A New Ride and Fall Break!

So, something awesome happened. Last Thursday I went and had my class with the Kraml family. They are an awesome family that I teach, and I have begun to get close to them. We have had some good conversations about what we value in life and they have asked me questions about my Christianity... They are great. But anyways we were talking about how they saw me walking on Tuesdays and Thursdays to go teach my class... Bottom line, they offered to let me use one of their bikes that they don't use anymore. IT'S AWESOME! A trip that used to take me 40 minutes to walk, now takes me 13 minutes to bike to!!!

So that has made my week really cool.

Also, starting tomorrow, we have our fall break. After I am done with my 11:00 class I dont have any work until next Thursday. Plans are as follows
Friday night go out with Joseph and some friends here in Kralupy.
Saturday Brady and some of his YWAM peeps are getting in.
The Budapest girls are getting here!!! which I am really excited about! I think Saturday, but Im not sure.
so the next few days I will be hanging out with people I love! and then Tuesday and Wednesday.. relax back here in Kralupy, play guitar, write...
Im excited.

Castles and Trains

So this weekend a few of us GPA-ers (Greater Prague Area, since Joseph and I dont actually live in Prague) made an adventure to Ostrava to visit the girls out there. Steph, Ashley, Frank, and Myself took the 4 hour train ride out there.

As I found out, the problem with Czech trains is, they sell more tickets than they have seats. So basically you have to either pay almost twice as much to "reserve" a seat, or pay a normal price and rush and pray that you get one before everyone else does. Sadly enough, We all didnt get seats. Frank found one, as did Ashley, but for Steph and I, the first 2 hours were spent in the part of the train right in front of the restroom. It wasnt too bad though. Just read and talked. After a few hours, a lot of the people had gotten off, and so we found seats all together.
When we arrived we were greeted by the Ostrava Ladies, Lydia, Bean, Jonna, and Laura. (We were also waiting on Sarah who was coming in from her town.)
But basically the night consited of dancing in an extremely crowded pub called Desperado to 90's music. a lot of fun.

But I will take a moment to tell you that over the past 72 hours I have had a terrible pain in my right shoulder/neck. It felt like a pinched nerve.. so the whole weekend, I was popping alieve and convincing the girls to give me back rubs, however, none of it helped.
On Saturday we took a train an hour out of Ostrava to see a Castle. Apparently It was one of the best kept and biggest castle complexes in Europe. Here are some pictures. If you want to see more you can go to my Flicker site. http://www.flickr.com/photos/31442658@N04/



All in all a good weekend. And I ended up going to a Thai massage place in Prague when I got back on Sunday and this Thai guy kicked my ass, but got the knot out.. So I'm better! Also, I figured out.. if you ever get really tired in a train and there isnt room to lay down.. move all of the bags to one side, and the bag rack makes a great bed... There are some perks to being small.:)

There Will Be Hair

So I decided a while back that when better to let your hair down and go crazy than when you move to Europe. You know... adopt the bohemia lifestyle... I mean.. I live in literal Bohemia... or just west of it. So as Sunday will tell you, I've always said... ok man I'm going to grow my hair out. And a little over a month later when it hits the awkward stage, I chicken out and cut it... But that was AMERICAN me... this is the new BOHEMIAN me. So here today. In front of all of you. I vow that my hair will not be cut (except for a slight trim so my thick hair wont fro) until the new year. I havent cut it since I have been here. So it has already been growing since the end of August.

Be prepared.... That is all. just my public declaration, so you all can hold me accountable, that THERE WILL BE HAIR!

Art

So for the past 2 years I havent really been inspired creatively. I have done a few projects for school and for fun, but not the kind of creativity I had before I moved to LA. So it is amazing how just a change of location stirs up all kinds of new thoughts and ideas. So since I have been here I have been so much more creative than I have been.. its amazing. First, I have had to resist taking my camera everywhere. There is something very cool and beautiful about this place, the mixture of modern capitalism against a background of old communist ideas. Throw in beautiful castles and buildings from 1000 years ago. I just want to capture it all. Here are some from the first few weeks of being here.
I have more pictures posted on my facebook you can check out.. I will also probably upload them to flickr soon... I will put the link on here soon.

So next, Ive been playing guitar. I just started teaching myself in about April or so, so I am not very good, but learning. I've learned a few death cab songs and a few nickel creek songs. I also borrowed a keyboard from the son of our boss. So I'm learning a few things. Maybe I'll start writing some of my own stuff soon.

Ive also been working on some film stuff. I'm so glad I brought my video camera, because I have a ton of new ideas. Even just short random, fun things.. like this. I got inspired one day during lunch because it was just a beautiful day, I had the window open, and was listening to music... and ready to make a grilled cheese.

I am working on some other videos too, so as soon as they are done, I will upload them. Ok, I have to actually get back to planning. And eat my homemade mac and cheese!

School

So it is October 8th, 2008. I have been in Czech Republic for only one month and 18 days. Not very long in the grand scheme of things, but extremely busy.
Like I said before It has been hard for me to catch up on writing because in the initial month of moving somewhere totally new, there is a wave of strange and new things that hit you. So I will try to break things down in different segments.

School:
School has been great so far. I teach at 4 different locations. The first and main one is Gymnazium, or the Czech equivalent of high school. I teach mainly the "juniors and seniors." I put it in quotes because the way they do the schooling here is different than the States. So they are for the most part upper level and pretty easy to handle. They don't always listen to me, but I quickly remind them that I control their grades! I'm a pretty laid back teacher with them. Right now we are doing a unit over art. We broke down many different aspects of art as a class and then broke up into groups of 2 and each group is doing a 12 minute presentation on their type of art. It should be pretty good.
The other school I teach at is called English Services. It is a private school owned and run by a couple, Anthony and Jitka Otahal. They are the greatest people. I teach around 13 hours a week with them. However, since they are a private school, companies hire them to come give English lessons to their employees. So 2 times a week, I travel 40 minutes (walking) to a giant chemical factory and teach English there. The rest of my classes are at their private school, groups of about 12 or so. Much more calm than Gymnazium students.
I also give a few private lessons, 2 different businessmen, and one family. They are great. A little stressful to have to sit and just talk for an hour to a person. Because there is a balance of teaching them certain topics, as well as just practicing conversation. They are the most challenging but best for really getting to know them.
So my schedule ... for any of you who want to know goes something like this
Monday: once a month I teach at a school out of town about 10 minutes away by car. I teach 5 lessons of beginner English. It is fun because I just get to teach about whatever and just have class discussions. They are very eager. So on that day I begin at 7:50 and teach until 1:00
And then all Mondays I teach at 1:45 my 4.A/8.g class (which are the seniors).
Tuesday:
8:00 Small group lesson at Synthos chemical company
2:25 my 7.G class, which are the juniors
5:00 small group at English services
6:00 small group at English services
Finish at 7:30

Wednesday: 8:00 4.A/8G 2 class
10:00 2.A class
2:25 3.A class
finish at 4:00

Thursday: 8:00 small group at Synthos company
9:00 Private lesson with a man named Pavel
10:15 Private lesson with a man named Penec
* both of these are pretty fun because both of them speak great English
3:00 small group at Synthos
4:00 private lesson at Synthos
6:00-8:00 Private lesson with Kramil Family

Friday: 9:00 2.G class

So that is the rundown of my schedule!

Hospital visit

This is a little late, but I will post it for any of you who havent read my story about being in the hospital:
Date written August 31st.

Some of you may not have heard, because it happened rather quickly, so I will give the brief version of the story. If you dont want to read it, feel free to skip ahead to read what the status of things are now.

Friday, I flew over to prague. I flew with Britt, Gina, and Frank. It was a good trip, but the whole time, my head was hurting. We landed and Joseph and one of my bosses, Mr. Otahal, picked me up from the airport. Got to the flat. But I felt really bad.

Saturday, started moving in, pretty cool town. went to downtown and got a cell phone, but all day had a pretty bad sinus headache on left side.

Sunday, Head really hurting, but had to take a sightseeing trip around prague. Took a lot of Alieve, made it through. came home head hurting badly.\

Monday, woke up, left eye was pretty swollen. Head hurting as bad as night before. In the morning had first teachers meeting at school. Met all of the new English teachers. Really nice. Got one of the English teachers who spoke Czech to take me to the pharmacy to get some sinus relief medicine. Came back took it and laid down about 10 a.m.

Two hours later woke up feeling terrible (after taking medicine) Called our boss and said I needed to go see a doctor, because I definately have a sinus infection. Boss called me back shortly after and said we would go in the morning. Laid back down for another hour. Woke up feeling even worse. Called back boss and told him we had to go today. My head at this point was starting to feel like it was going to rip open.

Got a Czech friend of my roomates (Joseph) to take us to the doctor. "Yes, you have a very serious sinus infection." Well yeah. So he prescribed antibiotics and some painkillers.... 400mg ibprofen... I was not very excited about that.

Ok, Im writing a lot I will keep it even shorter.

Monday night. WORST NIGHT OF MY LIFE. LONGEST NIGHT OF MY LIFE. WANTED TO DIE... LITERALLY ... IT SOUNDED BETTER THAN GOING THROUGH WHAT I WAS.

Tuesday morning. My eye is totally swollen shut. and I cant think about anything but the pain. back to doctor, "go to hospital." Went to hospital few minutes away. English speaking doctor. " Looks very bad we may have to operate." Started antibiotics. CAT scan showed both sinuses were full and very infected.

Wednesday morning operated. I was under anethesia so I dont remember.

Called mom, "Dad's on a flight in the morning"

Next 2 days, Bad shape, just lying in bed. Hardcore antibiotics, a lot of pain still

Dad got here thursday night. Since Friday have been feeling better.

Sunday can finally open my eye. It looks really gross though. Feel almost 100%

So that is the jist of everything. If you really want a more detailed story... too bad.

I will be in the hospital until tomorrow. Dad flies back early Tuesday morning. I am doing much better. Have had a lot of time to read and recover. I will be under "house arrest" by the doctor for another week. Meaning just that. Cant really leave my house. So I wont begin teaching for another week, possibly two.

THANK YOU! THANK YOU! THANK YOU! to all of you who have been lifting me up in prayer. I know there have been many people praying and God has given me a speedy recovery. Feel free to write me if you have any other questions or anything. I will be at my apartment all week starting tomorrow... all day... everyday. So I will have plenty of free time to write.

Thats it for now. I actually have to get back to the hospital for my next IV.

So that was written obviously a few weeks back. I will try to see if i can find a picture of my eye all swollen.