picked up four or five.
One surprise - we found cherry juice. Michigan never had cherry juice. I had to pick it up in Wisc and bring it back. So now I can fix old fashions. Of course they are not as good as my Mom can make. In fact, not even close.
International Women’s Group
Tuesday was the meeting for new members to the group. It was held from 10am - 11:30am at the President’s Hotel in downtown Praha along the river. They had it in the lobby of the fifth floor. Two of the women that were part of the registering process said that the best way to meet other members was to join the interest groups and attending the various activities during the month. I now understand why they said that. By 10:45 the lobby was packed. A lobby does not have acoustics made for large numbers of people. It was not conducive to conversations. One woman estimated 150 women had signed the book as you came off the elevator. I was sitting with two women from Korea and one from Japan. It was so hard to hear that I could not hear the person directly across from me unless we both leaned forward over the table.
Hanka’s mother could not baby-sit on Tuesday for Marek so we switch days. Jack watched Marek in the morning. I left the hotel around 11:00 as it was just impossible to really meet anyone there. Besides, they were trying to set up a microphone right behind our table for the President of the group to speak. However, they were having problems finding a plug and the President wasn’t even there yet. I was given the newsletter and that showed the various interest groups they have. I tried to call about the Cooking group and the Evening Dinner group, but didn’t make contact with either. I’ll try again later. Can you believe it? They have a cooking group I and II. I just may get some cooking in yet.
Ladies Room
In most public restrooms (other than restaurants) there is a woman who sits at a table. You hand her 2 kc (about 1/2 cent) and she hands you two small sheets of toilet paper. Some (including restaurants) have a large dispenser of toilet paper by the sink that you take off the paper you need before actually going into the stall. What makes this rather inconvenient is if there is a line of people. It never fails that the dispenser is on the opposite wall as the door into the restroom. It makes for disorder among the people standing in line. Some people wait until the line moves up to the dispenser, some come into the restroom, go up to the dispenser, and then get back into line. However, by then someone else may have come in before she gets back into line. Then there are people who want to wash their hands and they have to work around the people that are in line. My latest motto: “Always go to the bathroom before leaving the house”.
And then if there is a little old lady in line, and a stall becomes available that is closer to the door into the restroom (and therefore farther from the dispenser where you are now standing - yet closer to the little old lady), that little old lady will just waltz right in and take that newly available stall even if there are four other people ahead of her! You see, I have discovered that little old ladies carry a few sheets of their own paper in their purses. Once I saw two ladies together and one handed the other paper from her purse. Once a woman must have gone in without her paper and a lady reached into her purse and gave her a couple of sheets under the door. I don’t mind them carrying the paper, it’s the flagrant disregard for who is next in line. One time I saw a little old lady who did the waltz right in and the lady that was next in line said something to the person next to her in a grumbling manner. I, being the person next to her, just scowled in the direction of the stall the little old lady had just gone into and shook my head.
February 14th
Zoo
Hanka had a pharmacist class to attend from 10am until 3pm so Mike called and wanted to know if we wanted to help entertain Marek. We ended up at the Zoo. The entrance fee was 120kc ($3.50) total for three adults. Less than three years of age is free. The Praha zoo is a really big zoo. It is across the river and on the side of a hill, this makes for a lot of up and down walking. Very clean. Because of the unseasonably warm weather, many of the animals were outside. The giraffes have a fenced in area outside that is a couple of acres. The younger ones were running all over. First time we had seen a giraffe run in real life and not just on National Geographic type TV programs. Same with a younger hippo, he (she?) kept running in and out of the water and diving at another hippo that was in the water. He was trying to get the two older ones to play. They didn’t seem to be interested.
We probably didn’t see half of the zoo before it was time to leave. We had to hit all the big animals as they are Marek’s favorites. They have a large picnic area somewhere according to Mike. He said they came last summer a number of times and spent the entire day there. I’m sure we will be doing the same more than once.
Observations
-There are no pickup trucks. The closest thing is the real small pickups like Datsun used to make years ago. The Chevy S10 is the closest thing I can think of, and these are smaller than that. They have no tail gates. There is a cap over the truck box that comes up somewhat higher than the cab roof does. The cap doesn’t have windows. They have a hinged door that opens right to left. The color matches that of the truck itself. The truck must be made that way as they are all exactly alike. They don’t appear to be homemade jobs.
-Even though it may be a one way street always look both ways. Somehow it has become acceptable that as long as your car is facing the right direction that it is okay to drive in reverse down the street. One of those “Go figure” things. Emergency vehicles will use the unoccupied side of tram tracks. We have seen a south bound emergency vehicle using the north bound track line of the tram. Again, we look both ways before crossing the tram tracks.
-I’m starting to miss the microwave. The pans that come with the apartment are cheap and therefore when reheating things it either takes forever or it starts to burn to the bottom of the pan. Oatmeal in the microwave is better.
-Twice I have seen a video of the Village People singing YMCA. I’m quite sure it is a remake. Are they attempting a come-back? Of course it is better than the video made by David Hasselhoff (however it is spelled).
-Backyards don’t have large oaks, maples, elms, etc. They have fruit trees. They learned to grow their own food as you really could not depend on the availability of food in back in the days of communisum. Parks are really the only place you find large trees.
-We actually miss the snow falling. While watching the Olympics it was snowing. We both commented on how nice it looked coming down in such large flakes and wouldn’t it be nice to be in a house with large windows with a fire in the fire place watching it snow. We miss only snow falling to watch it, not the shoveling and bitter cold weather.
-Europe will play any version of soccer they can think of. Lately we have seen teams on two wheel bikes. They hit the ball with the front tire. It’s indoors and the playing field is much smaller. There are also only four players including the goalie on each team.
-Ice is not put in drinks. When you order a coke with a meal you get all coke and not 3/4 ice that dilutes the coke. That means a medium size drink is the right size with a meal. The coke comes out of the dispenser already adequately chilled. A much better system. That is except for cocktails. Jack still gets a glass with the booze, a glass with a few cubes of ice, a glass for the water, and the bottle of water. He looks like a chemist mixing it all together.
London
We’re excited to say the least about going to London. As I said in the last letter, we’ll be off line the 18th through the 24th. I have the entire time planned out. We keep picking up the book we bought on London and reading more in it. Hind-sight being easier we probably should b staying there 10 days. Oh well, we’ll at least see the highlights.
That’s it until we get back. . . .
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