Day 14

It.s official! We.ve hit the halfway mark! We are on day 14 of our adventure, and still loving every minute of it. However, I think I can safely speak for the team when I say that we all missed our mothers very much today. So mom, this is a Mother.s Day shout out for you!

Today we started the day by going to Frenstat, a small local town. I got to örder my first Czech zimzlena, or ice cream cone. (I had pistachio and chocolate, in case you were wondering.) Then we visited a museum on Czech folk life and immigration. Now, a word about Czech museums. I have visited many, many, museums in our tours here. In Prague, and a little in Pilsen I found the museums a little confusing and not very well curated. I had wondered if it was just a holdover from the communist era, or maybe a cultural/language thing. Not so! Because here in Moravia (the general area where I am staying is known as Moravia) the museums are tiny, but FABULOUS. The museum we visited yesterdaz in Pribor about Sigmund Freud, was superbly done and the exhibitions where very well put together. It was even (dare I say this about a museum?) very entertaining! Today we visited the Czech folklife and immigration museum in Frenstat. I had a similar experience with this museum as well. The museum exhibits were interesting, and very creatively put together. For instance, one of the largest Czech immigrated communities is in Texas. So they have a room that is divided by a large ship bridge. On one side is everyday historic life in the Czech area. Then you cross the bridge, and on the bridge are all sorts of primary historical documents about the immigrants from the CR. On the other side, is Texas! You read all kinds of interesting information about their lives in Texas. For instance, did you know that even today, Czech is the third most popular language spoken in Texas? (It.s right behind English and Spanish). The other exhibits were all done in a similarly superb fashion.

After that, we went on a short trip into the Beskzÿdy mountains (prounounced "Bes kiddy"). We took a ski lift up into the small moravian town at the top. It was gorgeous! We could see all around. Our host said that if the clouds had cleared out, we should be able to see all the way into the Slovakian Tatra Mountains. From there, we hiked up the mountain trail to a small statue of Radgegast, one of the folklife gods of beer. After that we went back to the trail and WALKED DOWN THE SIDE OF THE MOUTAIN. This sounds like not a big deal, but this mountain was bigger than any of the mountains in Huntsville. I was ready to fall over and die by the time I got down.

While we were up in the mountains, we stopped and had lunch at local restaurace. I got to try a local dish called Halusky (prounounced "hal loush key") that was very good. It was potato gnochi, with goatcheese and bacon. It tasted just like the best Velvetta shells and cheese you have ever had in your life! I loved it.

Words of the daÿ: zemzlina (pronounced "zem ez lina" and meaning Ice Cream) and ohchijee (totally not sure of the spelling, so i just spelled in phonetically. It means "certainly!")

We are all still having a wonderful time and we love our host families. We would stay here forever if they.d let us!

Tommorow we having vocational daÿs. I.m scheduled to visit the local public library and scientific library. Im VERY excited!!!