Currently obsessed with Couscous

I can't get Ikea's Couscous off my mind. This is the only reason why I haven't totally shunned this store after all the heavy lifting marathon we had the first time we were there. I just love eating at their restaurant. Their couscous with veggies is exceptional. It's so yummy and also affordable it makes me want to dash off there all the time. Fat chance, the store is so far from the center you have to have super cravings like mine to spend hours in transit just to eat.

So I tried to cook my own versions but they didn't come close to tasting like Ikea's. The first time I did, it came so dry it tasted like sand. My co-teacher then told me to mix it with a bit of white plain yoghurt but when I did, it came out too gooey. Not the one to give up easily, I searched the net and came across a different recipe. This time I put too much paprika that I couldn't eat more than a few small bites. This means that my neverending quest for the perfect couscous recipe will have to be put on hold till our kitchen unit is installed in our new flat, then I can drag my co-teacher to show me how to do it right.

This was the lunch I prepared which ended up in the bin. I didn't go easy on paprika it tasted like a bunch of raw chillies. The recipe I found said to just dump all the veggies you like so I put corn, peas, tomatoes, broccoli, and carrots along with garlic, cumin powder and of course, the culprit why it ended in the bin-- paprika. Better luck next time.

My current obsession is this--Ikea's Couscous with vegetables. It's so tasty I am itching to know what the secret is. Ikea is located at Cerny Most, an hour of metro ride from where we live. We were there yesterday to shop for a kitchen unit and of course, for me to eat this dish. It costs 45kc a serving but this one is kids' serving so I only had to pay 25kc. Yeah, you read it right. Just 25kc.

My dominant intelligence (?)

Mae's latest post got me curious. It's about Gardner's multiple intelligence theory. She also has this link where you can take an online test about what kind of dominant intelligence you have. I usually don't buy what the net sells but this one killed the cat. Here's what I got:

Your Dominant Intelligence is Linguistic Intelligence

You are excellent with words and language. You explain yourself well. An elegant speaker, you can converse well with anyone on the fly. You are also good at remembering information and convincing someone of your point of view. A master of creative phrasing and unique words, you enjoy expanding your vocabulary. You would make a fantastic poet, journalist, writer, teacher, lawyer, politician, or translator.

Oh really now. I'm not sure about this result. I noticed that my writing skill has deteriorated a lot. This is the reason why I turned to blogging-- to practice again. The only thing I fully agree is that I'm definitely great in convincing someone I'm right. A will attest to that. :)

I wanted to be a journalist, that's why I took up Mass Communications in college. I strayed, obviously. A lawyer or a politician? Not a chance. A translator? Honestly I have a strange habit of translating my grocery list from English to Surigaonon, Cebuano, Tagalog, and Czech, and I usually couldn't get everything right. A teacher? Well, if my employer would know this result, she'd better give me a raise.

What about you? What kind of dominant intelligence do you have? Click here to find out.

LP: "Edible lion"

Animals -- I love this topic. It's so easy I don't have to stare at the ceiling for long when I do my lesson plan. This is one of the most-loved topics, too, as kids love to imitate the noises animals make. Mind you, they can snort better than horses or pigs.

Arts and crafts can sometimes be tiring and boring. Eating can never be boring (at least for me) so one day we decided to make an edible lion for our activity. Though most of them didn't eat their lions, they definitely enjoyed making them. It was messy with lots of shredded carrots ending up on the floor but it was a real winner nonetheless.

" Edible lion" - shredded carrots for mane, a slice of pineapple for head, raisins for eyes and mouth, a cherry for nose.

In broad daylight

I've heard several bizarre stories about people stealing everything in CZ, from roads to ATM machines, in broad daylight. You have to hand it to the thieves here for being smart. If you would steal a part of the road in broad daylight, clueless witnesses would only assume you're doing your profession to give the otherwise abused tires a relatively easy life. If you steal an ATM machine, well, maybe smart isn't the word for it. It's either stupidity or sheer courage.

But in the least chance that you would steal with people milling around you, would you steal flowers? One woman certainly did. This narrative, however hilarious it may sound, is in no way embellished.

A and I were quite early for out apointment at the realty last week so we decided to kill the time outside the building. A few meters from where we stood was an ordinary flower shop with some potted plants displayed on the sidewalk. I remember this woman coming from the opposite side as she passed us by because I actually thought she worked at the realty. She certainly dressed the part; black suit and pants, white inner blouse, black bag, and black heels. She walked past us without any hurry. Next thing we saw she was dashing past us again like the devil was upon her, gripping a tray of potted tulips as if her whole life depended on it. A's immediate thought was she must have wanted to catch the tram desperately but I immediately thought otherwise when I saw the commotion tailing her. The shop owner was screaming with all her might behind the madly running woman, backed up by a few witnesses of the crime. It took the owner several seconds to get her bearing and run after the tulip snatcher who already vanished around the corner.

So what do you think, was she able to catch her? Of course she was. The greatest lesson I learned from this incident was never wear heels when you intend to steal something-- especially when you do it from someone who is wearing trainers.

But seriously....Tulips?! In broad daylight?

A place to call home

Finally the Deed of Absolute Sale was signed today. We now own a flat in Prague! Every tiny inch is solely ours. It's a brand new flat in an exclusive neighborhood near the school I teach. A year of relentlessly scouring for a place that fits out taste and budget has finally paid off.

Of all the places we went to see, this has always been our first choice. Somewhere in these buildings is a place we can finally call home. (Thanks to Tatka and Mamka for all the help.)

BUYING A FLAT IN CZ

I have to say the experience wasn't a walk in the clouds. With my very limited Czech, the deal was done in a blur. Of course one can request for an English copy of all the documents or have all the documents translated but we thought there was no need to since A can translate everything for me. If ever you'd find yourself in a similar situation, I suggest better request for an English copy so you wont have the paranoia of being kept in the dark.

Business, as I have noticed, is done differently here. Let's start with their "paperless" style which I still couldn't get used to. When you deposit a payment through the bank here, your validated deposit slip will serve as the receipt. Yes, the company you sent the money to doesn't usually issue one. When we deposited our reservation fee, I had to insist I needed a receipt for my peace of mind. We were given one but probably not without a raised eyebrow behind my back. (Paranoia strikes again.)

Maybe a deposit slip is enough here, but not back home. A receipt is the ultimate proof of payment. One can always deny receiving the money without it. Exactly why it's called a receipt.

On to the contract and the contract-signing-- I was surprised when I was told to sign it only on the last page. I was signing several contracts a month back home in my previous job and our lawyers were always adamant we had to sign it on every page. This means you've read and agreed to everything's that written, otherwise signing it only on the last page would legally mean you don't agree to the other conditions stipulated on the other pages. In CZ, one signature covers everything.

The biggest surprise was when I learned we had to deposit the rest of the money before signing the DAS (Deed of Absolute Sale). The usual process I know is that you review the contract, sign it, then pay the amount due. No, not here. Here you have to review the contract, pay the amount and later sign the contract. Note that again, the deposit slip is your only proof that you already paid.

Of course, the DAS has a clause which states that it can't be signed if the payment hasn't been made yet. I guess this makes the whole business valid but I really have to say this is such a strange process. It's not just me who finds it weird, my co-teachers as well. Apparently we all follow the same process in PI, Australia and the US, but the Czechs found a different way in making their legal system work. Oh well, different strokes for different folks is all I can say. For now I'm just happy to have finally found something to call ours.

A Czech Easter

Happy Easter!

Today the Czechs celebrate the Easter. They really have a flair for having their own days of celebrating holidays, like Christmas is on the 24th of December. Easter, to the rest of the Catholic world, was celebrated yesterday. To the Czechs, the big day is today. Another irony is that most of them are atheists. There might be a biblical reason why this holiday exists here but I'm not sure if they care what it's for. Well, religion is not an issue for me. I respect other people's belief or the lack of it, but I do expect to be shown the same courtesy.

A peek at the Czechs' Easter tradition:

1. Giving sweets and/or money to the men while the women get nothing except being beaten by a stick. The beating is for the women to stay healthy but nobody could explain to me why the men get the treats. How chauvinistic, I must say.

2. Baking, baking, and baking. They traditionally bake a cake in a shape of a lamb. A "Beránek" is what it's called. The women in A's family spent the whole Saturday afternoon baking two lambs and arguing how to put minimal icing on them as wool. It's a complicated process of measuring, mixing, baking, melting and decorating, something I wont have the patience to do on my own.

Don't they look yummy? I just think they are too nice and calorific to eat.

3. Easter bunnies, eggs, and chocolates galore - In P.I. I know sometimes people do an Easter egg hunt but we are not really into bunnies. A click on Wikipedia explained this difference in tradition. The Easter symbols are choco-fied here and these are what they give to friends and families. (Didn't I say only men get these treats tradionally?) Calories, here we go to gobble you.

These chocolate bunnies are running wild everywhere here on Easter. These were two of our bunnies last Easter given by A's family and some of my pupils, who either thought I was a man or didn't care about tradition. I gave all our bunnies up for someone else to devour. I'm one of the few who is not a fan of chocolates. They give me a headache. Seriously.

Amidst all these, I miss how Holy Week is celebrated in P.I. But it doesn't really matter how you celebrate it. What matters is how you take its meaning and use it in the way you live your life.

Words that brought them here

It's amusing how people stumbled upon my blog. Some by accident, some on purpose. Here are some key words that brought them here to have a peek:

1. Zara- I wonder if there's any Zara outlet in China. Several searchers came from this country. There must be considering that 99.9% of clothings distributed worldwide are manufactured there. It's everywhere here. I'm a fan of this store because it's one of the few which has my size but I'm not gaga over its price tags. Most of the time I only go in when there's a bold, colored SALE written outside.

2. Fifa fever- Korea tops the list where people drop by searching for a cure. Let me digress for a sec-- A's British officemate once said that he could sum up PI in three words; basketball, jeepney, and karaoke. It's not fair because there's more to a country than what meets the eye, but if I also had to sum up CZ in three or four words, it would be beer, fattening meals, and of course, football. CZ is definitely a football country.

3. Prague- what to wear in June - Americans are quite fashion conscious. Geez, my fashionista days were over the moment I became a preschool teacher. I'll try to give an advice though, unsolicited as it is... June is usually warm, can even be blisteringly hot but one has to consider the fact that Prague's weather is as unpredictable as a PMS-ing woman. A jacket and a sweater are a must-have. They always come in handy. For footwear, flip-flops wont go wrong in warm weather. Please leave your heeled shoes at home. You do a lot of walking here so better bring in your flats.

4. English teaching jobs in Prague - searchers come from different countries. If you're a native speaker, rest assured that there's a job waiting for you. Learning English is like a national obsession so the demand for English teachers is soaring every year, not to mention that Prague is a transient city. Teachers come and go -- there's always a room for another experienced one or a teacher wannabe here. Having a TEFL certificate is a plus.

These links can be very helpful:

www.monster.cz
http://www.expats.cz/prague/f-22.html

I found my job at www.praguepost.cz. I don't have a TEFL certificate and I didn't have a teaching experience. Though English is one of the official languages of P.I., it's not my mother tongue. I just got lucky maybe. Then again, they are luckier they got me. :)

Cheaper flights to Cebu/Manila

How is it that flights from Prague to Cebu are so expensive? I know big airlines have to have OP (operated flights) with other airlines in and out Ruzyne but that's no reason to charge more. What's more is that you can't even have much choice on when you will fly because the flights are not that frequent. I have a reason to rant--neighboring countries like Austria and Germany not only have frequent schedules, they do have much cheaper flights going straight to Cebu.

One airline that often flies there is Qatar Airways. I found this out after several hours of internet dwelling. The tickets are several thousands (in crowns) cheaper than other airlines such as KLM or Cathay Pacific. I browsed KLM's e-ticket last night and almost fainted when the total amount for two round trip Prague-Cebu reached almost up to 80k in crowns. With Qatar Airlines it only totalled 46K. The catch is you have to take the flight from Vienna, Frankfurt or Munich. Still, what a difference. The train or bus ticket from Prague to Munich or Vienna doesn't cost 15K per person, does it? I just have to get a Schengen visa to travel without a hitch but that's no sweat.

Thanks also to the ever reliable Google, I learned the airline has an office in Prague. It's right here.