Chillin' na Chatě

So we are at the chata (cottage) for the weekend. Nice to get away. It is cool that many of the city folk have these little places in the country side to which they can get away form the rat race of the city. Most of the Czechs use them every weekend. I actually think that Praha is better on the weekend for this reason. The city empties out. It is great. Even the tourist areas are less crowded. I don't blame them for wanting to go to the country. It is so much more peaceful. Well, sometimes.

The Chata

Hanka's family's cottage is in the 700 year old town of Tuchoměřice, about 20 kilometers from Praha. In terms of distance, it is not that far but seems like it is much farther as it is situated in this little valley with trees, grass, dogs, chickens and roosters, power lines, a bar with loud music and a major international airport nearby. Yeah, an interesting mix of peaceful country side sounds with some city-like noises. I am blown away by how much the sound of the airport (which is actually up on the plain and about 5 kilometers away) and the bar resonate down the valley.










Hanka workin' it in the kitchen

The bar creates the greater disturbance as it is just across the power line from where the chata is located. There is nothing like sitting outside and relaxing to the sounds of the countryside and having it pulled to a screeching halt by a jukebox playing bubble gum techno (a delightful style of Electronica music) that has its volume on high and is hooked to outside speakers. It is really a nerve-wrenching experience. Now I like the musical genre of Electronica. Well, some of it, and bubble gum ain't some of it. Although the genre is comprised of 98% shit, the 2% that is not, is really good. This 2% is made up of all of the sub genre that find themselves in the 'Electronica' heading. The worst of all in this genre are the 'bubble gum' (teenie-bop crap) and the 240bpm (beats per minute) 'drum and bass' garbage. It amazes me that no one cares about this noise, or at least says nothing about it. Maybe it's like the community oven, or water source and wash basin of days of old. One can see those kinds of things all over the place over here (Europe). At least they only play the music on friday, saturday and sunday nights (holidays too). When I first heard this, I was outside tending a nice little fire I had going, enjoying the peace. Seeing the dancing fire, and hearing the sound of crickets, the brook in the distance and the lightly crackling fire mesmerizing me into a trance-like state, and then BOOM!!!, here comes someones bad remake of an 80's tune**, that sucked in the first place, with a new and improved heavy bass back beat that has been jacked up to a relaxing 240 bpm, to rip me from my trance like being awakened from a pleasant dream by having thrown upon me a bucket of ice water, followed by hot grease (not bacon, 'cause that would be bittersweet, actually), and then having someone shake the shit out of me and scream in my face "BACON AND DOUGHNUTS HAVE BEEN OUTLAWED!!! THEY WILL BE AVAILABLE NO MORE!!!". For those who know me, this would be like the end of the world, my little version of hell. So, Hanka and I look at each other when this happens like, 'what the hell?!?!'. Oh well, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em. Around the fire I dance with my stick like some retarded-ass neo-native American Indian. But this is no rain dance. This one is for the celestial fireball that I want to land in close proximity to us-say, on the other side of the power line. Yeah.










Picking Cherries

The airport? Well, that one is surprisingly less intrusive than one would think. I guess we are far enough away that, while it is still loud, it isn't unbearable. Tuchoměřice is actually in the airport zone, so the city has agreed to pay for the installation of brand new, insulated, double-pane windows in each house in the entire town, which has only a populace of about a few hundred people. Now isn't that nice. People here already have double paned windows. Everywhere, in the whole country, windows, double paned. They are just an older style. Instead of one window with two panes of glass, the older version (which is about 80 years old) has two sets of windows. The funny thing is, while the new windows are better at insulating against the weather, they do no better at reducing the decibels. The older version windows in the apartment where we are staying in Praha were replaced this past spring and the city noises are just as loud as they were before. I wonder if the noise of the planes doesn't bother me because I am used to the periodic loud interruption of large transport vehicles from close by. I have lived within a stones throw from trains for 34 years of my life, you see. Hmmm...













Strawberries from the 2nd harvest (Blogger uploaded the pic this way, I don't know how to fix)

So, as it sounds like I have a dislike for the town of Tuchoměřice by the tone of this missive thus far, I do not. I like to get away to this place from the city very much. It is cool to be able to come to a place such as this. The chata, despite being a bit of a shack, is quaint in an 'uncle dad' or 'aunt mom' kind of way, and is dry and has enough amenities to keep one comfortable, including running water, toilet (shit funnel variety, no ledge, and complete with paper!), wood burning water heater for the shower, electricity, small kitchen with cooking implements and a piece of shit TV that is good for nothing more than for me to huck it off of a 3 story building into an open parking lot causing me to giggle like a child because breaking stuff is cool, especially stuff with glass. The chata sits in a large yard filled with trees and bushes that yield various fruits and nuts and a garden that yields fruits, vegetables and herbs. Of the things yielded by said plants are apples, cherries (sweet and sour varieties), strawberries, peaches (coming soon, as the tree is just about to go through puberty), black and red currants, raspberries, blackberries, green beans, leaf lettuce, tomatoes, cucumbers, horseradish, walnuts, hazelnuts, sage, mint, oregano or sorrel, and chives. It is nice to be there and be able to eat all this stuff fresh. The strawberries and raspberries are spectacular, and I did not like cherries until I got over here. Anything cherry in America sucks. Europe has the cherry thing worked out. The only thing that sucks about the way things grow here in the yard is that it is feast or famine. I have eaten so much of each individual thing as its' season has come and gone that I felt as if I would turn the color of that particular item. The only thing I have missed out on so far was the sweet cherry harvest. We picked and ate the shit out of them as best we could,b ut, as we could only hold so much of them and were going on vacation, so many of them were lost to the ground and insects. Sucked. Anyway, we pretty much just hang out and relax. Yeah, I know, I do a lot of that.










Red Currants

The last time were at the chata, we went to the bar with Hanka's sister, brother and law and their kid. Yeah kids at bars, more of a normal thing here. Thing is, there is a play ground and soccer field right next to the bar. A coincidence? I think not. While we were there, we run into the neighbors. Everybody is a neighbor in these small towns, and neighbors are friendly. What do friendly people want to do when you are at a bar? Yeah, buy you drinks.

A neighbor of Hanka's they call strejda (pron. STRAY-da, which means uncle), wanted to buy be a shot. A shot. I don't drink anymore. Not because I don't want to, because I can't. Me and drinking don't get along very much. It is somewhat of a crap-shoot for me. 80% of the time, after only one or two drings, I get anywhere from a mild to a massive headache the next day. I don't know why, and I hate it. Passionate hate. The kind of hate that if it had some kind physical presence other than being in me, I would kill it. A long, slow, why do you do this to me, and I'll get you for this!, kind of kill. The kind of kill that makes killers who kill passionately, proud to be killers who kill for the sake of killing, because that is what they do, kill. This really sucks because I have never wanted to drink more than now. So, Strejda isn't taking no for an answer, as they do not here, and goes to buy a couple of shots of rum. He returns with the shots and, as I have said before, if you can't beat 'em, join 'em -for one. "Tak, brambor!" is the toast, which means literally, "So, potato!"(instead of na zdraví-the traditional toast, which means 'to your health') The word for so, 'tak' is used everwhere in this language. As far as 'potato' is concerned, I don't know what these people would do without them here. They are everywhere. I even think they use them for stucco. Tak(so), as we are sitting there talking (they are, I can only understand a few words that they are saying), I feel like I am sitting in the middle of a fly's nest. People all around me talking Czech (buzzing), and fast. Strejda starts to talk to me. I can only give him my best deer-in-headlights look. Sucks. That and I can't stop staring at this guys forehead. Talk about a weathered face. Talk about weathered people. I have seen some rough ones over here. Men and women. Strejda has some canyons in the forehead of his leathery face that is on the front part of his big his big head. My friend Miso always talked about the large heads of the eastern europeans. Being here I see what he means. I think some of these people were cross-bred with the pumpkin! His hair is blown back like you have seen in pictures and movies of someone that has just had something blown up in their face, just cleaner. Despite the rough look of some of the people here, they are all some of the nicest, kindest people I have ever met. Sucks I have such a hard time understanding them. I would love to settle into 9-12 beers and talk about potatoes with these people. Anyway, we leave and I went to bed keeping my fingers crossed. No headache... No headache... Looks like it worked, no headache! Cool.


** A little note about bad 80's music: Over here they have taken a whole library of bad 80's music and have completely converted them to Czech. Music and lyricss. If you think 'Gloria' by Laura Branagan or 'Don't you want me baby' by The Human League were bad, you should hear them in Czech. Terrible.