To Je Pohodička, Co?

The word "pohoda," or its diminutive form "pohodička," does not really exist in the English language.  I've searched high and low on the internet trying to find a decent Czech dictionary.  All I can find are translation dictionaries, but nothing that can compare to my friend Webster.  Some of the synonyms I've been able to find include klid (peace), pokoj (room), and vyrovnanost (balance).  Some of the translations I've found include well-being, ease, peace, contentment, smoothness.  As I sat on the side of a pool on Saturday afternoon, having just swum for the first time all summer, allowing myself the rare opportunity to get a little sunburn on my shoulders, and drinking an ice-cold Radegast beer with new friends, life was good.  This was confirmed when my new buddy Jirka turned to me and said, "to je pohodička, co?"

This weekend was without a doubt one of the most fun I've had since returning to the Czech Republic in March, but also one of the most fun I've had during my entire time in the Czech Republic as a whole.  It was a weekend of trains, American family friends, new Czech family friends, old Czech friends, beer, slivovice, lots of food, grilling, swimming, and intense heat.  It was a blast.  It was pohodička.

Since I last wrote, things here have been quiet.  May was a very busy month for me, as I was working seven days a week, roughly ten hours a day.  My life wasn't very interesting that month to say the least.

June was much calmer, as I tried to limit the amount I was working, taking more weekends for myself, as well as not working past 7 or 8 at night.  I spent a night up in Ostrava, the third biggest city in the Czech Republic, located right on the border with Poland, visiting my friend Martin, which was a lot of fun.  I celebrated my birthday on the 20th, which was a nice day.  I worked in the morning, finishing a translation, and then in the afternoon played badminton with Libor.  I baked brownies with the brownie mix Mom had given me before leaving the US, and then in the evening went with Libor, Ivan, and Tania to an Indian restaurant here in Brno, which was fantastic.  Ivan and Tania, both Slovaks, had never had Indian food before, so I got a kick out of seeing their reactions to it.  Libor hadn't had Indian food since being in the US (ie, in the presence of Hillary), so he also had to ease back into it.  It was a pretty low-key birthday, but definitely a good one.

For a few weeks now, my grandmother's been badgering me about meeting up with some of her and my grandfather's friends who were visiting their family for a family reunion here in the Czech Republic in a small village named Hošťálková.  I can't even say how happy I am I went.  That kicked off my great weekend of pohodička.

The coat of arms of the village of Hošťálková

On Saturday morning, I boarded the train in Brno, making the mistake of sitting on the side with the sun.  I was luckily able to find another seat after we pulled out of the station, as the ride would've been otherwise unbearable.  I was headed east, out to the very last town in the Czech Republic before the border with Slovakia.  After a quick switch in Valašské Meziříčí, I arrived in Vsetín.  I visited Vsetín for a weekend last year, as one of my fellow Fulbrighters (a Rhode Islander, no less!) was living there.  When I got off the train, I had to smile at the sight of the Texan couple standing there holding a sign with my name on it.

I hadn't seen Josie and Marvin since I was 12 (we did the math), and though my recollection was a bit fuzzy, memories came back to me throughout the day.  When Josie saw me, though, she quickly pulled me into a giant hug.  Being from our family, my initial reaction was naturally, "What is this?  What's happening?  What's going on here?  Why are you squeezing me with your arms?"  Marvin, however, chose to go with a reserved handshake, something I'm much more comfortable with being a combination of Livingston and Greene.

We hopped in the car as the surrounding Czechs gave us dirty looks, given that the car had Hungarian plates, and zipped out to Hošťálková, the village where Josie's mother was born.  Along the way, we caught up on the happenings of the last 12 years, and I have to admit, it was almost a surreal experience.  As Marvin drove, I rode in the passenger seat, and Josie sat behind me.  Throughout the ride, Josie chatted about various topics, with Marvin making slight, quiet comments from time to time ("See what I have for a navigator?" and the like).  Listening to the two of them reminded me of my grandparents so much, it was really hard not to crack up.  It was going to be a fun day.

We drove through Hošťálková, where some of the sites were pointed out to me, such as the family's church (one of two in the village), as well as the street where Josie's cousins live (in the house next to the one where her mother was born).  We drove through the village and up into the surrounding hills to the hotel they were staying at.  It was here that their family reunion was taking place.  The doors were opened and there was a flood of names, handshakes, hugs, and slaps on the back.  I caught only about a quarter of the names, but as the day wore on, I filled in the gaps.  It was here, though, that I was given my new Czech name.  Most people came up to the three of us and introduced themselves in English, which was more or less the extent of their English.  I responded slowly with, "My name is Matthew," quickly followed by, "Jmenuji se Matthew, česky Matěj," telling them the Czech equivalent of my name.  Josie and Marvin explained to everyone my connection to them, and then I noticed something funny.  People were pointing at me and whispering to each other, "Peťa...jo jo, jmenuje se Peťa."  What's this?  Pete?  No, ladies and gents, my name's not Peter (Czech: Petr, or Peťa for short).  After years of being called Stephen, David, Michael, Jeffrey/Geoffrey, and Andrew, I shrugged off my new name and it stuck.  The rest of the day, I was Peťa.  I was introduced to the matriarch of the family, Josie's first cousin, who has three children (girl, girl, boy...which hit a little close to home).  Only one of the girls, Dana, who speaks amazing English, and the boy, Jirka, my new-found police friend, were present, though the oldest daughter, Mili, was not, as she is going to give birth to a new baby in Prague any day now.  As Josie and Marvin went around passing out gifts from Texas (keychains in the shape of Texas, paraphernalia for Texas A&M, and of course grilling spices), I grabbed a seat across from Jirka and his girlfriend, Markéta.  We were the youngest in the crowd, which Jirka was quick to point out.

After a champagne toast, lunch arrived: soup followed by svíčková!  One of my absolute favorite Czech meals, it is as traditional as you can get.  It's beef tenderloin in sauce with dumplings, a slice of lemon, and a little raspberry sauce.  As Kristy would say, "delicioso!"  We washed it down with a beer, of course, and that's when Jirka decided to cause Josie and Marvin some serious panic.  Though a policeman in Vsetín, Jirka said he had the day off and was excused from being a serious policeman.  In saying so, he pulled out a big bottle of slivovice, the home-made hard alcohol that all Czechs brew.  I just chuckled to myself.  As we were driving to Hošťálková, Josie and Marvin had expressed their relief that this year's reunion was in a hotel, as that meant there "probably wouldn't be any slivovice."  Having lived here now for almost two years, though, and knowing Czechs quite well, I kept my mouth shut.  Sure enough, the slivovice arrived.  We drank a shot to new friendships, to good health, to family and friends reuniting.

Josie and Me

After that, time was spent just chatting, swapping stories (some of which my grandparents seem to have "forgotten" to pass on to the family...interesting how that happened...), laughing, and of course drinking.  Jirka and I had five shots of slivovice together throughout the course of the day, with Josie, Marvin, and Markéta joining in sometimes.  Dana kept her distance from us, probably the wise choice.

I should mention that the room we were in in the hotel was nothing short of roughly baking temperature.  Everyone was sweating profusely, though cold beer did help.  The hotel, however, had a pool, and Jirka and Markéta decided it was high time to jump in.  They invited me to join, and Jirka even lent me his newly received Texas A&M shorts (the most comfortable shorts I've ever worn...I've even already hunted on the Texas A&M bookstore website to see if I could order myself a pair, but as of yet to no avail, unfortunately), and we headed out for a swim.  The pool was small, but me oh my, 'twas amazing.  So far this year, my only swimming experience had been jumping in the ocean back in March on the day before I left the US, captured on film for all time by Rachel.  Jumping into the pool in Hošťálková was fantastic.  The water was very cold, a welcome relief from the otherwise near-oppressive heat.

The snazzy shorts that changed my life.

We swam for a little while alongside a few little kids, and then the three of us ended up sitting on the side of the pool with our legs in the water, soaking up the sun.  Jirka got us some beers, Dana came to join us, and it was all around just a great, relaxing time in the water and the sun.  The time of course came, though, to return to the party, have some more slivovice, swap some more stories, and eat some more.  At one point, Dana and Jirka's mother, Milena, the matriarch of the family, came up behind me to give me a big hug and tell me I was part of the family now, because of which it was her mission to find one of her young relatives for me to marry to make me an official member.  I told her I had no objections, and that's how I became Peťa Jančík.

The afternoon was wearing on and it was getting to be time for me to go.  After some quick hugs and goodbyes, Marvin and I started to head out to the car.  One of the cousins, whose name I unfortunately didn't catch, came and demanded to drive, and so he chauffeured us away.  Being a local, though, he knew we didn't have enough time to make it all the way back to Vsetín, about a 20-minute drive, before my train left.  Instead, we high-tailed it to a small village, Jablůnka and, with two minutes to spare, I was able to catch the train.  As we were driving, he and I were discussing this change of plans while Marvin looked around a little confused.  I couldn't figure out why, but then Marvin said, "Uh...this doesn't look like the way to Vsetín, I think he's bringing us somewhere else."  Idiot me.  I didn't even realize this man and I were speaking to each other in Czech, so I explained to Marvin that he was indeed right, we were headed to a new village.  The train came, I boarded and waved goodbye to them, and I was off, Ostrava-bound.

Had I taken the train on Saturday night back to Brno, it would've taken me about four and a half hours.  Already being out east on the Slovak border, I decided instead to take the train for an hour and 15 minutes to the north to Ostrava to spend the night at Martin's, that way I'd only have a two hour train-ride back to Brno on Sunday.

Ostrava was low-key, just a few beers with Martin in a pub and early to bed, as we'd both had to wake up early on Saturday morning.  This weekend was, however, horribly hot in the Czech Republic, and both of us woke up at intervals throughout the night, even though we had the windows in his place open.  We finally got up at 8 and began to plan our trip, which I'll explain in a minute.  We headed into the city to a bookstore to try to find some information, but to no avail.  As we were walking back across the campus of his university, sweating like pigs and cursing the heat, my foot actually slid across the sidewalk.  I looked down to see what happened.  I had stepped on an area of the sidewalk where some extra asphalt had been poured to seal a crack.  The asphalt had literally melted and I had slid through it.  That's when we knew just how hot it was.  We got back to Martin's and looked at his university's information page, which shows various measurements taken about the air, wind, temperature, etc.  The recorded high so far that day in the sun was 47.5°C, a whopping 117°F.  Well, folks, it was hot.

We spent the rest of the day at Martin's, discussing our trip and preparing some things for the evening.  He called a few friends and we met outside next to a small mini-golf course to grill our dinner.  We had a table under an umbrella with trees all around, which was perfect on such a hot afternoon.  Martin was our chef for the evening, and we had great chicken, salad, bread, and cheese.  It was a nice and relaxing Sunday afternoon/evening.

After that, it was time for me to head back to Brno.  I caught the train at 8pm, arriving in Brno at 10pm, and settled in for two hours with Homer Wells (I'm finishing reading The Cider House Rules).  As I was leaving Ostrava, the sky was getting darker in anticipation of a big storm.  Though the storm never hit Ostrava, it followed me down to Brno.  With about 15 minutes left in the trip, as I could see the lights of Brno approaching, I put my book away and stood at the open window, watching the city approaching.  The cool thing about taking the train to or from the east is that it completely loops around the city.  We were hurtling from the northeast, slicing through the east of Brno, hitting a turn along the south, and eventually curving in in the west to arrive in the heart of Brno at the train station.  It's almost a perfect circle, and the view was amazing.  As I said, the storm had followed me from Ostrava, and as I was standing at the window watching, lighting erupted and a huge heat storm began.  Brno is a very low city, dominated by its cathedral and castle on two separate hills in the center.  It was incredible to see the size of the lighting in comparison to the city, illuminating everything.  While I was on the tram back to my place, the storm finally exploded in a torrential downpour, but it was very welcome after such a hot day, keeping everything balanced, pohodička.

Tomorrow I'm headed to Martin's village, Vranová Lhota, for a weekend celebration there.  The name "Lhota" is quite common in the Czech Republic and Slovakia (the Slovak equivalent being Lehôta), because of which there is a yearly gathering of all the villagers in different Lhotas or Lehôtas.  This year, Martin's village is hosting it, so I'm going to go there for the weekend, which should be a lot of fun.  On Monday, we're headed up to Poland, to the city of Wrocław, where we'll spend the night before flying on Tuesday night to Malta!


A few weeks ago, during an especially hot afternoon in Brno, I started looking up cheap flights to anywhere. Martin messaged me online asking what I was up to, and when I said looking for flights, his response was, "great, where're we going?"  After three hours of searching, we found cheap flights to Malta, and so we're going to be there for a week.  Malta's an island country in the Mediterranean, south of Sicily, to the east of Tunisia.  It's slightly larger than Boston, but not by much.  It's officially an English-speaking country, due to its historical ties to England, though its native language is Maltese, a combination of Italian and Arabic.  Many movies have been filmed in Malta, and it's a cool crossroads of Europe, Africa, and the Arab world.  Needless to say, I'm very excited!  We'll be there for a week, flying back to Poland and then returning to the Czech Republic.


As for now, I have plenty to do before I leave Brno tomorrow, and it's time to get underway.  I hope you haven't given up reading and have made it all the way down to here.  I'll talk to you all once I get back from the Mediterranean!