So, I'm obviously not updating this very often and I will probably continue not to.
I've started working - teaching English. I don't like it very much. I have a couple of lessons with children and they are fine. But on Friday mornings I have a 3 hour lesson with young adults. There are 19 students and they range from excellent at English to quite poor. Through the week they have Czech teachers and my job is only to focus on the speaking part of the course. It is really really difficult thinking of things to speak about for 3 hours. My knowledge of English is no where near good enough to explain why something is right or wrong. About a third of the students find the class boring and the other 2 thirds find it too difficult.
Anyway. I went to a rally in Zlin about a month ago. I forget the name but it starts with b. It completed my trifecta of motorsports and I probably enjoyed it the most. We went on Friday night when they give all the antique cars a go. They fly through the town, fishtailing around corners, spinning out, getting air off the speed bumps. It was really good fun to watch. Where I was positioned was after a corner and the cars would slide around, then the back end would flick out and suddenly the car is heading straight for you before correcting. The modern cars were faster but far less exciting. We were planning to go watch them the next day when they were on the dirt but didn't make it. I didn't really take many photos unfortunately.
The following weekend was a wine festival in Uherske Hradiste. There are 2 months of the year where it is legal to sell borchak, which is partially fermented grape juice (the English name for it is must, I believe). There are around 60,000 people that come and try all the wines and borchak from the different wineries. Because the borchak is still fermenting its taste, fizziness and alcohol content changes. I personally preferred the wine as borchak is incredibly sweet and not particularly good for your stomach.
The festival is also about the culture of the different villages around here. They all have their own traditional costumes, songs and dances. These villages are only 5 or 10 km apart so it's fairly amazing that they've maintained these different identities. The village Romana is from (praksice - pronounced prak shitza) has a costume with really big sleeves, which reminded me of napoleon dynamite so I had to get a photo.
The wine festival takes place in the square and in the park, but there is also a street that goes up the hill that has a bunch of cellars. That is where the real action takes place. There are cymbal bands every 30 metres playing traditional music while the crowd sings along. A cymbal is best described as a cross between a piano and a xylophone. It's basically a small piano that is open and you hit the strings rather than have keys. They're usually accompanied by people on violin, cello, and wine.
The weekend just gone a group of us went to the wine region. Where I am is kind of the wine region, so we went to a different part of the wine region, about an hour away. When we arrived we had a look at the sites in Breclav. There is a nifty castle and a minaret.
The minaret has a brilliant story. Some guy wanted to build a church in the town but he was denied approval, so to get back at them he built this big Islamic minaret instead. It is basically a big giant middle finger. It literally has no religious function, it's just to punish the council. Its very nice though.
On the Friday night we went out to a winery to taste some wine. While we were there the old bloke who runs the place came into the cellar to get his grandson to come do some work. His grandson was the guy doing the tasting. So we all went out and watched them press the grapes they'd just harvested. They go into a machine that crushes them a but and strips out some of the stems and seeds, then they go into another press that spins around like a washing machine and presses the juice out. It goes into a hose down into the cellar and into a big tub. It sits there for about a week and then becomes borchak. They didn't mention that they add anything so I don't really know how it starts to ferment. The walls of the cellar were covered in mould, like the white mold on cheese, and they said that it is really important for giving the wine its flavor. This is the light switch covered in mould.
After that we went deeper into the cellar and the old guy and his grandson sucked wine out of the barrels using this giant pipette contraption and we drank it. They got some of the grapes the wines were made from to show the flavour. There was one breed which tasted exactly like gummy bears. We were quite drunk by then so ended up throwing the grapes at each other and trying to catch them in our mouths.
By this stage we were no longer doing a tasting, we were just drinking with the owners. They were still working as well, pressing the grapes, but then someone starting singing so everyone started singing. I obviously didn't know the words so I just sang my own songs like a loser. Although one of the Czech songs has the line "mella mella mella mella" so I'd join in for that part. The old guy was an excellent singer.
Later on one of the guys with us decided to duck off down to the pub with a flat phone and without telling anyone. Apparently he had cracked the shits about something and had a bit of a bust up with another guy in our group. I manage to stay oblivious to this as I don't speak the lingo. For all I know everyone is fighting all the time. Anyway, while he was at the pub the police rocked up to do an ID check. He didn't have his ID (they have a national ID card here) so they took him back to the station.
Romana and I went to bed, oblivious, but apparently the others wandered the streets for an hour and half looking for him before finding him at the police station.
The next day I had an almighty hangover. We recovered through the day then walked to a neighbouring village to go to another cellar. It was a much quieter night. Some guys who own a different vineyard popped in and it turns out some of the people had met them before. So we went down to their cellar and drank their wine at a greatly reduced price (I'm fairly sure it was free). We went to go ten pin bowling but romana wasn't feeling well so we went home.
Now I'm sick with a cold.
Finally, here are some photos I took from here.
I've started working - teaching English. I don't like it very much. I have a couple of lessons with children and they are fine. But on Friday mornings I have a 3 hour lesson with young adults. There are 19 students and they range from excellent at English to quite poor. Through the week they have Czech teachers and my job is only to focus on the speaking part of the course. It is really really difficult thinking of things to speak about for 3 hours. My knowledge of English is no where near good enough to explain why something is right or wrong. About a third of the students find the class boring and the other 2 thirds find it too difficult.
Anyway. I went to a rally in Zlin about a month ago. I forget the name but it starts with b. It completed my trifecta of motorsports and I probably enjoyed it the most. We went on Friday night when they give all the antique cars a go. They fly through the town, fishtailing around corners, spinning out, getting air off the speed bumps. It was really good fun to watch. Where I was positioned was after a corner and the cars would slide around, then the back end would flick out and suddenly the car is heading straight for you before correcting. The modern cars were faster but far less exciting. We were planning to go watch them the next day when they were on the dirt but didn't make it. I didn't really take many photos unfortunately.
The following weekend was a wine festival in Uherske Hradiste. There are 2 months of the year where it is legal to sell borchak, which is partially fermented grape juice (the English name for it is must, I believe). There are around 60,000 people that come and try all the wines and borchak from the different wineries. Because the borchak is still fermenting its taste, fizziness and alcohol content changes. I personally preferred the wine as borchak is incredibly sweet and not particularly good for your stomach.
The festival is also about the culture of the different villages around here. They all have their own traditional costumes, songs and dances. These villages are only 5 or 10 km apart so it's fairly amazing that they've maintained these different identities. The village Romana is from (praksice - pronounced prak shitza) has a costume with really big sleeves, which reminded me of napoleon dynamite so I had to get a photo.
The wine festival takes place in the square and in the park, but there is also a street that goes up the hill that has a bunch of cellars. That is where the real action takes place. There are cymbal bands every 30 metres playing traditional music while the crowd sings along. A cymbal is best described as a cross between a piano and a xylophone. It's basically a small piano that is open and you hit the strings rather than have keys. They're usually accompanied by people on violin, cello, and wine.
The weekend just gone a group of us went to the wine region. Where I am is kind of the wine region, so we went to a different part of the wine region, about an hour away. When we arrived we had a look at the sites in Breclav. There is a nifty castle and a minaret.
The minaret has a brilliant story. Some guy wanted to build a church in the town but he was denied approval, so to get back at them he built this big Islamic minaret instead. It is basically a big giant middle finger. It literally has no religious function, it's just to punish the council. Its very nice though.
On the Friday night we went out to a winery to taste some wine. While we were there the old bloke who runs the place came into the cellar to get his grandson to come do some work. His grandson was the guy doing the tasting. So we all went out and watched them press the grapes they'd just harvested. They go into a machine that crushes them a but and strips out some of the stems and seeds, then they go into another press that spins around like a washing machine and presses the juice out. It goes into a hose down into the cellar and into a big tub. It sits there for about a week and then becomes borchak. They didn't mention that they add anything so I don't really know how it starts to ferment. The walls of the cellar were covered in mould, like the white mold on cheese, and they said that it is really important for giving the wine its flavor. This is the light switch covered in mould.
After that we went deeper into the cellar and the old guy and his grandson sucked wine out of the barrels using this giant pipette contraption and we drank it. They got some of the grapes the wines were made from to show the flavour. There was one breed which tasted exactly like gummy bears. We were quite drunk by then so ended up throwing the grapes at each other and trying to catch them in our mouths.
By this stage we were no longer doing a tasting, we were just drinking with the owners. They were still working as well, pressing the grapes, but then someone starting singing so everyone started singing. I obviously didn't know the words so I just sang my own songs like a loser. Although one of the Czech songs has the line "mella mella mella mella" so I'd join in for that part. The old guy was an excellent singer.
Later on one of the guys with us decided to duck off down to the pub with a flat phone and without telling anyone. Apparently he had cracked the shits about something and had a bit of a bust up with another guy in our group. I manage to stay oblivious to this as I don't speak the lingo. For all I know everyone is fighting all the time. Anyway, while he was at the pub the police rocked up to do an ID check. He didn't have his ID (they have a national ID card here) so they took him back to the station.
Romana and I went to bed, oblivious, but apparently the others wandered the streets for an hour and half looking for him before finding him at the police station.
The next day I had an almighty hangover. We recovered through the day then walked to a neighbouring village to go to another cellar. It was a much quieter night. Some guys who own a different vineyard popped in and it turns out some of the people had met them before. So we went down to their cellar and drank their wine at a greatly reduced price (I'm fairly sure it was free). We went to go ten pin bowling but romana wasn't feeling well so we went home.
Now I'm sick with a cold.
Finally, here are some photos I took from here.
