No charming life

Some of you people I know back in P.I. think that I lead a charming life just because I live abroad and in Europe no less. Nothing can be farther from the truth. Here’s how my usual week is like:

Monday: Get up at 6am. Has to be at the preschool at 7:45. Preschool is weekdays from 7:45am to 1pm. On Mondays after 1pm, has to rush to Namesti Miru to teach at a language school (same owners of the preschool) from 2 to 4pm. Usually back home at 5, home to the waiting pile of clothes to iron, dinner to cook, and lessons to plan.

Tuesday: At school only till 1pm. The rest of the day is dedicated for errands to run, friends to see, apartment to clean, and so most of the time I would end up not having a free afternoon at all. But nevermind, a time away from work especially with friends is always a treasure.

Wednesday: A repeat of Monday except I teach at the language school till 5. By that time I would be completely exhausted and can only think of crashing out. Still there would be some grocery-shopping to do, dinner to cook and whatnot afterwards.

Thursday: Another long day at work. No language school this time but I work til 5pm again, this time teaching "Drama" at the preschool.

Friday: Preschool still where I also take care of kids' "nap-time" from 1-2pm. Afterwards I usually find myself rushing to the main station to catch a train for Tisnov to visit my in-laws or having a meeting with teachers and directors of the schools.

Weekend: Spending quality time with A at home or sometimes visiting his family. Playing domestic goddess with the neverending struggle in the kitchen trying to come up with an edible meal.

You see, there’s no charming life here. Just an ordinary, working one. And if you think preschool is mainly playing with kids and therefore a breeze, you’re dead wrong. It’s hard work, ladies and gentlemen. It’s doing the things I never did before and probably would never do in the Philippines. So forget the notion that I’m better than you or have more than you do. Such is the ultimate lie you could ever let yourself believe.

The colors of Fall

I am in awe at how one season can transform the world into a kaleidoscope of colors. I love to feast my eyes on the technicolor display of trees around me.

I am enjoying the remaining days of a (relatively) warm season by taking long walks along the fields of Svatoslav. I breathe in the beauty surrounding me, knowing perfectly well it wont last long.

Winter will soon be here. What it will bring me still remains a mystery...

Trick or treat!

Halloween isn't such a big thing in the Czech Republic. Sure they do celebrate All Souls' Day like visiting the cemeteries and bringing flowers to the dead but the all-American way of celebrating it---trick or treating, carving a pumpkin, dressing-up in costumes, and all that jazz--- are still quite a novelty here.

At my school though it's the next big thing to Ježíšek (baby Jesus giving gifts to kids on Christmas eve. Santa Claus to most of us.) Halloween was introduced by an American teacher a few years back and it became an instant hit among the kids. This year it's the same. For a week everything at school revolved around skeletons, witches, ghosts, the works. I remember when I was their age I was so scared of such things especially ghosts. Our kids are exactly the opposite. They would tear the dummies between themselves to be the one to solely play with them. A Casper effect, it must be.

Yesterday we had our Halloween party to culminate the week that was devoted to it. The kids came in costumes. They went trick or treating inside the school knocking on doors while us the teachers were hiding behind them holding bags of candies. Not exactly the real thing but it was the closest we could do. It was fun and I guess that's what it's all about.

Congratulations Darleng!

The sole purpose of this post is to congratulate Eva and announce to the vast universe that she is now the new president of the Filipino community here in the Czech Republic. She will sit on this throne for two years flanked by her entourage which happens to include moi as the newly personified cash register.

Eva with Ate Ives, the outgoing president of the "Pamilyang Pinoy sa Czech Republic." Taken this afternoon at the Philippine Embassy in Prague.

She must have undergone an intensive training in PR and Event Planning when she was a little kid because she's so natural in these fields. These, among other talents, are a must-have for somebody to be able to lead the Pinoy pack in bonding tightly and healthily among themselves. I think the community made an excellent choice.

Way to go, Enday!

Faces and places

My childhood friend Che now lives in Kidapawan. Two other childhood friends in these photos, Emyat and Jen, live, well I don't really know which one is what they consider home now-- in Cebu or Surigao or ferrying between both. These were taken a week ago, one in Davao, at a hot and cold spring right at the foot of Mt. Apo and the other at Che's place in Kidapawan. I heard Che sent the other two girls some dough for the round trip airfare just so they couldn't refuse to visit her there for a week or two. It's not fair, she should have summoned me that way, too.

Ah, natural mudpack and sauna in Davao, durian eating frenzy in Kidapawan while I despair almost every morning in Prague over this darn cold weather. I take my revenge to a positive level by selling these girls online to the highest bidder. Che, (who's almost entirely covered with mud) is already hitched and therefore unavailable but if the offer is right she "might reconsider." Her words not mine. The other two are free as a bird. They might (pretend to be) be unwilling participants of this bidding but what the heck, I don't think they read my blog anyway he-he.

Now I wanna digress for a while... This morning one of my co-teachers was checking his horoscope on a local newspaper with the help of another co-teacher who speaks Czech. I've always been a skeptic when it comes to horoscopes but just for fun I asked them what's in-store for Sagittarius today.

"Sagittarius: you are now having a very healthy social life, you will socialize a lot this weekend, your health is better than before and you have finally arrived at where you wanted to be..."

Hmm...let's focus on the socilizing part, shall we? I have to say that whoever concocted that entry must have guessed it right that my social life is indeed better than last year. Just one lucky guess for just one of many millions of Sagis though, the skeptic of me says. Anyway, this afternoon we had another party at Lillian's. Just this week I met two other Filipinas who are relatively new in Prague. I met Daisy last Tuesday also at Lillian's. She happens to live very near our flat and she speaks Bisaya! Hay nakakita na jud kog laing Bisayang dako diri. Then this afternoon I met Grace who is from Manila but who also speaks Bisaya fluently! Like me and Lillian, she works as an English teacher here. Aside from teaching maybe Grace should also consider working as a comedienne. She's so hilarious my stomach ached from laughing too much. Her tales of her promdi experiences in Zurich are a cure for any problem because you just can't help but laugh aloud when you listen to them.

Tales, tales of woe, laughter, are trademarks of Filipino parties. And of course, food! If the Czechs are into drinking when they party, we are into eating. Eva brought her mouth-watering leche flan, Daisy took out a pack of dried squid, and Lillian cooked her famous pancit and springrolls and baked a yummy banana cake. It was such a great, and I mean great, party.

But darn, I forgot to take photos!

Deleted

I have a low tolerance for things that go kaput. My solution is usually to sever all ties asap, hence the demise of tagboard from my blog. I'm activating my comment section at the end of each post temporarily til I find a reliable messaging board . ( This is just in case somebody would like to bother leaving a message....:)

Possessed and the week that was

My tagboard has been possessed by an evil spirit for several days now. It wont display the messages and just last night it started asking for a password. I use only one password for everything I have online but for a reason beyond my imagination the possessed board rejected it. If it wont be exorcised soon I might as well delete it from my blog. Their loss, not mine.

It's the weekend again. Nothing much exciting to tell about the week that was. Still consumed by the daily routine and the depressing cold, misty, dark mornings that greet me the moment I get out of our flat. Below is a photographic evidence of such mornings:

At 7 o'clock in Prague the morning is cold, misty, and still in deep slumber.

I'm in a ranting mood right now probably stimulated by my tagboard's dementia so I'll rant some more. We're seriously considering buying a flat somewhere in Prague 10 and yes, we want to buy it when it's still no more than just a blueprint. It will be finished in autumn of next year. The assurance is it's with a big and well-known company. I doubt they would bother to run with the buyers' downpayments and risk decades of rock-solid reputation. Thing is, we need the bank's help to shoulder much of its cost and this is where the problem arises. A has been seeing people, mostly the so called financial advisers, to get to to the bottom of whether we could get a loan or not but all we've got so far is the terrible ambivalence of maybe and then maybe not. They give installment and inconsistent infos at the expense of our time and emotion. Sometimes you can't help but think that people are just after what they can get from you. "Advice doesn't come cheap." Worse, it doesn't come for free.

Which brings me to wondering where this world is heading if we keep on blood-sucking each other. I still have faith in the goodness of many yet experiences like this makes me question how long I could hold on to it.

This drives me crazy

The English language is the same whichever part of the world you’re in, right? Hmmm, not really. American English, the one we use in the Philippines, is quite different from the one my school here uses—British English. Below are just some among the multitude of reasons why it’s driving me insane. Don’t get me wrong though. I’m not demeaning it or anything of that sort. Only that it’s like having to write with my left hand when I’ve been right-handed since birth.

I don’t like to use "u" in so many words like colour, humour, neighbour, etc, la da dah. I mean, it’s much better calling Mom Mommy than Mummy, right?

It's a lot easier to say " I have" than "I have got" and to ask "Do you have?" than "Have you got?"

A ladybug is called a ladybird. Fine with that but really it’s a bug and not a bird.

I asked one of my pupils to get me an eraser. She looked at me blankly so I had no choice but to get one myself. When she saw what it was she told me in an accusing voice (like how come you’re my teacher when you don’t even know what it’s called?), "That’s not an eraser! That‘s a rubber!"

Well, I know, dahleng. Too bad I couldn’t explain to you yet that a rubber is also the one we use to prevent population explosion.

An eggplant is called an aubergine. I had to describe it really hard for them to get the picture.

The truth about creepy- crawly- itchy-bitchy lice is that they are called nits here. I have to accept the fact that I never heard this word before. I had to search it through Cambridge online dictionary to find out nits are actually the eggs of a louse. And how did I come across this word? Simple. Some kids at school have both and now I’m freaking out I might get it from them.

If you’ve read about the Shopaholic series you’d have noticed that Becky Bloomwood often spent time watching the "telly." Yes, that’s TV for you.

Anyway, British English is probably more easier to understand than American because the latter uses a lot of idioms. A always has a helluva day whenever he has to translate texts coming from America. But I’m more comfortable with it because I’m used to it. Then again maybe it’s just a matter of getting used to. Give me time and maybe, just maybe, I’ll get the hang of it pretty soon.

Beautiful, beautiful Prague

There's no denying the fact that I love Prague. It's so picturesque. Everywhere you look your eyes have something to feast on. The castles, the buildings, its narrow and winding streets, and of course, its gardens......To borrow my co-teacher's favorite adjective for the lack of words to perfectly describe them, they are simply phenomenal.

Last week Eva brought us to Vrtbovska garden where we took several photos of the place and of course, ourselves. It's relatively small but nonetheless awesome. It's perfect for a wedding party though God knows how much the rent will be if you'll have it closed for a few hours.

The well-manicured Vrtbovska garden and my dahlengs Lillian and Eva striking a pose.

Petřin Hill is known for its mini Eiffel tower but what I loved most about it when we visited it in summer was its garden with a gazillion multi-colored roses just about everywhere you look. I really had a blast there. Well, it's quite obvious, isn't it? :)

Valdštejnská garden is very near Prague castle. I was so awestruck the first time I visited it that for the life of me I couldn't shut my mouth for a minute. I know I looked every inch a Bisayang nakalugsong but beauty is meant to be enjoyed without inhibitions, right? :)

Another place worth every second of your time is Prague's botanical garden. It has an amazing collection of plants and flowers from everywhere around the globe. I saw a lot of tropical flowers which transported me back to the Philippine islands for a while.

Really you have to come to Prague for the ultimate aesthetic experience of your life.