Injustice

Injustice is all around, is everywhere. We are reminded of it on the news, in the metro and from history. This week I was a witness to injustice. First was through the 40 year anniversary of the Soviet invasion on Czechoslovakia in 1968. The second was prejudice that we'd like to believe no longer exists in the 21st century.

On August 21, 1968, Soviet tanks rolled into the sleeping Czechoslovakia to 'reinstate a good communist regime'. The Soviets weren't happy with the Prague Spring that had thrown open the windows of oppression and let people have freedom of speech. The Czechoslovak public did not welcome the interference of "big brother Russia" and pasted the streets with protest art. It is hard fro me to imagine the nations of the west that were spouting words of support for democratic thought and freedom sitting idly by and doing nothing.

My second witness of injustice was on public transportation. I have to preface this with the fact that the Czech Republic is a very safe place to live and the Czechs are some of the most tolerant and open people on earth. Unfortunately, stupid people live everywhere. As H. and I were sitting in the cable car at Petrin Park, a large group of drunk punks got on the cable car. They choose a section where two African-Czech students were sitting. They proceeded to harass the students into giving up their seats and eventually leaving the cable car. There were several other minorities on the cable car-Vietnamese, Slovak, a few tourists and myself. There was silence to the top of the hill. The experience left me with a new empathy for how it feels to be helpless .

I mention these two incidents together because essentially it is the same human ego and defenselessness that drives power-hungry governments to invade sovereign nations or drunk punks to pick on someone who looks different than them. Maybe in another 40 years humanity will have evolved past jealously and egotism, and social justice will prevail...Or maybe we can just start by loving our neighbor as we love ourselves. I'm not sure which is more likely.




http://www.radio.cz/en/article/44313

"Oh, give me a home/ Where the mushrooms roam..."

There is one thing you have to know about Tasci Gibson. Mushrooms. I love mushrooms. I love them fried, sauteed, raw in salads, on pizza, in pasta-honestly, there are very few foods I wouldn't put a mushroom on.

Ask my mom, it's been like this since I was in the womb. She craved mushrooms endlessly. And as a small baby I demanded a mushroom on everything I ate. So, not much has changed over the last 30 years.

When I moved to the Czech Republic I discovered my own holy grail of cultural wisdom: The Czechs love mushrooms too! Not only do they love them, but they go into the forest and pick them! I was delighted, overwhelmed and amazed that I had come to live in a country that appreciated fungus as much as me.

So, this weekend I began begging H. to take me mushroom picking. We go a couple times a year but usually in the autumn, when the weather is best. The best mushroom harvests are due to a combination of rain, warmth and moon cycles which are carefully calculated and analyzed. These calculations all pointed to no mushrooms in the forest according to my dear boyfriend. But I was having none of it. I wanted mushrooms. So being the loving, caring, patient man he is...H. drove me out of Prague to a forest.

We searched. We searched. We searched. There were no mushrooms to be found. (Sometimes I hate being wrong...) I did find a bit of yellow fungus that I'm told can be eaten but I'm not brave enough to try, I also found a four leaf clover and one mushroom that H. said I could eat once (i.e. poisonous). But I'm not deterred. I'll be back in that forest soon...Once I learn how to calculate the pull of the moon and its effect on fungus.

Vineyards and Villages II

Mikulov



A little piece of the Mediterranean must have broken off during the creation of the world and fallen into Southern Moravia. I really had to check the GPS to make sure we hadn't accidentally driven to Croatia instead of the quaint town of Mikulov.

Mikulov sits on a hillside bordered by white rock face on one side and hearty green vineyards sprawling as far as the eye can see on the other side. Most of the buildings have been renovated recently with bright colors of yellow, brick red and blue adding to the quaintness. We had dinner on the main square, where a local band was playing toe-tapping folk tunes.



Valtice

After dinner we took a drive in the cool evening air. Through the vineyards, the road ribboned and brought us to the village of Valtice, wine capital of the Czech Republic. The square was large. People were walking slowly across. Grandparents holding toddlers, a group of teens with green and pink hair. A few tables sat outside a restaurant where the merry laughter of wine drinkers filled the air. Of course the standard chateau loomed on the horizon.

I loved little Valtice so much that the next day before driving back to the big urban Prague I asked H. to stop one more to and let me take a little "souvenir or two" back with us. The wine cellar at the chateau was excellent and I found lovely souvenirs to remind me of our weekend in the sun of southern Moravia.

www.mikulov.cz/en/?languageId=1

www.radnice-valtice.cz

Vineyards and Villages I

The Battle of Three Emperors

Tucked into the hills of the south of the Czech Republic is a field of purple flowers. If one doesn't know better than the field would appear to be like any other picturesque scene in Moravia. However, two hundred years ago this field was covered with bright red and blue uniforms of French, Russian and Austrian troops.

Napoleon met his enemies on this purple-flower field. Tolstoy wrote of this battle in War and Peace. If I'm honest, I was ignorant of the battle and its significance before our little journey to this stone monument. But after standing and gazing and the blowing flowers, imagining the young men sweating, scratching in their uniforms, the fear and dread in their eyes and hearts, I felt a new connection to a history that is not mine but has captured my imagination.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Austerlitz





Lednice

Last time I was at Lednice Castle, it nearly broke my heart. Not because of its beautifully sculpted gardens or its deep emerald lake or the sprawling trees and wild flowers. No, it broke my heart to see the castle, literally, crumbling where it stood. We passed by Lednice in the fall of 2006. It looked as if it hadn't been maintained since it was built in the 17th century.

However, on our latest trip to Southern Moravia last weekend we stopped back by Lednice and to my delight it was evident that reconstruction has begun and is moving swiftly to restore this castle to its glory.

The other surprise for me was how many visitors there were strolling throughout the massive gardens. The weather was quite warm and very sunny. It appeared that anyone that lived in a 20 km radius must have decided to wait out the heat at Lednice. The Lichtenstein landowners spared no money or extravagance in their garden designs. There is even a Turkish minaret imported directly from Turkey to accentuate the extravagance.

After a long (long, long, long, long....) walk around the gardens it was time to beat the heat in our own way and drive off to find a cold shower and chilled wine.


www.zamek-lednice.info/en/

Tanky

Tanks. This is not the subject one would expect from me but I've always loved history and am really interested in military history. History is written by the winners, after all. So when H. proposed we spend a Saturday (not the first time) at the Czech Military Museum I was all for it.

The museum is mostly outdoor. When you enter the complex, there are 5 long exposition halls that are divided by time periods: WWI, WWII, and Cold War. Each hall is arranged to show how military vehicles would have been utilized in their time period.

There is also a hall that recreates a large tank battle that happened in 1945 in the eastern Czech town of Ostrava. There is a trench that runs about 60 meters through the dark hall. Above you there is the sound of gun shots, whizzing grenades and incoming artillery fire. You feel like you've experienced a little of the battle for yourself.

Outside there is a long line of tanks with their details on small plaques with details of when the tank was produced, by who, when it was in use and any special facts to draw attention. I was awestruck at the number of things inventors have come up with to do with a tank. There were tanks that could dig trenches, amphibious tanks, tanks to assist with domestic tragedies such as floods and even a tank that could become a temporary bridge.

There was a time in life when I thought I might want to become a war correspondent. I think my hours at the military museum was all the action I'll be seeing for awhile.

www.vhu.cz