Phil and Teresa Mohr Czech Republic: Days 12 and 13

When you enter a Czech home, you are expected to take off your shoes before you go in. In the entrance stairwell of our apartment buiding there are mountains of shoes in front of each door. It seems kind of silly to us, but it does keep the floors clean inside, which is nice. Fortunately Pastor Milan taught us this custom on our first day, so as to avoid any major errors on our part.

This week the spin dial outside our apartment points to our name, which (according to the previous UMVIM volunteer's book of helpful hints) means we are responsible for sweeping and mopping the entrance hall and staircase for our building. The three apartments on our floor share this responsibility once each 3 weeks.

The boys received a package from Grandma and Grandpa yesterday. The poptarts were a huge hit. We have been very proud of the boys, who have taken to apartment living with ease, and who have shown no major signs of homesickness.   Eric refers wistfully back to our "old brown house," and both boys talk often of their friends back home. Beyond the occasional bumps associated with sharing a one-bedroom apartment, they have done extraordinarily well.   Daniel helps to prepare lessons, do the shopping, etc.

This week the focus has really been on preparing. We have been preparing Phil's sermon, preparing English lessons, and preparing for the week of "English Evenings" next week, including lessons and food - we will be bringing different "typical" American picnic foods each night. This poses somewhat of a challenge as Teresa rifles through her recipes. Have you seen marshmallows here? No. Ranch dressing? No. Jello? No. Hamburger meat (that is not mixed with pork)? No. Fresh spinach? No (this one surprised us). Marzetti slaw dressing? No.  Sweetened condensed milk? Well, we think so, but you try asking for that in Czech! The stores are full of amazing foods, but to cook "American" is tricky.

We are also starting to look ahead to the week of youth camp, which happens the following week. We think Phil scared Pastor Milan a little when he added "hair wrestling" to the agenda, but Phil knows our youth will be very proud of him for passing along this tradition to the Czech people.

Last night was Phil's dinner with the firemen. Of course, dinner did not involve any food - just beer. With a little bit of forethought, Phil should have anticipated this. The big meal of the day is eaten at lunchtime in the Czech Republic, and in the evening is usually just a light snack of some sort. This is a pretty healthy way of living, as you burn off the calories during the day, and you don't go to bed on a stuffed stomach. What better evening snack than a stop at the local watering hole? This posed a bit of a challenge for Phil, whose tolerance for alcohol amounts to about one small glass of beer, and here beer is not served in small glasses. Nonetheless he got through the evening in a respectable fashion without offending his hosts or making a fool of himself.

The firemen are a delightful bunch of family men (even Jerry the heavy metal loving young guy with the mohawk. Ricky Duncan would love this guy! He had to leave early because he didn't have a babysitter). Each of them also has a particular love for some interesting or exotic pasttime, so there was plenty to talk about. The chief, Pavel, came with his wife, who speaks very good English and German.  They both play hockey (one of the Czech national sports), and he enjoys spelunking (caving) and mountain climbing. Lubosh is the professional soccer player (the other Czech national sport). He plays for the Tachov team, which is in the fourth league. The season starts on August 11, so we will be able to catch a game before we leave. Martin is a biker, and he rode his bike there that evening. Biking (bicycling that is) is a huge pasttime here as well. On the country roads you will see many bikers everywhere. Milan (not Pastor Milan) is into climbing, cliff diving and rapelling down waterfalls. He showed Phil some cell phone videos of him and Jerry doing this. We have a word for this in English - "crazy!" As the evening wore on, the English speaking got tiresome for everyone, and they relapsed into the much more comfortable German. The other Pavel was not with us last night.

It is nice to start to get to know people here in the Czech Republic - Michal and the other English students, the firemen, some of the church people... It makes our time meaningful, and it helps us appreciate the culture much more than we ever could as tourists. It is also nice when the conversations turn to God, faith, the church, the end of communism, and life in general. Almost every conversation eventually ends up there. It seems that everyone believes in "something," but that 40 years of communism has bred a great deal of mistrust of the church. The search for purpose and direction and meaning (and the church) here is obvious. However, the church here has to rebuild from the ground up.

The end of communism (now about 20 years old) is still reflected on as a positive and a negative. For the older folks, who lost job security and a strong social welfare network, it is seen more negatively. Their worlds were up-ended, and they were not in a position to retool for western job markets and capitalism. On the other hand, today's high school students, who never knew communism, are fully engrained in western thinking. The people our age, who experienced both systems, tend to stop and think for a minute before answering. Something like, "Well, no more waiting in line for bananas" comes out first. Then concern about their parents and about some of the negatives about free market capitalism follows. Usually this leads to discussion about the fact that we only get 6 weeks of maternity leave in the USA, where they get 4 years of support from the state when they have a baby. As I've said before, everything here has a complex history.  Politics and religion are not exceptions.

Some Pictures:
Primda Castle: