Tischlers in Prague

The last post (probably)...

2008-06-21T12:50:00.000+02:00

I am setting up this message to post at the same time we are scheduled to leave Prague - 12:50 PM on Saturday. My last day at work I was busy to almost the bitter end, finally sneaking out about 4:30 for a couple of last beers with some of the IT guys (who are actually about the most interesting and fun people here, imagine that). I had to finish the performance appraisals for my employees even though they aren't due to be finished until late July since there isn't anyone else here who can do it.

All in all I am satisfied with my time here. RFE/RL is a great institution and Prague is a fantastic cityin which to live. In addition, the opportunities to travel from right in the middle of Europe are truly staggering. Noah was able to meet friends from literally dozens of countries and Kathy was able to do the same and be able to enjoy not working for a couple of years (although she has been extremely busy the entire time in Prague).

We look forward to getting back to Minnesota. Here is a partial list of what we are excited about:
- having most family and friends close at hand
- shopping at Target
- shopping at Best Buy
- going to movies every week
- no language frustration while shopping or at the doctor
- golfing regularly (Al only)
- driving on wide street with signs in English

I am not looking forward to going back to American beer, since they taste like water compared to Czech beers and ome only in those cute little 12 ounce bottles (as opposed to the more manly 1/2 liter bottles).

That's about it. I don't know if there will be any more posts here or not since we are no longer "Tischlers in Prague", but it was fun while it lasted and was quite an experience (and I am referring both to living in Prague and writing the blog).

Goodbye and good luck.

The last night in the house...

2008-06-19T15:35:00.002+02:00

The movers came on Tuesday and started by packing up the garage and then the top bedroom that we used for guests (there are five bedrooms in the house). Yesterday they continued on the two other bedrooms we don't use and the kitchen. Today they are supposed to almost finish, wrapping up tomorrow around noon.

Because our beds will likely be gone by the end of today we have arrangements to stay in a hotel tonight and Friday night (thankfully paid for by the company). So last night was the final night of sleeping in this house. We were only in it for about two years and we only rented, but it's still kind of sad.

Kathy has been stuck at home watching the movers pack stuff up and making sure they behave (they have). It's not very exciting duty but at least it's almost over.

Today after work I go out to a local watering hole (Jama's) for a few beers with some of the guys and tomorrow I basically just check out with all of the various departments (Security, Property) by turning in my badge, laptop and BlackBerry. I've been so busy getting things done that it hardly seems like we are leaving in less than 48 hours.

Am I a Mensch?...

2008-06-17T14:59:00.007+02:00

I sent out an email this morning to everyone at RFE/RL here in Prague telling them it has been an honor and a pleasure to have worked with them for the last two years. I have received some very nice replies, including one that said in part "Where I come from, New York, we sometimes use a Yiddish word, which would seem apt to describe you and that is to say you're a real 'mensch'."

I have heard the word "mensch" but did not have a full unserstanding of its meaning so I asked this person for a definition. She sent a link to this blog which includes the definition of the word "mensch" from Leo Rosten, the author of The Joys of Yiddish, as Someone to admire and emulate, someone of noble character. The key to being “a real mensch” is nothing less than character, rectitude, dignity, a sense of what is right, responsible, decorous.

This blog then also gives the steps to menschdom:

1. Help people who cannot help you. A mensch helps people who cannot ever return the favor. He doesn't care if the recipient is rich, famous, or powerful. This doesn't mean that you shouldn't help rich, famous, or powerful people (indeed, they may need the most help), but you shouldn't help only rich, famous, and powerful people.

2. Help without the expectation of return. A mensch helps people without the expectation of return--at least in this life. What's the payoff? Not that there has to be a payoff, but the payoff is the pure satisfaction of helping others. Nothing more, nothing less.

3. Help many people. Menschdom is a numbers game: you should help many people, so you don't hide your generosity under a bushel. (Of course, not even a mensch can help everyone. To try to do so would mean failing to help anyone.)

4. Do the right thing the right way. A mensch always does the right thing the right way. She would never cop an attitude like, “We're not as bad as Enron.” There is a bright, clear line between right and wrong, and a mensch never crosses that line.

5. Pay back society. A mensch realizes that he's blessed. For example, entrepreneurs are blessed with vision and passion plus the ability to recruit, raise money, and change the world. These blessings come with the obligation to pay back society. The baseline is that we owe something to society--we're not a doing a favor by paying back society.

So back to the question of whether or not I am a mensch? No, I don't think so, but it is cretainly something to aspire to, and I am happy that there are some who think I am already there.

Palladium Mall open again...

2008-06-17T11:59:00.002+02:00

I was at the Palladium Mall briefly today to turn in our rented phone and I can report that everything is open. I did notice several engineer-types with building schematics walking around on the lowest shpping floor pointing at certain spots of tiled floor. Not sure what they were looking for, but I suspect that it relates to the "technical difficulties" that caused the closure yesterday.

More paintball for 10-year olds...

2008-06-17T10:32:00.000+02:00

On Saturday Noah had another birthday party at the best local paintball facility. Everyone had a good time and there were no serious injuries - although there were a few tears from those hit at relatively close range.

Here is Noah and some of his friends in their protective hear, sans the face mask.

I'm not sure what Noah is doing here other than being very silly. He is a bit of a ham and likes attention even when it's for doing something stupid. I can't wait until he's a teenager.

Palladium Mall closed again...

2008-06-16T13:08:00.003+02:00

Kathy and I had plans to meet at lunch time to take our land line telephone for the house back to O2, our telephone service provider since the phone is rented. There is an O2 office in the Palladium Mall so we were going to meet there and then stay in the mall for lunch.

Kathy phoned me late this morning to say that the Palladium Mall was closed. The mall, which opened just last fall, was closed for a month earlier this year after a fire in the electrical room damaged equipment. Kathy said that the Palladiuim had representatives outside the closed mall to inform would-be shoppers that the mall was closed due to "technical difficulties" but it was only for the day and everything would be open tomorrow.

We'll see. This is either the unluckiest or most poorly constructed mall in the world.

Czech Republic collapses in Euro 2008...

2008-06-16T10:26:00.005+02:00

I suppose it's equivalent to being up 21-7 in the Super Bowl (or at least a playoff game) with 5 minutes left and then losing. That's what the Czech Republic national team did last night in the Euro 2008 tournament in one of the most memorable collapses in European tournament play.

The winner of the match would move forward into the semi-finals while the loser went home. The Czech Republic started strong and led 1-0 at halftime and even pushed their lead to 2-0 early in the second half. But the Turkish team did not give up and drew to within 1 with a goal in the 76th minute. Then arguably the best Czech player in professional football, goalie Petr Chech, made a horrendous error in the 88th minute that allowed the tying goal.

At that point, everyone thought that the match would end in a draw which would require penalty kicks since they were even on all the other tie breakers. But the Turkish side put in the winner during injury time to move into the semi-finals. I am not a huge fan of soccer but I enjoy it more now than before we moved to Prague. And seeing the game boiled down to three minutes of highlights is more exciting than watching the whole game.

Politics and Art - Obama and Hillary as chickens...

2008-06-14T12:56:00.006+02:00

I was with a visiting friend at a local art gallery so she could look at newer works from the same artist she had bought works of while in Prague five years ago. The gallery had a pretty extensive selection - some of which I liked and some of which I didn't.

My definition of art is really a negative definition: "If I could have done it, it's not art". That's because I know that I have absolutely no artistic ability whatsoever. I saw quite a bit of "not art" when my friend, Barbara, was here in March and we visited the national gallery. Out of the five floors of exhibits only about 1% of the items I really liked, 20% of so were "feh" and 79% were, in my opinion, not art because I could have done them. I'm sorry, but a big white canvas with a blue dot in the middle is not art because I could do it. Anything that approximates an animate or inanimate object is, in fact, art because I can't do anything more involved than stick figures.

Anyway, this painting was hanging on the wall and to me it sure looks like Obama and Hillary as birds, or maybe chickens. I don't know if that was the intent of the artist and if it was what kind of political statement is being made.

We sold the Mondeo...

2008-06-14T12:50:00.003+02:00

The biggest item to be taken care of before our departure in one week has been, well, taken care of. We sold our 2003 Ford Mondeo to the brother of a Czech co-worker at RFE/RL. I have the deposit and the transfer of the title will happen on Tuesday. To avoid having to take my own time to do it I will execute a power of attorney to Czech woman, Martina, so she can sign everything for me. We used her to do the same thing when we bought the car. The sale of the Mondeo is a big relief. I got less for it than I had hoped, but the fact that the dollar has fallen sharply has actually helped me, as the crowns I receive will buy more dollars now than they did 2 years ago.

As soon as we get back to Minnesota we will have to buy two new vehicles (meaning new to us, but actually used. I don't buy new cars). Kath is planning to look at the Ford Focus, Dodge Calibre and Chevy Malibu for starters. I would like to get something a bit nicer but will have to see what kind of house we plan to buy.

The Goodbyes start...

2008-06-12T14:04:00.005+02:00

It's still over a week before we leave, but the Goodbyes have started. Kathy had a ladies coffee get together this morning in her honor (and that of Dana, our friend who is also leaving Prague later in the summer). Kathy said it was very, very nice and that they gave her nice gifts that I will see tonight when I get home.

My staff surprised me with two gifts today as well. A nice coffee table book of Prague that they wrote kind things in and a wonderful ceramic beer mug. I told them that I wasn't sure that I could defile such a mug by pouring American beer into it. Even though I have another week they presented the gifts today because my college intern, Julie, is going on vacation tomorrow and I will be gone before she returns on the 23rd. So this was the last day that all four of us will be together.

Here are Jiri, Julie, and Vera with the National Museum across the street as a backdrop.

The only one missing is my DC employee, Abdul, who left the company a few weeks ago.

Even though I have only been here a bit less than two years I find myself getting emotional about leaving. The department has changed a lot since I got here - for the better I think - and the credit goes to the staff who works for me. I will miss them.

Post #400...

2008-06-11T21:18:00.003+02:00

Our time in Prague is quickly drawing to a close - we leave for the States a week from Saturday. It's hard to believe how quickly the time has gone (although some will point out, rightly, that we were only here 22 months).

There might not be a million details left to handle regarding the move, but there are many. Getting the car sold is the highest priority. We have 3 or 4 prospective buyers and I am optimistic about getting an offer, though it will likely be less than I was hoping for.

Anyway, with other important things going on I have sunk to writing a post about how many posts I have written. This is number 400.

It really is an oil bubble - 2 more data points...

2008-06-10T10:23:00.002+02:00

When looking at the amazing increase in the price of oil lately and trying to determine if it represents the new real price of oil or an unsustainable and inflated price driven higher by speculators, it is worthwhile to look at what the "players", those in the oil business, say.

Here are two recent examples. The Wall Street Journal reports today on what OPEC has to say.

“Where is the demand going? It keeps going down. People need to look at that. Why would we produce more?” says Shokri Ghanem, Libya's top oil official. He said he believes the world market has enough oil. A Gulf OPEC official echoed that, saying the 13-nation group “will provide what the market wants. If customers aren’t asking for it, we’re not going to supply it. We don’t think more oil will lower prices anyway."

Hmmm...he seems to be saying that supply and demand not at work here. Well, let's see what a CEO of one of the world's largest companies, Royal Dutch Shell has to say from Saturday's Wall Street Journal -

“If you asked me why oil prices are so high, the answer would be “I don’t know,’” said Royal Dutch Shell PLC Chief Executive Jeroen van der Veer.

As Dinocrat observes: "The fellow makes quite a lot of money, and his company makes quite a bit more than that. You’d think as CEO part of the job description would be to have a view of why this was all happening."

Whether it's next month or next year, the oil bubble will burst.

Multiple Obasms...

2008-06-09T15:29:00.001+02:00

An "obasm", according to the web site urbandictionary.com is "The pleasure that a liberal-leaning journalist gets when writing a fawning story about U.S. Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL). A story so gushy and so fluffy, bereft of objectivity, that one imagines having to clean up after the writer with a mop and bucket". I will expand the definition to include remarks by Obama himself that might seem a teensy vain. Obasms are multiple and show no sign of flagging, but here are a few examples...

"I have to tell you, you know, it's part of reporting this case, this election, the feeling most people get when they hear Barack Obama's speech. My, I felt this thrill going up my leg." [Chris Matthews on Hardball, February 12, 2008]

“I face this challenge with profound humility and knowledge of my own limitations. But I also face it with limitless faith in the capacity of the American people…I am absolutely certain that generations from now, we will be able to look back and tell our children that this was the moment when we began to provide care for the sick and good jobs to the jobless; this was the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal…” [Barak Obama, June 3, 2008; Note - what would he say if he wasn't profoundly humble?]

"Many spiritually advanced people I know…identify Obama as a Lightworker, that rare kind of attuned being who has the ability to lead us not merely to new foreign policies or health care plans or whatnot, but who can actually help usher in a new way of being on the planet, of relating and connecting and engaging with this bizarre earthly experiment. These kinds of people actually help us evolve. They are philosophers and peacemakers of a very high order, and they speak not just to reason or emotion, but to the soul…" [Mark Morford, SF Chronicle, June 6, 2008]

Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.), son of the one-time presidential contender, said Obama’s victory overwhelmed him. “I cried all night. I’m going to be crying for the next four years,” he said. “What Barack Obama has accomplished is the single most extraordinary event that has occurred in the 232 years of the nation’s political history. ... The event itself is so extraordinary that another chapter could be added to the Bible to chronicle its significance.” [via politico.com, June 7, 2008]

It's really a shame that I won't be writing after we leave Prague. I sense that the obasms are going to just keep on coming (no pun intended). The Democratic convention should be something to behold.

Another soccer tournament...

2008-06-06T13:43:00.001+02:00

Yes, ISP played hated Riverside, a small Christian school here in Prague, in a soccer tournament on Wednesday. The weather was absolutely horrible with a steady rain that lasted all day. They played, though, and ISP crushed Riverside 7-0 in the first game and somewhere between 7-0 and 9-0 in the second game (different sources had different scores but by that point the actual score really didn't matter). The ISP side was all boys, while all but one or two of the Riverside team were girls. I make no judgement about relative ability except to say that the boys were much more aggressive in their play.

Noah loves soccer and is convinced that because he has played in Europe he will dominate when he gets back to Minnesota. We'll see. He did score 3 goals over the two games, though, so he doesn't do too badly.

Exuding confidence prior to the first game.

In action against Riverside.

Proud but damp parents.

Blog tidbits...

2008-06-05T16:26:00.004+02:00

In slightly more than two weeks we will be moving back to the States and I doubt that I will add new posts to the blog. I might keep the blog going for awhile since most of my hits are on older posts (like the one post I did on Jane Mansfield which still gets a lot of hits). I will probably start another blog on another topic, but if I do I will do it anonymously and it won't deal my family.

Even as I approach the mothballing of the blog, though, there are some significant milestones to savor. As I write this the original hit counter (the small one at the bottom of the left hand side of the blog), which was up and running within a few days of when the blog began in April of 2007, is at 9,997 and I expect it to hit 10,000 by the end of the day. 10,000 hits. If you had asked me when I started if I would reach 10,000 I would have said sure, in 2012. Of course, the daily traffic started quite small and grew over time as there was more content to found by Google searches. So while I have reached 10,000 hits 14 months, I am currently averaging about 1,000 hits a month and about 75% of these hits are first timers, not returning friends and family.

This post is also number 396 and I will hit 400 in the next few days. That's an average of just under one per day (about 93% of the days I add a post), and many of the posts were pretty lame, but at least there was a wide variety of lameness.

I have now had visitors from 96 individual countries or territories (e.g. Puerto Rico and the Palestinian territories) and just yesterday had my first visitor from Iran (also brought to the blog thanks to the post on Jane Mansfield). It proves what a wonderful tool Google is that so many people can find my little blog about this and that. But I never in a million years thought I could reach countries of more than half the planet.

My plan is to convert many of my posts into a book via blurb.com. This is a self-publishing web site that is linkable to some blogs (fortunately, blogger is one of them) so I can create a publisher quality coffee table book of our time in Prague as keepsake.

I have really enjoyed writing the blog and hope that when you stopped by you found something interesting. It was a great learning experience for me and I now feel I could start a blog about anything that interests me and be able to make the blog look good and have interesting features. Thanks for your support.

Dollar Update (June 2008 Edition)...

2008-06-04T10:42:00.001+02:00

This will be my last update on the US dollar since we leave Prague in a little over two weeks and once I'm back where a dollar is a dollar I won't care so much if it is falling or rising.

Here is the graph of how the dollar has fared compared to the Czech Crown over the past month. It ended the month almost exactly where it started, at about 16.1 crowns to the dollar, although it was higher than that for most of the month. The dollar jumped to abut 16.5 in the first week of May and then the air leaked out of the balloon and the dollar slowly fell. However, the dollar is still above its low mark of about 15.5 crowns experienced in April.

The dollar is tied, in my opinion, to the current credit crunch, the slowing economy and the recent run up of the price of oil. In all three of these areas I think we have reached bottom so the dollar should appreciate by the end of the year. But let's look at these three elements one at a time.

The credit crunch - After being front page news for months amid worries of a collapse of the banking system, things have calmed down considerably recently. Credit crunch news, what there is of it these days, is more likely to be related to the situation in Europe, particularly the UK. The US was ahead of the curve in the discovery of, and recovery from, the credit crunch. The Fed has been dropping rates steadily for months but the general belief is that further rate reductions are unlikely. The housing market is still down and prices are still falling (something that will benefit us immensely when we move back to the States in a couple of weeks) but inventory is stabilizing.

The slowing economy - The widespread belief that the US is in recession is wrong - at least so far. The commonly accepted definition of a recession is two consecutive quarters of negative growth. The last few quarters growth has been very slow, under 1%, but not negative. Therefore, the earliest we could know that the US is in recession would be October (after the quarters of April/May/June and July/August/September). This assumes negative growth for these two quarters and I don't think we will see that. But whether the US slips into recession or not has a lot to do with the third area - oil.

Oil has risen sharply recently, and I had posted previously, here in particular, of my belief that the current situation is a bubble. The price run up is not related in any significant way to supply and demand but more due to the impact of speculators. This is far from sure thing and I even received a chiding email from my father-in-law saying that oil is really worth the higher prices. However, observers in many diverse quarters are calling the rise of oil prices a bubble.

The Financial Times reported yesterday that:

Billionaire investor George Soros is to tell US lawmakers on Tuesday that “a bubble in the making” is under way in oil and other commodities and that commodity indices are not a legitimate asset class for institutional investors.

He is expected to tell a congressional committee that rising oil prices are the result of a number of fundamental changes and factors in the market, but that the relatively recent ability of investment institutions to invest in the futures market through index funds is exaggerating price rises and creating an oil market bubble.

“I find commodity index buying eerily reminiscent of a similar craze for portfolio insurance which led to the stock market crash of 1987,” Mr Soros will tell the Senate commerce committee, according to a draft text seen by the Financial Times.

“In both cases, the institutions are piling in on one side of the market and they have sufficient weight to unbalance it. If the trend were reversed and the institutions as a group headed for the exit as they did in 1987 there would be a crash.”

Here is the graph of historical prices for oil.

The credit crunch in the US seems to have bottomed out, the economy may not even fall into recession, the Fed is probably done with cutting interest rates and the price of oil may be a bubble which could burst very soon (the price has fallen from $135 TO $127 in the past few days). In every area it appears to me that the worst is over, or nearly over, for the dollar. I will predict $90 a barrel oil and a dollar at 18.5 crowns by the end of 2008. We'll see.

A million details...

2008-06-03T09:24:00.002+02:00

The movers show up two weeks from today and we are busily preparing. This mostly involves getting rid of things that we don't want or need anymore. It's amazing how much stuff that really is. It didn't help that we brought a lot of stuff over with us that we shouldn't have, but it's understandable considering that the time between when I accepted the position here and when the movers showed up at our house in Minnesoat was just three weeks. And we were trying to finish some big house projects to get it ready to sell.

This time we don't have to worry about selling the house, and that is a big relief. The most significant item to get rid of is our car. We will get less than we had thought for it, mostly because we were not aware that Czechs are suspicious of cars that originate from outside the Czech Republic, and ours came from Germany. There is also a "technical book" that normally goes with the car that we don't have. These two factors will mean a lower price. Still, the car is the one area where the falling dollar will help us since we bought a crown asset with dollars when the dollar was higher and can convert those crowns back to dollars with the dollar lower.

We got rid of the Garmin yesterday since we completed our last trip on Sunday. I could have taken it home but I would have to buy the CD with the maps of the US and that would be a couple of hundred dollars. I'll just get a different one when we move back.

There are a million details to sort out for the move back, but everything is proceeding pretty well. In less than three weeks we will be back in Minnesota!

Back from Germany...

2008-06-01T17:11:00.012+02:00

Another successful road trip for the Tischlers. We just got back from our overnightger to the Tropical Islands waterpark about an hour from Berlin.

It is really an amazing place - it's huge. We are lucky that it's low season, after all how many people want to spend $50 a head to go to an indoor waterpark when it's beautiful and in the high 80s outside? So there was plenty of open space in the pools and the lines at things like the water slides were quite light.

We stayed overnight at the park's tent hotel. It was very much like camping - lots of sand, noisy neighbors and the inside of the tent was hot. Still, Noah was so worn out from swimming and running around in the children's play area for so long that he collapsed on his bed at about 11 PM and was out like a light soon after. Kathy followed Noah to sleep within minutes.

Here is Noah in the lagoon, the smaller of the two main water bodies in the park. It has waterfalls, assorted geysers and two decent water slides (oh, and multicolored lights after the sun goes down).

Here is our tent - the one dead center. In the background are the two pay per slide water slides. They are really high, but I don't like them enough to pay $5 per run.

I got up before Kathy and Noah and decided to take a stroll through the park. The park is open 24/7, and when you pay you can stay as long as you want (or can tolerate). I found that many people slept on the wooden lounge chairs on the beach. I'm sure they are made of wood to make them especially uncomfortable. One family had a queen size mattress that they had placed on top of two of these wooden lounge chairs. One guy was sleeping on the floor of one of the bars (I think alcohol may have been a factor). Lord knows what this place is like in winter when as many as 7,000 guests are in here at a time.

Here are Noah and I in front of the lagoon (his favorite place).

If you point a camera at Noah his instinctive reaction is to make bunny ears.

It was a great trip, but I am exhausted. At 6 PM last night that I had enough of swimming and the waterpark and then realized that I had 18 hours to go. Noah has a lot more energy than I do but he ignores me when I say I need to rest.

Our last trip in Europe...

2008-05-31T12:21:00.001+02:00

We are heading today for the largest indoor water park in the world for what will be our last trip outside of Prague before we head home. It's Tropical Islands water park and it is housed in an old zeppelin hangar about an hour south of Berlin. Here is the link in English. The web site about.com says about Tropical Islands "the structure spans over 710,000 square feet and is the largest freestanding building in the world. It can accommodate up to 7000 visitors. Tropical Islands offers a variety of attractions in addition to its indoor beach and water rides. Regardless, it easily qualifies as the world's largest indoor water park".

We are doing this primarily as a reward for Noah, who has been a real trooper as we have traveled throughout Europe these past two years. Some of the places haven't been particularly kid friendly and he has blurted out "not another castle!" once or twice when we told him where we were going. Still, I think he has enjoyed everywhere we have gone though he might have thought that we stayed too long. And to be truthful, I'm looking forward to this water park trip as well.

We have decided to stay right in the park. They have tents on the beach that you can rent for the night. They have mattresses and sheets and pretty much all the comforts of home. The park is open 24/7, and when you pay it's good for as long as you stay. So if we were staying at a hotel away from the park we would have to pay twice, for Saturday and then again on Sunday, while this way we only pay the entry fee once. I am a little concerned about the noise level with kids, especially teenagers, playing all night. Oh, well, it's just one night.

A tale of two blogs...

2008-05-30T14:56:00.000+02:00

At first blush, Michael Carøe Andersen and I don't have much in common. He is Danish, I am American. He is very young, and I am...not so young. He has grown up with the technology of computers and the internet and I was amazed with the capability of my roomate's TI-99 when he bought it in 1983.

Still, in a bow to what a new and exciting world this has become we met last night for a few beers at a local beer garden. We came to know each other through blogging. His blog, Blogging Gelle, is linked to mine and mine to his. There are a decent number of expats blogging in Prague, but Michael left a few comments on some of my posts and we began to correspond a little. When Michael learned (from my blog) that we were moving back to the States he suggested that we meet for a beer.

The beer garden is in Brevnov and adjacent to the Czech Pop Music museum. Between beers we went through the museum - it was free - and it didn't take long because it was contained in a single room about 15 x 20 feet. The current exhibit is on New Wave/Punk music in Czechoslovakia in the 1980s, but it was all in Czech except for a few paragraphs in English describing the exhibit. I mentioned to Michael that he is too young for New Wave. He agreed and asked for some examples of the genre, so we discussed the Clash, Sex Pistols and Elvis Costello. Then it was back to the garden for more beer.

Michael is a very interesting guy who has spent some time in the States, even interning with a small IT company in Ann Arbor, Michigan (where he attended a Michigan football game). His English is excellent but he also knows German (but, like me, he hasn't managed to learn czech). He has his own IT consulting firm working with clients in Denmark and the US. When I asked how he ended up in Prague when he doesn't market to the Czechs he explained that he and his partner got out a map and decided to move to Prague after also considering Budapest and Berlin. What a great world when you can live anywhere and do the job you like. He has a girlfriend in Malta and has traveled there - check out his blog for pictures. He just got back from a visit to Scandinavia (again, blog and pictures) and is leaving later tonight with some friends for Lisbon for the weekend.

It was a pleasure to have met him, and I wish him every success in the world. To be that young with so much ahead...

Michael is the young one.

I am the less young one.

The next big thing - eating in the dark...

2008-05-29T11:03:00.002+02:00

I am not a culinary expert by any means, but I wonder about this new fad (if that's the right word) of going to a restaurant to eat meals in the dark. Not romantic, subdued lighting with candles, but pitch black.

Prague restaurant offers enjoyable meals in darknessBy ČTK / Published 28 May 2008

Prague, May 27 (CTK) - The first restaurant in Prague has decided to follow the foreign example and start offering "darkness" to its guests during their meals, the daily Mlada fronta Dnes (MfD) writes Tuesday.

The new gastronomic experience, well known to gourmets in Paris, Moscow and other world cities, will be offered to Prague residents and visitors by the Pod kridlem noci (Under the Night's Wing) restaurant, which opens in Narodni street in Prague's centre.

"In our restaurant the guests will enjoy a delicious menu comprising three dishes in absolute darkness. In a hermetically closed room, the eaters are solely confined to their four senses - hearing, touch, smell and taste," Monika Urbanova from the company operating the restaurant, is quoted as saying.

On arrival in the restaurant, a visitor is supposed to choose one of the four menus on offer. Afterwards the staff will rid him/her of anything that could radiate though the minimum dose of light. Their mobile phones, digital watches and lighters will end up in a safe.

"Cigarettes, too, give light, therefore our restaurant is for no-smokers only," Urbanova says.

Having a meal in such a restaurant has specific rules. The guests always sit next to each other, never opposite.

Ladies can put their purses only under the table, not on the back rest.

If a visitor needs to use a toilet, he/she is led there by a member of the staff.

"In such an environment, all of your remaining senses sharpen. You speak more loudly, you better enjoy the meal as well as the other person's presence," Urbanova says.

A waiter leads each guest to his/her place at the table, and the rest is completely up to the guest. To find his plate, glass, cutlery, partner..., the daily writes.

"They mostly rely on their instinct and eat with their hands," says Urbanova.

"We believe this programme will attract teambuilding organisers and schools. Travel agencies have already shown interest in it and we also plan to stage introductory get-together meetings for single people," she says.

Of course, my biggest concern would be spilling my drink. Maybe they let you use those hats with two holders where you can put your beers with a straw running to your mouth. I suppose there will be jokes about this being the place to go if your date isn't attractive. On the other side of the spectrum, how long do you think it will be before the staff starts catching ammorous customers in the act. Couples + complete darkness + alcohol will undoubtely lead to certain things.

In doing a little research I found this blog description of someone having dinner in the dark in a Paris restaurant called Dans le Noir. Maybe it would be fun.

A memorial for the assassins of Reichsprotektor Reinhard Heydrich...

2008-05-28T11:35:00.003+02:00

Memorial to Heydrich's assassins to be in PragueBy ČTK / Published 28 May 2008

Prague, May 27 (CTK) - The ground-breaking ceremony for the memorial to the Operation Anthropoid in which Czechoslovak paratroopers killed acting Reichsprotektor in Bohemia and Moravia Reinhard Heydrich in 1942 took place in Prague 8 Tuesday, exactly 66 years after the attack.

The soldiers flown from London to the Nazi-occupied Bohemia and Moravia fulfilled the oath they had sworn to Edvard Benes, the Czechoslovak president-in-exile, Ales Knizek, director of the Military Historical Institute, said.

"They were real heroes of Czechoslovakia," Knizek said, adding that if it had not been for the help of domestic resistance, the mission would not have been successful.

"If it had not been for these people, we would perhaps speak German now," Knizek said.

The idea to build a memorial to the paratroopers appeared in 1946, but it will only be materialised now.

The Prague 8 town hall has put up a contest for the memorial. Deputy Mayor Vladimira Ludkova (the Civic Democratic Party, ODS) said 21 projects had been delivered.

The jury may select the winner perhaps later today, Ludkova said.

The memorial, that is to cost fewer than five million crowns, should be unveiled exactly in a year, she added.

The memorial will be built virtually at the same place where the mission took place, Ludkova said.

The paratroopers from the Anthropoid unit were sent to help Czech resistance movement from London and to kill Heydrich. They were flown to the Protectorate in December 1941.

Heydrich had been removed to Prague in order to quell the anti-Nazi resistance in the Protectorate in September 1941.

In the aftermath of Heydrich's assassination, the Nazi regime responded with brutal reprisals. It proclaimed the martial law, started mass executions and razed down two Czech villages, Lidice and Lezaky.

The paratroopers were hiding for three weeks, eventually in the crypt of an Orthodox church in Prague. They were eventually betrayed by one of them and the German police tracked them down and killed them all in an exchange of fire [ed. The official version is that the paratroopers committed suicide by shooting themselves rather than be taken prisoner by the Nazis].

Adolf Opalka, Gabcik, Kubis, Josef Valcik, Josef Bublik, Jan Hruby and Jaroslav Svarc died in the ensuing fight with the German police who also executed Orthodox Bishop Gorazd for having provided shelter to them.

It is estimated that over 5,000 people, the vast majority of whom were innocent with no connection to the Heydrich affair, were killed by the Nazis in the reprisals for the assassination. This was a very, very high price indeed, and was done to quell the resistance and prevent further such actions. I hope the new memorial makes mention of the these other victims in addition to the paratroopers.

George Soros on the price of oil...

2008-05-27T11:39:00.004+02:00

I don't agree with George Soros on much, but he looks at the recent run up of oil prices and sees what I see - a bubble. Below is the report from the UK's Daily Telegraph newspaper:

George Soros: rocketing oil price is a bubble
By Edmund Conway, Economics Editor
Last Updated: 12:53am BST 27/05/2008

Speculators are largely responsible for driving crude prices to their peaks in recent weeks and the record oil price now looks like a bubble, George Soros has warned.

The billionaire investor's comments came only days after the oil price soared to a record high of $135 a barrel amid speculation that crude could soon be catapulted towards the $200 mark.

In an interview with The Daily Telegraph, Mr Soros said that although the weak dollar, ebbing Middle Eastern supply and record Chinese demand could explain some of the increase in energy prices, the crude oil market had been significantly affected by speculation.

"Speculation... is increasingly affecting the price," he said. "The price has this parabolic shape which is characteristic of bubbles," he said.

The comments are significant, not only because Mr Soros is the world's most prominent hedge fund investor but also because many experts have claimed speculation is only a minor factor affecting crude prices.

Oil prices stalled on Friday after their biggest one-day jump since the first Gulf War earlier in the week.

At just over $130 a barrel, the price has doubled in around a year, causing misery for motorists and businesses.

Music Video Theatre #7 - Sledgehammer by Peter Gabriel...

2008-05-26T11:55:00.002+02:00

Here is another one of those old (1985) music videos that really grabbed attention in the early years of the genre. It's supposedly about sex, but you wouldn't really know unless I told you (well, except for the very beginning of the video). But it is a very infuential music video from the early years of MTV.

From Wikipedia:

"Sledgehammer" is a hit song by Peter Gabriel from his 1986 album So. It peaked at number one in Canada for four weeks on July 21, 1986, number one in the U.S. on July 26, 1986, and number four in the UK singles chart, thanks in part to a popular and influential music video.

"Sledgehammer" spawned a widely popular and influential music video directed by Stephen R. Johnson. Aardman Animations provided claymation, pixilation, and stop motion animation that gave life to images in the song. The video ended with a large group of extras jerkily rotating around Gabriel, among them: Peter's daughters Anna and Melanie , the animators themselves, and director Stephen Johnson's girlfriend. Also included were six women who posed as the back-up singers of the song. Gabriel lay under a sheet of glass for 16 hours while filming the stills for the video.

In 1987, it won nine MTV Video Music Awards, a record which still stands as of 2007. It ranked at number four on MTV's 100 Greatest Music Videos Ever Made (1999). MTV later announced that "Sledgehammer" is the most played music video in the history of the station. "Sledgehammer" has also been declared to be MTV's number one animated video of all time.

The video was also voted number seven on TMF's Ultimate 50 Videos You Must See - first aired 24th June 2006. It ranked at number 2 on VH1's top twenty videos of the 80's as well as being named the #1 amazing moment in music on the Australian TV show 20 to 1 in 2007.

The portion of the song featuring the synthesized flute solo was realized in the video by first one and then two oven-ready chickens, headless and featherless, animated using stop-motion. These were animated by Nick Park (of Wallace and Gromit fame) who, at that time was refining his work in plasticine animation.

Sledgehammer

you could have a steam train
if you'd just lay down your tracks
you could have an aeroplane flying
if you bring your blue sky back

all you do is call me
I'll be anything you need

you could have a big dipper
going up and down, all around the bends
you could have a bumper car, bumping
this amusement never ends

I want to be your sledgehammer
why don't you call my name
oh let me be your sledgehammer
this will be my testimony
show me round your fruitcage
'cos I will be your honey bee
open up your fruitcage
where the fruit is as sweet as can be

I want to be your sledgehammer
why don't you call my name
you'd better call the sledgehammer
put your mind at rest
I'm going to be-the sledgehammer
this can be my testimony
I'm your sledgehammer
let there be no doubt about it

sledge sledge sledgehammer

I've kicked the habit
shed my skin
this is the new stuff
I go dancing in, we go dancing in
oh won't you show for me
and I will show for you
show for me, I will show for you
yea, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, I do mean you
only you
you've been coming through
going to build that powerr
build, build up that power, hey
I've been feeding the rhythm
I've been feeding the rhythm
going to feel that power, build in you
come on, come on, help me do
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, you
I've been feeding the rhythm
I've been feeding the rhythm
it's what we're doing, doing
all day and night

Cesky Krumlov...

2008-05-25T19:06:00.012+02:00

We took a trip today to Cesky Krumlov to check another item off the list of things to see before we leave Prague in a few weeks. The Garmin got us there without an y significant problems (just a little hiccup where a new section of highway was recently completed) and I was even able to bring up the closest parking lot to park in. It was really smooth.

Here we are upon our arrival at Cesky Krumlov. A nice German lady took our picture for us.

Cesky Krumlov is a UNESCO world heritage site and is an amazing place. The Vltava river - the same river that runs through Prague 150 miles to the north - surrounds teh town on three sides. This made the town more easily defended.

From Wikipedia:

Construction of the town and castle began in the late 13th century at a ford in the Vltava River, which was important in trade routes in Bohemia. In 1302 town and castle was owned by the House of Rosenberg. Emperor Rudolf II bought Krumau in 1602 and gave it to his natural son Julius d’Austria. Emperor Ferdinand II gave Krumau to the House of Eggenberg. From 1719 until 1945 the castle belonged to the House of Schwarzenberg. Most of the architecture of the old town and castle dates from the 14th through 17th centuries; the town's structures are mostly in Gothic, Renaissance, and Baroque styles. The core of the old town is within a horseshoe bend of the river, with the old Latrán neighborhood and castle on the other side of the Vltava.

The town became part of the Austrian Empire in 1806 and Austria-Hungary in 1866. 8,662 inhabitants lived in Krumau an der Moldau in 1910, including 7,367 Germans and 1,295 Czechs.

After World War I, Krumau belonged from October 1918 until September 1919 to Upper Austria within the Republic of German Austria. In November 1918 Czech troops occupied the town. During the interwar era it was part of Czechoslovakia. Between 1938 and 1945 it was annexed by Nazi Germany as part of the Sudetenland. The town's German-speaking population was expelled after liberation by the American Army during World War II and it was restored to Czechoslovakia.[1]

During the Communist era of Czechoslovakia, Krumlov fell into disrepair, but since the Velvet Revolution of 1989 much of the town's former beauty has been restored, and it is now a major holiday destination popular with tourists from Germany, Austria, and beyond. In August, 2002, the town suffered from damage in the great flood of the Vltava River.

Český Krumlov Castle is unusually large for a town of Krumlov's size; within the Czech Republic it is second in extent only to the Hradčany castle complex of Prague.

Český Krumlov is home to Pivovar Eggenberg brewery. It has also been used as filming locations for movies such as the 2006 films The Illusionist and Hostel.

Part of the castle complex. In the Czech Republic it is second in size only to Prague castle. We climbed up to the area just below the dome.

Here is a picture from the castle looking back down on the town and the Vltava River.

Riding the river is a popular thing to do in Cesky Krumlov.

The price of oil - To infinity and beyond...

2008-05-22T17:35:00.006+02:00

The price of oil keeps going up, and at an amazingly rapid rate. I have posted before that I believe that the current price represents pure speculation disconnected from the usual laws of supply and demand similar to tulip prices in the Netherlands in the 19th century and NASDAQ prices much more recently.

One of my favorite blogs, Dinocrat, has been warning about the oil bubble for some time and today they have added had several additional posts. Here is the most recent:

We live in that (hopefully) brief moment when the Index Speculators ruled the earth and pushed oil from its new high of $135 a barrel to God only knows what price.

Oil prices rose above $135 a barrel for the first time Thursday…”Simply put, this is a market you cannot afford to be short in,” said U.S. analyst and trader Stephen Schork about Brent futures…Goldman Sachs last week revised its oil price forecast for the second half of 2008 from $107 to $141 a barrel. But some analysts saw the new target becoming a reality much sooner. “Futures are moving so fast that under the current volatility that goal could already be reached within the end of the week,” said a report by Olivier Jakob of Petromatrix

We’d really like to know what Goldman Sachs’ oil futures positions are, given its forecast and its top former officers (eg, Paulson and Steel) serving in the top positions in the US economy. Furthermore, we’d like to know at just what ridiculous price the administration will stop saying that oil prices continue to represent “fairly” the actual marketplace conditions of supply and demand, when demand is obviously getting destroyed every single day. Finally, of course, it would be nice if Congress stopped their silly lectures to the oil companies and started letting them get some of more of the 112 billion barrels of oil and 420 trillion cubic feet of natural gas that are right here at home.

As a reminder, here is the graph showing the run up of the NASDAQ. If you laid this graph over the oil price graph they would corrolate pretty well. If we had detailed prices over time for the tulip rush in the Netherlands I am confident that graph would also look almost the same. To see what happened to the NASDAQ shortly after the period of this graph look below.

The NASDAQ composite index slid down the graph from a high of 5,000 to about 1,200 in the same time it had taken to run up to 5,000. I feel like the boy who cried wolf about the price of oil but I am sure it will come down from its stratospheric heights soon ("soon", of course, being a relative term).

Starbucks in Prague - Meet the competition...

2008-05-21T08:47:00.008+02:00

I wasn't really planning on posting anymore about Starbucks, but finding out that Starbucks will soon be opening it's fifth store already made me change my mind. I only know of four stores - the original on Malostranska namesti, the second in the Palladium Mall (which opened a day before the fateful fire there), the third in Terminal 1 at Prague airport (which opened on March 20), and a new fifth store to be opened at the Avion mall at Zlicin. I don't know yet where the fourth store opened.[Note: I know Zlicin but didn't know the name "Avion Mall". When I googled it I found a mall by that name in Bratislava. So it's possible that the name of the mall is wrong in the article.]

Anyway, the Prague Monitor today has an article on Starbucks and its Czech and other European competitors. I feel that, just like in the States, while there is room for several premium coffee chain, Starbucks will become the "big dog" in the Prague market.

Coffee chains gearing up for tough rivalry in Czech marketBy Jiří Fencl / E15 / Published 21 May 2008
Translated and adapted with permission by the Prague Daily Monitor

The world's largest coffee chain Starbucks, which entered the Czech market only in January this year, is growing fast in the country. A mere four months after it opened the first cafe in Prague's Malostranské náměstí, it is now opening its fifth branch in the Avion Shopping Park in Prague-Zličín.

But for now, local coffee chains can cope with the fierce competition of US chains, including Starbucks' sister KFC and the McDonald's network. For instance, Czech coffee chain Café Emporio more than doubled operating profits year-on-year in 2007, said Emporio chief executive Vladimír Staněk. The company is reluctant to disclose precise data for now.

"Theoretically, it is not a problem to open one shop after another. But every new cafe is a bit of a lottery, particularly as regards the choice of the location. Our chain underwent considerable restructuring in 2007, including the windup of several regional branches which failed to meet the investor's demands," Staněk said.

"Owing to this, we are able to improve our business results relatively fast this year. I think a number of rivals are still facing a similar slimming therapy," he added.

Emporio is getting ready to start another expansion wave, just like the Polish chain Coffee Heaven. The Czech market is the second most important one for this chain, whose chief executive Nikolaos Balamotis says it will not hesitate to open new cafes either.

Coffee&Co is opening new shops at the Tesco store in Karlovy Vary and at Zlaté jablko in Zlín as of May. "We are also planning to open a new cafe in the centre of Prague soon," said Miroslava Vatajová, marketing director at Coffee&Co. "Our goal is to open a new branch roughly every month," said Vatajová.

The strong McDonald's chain is aware of the new rivals, but it is planning to open its own chain, McCafé, all the same. "I think Starbucks will also attract a slightly different segment of customers," McDonald's ČR communications director Drahomíra Jiráková said in January, when Starbucks opened the first branch.

German chain Cup&Cino is allegedly also on its way to the Czech market. Incoma advisers say this is the ideal time for coffee chains to expand.

As a side note, we actually tried a McCafe when we drove to Berchtesgaden last fall. Apart from a language problem, I found the concept and experience to be intriguing. The McCafe was in the store, but its counter was completely separate from the food counter. McDonalds has so many stores that expanding into upscale coffee will cost very little and offer the opportunity of significant increases for revenue and profit. Many people go to Starbucks for not only the coffee but also the laid back atmosphere and wi-fi, but for those who are accustomed to premium coffee may start buying it at McDonalds if it's fast (and maybe a little cheaper).

Wii Fit...

2008-05-20T13:10:00.008+02:00

I am still playing my 6 or 7 year-old Playstation 2, but have been looking forward to getting back to the US and purchasing one of the fast new systems - either the Playstation 3 or the Xbox 360. Noah, however, has been pushing for a Nintendo Wii. The Nintendo Wii has become extremely popular even though the graphics of its games are more rudimentary than the other more powerful systems.

What Wii did was make video game playing attractive to traditional non-gamers, mostly from the use of its unique controller that can be used in a realistic manner in games like bowling, tennis and baseball.

Our friends have a Wii and we first tried it last fall. It was fun and easy to use. I started to consider actually buying a Wii instead of the more powerful (and higher priced) PS3 and Xbox 360. This past weekend Noah was able to try the new game Wii Fit, that uses another clever new gadget, the Wii balance board.

From Wikipedia:

Wii Fit uses a unique platform peripheral called the Wii Balance Board that can measure a user's weight and their center of gravity, and calculate their body mass index when told the user's height. The game has about 40 different activities, including yoga poses, push ups, and other exercises. Furthermore, Wii Fit allows its players to compare their fitness by using Wii Fit's own channel on the Wii Menu.

Wii Fit tracks a user's "Wii Fitness Age" through a daily body test basing the result on the user's current age, weight, and athletic ability.

According to Shigeru Miyamoto when speaking to IGN during an interview at E3 2007, there are currently no plans to integrate any WiiConnect24 functionality into Wii Fit. He did note, however, that there could be possibilities to take advantage of the WiiConnect24 in the future, such as using the service to keep in contact with a doctor to help with rehabilitation, or with a fitness specialist to help with training exercises.

Noah was hooked on Wii Fit right away and is more determined than ever to convince me to buy a Wii. He spent every second he could playing Wii Fit. He jogged, which is actually just running in place but your character on the screen runs through diffent park setting, and played a ski jumping game that used the balance board to neat effect. There is also a hula hoop game where you move your hips and you see the results as your character on-screen works the hula hoop. It's quite comical to watch someone pretend to hula hoop.

Here's a video from YouTube that demonstrates the hula hoop game.

This may be the natural evolution of kids and video games. The only way to get them to exercise is make a video game out of it. I think this will be a huge success and they have only scratched the surface of its potential. I foresee physical therapy using Wii (or Wii-like technology) including exercises for the elderly that can be done at home. I think I have decided to get the Wii instead of the other "muscle" systems, at least until the more powerful systems start to use the Wii's controller and balance board.

Lost weekend...

2008-05-19T12:41:00.003+02:00

It was a fairly busy weekend but I wasn't in much of a blogging mood.

Friday started with dinner that the Bohemia Bagel in Nebusice. Bohemia Bagel is a local chain started by an American that serves full breakfasts and is kown for its burgers. It also offered the first "bottomless cup of coffee" in Prague. It saw a great demographic in Nebusice, which is full of expats because the International School of Prague (Noah's school).

I met Kathy and Noah and some friends there after work. A friend of Noah's, Ryan, was sleeping over at our house on Friday night and we decided to have dinner and do the handover then. After dinner we got home and I played with the kids a bit, but the rest of the evening was uneventful after they went to bed.

On Saturday Noah had a birthday party at noon that Ryan was also going to, so Ryan's dad picked them both up at our place and took them to the party. I used the opportunity of Noah being gone to clean the house. We picked Noah up at 2:00 and went home to get ready for Noah's baseball practice. I assist in the coaching and it's pretty entertaining since most of the kids are not American and this is their first exposure to baseball. Let's just say that they haven't picked up all of the nuances of the sport. Baseball goes from 3:00 to 5:00.

After baseball I had to rush home and change because Kathy and I were invited to a garden party in Nebusice. Two Danish couple who are neighbors entertain once a year and really go all out. This wasn't a farewell party or a birthday party - it was a party just for the heck of it. They catered everything and had an open bar (with strawberry mojitos beiong the specialty) and a grill with beef, chicken, pork and shrimp. Everything was just great.

It rained at about 9:30 during the party, but they had planned ahead and had a big tent with tables and chairs - and a jukebox. Things were just starting to get wild when we left about 10:45. We don't stay out as late as we used to. But it was a great time.

Sunday was the usual - Sunday school for Noah while we sat at Starbucks, then church and home. We have been going through drawers and boxes looking for things to sell, shred or throw away before the packers come on June 17 (that date is now official).

We had brought the camera just about everywhere over the weekend but didn't take a single photo - so I have nothing to add to this rather lame summary of our weekend. I'm sure after we move back to Minnesota there will be times when I wish we could walk around Prague and stop in a sidewalk cafe for a coffee or a good Czech beer, but for now we're getting anxious to get back and on to the next phase of our lives.

Kathy tours the Krusovice brewery...

2008-05-16T15:34:00.002+02:00

This week Kathy went on a tour of the Krusovice factory that is about 45 minutes outside of Prague. We passed it on the way to Karlovy Vary a couple of weeks ago. Krusovice is not as big or well known as some of the other Czech beers like Pilsner Urquel, Staropramen or Gambrinus, but it is a very good beer.

Kathy said that this old Czech brand was recently bought by Heinekin and the factory went from being outdated and inefficient to a model for the industry. You can see many more pictures of the modern Krusovice factory at their web site here.

Also from the Krusovice web site: A copy of the first written document concerning the establishment of the brewery decorates one of the staterooms in the original Malt House. The document dates back to 1581. Jiří Birka from Násile offered to sell the brewery to Emperor Rudolf II in 1581. We can read in the Property List that in Krušovice "17 reside in the town, the town fort and plough court are well built, nearby lies the brewery, the brewing kettle is made from stone so it may be cooked upon immediately." Two years later, the Emperor bought the brewery and it became part of the Křivoklát Estate. He grew fond of the Krušovice beer, taking a personal interest to ensure that the brewery had a sufficient supply of quality raw materials and that production continually increased. Even though the brewery was devastated by mercenaries during the Thirty Year War and partially burnt, the production of the beer was always quickly re-established.

A.J.Valdštejn bought the Krušovice Farm from the Czech Crown in 1685 and conducted a thorough maintenance on the property. After he died in 1731, his daughter Marie brought the entire property as a part of her dowry when she married into the Furstenberk Family. The brewery underwent major reconstruction during the time when it belonged to this family. For the next 200 years, the Furnstenberk Family equipped the brewery with the most modern facilities available. The brewery belonged to the family until 1945. After 1945, the Krušovice Brewery was part of many state-owned companies until 1991. Production reached a quarter of million hectolitres a year. But most of this beer was consumed in the areas nearby Rakovnik, Kladno and Slaný so other customers were not familiar with the beer. The Krušovice Brewery became a privatised company in 1991 when it broke its alliance with Central Bohemia Breweries, State Company Velké Popovice.

The brewery was fully privatised in 1993, part of an alliance with the multinational financial and industrial company Dr. Oetker. From 1993 major reconstruction commenced. The construction of large dimensioned CK tanks, new filling lines for bottles, barrels and cans, highly efficient waste water cleaners and new brewing facilities have helped to lift the brewery from its origins as a regional brewery to part of the group of the most modern producers of brandname beers in the Czech Republic. 1997 saw the brewery sell for the first time over 1 million hectoliters of beer. Natural spring water is drawn from the protected Křivoklát area and Moravian malt and hops are gathered from the Žatec area to become the founding ingredients of our beer. The age old recipes have improved over the passage of time through the work of generations of Krušovice Brewing Masters and with the most modern technology available today the way is wide open for the high quality product. The Královský Krušovice Brewery is presently placed 5th amongst producers of beer in the Czech Republic. Krušovice beer is available on tap in thousands of pubs and prestigious restaurants alike throughout Bohemia and Moravia. Several significant sites have been that chosen to serve our beer have helped to achieve success in the brand beer domestic market. These sites combine high standards with a pleasant environment in which to sit and enjoy a glass of beer. Quality service and aesthetic decorations help to create the image of 'a Czech beer fit for Kings'.

Heineken acquires Krušovice Brewery in Czech Republic

Last year Krusovice was bought by Heinekin

Date: 14 June 2007
Location: Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Publisher: Heineken N.V.

Amsterdam, 14 June 2007 - Heineken N.V. announced today the acquisition of Krušovice Brewery in the Czech Republic from Radeberger Gruppe KG. As a result of this transaction, the market share of Heineken in the Czech Republic will increase to 8%, with total volumes of over 1.6 million hectolitres, improving Heineken’s position in the market to number three.

The transaction, which will be funded from existing cash resources, is expected to be earnings enhancing in 2008 and value enhancing in 2010. The proposed acquisition will be submitted to the relevant competition authorities and is expected to be completed by 1 September 2007. Under the terms of the transaction, the acquisition price is not disclosed.

The Royal Brewery of Krušovice was founded in 1517, is situated around 70 km west of Prague and employs 300 staff. The brewery has a portfolio in the premium segment of the market, with the main Krušovice brand, one of the oldest Czech beer brands, and five variants, Svetle, Musketyr, Imperial, Cerne and Jubilejní. The state of the art Krušovice Brewery is profitable. In 2006, sales volumes were 700,000 hectolitres. Production capacity is 1 million hectoliters with the possibility to expand. The domestic market share is almost 3%.

Biking in Burgenland...

2008-05-15T12:35:00.000+02:00

The highlight of our short vacation for Noah was the biking we did on Friday. Burgenland is a cyclist's dream, with bike paths everywhere - between every town and to and around the large lake, the Neusiedler See.

The hotel where we were staying, the Hotel Zur Post, had a collection of 10 bikes for renting and we were helped by the hotel owner, Otto. Noah couldn't find a bike small enough so we had to go the short 2 blocks to the main bike rental store. We swapped out his larger bike for one that was just the right size and we were on our way.

Our plan was to bike to the Neusiedler See and then take the ferry to the other side and bike to the Hungarian border. We had a false start by heading the wrong way on one of the bike trails, and ended up in the next town over from Illmitz further away from the lake. We retraced our way back to Illmitz and soon were on the right path to the lake.

On the way we passed a farmer with his herd of cattle, and there was much other wildlife to see. We got to the lake and quickly found where the ferries departed. It was 25 Euros (about $38) for roundtrip passage on the ferry for the three of us and our bikes. Ferries depart every 30 minutes but we were lucky and one was just about finished loading. We were the last passangers to board and off we went for the 20 minute trip across the lake to Morbisch.

Noah with his bovine friends.

Resting on the ferry crossing lake Neusiedler See to the town of Morbisch on the other side.

Everyone on the ferry had a bike. Bugenland is a paradise for bikers, even casual ones like us.

Because of recent EU rule changes, there is an open border between Austria and Hungary.

We made it to the Hungarian border, which is just a few kilometers south of Morbisch. Not much to see, really, but at least now we can say that we were in Hungary.

We went back to Morbisch and decided against biking to Rust seven kilometers further north. Instead we went back to the ferries and again got lucky with one boarding as we arrived. Upon arriving back on the east side of the lake we decided to have lunch at one of the restaurants with patios overlooking the lake. The food and service were quite good (and the prices not bad either). Then it was back to Illmitz and the end of our little ride. I figure that we travelled 25 kilometers, or about 15 miles. That's not very far for seasoned bikers, but it was the longest bike outing as a family.

The rapeseed bloometh...

2008-05-14T12:07:00.001+02:00

After dinner yesterday evening Noah and I did our usual bike ride to the spa on the edge of town. The weather the last few days has been glorious - bright sunshine and highs in the 70s.

We stopped at one of the fields of rapeseed that we pass on our ride and I took some pictures.

Here is Noah this evening standing among the blooming rapeseed.

In a post just 10 days ago (on May 4) here is Noah in the exact same spot in the field. The plants are easily a foot taller and the golden blooms are now peaking.

The church in Andau...

2008-05-13T12:19:00.001+02:00

After visiting Weinbau Sattler on Thursday we went to Andau and looked at the Catholic church there. I think it has an interesting architecture but Martin Sattler would say at dinner the next night that it "looks like a factory". I suppose it does, but I still like it.

The door to the church was unlocked - this surprised us since in the US it seems that churches are only open when services are being conducted.

Here is a mural on the ceiling of the church.

In front of the church there is a memorial to the Andau dead from WWI and WWII. It seems as if every town has at least one of these. There are 8 Sattler dead from WWI listed, and 20 from WWII. These numbers, from such a small village, is staggering. I know that the Martin Sattler killed in WWI is related to me since my aunt has a card, in German, with details of his death.

The surnames Peck, Pelzer and Thell are also in my Sattler line (as the maiden names of Sattler wives).

Meeting more of the Sattlers...

2008-05-12T12:03:00.001+02:00

On Friday evening we had arranged to meet Martin Sattler for dinner. Martin is a member of the Burgenland Bunch - as I and my cousin Rick are - which has a web site devoted to researching family genealogy in Burgenland.

Martin Sattler is a common name in my genealogy, and is the name of both my great-grandfather and great-great grandfather, both born in Andau.

We were to meet at 7 PM and since we were a little early we decided to walkl through the little Illmitz cemetery that was just across the street from the restaurant. We had just entered the cemetery when Kathy heard a group of people speaking English and struck up a conversation. It turned out to be a group from Minnesota - from St. Paul no less. They were Gartners and were researching their family history in Burgenland. Al Gartner was the patriarch of the group and he is from Rice Street and knows my uncle Frank Tischler. Al's brother is Jim Gartner who ran the St. Bernard's bowling alley when I was in grade school and in a league there. Small world!

We met at the Presshaus restaurant in Illmitz, just a few doors down from our hotel (and, as noted, across the street from the cemetery). Martin brought his uncle Alfred with him. Martin spoke pretty good English but Alfed didn't speak any. Both men seemed genuinely interested in genealogy and we talked for three hours about the Sattler line and how we might be related. Unfortunately, we can't find the exact manner of how we might be related, and more work is required. I did find out that a Sattler left Burgenland for China in the 1920s and ended up farming 60,000 hectares, which is almost 150,000 acres. I may ask for more details from Martin about this since I am sure it is an interesting story.

It was a great evening. The company was wonderful as were the food and the wine at dinner. I also told Martin about Rick's probable visit next year. I have a feeling that we will meet Martin again.

Meeting the Sattlers...

2008-05-11T16:34:00.011+02:00

Our first stop on Thursday after we settled into our hotel was the Weinbau Sattler, a little winery run by Erich Sattler in Tadten, just a couple of miles from Andau which is the area where my Sattler family came from. I assume there is some relation between me and Erich but don't know for sure.

I had looked at the Weinbau Sattler web site but had not contacted Erich ahead of time. We found the winery which is on the main street through Tadten - we had expected something out in the country. We brought with us the article from the International Wall Street Journal from February that had reported on the great Austrian wines and noted a Weinbau Sattler red as one of the best.

The sign for the Sattler winery on the main street though Tadten. In the background is the memorial for the men from Tadten who died in WWI and WWII. There are many Sattlers and a couple of Tischlers listed.

We went through a big wooden door from the street and entered the compound. We didn't see anyone and so continued to the back where we found the tasting room. We also found the door to the wine storage warehouse and rang the bell. After a few minutes an older gentleman came out and we tried to explain that we were looking for Erich. He didn't speak English but we understood that he wasn't in now but would be later. We thanked him and left to explore Andau.

We returned a couple of hours later and this time found Erich at home and I explained that I was doing some genealogy research on Sattlers and thought we might be related. His English was quite good and he graciously invited us to sit and have a chat. He brought out some of his wine (and apple juice for Noah) and I showed him a summary of my Sattler line and asked him if he recognized any or thought we were related. His answer, with a shrug, was "All Sattlers in Burgenland are related". He is a low key guy and I got the impression that he didn't really see the point of trying to find old relatives. Kathy sees a family resemblance, and I guess I do as well in the weak chin (which is nice way of saying no chin).

I asked him if business had picked up after he was mentioned in the Wall Street Journal article and he had a blank look. He was not aware that one of his reds was proclaimed one of the best in Europe by one of the best known papers in the world. We gave him the copy of the article that we had brought with us and he seemed proud and happy.

We bought 13 bottles of his wine and then returned the next day and bought 8 more. The prices were very reasonable. The red wine mentioned in the Journal was listed at $32 a bottle at retail, but at his winery it can be had for about $12 a bottle. Again he brought out wine and apple juice and we had another nice visit.

I still don't know for sure if Erich and I are related or how, but I will keep looking with the help of my cousin, Rick. Rick and his wife plan to visit Burgenland next year and I let Erich know that he would probably be having more visitors. We also got the name of Erich's distributor in the US and we hope to be able to buy more of the Weinbau Sattler wine when we get back home.

Back from Burgenland...

2008-05-10T19:50:00.007+02:00

We just got back to Prague after spending a couple of days in eastern Austria, in the area known as Burgenland. It was both a vacation to enjoy the wonderful scenery of Burgenland and also to do some genealogical research since my paternal grandmother's family - the Sattlers - emigrated to the US from Burgenland (more on that later).

Kathy and I did a little reading on Burgenland before we left, but we still found out a couple of very interesting facts. The first is that after the end of World War II, Burgenland was part of the Soviet zone. The second is that more than 20,000 Hungarian refugees crossed the border into Austria near Andau when the Soviets crushed the Hungarian revolution in 1956 (as they would crush the Czech revolution 12 years later).

From Wikipedia:

Burgenland was...given to the Soviet forces in exchange for Steiermark (Styria), which was in turn occupied by the United Kingdom.

Under the Soviet occupation, people in Burgenland had to stand a time of serious mistreatment and an extremely slow economic progression, the latter induced by investor-discouraging presence of the Soviet troops. The Soviet occupation ended with the signing of the Austrian Independence Treaty of Vienna in 1955 by the Occupying Forces.

The brutally crushed Hungarian Revolution on October 23, 1956 resulted in a shockwave of Hungarian refugees at the Hungarian-Austrian border, especially at the Bridge of Andau (Brücke von Andau), who were received by the inhabitants of Burgenland with an overwhelming amount of hospitality.

In 1957, the construction of the "anti-Fascist Protective Barrier" resulted in a complete bulkheading of the area under Soviet influence from the rest of the world, rendering the Hungarian-Austrian border next to Burgenland a deadly zone of mine fields (on the Hungarian border) and barbed wire, referred to as the Iron Curtain. Even during the era of the Iron Curtain, local trains between the north and south of Burgenland operated as "Corridor trains" (Korridorzüge) – they had their doors locked as they traversed Hungarian territory.

Starting in 1965 and finishing in 1971, the minefields were cleansed because people were often harmed by them, even on the Austrian side of the border. This could well be taken as a sign of the Soviet Union towards opening the borders to the Western countries, starting in the late seventies.

Here is where tens of thousands of Hungarian refugees crossed into Austria in 1956.

The border between Hungary and Austria at Andau as it looks today. With Hungary and Austria both in the EU, new rules that took effect last December means that now there aren't even any border guards or any hindrance in crossing the border. It's like going from Minnesota to Wisconsin.

An interesting side note, James Michener wrote a book entitled "The Bridge at Andau" in 1957 that chronicled the Hungarian Revolution of 1956. Michener was living in Austria in the 1950s.

Off to Burgenland...

2008-05-08T14:55:00.002+02:00

The three of us are leaving this morning for eastern Austria, which is the area known as Burgenland. This is the land of my Sattler ancestors - my dad's mother was Barbara Sattler. Anyway, I have some good information on my Sattler ancestors going back to around 1800 and had formerly posted on the topic here and here.

While we are there we are going to have dinner with Martin Sattler and we will try to figure out if or how we are related - I have a high confidence that we are kin. We are also going to visit the Sattler winery, which was lauded in the International Wall Street Journal a few months ago as having some of the best wine in Europe.

We are staying in what looks to be a nice hotel, the Hotel Zur Post, in the town of Illmitz, just east of lake Neusiedl am See. The town of my forefathers is Andau, and is located about 15 miles east of Illmitz on the border with Hungary.

I will report more but it will likely be when we return on Saturday.

What's wrong with this story? Oh yea, no motive...

2008-05-07T14:58:00.003+02:00

You have to love this "reporting" by the local Czech media on the unexplained pummeling of a Czech cabbie, or least the denting of his cab, by three American soldiers stationed in Germany. Here is how the Prague Monitor reported the story today:

American soldiers attack Czech taxi driver
By ČTK / Published 7 May 2008

Cheb, West Bohemia, May 6 (CTK) - Three U.S. soldiers from a base in Germany attacked a Czech cab driver who drove them from Sokolov to Cheb on Sunday, local police spokesman Ladislav Boehm said.

The driver was not injured, but his car was damaged, Boehm said.

Three Americans aged 21, 25 and 35 years have come under the suspicion of assault.

Near the village of Dolni Dvory, they attacked a cab driver, 40, who had to stop instantly to avoid an accident. Then he fled, Boehm said.

A soldier, aged 25, several times kicked in the back door and rear fender, thus making a dent in it.

When the driver returned to the car and wanted to drive away, a soldier, aged 35, jumped off the moving car. As he fell to the ground, he suffered light head injuries.

The damage at the car is estimated at 50,000 crowns.

Damage to property charges have been brought against the American aged 25, Boehm said.

For no reason the American soldiers start hitting the cabbie, and then when he runs away they kick his taxi. If you know Czech taxi drivers at all you have every right to suspect that the taxi driver was somehow running up the meter on these guys and they then probably demanded that he stop the cab. When he didn't they opened up a can of whup ass on him. My theory, although not supported by any evidence, at least has the benefit of being plausible. You would think that it would be wasy to ask one of the three Americans why they did what they did (but that would involve, you know, actual reporting).

The assasination of Heydrich...

2008-05-06T21:03:00.000+02:00

I have posted in the past about the story of the town of Lidice, just outside of Prague. Reinhard Heydrich, Hitler's Reichsprotekto in Bohemia and Moravia, died on June 4, 1942 from wounds suffered in an attack by Czech partisans who had parachuted into Czechoslovakia after being trained in England. Heydrich's funeral was on June 9, and the following day all of the men of Lidice (173 in all) were executed, the women and children were sent to camps, most of them to perish, and the town itself was raised to the ground to remove all evidence that it had ever exisited. The Nazis even emptied the cemetery of its corpses. This was all to teach a lesson to the Czechs that to fight the Nazis would result in swift and incredibly cruel consequences.

After the attack on Heydrich's car that left him mortally wounded, the seven parachutists ended up at the Church of Saints Cyril and Methodius in Prague which had been arranged as a safe house and they were concealed in the crypt of the church.

With the aid of a turncoat Czech named Karel Curda, the Germans learned of the location of the parachutists and 800 soldiers surrounded the church at 2:00 am on June 18, 1942. The Germans entered the church before dawn but were met by three of the parachutists firing from the choir loft who held the Germans at bay for several hours but were eventually killed. It was discovered that the others were in the crypt and the orders were to take them alive. The Nazis tried pumping smoke and then water into the crypt to force the four remaining parachutists to surrender. Rather than be captured the four committed suicide.

Heydrich's car after the attack on May 27, 1942. He would die from his wounds on June 4.

Bullet holes from the attack on June 18, 1942 remain visible near a small window to the crypt of the church.

Inside the crypt there are many memorials to the men who killed Heydrich.

This small cross is just outside the main door to the church.

The price paid by the church for aiding the parachutists was extremely high. from the web:

The trial of the members of the Czech Orthodox Church was held on September 3, 1942, after which Bp. Gorazd, Fr. Cikl, and council chairman Sonnevend were executed by a firing squad on the next day. Fr. Petrek was executed on September 5. For aiding the parachutists, 263 Czechs were arrested, transported to the Mauthausen concentration camp, and shot to death on October 24, including nine members of the cathedral’s congregation: Marie Ciklova, wife of the dean; Marie Gruzinnova, Bp. Gorazd’s secretary; Marie Sonnevendova, wife of the council chairman; Ludmila Rysova, choir member; Vaclav Ornest, the sacristan, his wife Frantiska Ornestova, and daughter, Miluse Ornestova, a choir and youth group member; Karel Louda, choir member; and Marie Loudova, also a choir and youth group member. In all, the Orthodox Church lost 13 sons and daughters.

More biking in Horomerice...

2008-05-04T21:09:00.006+02:00

Last year on May 1st I posted on the beautiful fields of canola/rapeseed around our home town of Horomerice. The link to that old post is here. Well, it's that time of year again, and (not surprisingly) the rapeseed is again growing and in bloom.

Noah and I took a little cycle along our usual route to the nearby spa and passed the now blooming fields. We stopped and I took this picture of Noah.

As a proud father I always knew that Noah would be out standing in his field.

We took a slight detour down a side road that goes to the main road connecting Horomerice and Prague. This memorial to someone who was killed at this spot has been up since February of last year. Just as in parts of the US, it is a common practice for friends and family of a person killed on a highway to erect and maintain a memorial. This one occassionaly has lit candles.

Oil, Nasdaq and tulips - what do these things have in common? A prediction...

2008-05-04T07:28:00.002+02:00

From the Associated Press on April 20th: OPEC Secretary-General Abdullah el al-Badri said Sunday oil prices would likely go higher and that the group was ready to raise production if the price pressure was due to a shortage of supply — something he doubted. “Oil prices, there is a common understanding that has nothing to do with supply and demand,” al-Badri said…

When someone says that the law of supply and demand are not in affect, run away as fast as you can, but check for your wallet first.

The price of oil has been going ever higher despite a slowdown (even recession?) in the US. An economic slowdown means that people and companies cut back - travel less, make less, spend less. If supply remains constant then the law of supply and demand would predict a reduction in price. But that isn't happening - the price of oil contiinues to go up and up.

But this isn't the first time this has happened. First, let's visit the Netherlands in the 1630s, where the beautiful tulip has arrived from Constantinople (Istanbul). Here is some of the story of tulip mania. Read more here.

Could a mere tulip bulb be worth $76,000? It is if people are willing to pay for it! It may sound preposterous, but this is exactly what happened in Holland in the 1630’s.

The seeds of this craze were planted in 1593. A man by the name of Conrad Guestner imported the first tulip bulb into Holland from Constantinople, in present day Turkey. After a few years, tulip bulbs became a status symbol and a novelty for the rich and famous. Eventually, tulip bulbs became a hot ticket item in neighboring Germany, as well. After some time, a few tulip bulbs contracted a non-harmful plant virus called mosaic. The effects of this mosaic virus were tulip petals with beautiful “flames” of color. This unique effect furthermore increased the value of the already rare and highly exclusive tulip bulb.

Initially, only the true connoisseurs bought tulip bulbs, but the rapidly rising price quickly attracted speculators looking to profit. It didn’t take long before the tulip bulbs were traded on local market exchanges, which were not unlike today’s stock exchanges. By 1634, tulip mania had feverishly spread to the Dutch middle class. Pretty soon everybody was dealing in tulip bulbs, looking to make a quick fortune. The majority of the tulip bulb buyers had no intentions of even planting these bulbs! The name of the game was to buy low and sell high, just like in any other market. The whole Dutch nation was caught in a sweeping mania, as people traded in their land, livestock, farms and life savings all to acquire 1 single tulip bulb!

In less than one month, the price of tulip bulbs went up twenty-fold! To put that into perspective, if you had invested $1,000 and came back on month later, your investment would have ballooned to $20,000! Now you can understand the mad rush to buy tulip bulbs at any cost. Tulip bulb mania affected the public psyche to an extreme. One drunk man in a bar started peeling and eating what he thought was an onion, while it was in fact it was the bar owner's tulip bulb on display. This man was jailed for many months!

All common sense and logic was thrown to the wind, and even scoffed at. This is exemplified by how many USEFUL items it cost to buy 1 single tulip bulb:

• four tons of wheat
• eight tons of rye
• one bed
• four oxen
• eight pigs
• 12 sheep
• one suit of clothes
• two casks of wine
• four tons of beer
• two tons of butter
• 1,000 pounds of cheese
• one silver drinking cup.

Mind you, these valuable items COMBINED only equaled the value of 1 tulip bulb! The modern day value of these items is over $40,000!

In 1636, tulips were trading hands on the Amsterdam stock exchange as well as on exchanges in Rotterdam, Harlem, Levytown, Horne and many other exchanges in other nearby European countries. These exchanges started to offer option contracts to speculators. These option contracts allowed tulip bulbs to be speculated upon for a fraction of the price of a real tulip bulb. This allowed people of lower means to speculate in the tulip market. Additionally, options allowed for leverage. Due to leverage, option buyers were able to control larger amounts of tulip bulbs, allowing a greater profit. In a previous example, we showed how a $1,000 dollar investment would have yielded $20,000 in one month. As if this weren’t enough, option leverage allowed this same investment of $1,000 to balloon into $100,000! Unfortunately, leverage is a double-edged sword. If the tulip bulb price moved downwards ever so slightly, the option buyer’s investment would be lost and they might even owe money! Talk about risky. But at this point, it was commonly believed that the tulip market was immune to crashing and that it would “always go up”.

The financial devastation that followed the tulip bulb crash lasted for decades, crippling Dutch commerce. The price of tulips at the height of the mania was $76,000; 6 weeks later they were valued at less than one dollar! The only people who prospered from the insanity were the smart money who liquidated at the top.

Now move forward in time 360+ years.

From one of my favorite blogs - Dinocrat:

The NASDAQ doubled from March 1999 to March 2000 to over 5000 on flimsy fundamentals, and then had a little problem — it crashed, falling 70% to a low of 1600 or so. It is axiomatic that no one who bought at the high believed they were buying at the high.

Just like the NASDAQ, in the 12 months from April 2007 to April 2008, the price of oil has doubled, while forecasts of demand have been repeatedly lowered over the period. We’re not saying that prices can’t go higher, but everyone in the world, even the most sophisticated investors, seems to be on the same side of this trade — and that in itself ought to be a red flag.

So where does oil go fom here? Again from Dinocrat:

It looks like the insanity in the oil market may be nearing, or has possibly even reached, an end. A great unwinding may be at hand from the Tulipmania or NASDAQ 5000 of these times.

We’ve compared the spike in oil and other commodities like gold with the decline in the dollar since the fall of last year, and, up until recently, there was an outstanding correlation — going long oil, gold or other commodities was pretty clearly an effective way to short the dollar in an almost risk free environment. Something has changed, however, in recent days.

Since early April, gold and oil have moved in opposite directions. Gold’s price, in our view, has retreated as the market has judged, correctly, that the dollar’s decline is nearing an end for multiple sound reasons (a halt to interest rate cuts, global slow growth or recession, etc.). Meanwhile, oil’s price has become completely untethered from reality in an insane speculative frenzy, even versus other commodities (which have had their own bull markets).

It’s over, or at least coming to an end, in our opinion. The fundamentals do not support current oil prices, as industry veterans say, and that situation is ever more glaringly evident each day, as economies weaken in the West. Of course, we may be wrong about this — but the last man who bought an insanely expensive tulip bulb, or an internet stock in March 2000, thought that the price would go yet higher. Peaks are only understood in retrospect.

In addition to my prediction that the dollar has already or soon will reach bottom, I add a second prediction that oil has also peaked, or soon will. From the lofty $117 a barrel today I foresee a reduction to the more common (at least until recently) range of $60-$75 a barrel. I find that my predictions are often right, they just take longer than I originally estimate (this is part of what I call the "Tischler Effect", which I will post on later).

Dollar update (May 2008 edition)...

2008-05-02T09:15:00.010+02:00

It is the first week of the month and time for another review of the US dollar. At the last report on April 4th (see here), the dollar was at 15.95 Czech crowns. This was an improvement off the lows of about 15.5. As I write this, the dollar has continued to strengthen and sits at about 16.36. Here is the graph.

Of course, the big question is whether the dollar has found the bottom yet or not. Back in January I predicted that the dollar had already seen the bottom (it was at about 18.15 then). Read it here. The logic for my prediction that the dollar would rise was based on the belief that Europe would eventually succumb to the same sub-prime woes as the US and fall towards recession. The US, having entered first would also exit first, resulting in a stronger dollar.

I still believe that a stronger dollar is at hand, although the timing of my initial prediction in January may have been a little premature. The Federal Reserve cut rates again yesterday by .25, but this is widely expected to be the last of the cuts (there was even some speculation that this cut might not happen at all and the Fed would elect to keep rates firm). No more cuts will help keep the dollar from declining further against the Euro and Crown. Also, there are signs that Wall Street believes that the sub-prime mess may be mostly over. The Dow is up and optimism reigns (at least for the moment). The recent growth figures from the government show decreased growth (down to .6%) but not the negative growth of a recession.

The price of oil has also been skyrocketing lately, but I believe that oil, too, has peaked and will drop dramtically in the near future. This will also help make a stronger dollar. I will post on that soon.

Karlovy Vary...

2008-05-01T19:56:00.010+02:00

With our upcoming departure from the Czech Republic we have developed a punch list of things to see before we leave (a short 7 weeks from now). One of these items is to visit Karlovy Vary. Since today is a holiday (May Day) we decided to take the 90 minute drive to Karlovy Vary in the western part of the Czech Republic.

Here is information from Wikipedia:
Karlovy Vary (German: Karlsbad), sometimes known in English as Carlsbad, is a spa city situated in Bohemia, the western part of the Czech Republic, on the confluence of the rivers Ohře (German: Eger) and Teplá. Carlsbad is named after Holy Roman Emperor Charles IV, who founded the city in 1370. It is historically famous for its hot springs (13 main springs, about 300 smaller springs, and the warm-water Teplá River).

In the 19th century, it became a popular tourist destination, especially for international celebrities visiting for spa treatment. The city is also known for the Karlovy Vary International Film Festival and the popular Czech liqueur Karlovarská Becherovka. The glass manufacturer Moser Glass is located in Carlsbad.

The city has been used as the location for a number of film-shoots, including the 2006 films Last Holiday and box-office hit Casino Royale, both of which used the city's Grandhotel Pupp in different guises.

On 14 August 1370, Charles IV, Holy Roman Emperor gave city privileges to the place that subsequently was named after him, according to legend after he had acclaimed the healing power of the hot springs. However, earlier settlements could be found in the outskirts of today's city.

Due to publications by doctors like David Becher and Josef von Löschner, the city developed into a famous spa resort and was visited by many members of European aristocracy. It became popular after the railway lines to Eger (Cheb) and Prague were completed in 1870.

The number of visitors rose from 134 families in the 1756 season to 26,000 guests annually at the end of the 19th century. By 1911 that figure had reached already 71,000 but the Great War put an end to tourism and also led to the collapse of the Austro Hungarian Empire by late 1918.

The German-speaking majority protested against being made a part of Czechoslovakia by the Treaty of Saint Germain. A demonstration on 4 March 1919 passed peacefully, but later that month six demonstrators were killed by Czech troops after a demonstrations turned unruly[1].

In 1938 the Sudetenland including Karlovy Vary became part of German Reich and the entire Czech population was expelled. The German speaking inhabitants thus[citation needed] became a majority in the city until their expulsion in 1945.

Before that, the Carlsbad Decrees of 1819 had associated the city with anti-liberal censorship within the German Confederation.

The center of Karlovy Vary.

May Day in Karlovy Vary.

Noah trying some tree climbing.

Pastel colors and horse drawn carriages.

Kathy samples the mineral waters for which Karlovy Vary are famous. Nearly every tourist walks around with a special glass for the waters. The water itself was hot and with iron or sulphur. Not very good, really.

Just like Petrin in Prague, Karlovy has a hill with a furnicular to the top, and then a tower you can climb for a great view of the area.

It was aa great day for a trip to Karlovy Vary.

Kathy and "le Sabrage" (Using a sword to take the top off a bottle of champagne)...

2008-04-30T08:43:00.004+02:00

Kathy had what she described as one of her best days in Prague yesterday. She went on one of the "Let's Go" tours with several of her friends from ISP. This one was called "Surprising Spring Walk" and covered some hidden places in Mala Strana including the Palffy Palace (music school) and Royal Gardens.

It also included a stop at the restaurant U Maliru (literally,"At the Painters") which is described on-line as "A landmark restaurant with a history spanning 460 years, appreciated by kings, diplomats and politicians alike. Fine French cuisine among the restored frescoes or in the summer garden with a view of a picturesque little square on the Lesser Side. When the famous gourmet King Rudolf II sent his spies to investigate Czech pubs, a superb kitchen was indicated by one star, an excellent one by two. The only restaurant with three stars was this one."

U Maliru's sommelier, Dita Skrivankova, demonstrated a technique called "le Sabrage", where the top of a bottle of champagne is removed with a sword, sabre or knife. This tradition was initiated in France in 1812 by Napolean and used to celebrate victories in battle. She then let several of the women try the technique themselves.

Here is Dita Skrivankova with her "weapon".

Kathy tries out Sabrage on her own.

Here is a demonstration of the "le Sabrage" technique by a French-sounding guy on YouTube.

Chuckleheads...

2008-04-29T09:35:00.003+02:00

I dare you to watch this adorable (if pointless) video of quadruplets and not smile.

Prague tulips...

2008-04-28T12:08:00.001+02:00

Spring has finally sprung in Prague and the tulips are in full bloom. It wasn't a bad winter, especially considering that some cold weather and measurable snow in December had many predicting it to be long and painful.

I guess it was long, but just not too cold and not snowy at all. It seemed as if March lasted for three months. First there was FebruMarch, then March and then we got three weeks of Marchpril. The high temperatures seemed to fluctuate from 35 to 49 Fahrenheit for that entire period.

Anyway, there were some outdoor cafes open on Sunday as the temperature approached 70, and it looks like the same today.

On the way into Sunday school yesterday we (as usual) parked near Dejvicka circle and then caught the tram to Malostranska namesti where our church, St. Thomas, is. Here are a few pictures of the thousands of tulips in bloom - they were quite beautiful.

Hello I must be going...

2008-04-27T14:18:00.000+02:00

A lot has transpired in the last few weeks, and big changes are in the offing. We will be leaving Prague and back to Minnesota. I have already accepted a job, given my notice at Radio Free Europe and informed my staff that I will be leaving. It won't be for a little while yet - June 21 to be exact - because Noah needs to finish the school year at the International School of Prague (which he does on June 19).

We are moving back to the great state of Minnesota, and I have, thankfully, already secured gainful employment there. I will go back to work for my previous employer ATK in Plymouth, and for my old (as in previous) boss, George Frye. The company and George seemed glad that I was available to come back and once the ball started rolling it didn't take long for all of the details to get wrapped up. George's offer was fair - he has always been fair to me - and I am looking forward to getting back to work there.

I do not regret my time at Radio Free Europe. To the contrary, the experience has exceeded my expectations. We wanted to move to Prague to give Kathy and especially Noah the experience of living outside of the US. I had lived in Saudi Arabia for three years so I already knew what living outside of the US was like. And it certainly wasn't a dissatisfaction with life in the US or a belief that life in Europe would be better than in the US. I firmly believe that the US is the greatest nation in the history of the world, and I want to live there. But it's hard to appreciate how great she is (even with the faults) until you look at her from from the outside.

I will have more to say about the move back in the coming weeks, but for now we just want to officially announce our upcoming departure from Prague and return to the Twin Cities. It will be good to be home.

Turkey visit - Final tidbits...

2008-04-25T22:11:00.006+02:00

We returned to Prague from Turkey nine days ago, so it's time for me to wrap things up. Here are a few photos that I like.

This is looking down a quaint little alley in Sultanahmet. Notice the mosque framed in the center.

Turkish women.

One of the cafes where we had a meal. You could also get a hookah, or water pipe (also known as a shisha or, in Saudi, a hubbly bubbly) for a smoke (tobacco only).

A view of the Bosphorus from the Galata tower on a warm but hazy day in Istanbul.

Trip to Turkey - The Grand Bazaar...

2008-04-23T12:10:00.001+02:00

The last full day in Istanbul was Tuesday, April 15th. Tuana drove Noah to our hotel after her boys were put on the bus to school (she had kept them home from school on Monday just so they could be with Noah) and then the four of us headed to the Grand Bazaar in the old part of the city.

From Wikipedia:
The Grand Bazaar (or Covered Bazaar, Turkish: Kapalıçarşı ("Covered Bazaar")) in Istanbul is one of the largest covered markets in the world with more than 58 streets and 4,000 shops, and has between 250,000 and 400,000 visitors daily. It is well known for its jewelry, pottery, spice, and carpet shops. Many of the stalls in the bazaar are grouped by type of goods, with special areas for leather coats, gold jewelry and the like. The bazaar contains two bedestens (domed masonry structures built for storage and safe keeping), the first of which was constructed between 1455 and 1461 by the order of Sultan Mehmed the Conqueror. The bazaar was vastly enlarged in the 16th century, during the reign of Sultan Suleiman the Magnificent, and in 1894 underwent a major restoration following an earthquake.

Here is one of the many covered streets (58, according to Wkipedia).

Here is Tuana helping Kathy buy some scarfs (pashminas). It helps to have a local with you to help secure the best prices. Americans are not used to haggling for everything (in the US nowadays even the price for a car normally isn't negotiated). Imagine going into Walmart and haggling for every purchase.

Noah and I waited outside the shop while the wheeling and dealing for scarves went on. We went to a nearby shop and found a jersey from another of the four top level football (soccer) clubs. It was offered at 20 Turkish Lira ($15.50) and I got it down to 15 ($11.50). Not bad.

We then had a nice lunch in one of the many restaurants in the bazaar. It was a very interesting experience and Kathy and I both wished we had gone there sooner to shop. As you can imagine, with 4,000 stores they have lots of neat stuff.

"Does Radio Free Europe Still Exist?"...

2008-04-22T12:38:00.004+02:00

Here is an op-ed from today's Washington post that makes a good case not only for our continued existence but for our resurgence. Since coming here in 2006 I have said that most people under the age of 45, when you mention Radio Free Europe, think of the r.e.m. song. It's time for Congress to put up or shut up. Those of you who visit the blog know that I report on the falling dollar every month, because I am greatly impacted since I am paid in dollars but most of my expenses are in Euros or Czech crowns. The same is true for RFE/RL - our entire budget from Congress comes to us in dollars and the dollar has fallen so much recently that operations may be impacted.

Radio To Stay Tuned To
By Anne Applebaum
Tuesday, April 22, 2008; A19
"Radio Free Europe? Does that still exist?"

That was the question; the speaker was an Important Public Broadcaster, visiting Europe for a few days last week. It wasn't a surprising query, as these things go, or an ignorant one. Not many other Americans know that Radio Free Europe still exists, so why should he?

Nevertheless, the query bothered me, because Radio Free Europe -- the Cold War news service that was, for decades, the only source of independent information in Eastern Europe -- does exist. In fact, it's as important as it ever was, at least in the 21 countries and 28 languages in which it is still often the only source of independent information: Farsi for Iran, Arabic for Iraq, Dari and Pashto for Afghanistan, plus Turkmen, Azeri, Belarusan, Georgian, Chechen, Tajik, Albanian, Serbian and Russian, among others. The fact that you haven't heard anyone mention RFE lately, let alone the achievements of its Afghan journalists-- they provide much of the news in much of that country -- says more about the poverty of the American foreign policy debate in general (and this election-year debate in particular) than about almost anything else. In RFE, we have an American institution that is admired, even beloved, in many difficult parts of the world; and yet we are slowly, methodically, starving it to death.

Reputation to the contrary, RFE is not American propaganda radio. It is better described as "surrogate radio": a broadcasting service that supplies local, national and international news, in radio, Internet and sometimes video form, in countries where other local news is weak or unavailable. Most of the programming is written by local journalists, who follow local politics in the local languages. Many of them live in the countries they cover, sometimes at great risk. When the Newseum was opened in Washington last week, the names of four RFE journalists -- a Turkmen, two Iraqis and an Uzbek -- all killed in the past two years, were already inscribed on a plaque there. In the past year alone, RFE has dealt with staff kidnappings in Iraq and Afghanistan, disappearances in Turkmenistan, official harassment in Russia and Belarus, and blackmail from Iran.

Occasionally, RFE journalists even have to be smuggled out of their home countries. But when this happens, they wind up in Prague, where, for anachronistic post-Cold War-era reasons (President Vaclav Havel gave RFE a building there after 1989) the organization now has its headquarters. Once there, they can't go home, they can't get green cards, they don't speak Czech, and, now that the dollar has collapsed to a degree not fully appreciated in Washington, they can't support themselves, either. RFE, which at its peak received $230 million annually in congressional funding, now gets $75 million in rapidly devaluing currency. That money pays for transmitters, salaries, security and anti-jamming technology as well as programming and Web content in 28 languages. To put that in perspective, as RFE President Jeff Gedmin likes to say, $75 million is also the price of four Apache helicopters.
Which is an apt comparison, since, if RFE vanishes, we may need a lot more helicopters to replace it. Many analysts -- our defense secretary among them -- pay much lip service nowadays to the need for "soft power," the non-military initiatives and institutions that, once upon a time, helped us win hearts and minds in remote places, even when we wouldn't or couldn't send an army. Each of the presidential candidates has implicitly agreed, claiming that when he or she is elected, foreign policy is going to be conducted differently, more diplomatically and so on. But what does that entail? Will "diplomacy" mean we force Slovenia and Norway to send a dozen more soldiers to Afghanistan? Or should diplomacy" mean that we help the people who are trying to foster civilized public debate in Afghanistan as an alternative to warfare? When I was at the RFE office in Prague several weeks ago, the Afghans there showed me the enormous, old-fashioned canvas mailbags that arrive every week from Afghanistan, full of letters thanking the presenters, offering arguments, making comments -- and asking why there isn't more service, more coverage, more than 12 hours of daily service from Radio Free Afghanistan.

RFE does have a good number of admirers in Washington, as well as a few constructive critics, usually people who wish it did more things better. What it does not have, however, is an advocate: someone, in Congress, the White House or on the campaign trail who remembers that Americans have done soft power rather well in the past, that the collapse of the dollar is more than a minor irritant for rich tourists, that with better transmitters we could reach more Iranians, and that we could easily swap a few helicopters for better-informed Afghans. "Yes" is the answer to the Important Public Broadcaster's question; Radio Free Europe still exists. But if no one remembers to support it, politically and financially, Radio Free Europe won't exist much longer.

Turkey Visit - We meet our friends...

2008-04-21T12:29:00.002+02:00

Continuing with our Istanbul vacation, on Sunday (April 12th) we met our Turkish friends, Armin and Tuana and their two boys, for brunch at the Istanbul Hilton. Armin had managed the Hilton in Prague before returning to Istanbul last summer. He was there when President Bush visited last June and was able to him. He now manages three properties in Istanbul, two Hiltons and a Conrad (an upscale version of the Hilton).

They hosted us for Sunday brunch at the Istanbul Hilton, which is the flagship of the properties in Istanbul. There was a lovely view and the food and service were excellent.

Here are Kathy and I with Armin and Tuana.

Here is Noah with his best friend from ISP last year, Ares, and Ares's younger brother Marco. They got along like long lost friends, which is what they were (but it sounds odd to say about 10 year olds).

After brunch they took Noah for 2 days giving Kathy and I the chance to explore a lot of Istanbul on our own. And Noah had a great time.

Trip to Turkey...Visit to Asia

2008-04-20T16:28:00.001+02:00

Turkey is known as the place where Europe and Asia meet. The Bosphorus is the waterway that goes from the Black Sea in the north to the Sea of Marmara in the south. The old historic portion of Istanabul, Sultanahmet, where we stayed is on the European side of the Bosphorus, so we took a ferry ride to the other side so that Noah could say that he had been to Asia. There are ferries that go to many places on the asian side, but we decided to go to Uskudar. See the map. The price is extremely reasonable, about $1 per person, for the 15 minute trip.

Here we are after arrving at Uskudar. As soon as we were all off of the ferry they allowed the returning passengers board - that is them in the background.

We walked around for about an hour on the Asian side before jumping on the ferry back to Sultanahmet. We found these stairs and climbed to the top. Noah is much faster than Kathy and me.

Here is one of the views from the top - looking back to the European side. After this we climbed back down and explored the shopping area near the port. As you might expect, this area was much less touristy than Sultanhmet.

It was a good (and very cheap) excursion for us to take.

Trip to Turkey...Aya Sofya

2008-04-19T19:24:00.014+02:00

After visiting the Blue Mosque we walked across the way along the hippodrome to the Hagia Sofia (or Ayasofya in Turkish). It is now a museum but was built as a church and later converted to a mosque.

From Wikipedia:
Hagia Sophia (Turkish: Ayasofya, Latin: Sancta Sophia or Sancta Sapientia) is a former patriarchal basilica, later a mosque, now a museum, in Istanbul, Turkey. Famous in particular for its massive dome, it is considered the epitome of Byzantine architecture. It was the largest cathedral in the world for nearly a thousand years, until the completion of the Medieval Seville Cathedral in 1520.

The current building was originally constructed as a church between 532 and 537 AD on the orders of the Byzantine Emperor Justinian, and was in fact the third Church of the Holy Wisdom to occupy the site (the previous two had both been destroyed by riots). It was designed by two architects, Isidore of Miletus and Anthemius of Tralles. The Church contained a large collection of holy relics and featured, among other things, a 50 foot (15 m) silver iconostasis. It was the patriarchal church of the Patriarch of Constantinople and the religious focal point of the Eastern Orthodox Church for nearly 1000 years.

In 1453, Constantinople was conquered by the Ottoman Turks and Sultan Mehmed II ordered the building to be converted into a mosque. The bells, altar, iconostasis, and sacrificial vessels were removed, and many of the mosaics were eventually plastered over. The Islamic features - such as the mihrab, the minbar, and the four minarets outside - were added over the course of its history under the Ottomans. It remained as a mosque until 1935, when it was converted into a museum by the secular Republic of Turkey.

For almost 500 years the principal mosque of Istanbul, Hagia Sophia served as a model for many of the Ottoman mosques such as the Sultan Ahmed Mosque (Blue Mosque of Istanbul), the Şehzade Mosque, the Süleymaniye Mosque, and the Rüstem Pasha Mosque.

The Empress Zoe mosaics (right) on the eastern wall of the southern gallery date from the 11th century. Christ Pantocrator, clad in the dark blue robe (as always the custom in Byzantine art), is seated in the middle against a golden background, giving His blessing with the right hand and holding the Bible in His left hand. On either side of His head are the monograms IC and XC, meaning Iesous Christos. He is flanked by Constantine IX Monomachos and Empress Zoe, both in ceremonial costumes. He is offering a purse, as symbol of the donation he made to the church, while she is holding a scroll, symbol of the donations she made.

Here is a depiction of what the Hagia Sophia looked like before it was converted to a mosque in the 15th century.

View from the second floor.

Playoff hockey 26 years ago with Styopa...

2008-04-18T20:37:00.005+02:00

My friend Steve of Thus Spake Styopa recently relayed the story of our eventful trip to Chicago in April 1982 to attend two NHL playoff games between our beloved Minnesota North Stars (later to depart to Dallas) and the hated Chicago Blackhawks. Rather than write my own recollections (which are somewhat fuzzy due to the amount of alcohol consumed) I will just link to Steve's admirable posts.

Part 1 - Stanley Cup Playoff Hockey...26 Years Ago This Week

Part 2 - Stanley Cup 1982...Stars versus Blackhawks, Game 3

Part 3 - The Stars Fall to Their Demise...Steve and Al Live

The Blue Mosque...

2008-04-18T20:08:00.004+02:00

After the visit to the Basilica Cistern we walked across the hippodrome to the Blue Mosque. It was quite busy but it only took a few minutes in line to make it to the north entrance, which is for non-Muslims. We had to remove our shoes before we entered the mosque.

From wikipedia:It was built between 1609 and 1616, during the rule of Ahmed I. Like many other mosques, it also comprises a tomb of the founder, a madrasah and a hospice. The Sultan Ahmed Mosque has become one of the greatest tourist attractions of Istanbul.

The mosque was to be built on the site of the palace of the Byzantine emperors, facing the Hagia Sophia (at that time the most venerated mosque in Istanbul) and the hippodrome, a site of great symbolic significance. Large parts of the southern side of the mosque rest on the foundations, the vaults and the undercrofts of the Great Palace. Several palaces, already built on the same spot, had to be bought (at considerable price) and pulled down, especially the palace of Sokollu Mehmet Paşa, and large parts of the Sphendone (curved tribune with U-shaped structure of the hippodrome).

At its lower levels and at every pier, the interior of the mosque is lined with more than 20,000 handmade ceramic tiles, made at Iznik (the ancient Nicaea) in more than fifty different TULIP designs. The tiles at lower levels are traditional in design, while at gallery level their design becomes flamboyant with representations of flowers, fruit and cypresses. More than 20,000 tiles were made under the supervision of the Iznik master potter Kaşıcı Hasan,and Mustafa Mersin Efendi from Avanos(Cappadocia). However, the price the builders were able to pay for tiles was fixed by the sultan's decree, while tile prices increased over time. As a result, the tiles used later in building were of lesser quality. Their colours have faded and changed (red turning into brown and green into blue, mottled whites) and the glazes have dulled. The tiles on the back balcony wall are recycled tiles from the harem in the Topkapı Palace, when it was damaged by fire in 1574.

Until recently the muezzin or prayer-caller had to climb a narrow spiral staircase five times a day to announce the call to prayer. Today a public address system is used, and the call can be heard across the old part of the city, echoed by other mosques in the vicinity. Large crowds of both Turks and tourists gather at sunset in the park facing the mosque to hear the call to evening prayers, as the sun sets and the mosque is brilliantly illuminated by coloured floodlights.

The interior of the Blue Mosque - basically one big room.

The ceiling of the mosque, showing some of the many hand made tiles.

A sign that must be obeyed.

Noah later that evening in front of the well lit Blue Mosque.

The Basilica Cistern...

2008-04-17T12:41:00.001+02:00

The first morning in Istanbul (Saturday) we started off by visiting the Basilica Cistern. The cistern is in the center of the historic section of old Istanbul called Sultanahmet. Many of the other main sites are also in this area - the Blue Mosque, the Hippodrome, the Ayasofia and Topkapi Palace. Our hotel was just a 5 minute walk to the Hippodrome, which is really a long and narrow park with the other sites around it.

When I was here in 1993 I stayed in a cheap hotel very close to the Hippodrome. I remember visiting the Basilica Cistern and that it was just a block away. When we were exploring the neighborhood I think I found the hotel that I stayed in then, and the carpet shop where I bought the two beautiful wool carpets that I still have today.

Anyway, I remember the cistern as being a great palce to see so we went there first.

From wikipedia:
The Basilica Cistern (Turkish: 'Yerebatan Sarayı' or 'Yerebatan Sarnıcı'), is the largest of several hundred ancient cisterns that still lie beneath the city of Istanbul, former Constantinople, Turkey.

The cistern, located in the historical peninsula of Istanbul next to the Hagia Sophia, was built during the reign of emperor Justinian I in the 6th century, the age of glory of Eastern Rome, also called the Byzantine Empire.

This cathedral-sized cistern is an underground chamber of 143 by 65 metres, capable of holding 80,000 cubic metres of water. The large space is broken up by a forest of 336 marble columns each 9 metres high. The columns are arranged in 12 rows each consisting of 28 columns. The capitals of the columns are mainly Ionic and Corinthian styles, with the exception of a few Doric style with no engravings. According to ancient historians, emperor Constantine had already built a basilica and cistern on the same spot. As the demand for water grew, emperor Justinian enlarged the cisterns and incorporated the basilica.

The cistern is surrounded by a firebrick wall with a thickness of 4 meters and coated with a special mortar for waterproofing. The cistern's water was provided from the Belgrade Woods—which lie 19km north of the city—via aqueducts built by the emperor Justinian.

The cracks and the columns were repaired in 1968. Having been restored in 1985 by the Istanbul Metropolitan Museum, the cistern was once again opened to the public on 9 September, 1987.

And this, from another web site - guideistanbul.net:
The interior of Underground Cistern is breathtaking. It is 138 m, 452 ft long by 65m, 213 ft wide. There are 336 columns in the cistern. Most of the column capitals are either in Corinthian or Doric Style. At the far end of the Cistern, there are two heads of Medusa which are put upside down or side ways. The Medusa Heads are taken from an ancient Pagan site but they complement the pillars very beautifully and add a different taste to the building.
Because of its magic atmosphere and great acoustics, this cistern is now hosting many Classical Music Concerts. There is also a little café which one can sip his or her coffee and enjoy this unique building. On the way to the exit, there are two small bookshops which is full of postcards and informative books as well as some silver jewelry.

We visited at about 9:00 in the morning. I think the restaurant in the cistern is used only for specially catered occassions.

A couple of other facts about the cistern: it covers an area of 2.4 acres and can hold 21 million gallons of water (or 80,000 cubic meters).

Here is Noah with one of the two medusa heads (referenced above). One is upside down and one is sideways (this is the sideways one). It is believed that they were placed this way by design, but no one is sure why.

Sarnic cistern restaurant...

2008-04-16T17:01:00.013+02:00

We got back to Prague a few hours ago after a successful vacation in Istanbul. Where to begin? I've already downloaded the 148 photos from our digital camera and they cover a whole lot of ground.

I'm going to go with something out of the ordinary for my first post-Istanbul post. With Noah staying with our Turkish friends for a couple of nights we got to have a couple of great dinners alone. The best was at a place called Sarnic, which is in a 1,500 year old cistern located just behind the Aya Sofia.

The ceiling is about 30 feet high, and the room has six marble pillars supporting it. Until recently it was used as a car repair shop and had a second floor added. Renovation, though, meant the loss of the additional floor and back to all brick. The restaurant has tons of candles and lots of wrought iron.

Here I am - with the fireplace in the background. Obviously, this was a feature added later.

This gives some idea of the ceiling height as well as the wrought iron gates.

Here is a photo from the web with better lighting than I am capable of.

I found a Frommer's review on-line:
The setting for this restaurant, an old Roman cistern tucked away behind the Ayasofya, is nothing less than dramatic. The flickering light of 500 candles bounces off the iron grillwork, the lofty brick domes, and the stone pillars, while the crackling of the fire in the massive stone chimney (an inauthentic but effective addition) supplies more romance than a girl can handle. It's hard to believe that only a few years ago, before the Turkish Touring and Automobile Association bought and restored it, the cistern served as a greasy old auto repair shop.

I found a few food reviews for Sarnic on the web and they say the food is so-so. Actually, we found the food and service to be quite good and reasonably priced. The wine, while good, was quite expensive and next time we would probably pass on the wine.

Istanbul update...

2008-04-14T15:28:00.003+02:00

I'm sitting in one of the many internet cafes in Istanbul - just $2 an hour for a computer with a high speed internet connection.

Noah is staying with our friends, Tuana and Armin, and their sons Ares and Marco. We will get him back tomorrow, so tonight will be another nice evening at a better than usual restaurant (where we won't have to worry of there is something that will appeal to Noah.

Spent all day so far (it's 4:30 in the afternoon) site seeing. We spent all morning at Topkapi palace - very interesting. Then we went to the spice bazaar to look around - also very interesting. We had lunch at a restaruant on the 5th floor roof of a building overlooking the Golden Horn - the waterway that separates the older and newer European sections of the city. Finally, we went to the shopping district of Beyoglu and bought Noah a jersey from one of the four top league teams in the city - Fenerbache. Fenerbahce had beater Aresenal in a shocker here in Istanbul a couple of weeks ago, but then they lost in England and are out of the UEFA cup. Still, even though they lost we got the jersey anyway.

That's the quick update for now. Back to Prague on Wednesday.

The wi-fi doesn't work...

2008-04-13T09:05:00.003+02:00

The promised wi-fi at the hotel where we are staying in Istanbul doesn't work, even in the public areas. That means very limited posting. The three of us are at an internet cafe a 5 minute walk from the hotel.

In an hour we will be going to brunch with our friends and then Noah will stay with them until Tuesday morning to play with their son, Ares. That will give Kathy and I a chance to see some of the city on our own.

Yesterday was very full. We saw the Basilica Sistern (my favorite site of the day), the Blue Mosque, and the Aya Sofya. We also took a tram and a furnicular to the other side of the historical section of the city. All in all a great day.

Kathy and I haven't scoped out what we are going to do the rest of the day yet. If I can I will post more on Monday.

We're off on spring vacation...

2008-04-10T21:29:00.007+02:00

The three of us are heading to the airport shortly to take a flight to Istandul and will be there until next Wednesday. I wanted us to go somewhere exotic for a vacation and Istanbul seemed like a natural destination. I visited Istanbul (along with much of the rest of Turkey) way back in 1993. It's a great place.

We will see some friends who left Prague last year to return to their native Turkey. I posted on their going away party here. Armin ran the Prague Hilton, and met President Bush when he stayed there while visiting Prague last June. His wife is Tuana and is a good friend of Kathy's.

Armin and Tuana have a son, Ares, who was in Noah's class last year and the two of them were best friends. While we are in Istanbul Noah is going to stay with them from Sunday afternoon until Tuesday morning - he is very excited to stay there and see his old (relatively speaking) friend. Of course, Noah being with them for a couple of days gives Kathy and I the opportunity to see some sites that we wouldn't be ablr to otherwise.

Istanbul is a very large city with 17 million people and we will be staying in the old historic section called Sultanahmet where the most popular tourist attractions are. The hotel terrace has a view of the nearby Blue Mosque (see picture).

I haven't decided yet if I will bring the laptop. I wasn't planning on it, but noticed that the hotel has free wi-fi so I might bring it (if anything just to keep up on the Wild playoffs scores and fantasy baseball). Posting will either be light or non-existent through Wednesday.

My good deed for the day...

2008-04-10T13:38:00.009+02:00

Returning from a visit to our new building yesterday (see previous post) I came to the top of the escalator at the Muzeum metro station and saw one of the metro police with a young woman. At first I thought that the young woman was trying to get help in working the automated ticket machines, since they were standing next to a bank of them and they are not that easy to decipher. So I decided to stop to see if I could help.

As I approached I could see that the young woman was sobbing and I heard her say "I don't understand" to the unmoved female policewoman. I suppose I could have bailed but she looked so distressed that I thought I would at least see what the problem was.

Apparently, the girl had just arrived from the airport. She had purchased a transportation ticket at the airport but when she was spot checked (the metro police often check riders of the metro for valid tickets since the honor system is used, i.e. no turnstiles) the policewoman said that there was a problem. She would have to wait for the regular city police an dbe dealt with accordingly.

You can buy tickets that are valid for 24 hours anywhere within Prague, but there are also tickets where the validity is based on either time or distance (in zones). I listened to the young girl and explained that I didn't speak Czech but that perhaps the ticket she bought at the airport might, indeed, be expired. Not to worry, I said, they usually just want you to pay the fine and then you can be on your way.

I asked her if they told her the amount of the fine. 700 crowns, she said (about $44). That seemed a bit steep to me - I had expected around 400 crowns. I turned to the policewoman and asked if the fine could be smaller - and for effect I placed the thumb and forefinger of my right hand close together. I expected some answer in Czech that I wouldn't understand. But she said, in perfect English. "That is impossible". I didn't dare ask what was impossible about it since I didnt want to get arrested myself.

Hmmm. I asked the girl if she had any crowns and of course she didn't. She was just coming from the airport. Hmmm. I had another thought. "Do you have friends in Prague?" I asked. Yes, her boyfriend was here in Prague. Great - I would lend her my cell phone and she could call him to come and help her out. Then she quickly went on - "but his mobile phone is off, I can't reach him".

Hmmm. I knew I only had 300 crowns on me, well short of the 700 needed. If I wanted to trust her I could leave and find an ATM (there was one at my building just a few minutes away), get some money and come back. But that would take some time and the police might show up by then and take her somewhere else. Then one of those strange occurences - occured. I looked up and there in the station was an ATM, not 30 feet from where I was standing.*** I had never noticed it before. But I took it as some kind of sign and told her to wait and I would be right back. I walked over to the ATM and put in my card. While it was reading my card I began to worry "what if I can only get 1,000 crowns out of this thing. I don't think the metro police will make change".

Just then I heard the girl's voice behind. I turned to see the policewoman leading her away and the girl pleading "they are taking me somewhere else". They vanished around the corner.

I typed my PIN and, as luck would have it, while the machine didn't offer a 700 crown amount it did offer to spit out 600. I withdrew that and added 100 crowns from my wallet. I grabbed one of my business cards from my wallet and went to see if I could find them. Luckily, I turned the first corner and there was the girl and the policewoman - they had been joined by two Prague policeman.

I folded the bills so that they were smaller than my business card and walked up to her. I tapped her on the shoulder and handed her my business card, but in a way so that the others wouldn't see the money behind it. "Here is my card", I said, and then whispered that there was also 700 crowns if she needed it. And I turned and walked away. Her look as I turned was a mix of gratitude, relief and a little disbelief.

I didn't think much more about it the rest of the day and even forgot to tell Kathy about it when I got home (maybe because it would sound like a crazy thing to do). I had just cleaned up the dishes from dinner when my cell phone rang. That doesn't happen very often and so I wondered who it was. It was the girl from the metro. She had to use the 700 crowns for the fine and wanted to meet me the next day to pay me back. We agreed to meet in from of the National Muzeum right across from my office at 12 noon today.

She was right on time, and had her boyfriend and another girlfriend with her. She explained that the ticket she had bought at the airpotrt was indeed for a set time and that she had exceeded the time on the ticket by 3 minutes! All of this hassle for 3 minutes. The police had threatened to hold her for 24 hours if she hadn't paid the fine. All three of them were very nice and very grateful.

It was nice to act as a good samaritan, especially as an American. Also, I can't believe that Prague would allow this kind of treatment of tourists by it's police. It's not like tourism is important to the city or anything (//sarcasm//).

*** There was also an ATM even closer, just right around the corner, not 10 feet from where we were standing. I passed this one every day but only remembered it later.

The new Radio Free Europe building...

2008-04-09T20:16:00.005+02:00

I made a visit to the new building today, after about two months since I was last there. There is much progress but also much work to be done. Our technical guys will get in soon to start

Here is the building juxtaposed against the artist's concept on a billboard.

This is the view from inside the building looking up to the top of the atrium. Of course, it will look a little better when all of the scaffolding is gone.

You have to use your imagination to visualize it, but this is my future office. This is where the future magic will happen.

First anniversary of the blog...

2008-04-08T11:38:00.006+02:00

Tomorrow, April 9th, is the first anniversary of my first blog post here at www.tischlersinprague.blogspot.com. It was a riveting account of our Easter festivities. You can reminisce here.

In that one year I have posted 347 times, or about 95% of the days. I don't think that's too bad. If someone bothers to visit I feel that I should at least have something recent to offer. That's not to say that they were all quality posts - I am painfully aware that there were some clunkers and others that qualified merely as space fillers. Still, in the end the readers get what they pay for.

In the beginning I experimented with widgets, being generally fascinated with the variety available. I added headlines in the Czech republic and a basic hit counter. Later, I added pictures showing progress on the new Radio Free Europe building here in Prague.

What really got me excited, though, was when I added the capabilities of web-stat.com. After that I could not only see how many people were visiting, but where they were, what time and for how long they were at the blog, and how they found it, even down to the words they put into the Google search. That has made checking the blog much more interesting.

I am now up to over 1,000 hits per month, which is extremely modest as things go, but still much more than I ever thought I would reach with my little blog on our life in Prague. There are a few topics that I blogged on that keep bringing readers. Starbucks always generates a lot of interest. The Palladium mall fire, while not very interesting to my friends and family back home, brought (and still brings) a lot of English speakers to the blog since information on the fire and resulting shutdown of the mall was hard to come by. The same is true of the reporting on the murder of American Mike Murray in Prague by a drunk off-duty Prague policeman. If you are a friend of Mike's you know that there was very little information to be had (that is still the case) and all I did was accumulate it into a single spot.

Other posts that get a lot of continuing hits relate to places we have visited. The Colliseum in Rome and Terezin here in the Czech Republic have continued to draw readers over time. And, of course, my multiple posts on the fall of the US dollar seem to be of interest (despite how awful I have been at predicting where the dollar will go).

I will continue to post as long as the name - Tischlers in Prague - still applies. We don't know yet how long that will be, but while we are here we are enjoying the experience.

Noah's feet...

2008-04-06T16:14:00.005+02:00

It was cool and rainy today - the weather we were supposed to have yesterday for the birthday party but didn't (thank goodness) so after church we took a drive to Prague's first outlet mall that opened last fall. Noah needed new play shoes and we needed to find something reasonably priced. For his last pair we tried a Czech brand because they were quite a bit cheaper, but they only lasted a few months, so we decided to go back to a name brand

The outelt mall had stores for just about every brand of show that we are familiar with - Nike, Addidas, New Balance, Rebock, and others. Kathy said that the Rebocks ran a little wider and Noah has wide feet so we went there There was a sale going on and we were able to find a pair that he liked on sale for 1200 crowns (about $75, and that's a GOOD deal)

I know that Noah is getting big, but I wasn't prepared for the fact that he now wears a size 9 1/2 (European 42.5). I wear a 9. They say you can tell how big a dog will get by his paw size when he is a puppy. I wonder how big Noah will be at 18.

Noah's birthday party...

2008-04-05T20:45:00.008+02:00

Yeah, I know he turned ten years old six weeks ago. But we had visitors in town and also wanted the weather to be warmer, so here we are havinig his birthday party in April. All week the forecast for today was cool and rainy, so of course it was mild and partly cloudy - thank goodness.

We had six other boys invited to the party and so we had a long list of games to keep them occupied. In a fortuitous turn, Noah won one of several items that were raffled at his school a couple of weeks ago. What did he win? Free use of a large inflated bouncy castle, and a large custom made cake. (See the pictures).

Kathy's organizational and culinary skills were put to great use. Besides the list of games, she had each kid make their own personal pizza, and that was a hit. What kid doesn't like pizza? The kids seemed to have a good time and were well behaved. Two hours, though, was enough.

Here is Noah with the free cake he won in the school raffle.

Here is Noah with the free bouncy castle that he won in the school raffle. It was really big, but it inflated in only about a minute.

The obligatory blowing out of the candles on the cake. The cake is really about 30 cupcakes with loads of frosting. If we had paid for the cake the cost would have been $125 (which means, of course, that he wouldn't have had this cake).

Here I am giving instructions for the egg relay race. The non-American boys were bemused by the idea of racing carrying an egg on a spoon.

The Falling Dollar - April edition...

2008-04-04T13:12:00.002+02:00

It's another first week of the month, and no it's not April Fool's Day - I purposely didn't post about the dollar on the first. In a nutshell, over the last month we have had more of the same from the dollar - weakening. You can see from the graph that the trend is still lower. There was a brief recover from 16.0 to 16.5 in the middle of the month, but that was just the dollar mocking us before it turned and continued its slide. As I write this the dollar is below 16 again, standing at 15.94. When we arrived in Prague in August of 2006 we could get about 23 Czech crowns (koruni) for one dollar, now we can only get around 16, a 30% drop.

Today's Prague Daily Monitor reports that the Czech government is going to get proactive in moderating the crown's strength. While the dollar has fallen tremendously to the crown, the crown has also grown stronger against the Euro, but at a slower pace.

Measures against strong crown to be established in a week
prepared by Prague Daily Monitor editorial staff / published 4 April 2008
An agreement concerning the excessive strengthening of the Czech currency being put together by Ministry of Finance and Czech National Bank should be ready in a week. E15 informs that the aim of the agreement is to freeze the flow of foreign currency into the Czech economy.

We'll see how much this helps - and how quickly.

Baseball in the Czech Republic...

2008-04-03T09:19:00.004+02:00

Major League Baseball has opened the 2008 season, and it looks to be a long season for my Minnesota Twins, especially with the departure of ace pitcher Johann Santana. Baseball is a fairly obscure sport in the Czech Republic, but obscure does not mean non-existent. There is a web site - in English! - for baseball news and information in the Czech Republic and throughout Europe. It is called mister-baseball.com. Here is the link to the Czech Republic page.

Mile high (less 30 feet) tower planned for Saudi Arabia...

2008-04-02T21:27:00.006+02:00

The Daily Mail of London reports:

Plans for a mile-high tower in the Saudi Arabian desert have been unveiled by the billionaire owner of London's Savoy Hotel.

It is being planned for a new city near the Red Sea port of Jeddah. Behind the scheme is 51-year-old Prince al-Walid bin Talal, who bought the Savoy for £1.25billion in 2005.

The plan gives the Middle East a clear lead over Asian countries and the U.S., who have vied in the past to construct the world's tallest buildings.

None of the other skyscrapers under construction, including New York's Freedom Tower on the World Trade Centre site, will exceed 2,296ft.

Experts say the technical challenges are enormous. Much of the lifting will be carried out by helicopters, which will also be used as commuter transport for builders.

The tower will have to be capable of withstanding a wide range of temperatures, with its top baking in the desert sun by day but dropping to well below freezing at night.

To resist the strong winds prevalent in the area and stop it swaying, giving its occupants a form of high-rise seasickness, it will be fitted with a giant computer-operated damper.

Two "mini-towers" - both taller than Canary Wharf - will be built on either side of the main tower.

Linked to it by elevated walkways, they will anchor it and act as stabilisers.
I'm thinking this is a joke. I lived in Saudi Arabia for three years and I am familiar with the construction quality there, which could charitably be called "low cost", but is really "low tech" and could be called just "shoddy". It's what you get when most of your workers are from dirt poor countries and they are only living and working there to send a little money back home to their struggling families.

It's true that I haven't been to Saudi Arabia for about eight years, but I doubt things have changed much. If the tower is actually built and is one mile high, I wouldn't live within a one mile radius of the building (just in case).

Grant's Prague Bike Blog...

2008-04-01T09:01:00.006+02:00

An American co-worker here at RFE/RL has a blog dedicated to biking. He is a journalist by profession so it's not too surprising that his blog is very well written. Here's the link to it. It also has the benefit of being focused pretty much on a single topic (unlike mine, which flits around to and fro like the feather in Forest Gump). Amyway, Grant's blog is often linked in the Prague Daily Monoitor, as it was today.

Grant has a very interesting story about a bike ride to Okor, where he stumbled upon a childrens' fair with a small old merry-go-round and a shooting gallery from 1895. Here's the video of the shooting gallery:

Look at the whole post and the rest of Grant's blog. I'm adding it to my ever growing list of blogs on the left side of the page.

We're #12!!...

2008-03-31T17:03:00.003+02:00

Most popular cities with tourists by TripAdvisor.com data:

City, country Number of votes
1. New York, USA 291,870
2. Paris, France 278,663
3. London, Great Britain 260,417
4. Rome, Italy 160,207
5. Barcelona, Spain 140,234
6. San Francisco, USA 126,000
7. Las Vegas, USA 120,412
8. Amsterdam, Netherlands 107,898
9. Venice, Italy 106,859
10. Orlando, USA 91,965
11. Sydney, Australia 87,973
12. Prague, CzechRep 84,684
13. Florence, Italy 82,982
14. Hong Kong, China 71,293
15. Berlin, Germany 63,919

Prague obviously can't compete with the likes of New York, Paris, London and Rome so I pretty much agree with the rankings generated by TripAdvisor.com. Las Vegas and Orlando should really be in their own category since the experiences to be had there are so different. I'm a little surprised that Amsterdam is higher than Prague, but all in all a good list. [One question, where is Beijing? Maybe it's too hard to get to].

Prague 12th most popular city with tourists

Prague is the twelfth most popular city in the world with tourists, according to a poll of the TripAdvisor.com. portal of whose users nearly 85,000 said they liked Prague the best.

The top three cities were New York, Paris and London.

Six European cities got ahead of Prague, as well as four US cities and Sydney, Australia.

No other Czech city or town made it into the top 100 chart.

TripAdvisor.com surveys rank among the most closely watched in the tourist area. Nearly 30 million users visit the portal each month.

Over 4 million foreign tourists visited Prague last year, which ranks the Czech capital among the top five cities in Europe.

Source: TripAdvisor.com

Paint ball for 10 year olds...

2008-03-29T14:19:00.010+01:00

Noah went to a classmate's birthday party today. The whole class of 17 kids was invited. Surprisingly, the party included 2 hours of outdoor paintball using the normal guns and safety equipment. Even more surprisingly, it is a girl in the class having the party. We suspect that the father may be living precariously through the girl, but maybe the little girl loves paint ball.

They were going to have 30 minutes of safety training before they actually went into mortal paint ball combat, but my expereince tells me that 10 year olds aren't capabable of absorbing information related to safety. The paint ball portion of the party ends in a few minutes and we haven't received a call yet, so we have our fingers crossed that they are all OK.

Noah and his classmates get safety instructions on the paint ball rules equipment.

The paint ball grounds (field? course?) next door had the typical teenaged boys in full combat mode.

The paint ball grounds are on an island in the Vltava, just south of the city. Even with the Garmin we decided not to drive, but there is no direct way to get there using public transportation. We ended up driving to the Dejvicka metro station and hopping on a tram that we thought would take us all the way to the island, except that on weekends its route ends about a mile short of our destination. So we had to transfer to another tram to get us the rest of the way, and then it was a 15 minute walk after that. A trip of about an hour and twenty minutes to go less than 10 miles. I miss the wastfull American way of just getting in a car to go anywhere quickly, because after all the most important thing is convenience.

Here is the church of Saints Peter and Paul at Vysehrad as seen through one of the fake buildings set up at the paint ball course.

Here is Vysehrad as seen from the island as we walked back to the tram after dropping Noah off.

Palladium Mall - final update...

2008-03-28T09:19:00.005+01:00

To the average consumer things are back to normal at the Palladium mall. They opened last Thursday, one month after a fire took out the power distribution system. Our visit last Saturday revealed throngs of customers, but it was the long Easter weekend so there were more shoppers than usual everywhere.

The Prague Post had an article from Wednesday that delved into the problems that tenants are having recouping their losses from the shutdown. The link to the full atticle is here.

Here are a few exerpts from the article:

Initial complaints by the mall’s shops and restaurants prompted the Palladium’s management to forgive the rent obligations of all its lessees for the month that it was closed. At 150 euros ($236/3,822 Kč) per square meter, the rent is one of the highest in the city. What didn’t come with this pardon was any willingness to compensate its tenants for lost profits. Most shops have insurance to cover their claims, or at least they should.

While the mall was closed, most businesses were still paying salaries to employees. And the Palladium’s many fashion boutiques were unable to sell their winter stocks, which are now out of date and have to be replaced.

And of course I have to address the situation with the new Starbucks at the Palladium. From the article:

Just a day before the fire started, Starbucks opened its first coffee shop at the Palladium. Exactly one month later, the company gave away free coffee treats to customers.Now the company is trying to be patient as its insurance company finishes its analysis and calculates losses. Starbucks, which operates in a joint-venture with Poland’s AmRest, will try to reclaim lost profits from its insurer. Should that fail, it will turn to the Palladium’s insurer as a last resort.

Unless there is another fire (or perhaps a plague of locusts or frogs) this will be my last post on the Palladium mall fire.

Another semester over at ISP...

2008-03-27T21:03:00.009+01:00

Late last week we had the teacher conference for the end of the second (winter) semester at ISP. This time, though, instead of sitting with the teacher and having her go over how each student had performed the student, the student led the conference.

This was very interesting as each student spent ten minutes with their parents on each of four stations - math, science, social studies and a summary of the work that had been done all semester. The teacher, Ms. Light, was on hand to keep things moving, but the student was responsible for covering the information. Noah is a bit of a ham and is very proud of the work he has done. It was fun and the 40+ minutes flew by.

The one section included a review of his report card. He did well, but had a drop in the area of classroom behavior. He seems to be developing the attitudes normally associated with teenagers at 10 years old. We are hoping to keep the attitude problems at bay with a combination of positive and negative reinforcement, but I fear it will be a losing battle. We'll see.

Noah's web site for class work. Each student has their own web site. Boy, they sure learn this stuff young.

Noah builds and demonstrates an electrical circuit as part of the science module.

Noah shows us his timeline of significant events over the past 2,000 years (all the back to BCE - Before the Common Era, instead of BC - Before Christ).

Shocking Story! US Schools Trail World In Child Soldier Aptitude...

2008-03-26T09:38:00.006+01:00

I hope that you have realized that this is satire from The Onion. I am familiar with their "newspaper" but was not aware that they were now doing videos. There are many available on YouTube, including stories such as

- Diebold Accidentally Leaks Results Of 08 Election
- Press Secretary Spins Wife's Death As A Positive
- Army Holds Annual Bring Your Daughter To War Day
- Anonymous Hero Donates Hospital 200 Human Kidneys

I think I was born 30 years too soon.

Two more recommended blogs...

2008-03-25T15:17:00.002+01:00

I am adding the web site czechmatediary.com to my list of blogs to keep tabs on. It is written by a Czech woman living in the US and has information on a variety of subjects, including the US dollar and movies. Czech it out.

The Czech Mate Diary blog was recommended to me by another local blogger, Michael Carøe Andersen, who is a Danish entrepreneur living in Prague. I have also linked to Michael's blog on the left side of the page. He has a great story about a web site that tracks tap beer prices in Prague, and some great photos from a recent walk about Prague (he obviously has a better camera than I do). Please take a look at his site as well.

How to find the cheap beer!

The Lent diet is over...

2008-03-24T07:34:00.001+01:00

Lent - the period of the Catholic calendar from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday - is meant to be a period of reflection and fasting as good Catholics prepare for the Easter celebration of the resurrection of Christ. For the last several years as my Lenten sacrifice I have given up both alocohol and sweets. It has gone from something that I dread to something I actually look forward to.

It does take a little adjustment, though. In the evening after putting Noah to bed I usually have one beer or one drink. For the first few days I have to fight the force of habit and not have a beer, but then I get used to the new status quo and it becomes easy.

Giving up sweets is a little easier since there are so many sugar free substitutes now. I allow myself sugar free gum, sugar free jello and diet soda.

One of the non-spiritual benefits I noticed from the first year is that giving up alcohol and sweets made me lose weight. The weight loss has varied from year to year, but is always noticeable and last year it was 8 pounds. When I got on the scale yesterday (Easter) morning, the loss for the 46 days of Lent was 11 pounds.

Someday I am going to write a book called The Lenten Diet and make a fortune, but until then I will have to be satisfied with having my clothes fit better for a portion of the year.

Starbucks in Prague update...

2008-03-23T09:49:00.003+01:00

The blog receives quite a few hits based on google searches looking for information on Starbucks in Prague. I'm not sure why. But, always give the customers (even nonpaying customers) what they want, so here is an update on Starbucks stores in Prague.

The first Starbucks opened on Malostranska namesti back in late January. I obviously have no access to company records but based on anecdotal information from friends and our own observations, this location has been very successful. Even opening at the absolute low season here in Prague it has always been busy when we have been there. Business this weekend should be booming with hordes of tourists (mostly from Europe) visiting Prague over the long Easter weekend. The cool weather and snow flurries should also help hot beverage sales.

The second Starbucks opened in the Palladium mall last month. Unfortunately, the day after they opened the mall experienced its fire which closed the mall for weeks, reopening just within the last few days. The Starbucks at Palladium was doing a good business yesterday afternoon and it would seem to be a good location assuming no more serious problems at Palladium. It is located one level below the main entrance, so you see it right away when you enter, but you have to go down a level to reach it.

The third Starbucks has opened at the Prague airport in terminal 1. I haven't heard anything about this location yet - other than it is open.

I will post when I hear of additional locations, which are expected to be numerous.

The Palladium mall is open again...

2008-03-22T16:58:00.003+01:00

Noah and I stopped by the Palladium this afternoon and it was open and very busy. It was supposed to open last Thursday, and I don't know if it did, but it was certainly doing a thriving business today.

We walked around the top floor food court and all of the restauants were open - none appear to have been permanently closed as a result of the lengthy mall shutdown caused by a fire in the power equipment room. The only business we saw that was definitely closed for good was a little cafe on a lower floor at the back of the mall that we had visited with Kathy's family in early October. It was good and I'm disappointed that it closed. I'm surprised there weren't more casualties.

Friend's visit and St. Vitus Cathedral...

2008-03-22T09:35:00.006+01:00

A good friend from Minnesota is visiting this week. Yesterday we spent the day sight seeing, starting at the castle and St. Vitus cathedral, then down to Malestronska namesti, the Charles bridge, Old Town square (we climbed to the top of the astronomical clock) and then the Jewish quarter.

Barbara up at the castle.

From the top of the tower at the Charles bridge.

Views from the inside of St. Vitus cathedral.

More on the Czech Easter tradition of beating women with sticks...

2008-03-20T14:36:00.001+01:00

Tomorrow is Good Friday and the start of Easter weekend, so it's a good time to discuss the Czech tradition of pomlazka takes place on the Monday after Easter. Here is some of (American married to Czech) Emily Prucha's article from the March 14th Prague Daily Monitor on an American woman's reaction to the tradition.

Whipping Easter into the 21st century
By Emily Prucha / Prague Daily Monitor / Published 14 March 2008
My first information about Easter in the Czech Republic, in spring of 2003, was relayed to me by my English students at the time. They told me there was no Easter bunny and no traditions involving Jesus.

At first I was surprised by this. Prague is filled with churches, primarily Catholic churches of historic significance. But in reality, the majority of Czechs are not religious, a sentiment in the country that was prevalent even before the banning of religion under Communism. In his article “God at Large” published on Christianity.com (Spring 2003), Philip Yancey outlined different phases of a country’s Christian life. The Czech Republic, Yancey claimed is in a “divorced” phase. Vying with Denmark as having the lowest rate of church attendance in the world, the Czech Republic lays only ceremonial claims to the Roman Catholic Easter tradition.

The pomlazka, as these braided willow branches are called in Czech, are...but one of the primary traditional objects of the secular Czech Easter holiday, celebrated on the Monday following the Christian Easter Sunday. The pomlazka dates back to pre-Christian times and is a symbol of health, fertility and springtime.

While this seemed lovely and benign, I was taken aback when my student Jana told me of her Easter plans to spend the weekend at her family's cottage in the countryside. “It’s going to be terrible!" she complained. "All my father’s friends will come to our house. I’ll have to hide upstairs and keep the lights off.” She groaned and shook her head. What was she talking about, I wondered to myself.

From my other students, I learned Easter Monday was generally embraced by one-half of the Czech population—men and boys, who go door to door singing Easter carols, demanding "treats" (eggs, chocolate, liquor, or a peck on the cheek) and the right to beat the women with their pomlazka whips for good luck. While my female students said they generally enjoyed decorating Easter eggs and preparing Easter sweets, none seemed too fond of the pomlazka or gendered traditions.

According to the pre-Christian tradition, good health, beauty and fertility are assured in the upcoming year to those women who are whipped. More modern tradition holds that the bearer of the “beating” comes equipped with an Easter chant, which includes the following lines, “Give us dyed eggs. If you don’t give dyed, give at least white. The hen will lay a new one for you.” Usually the whippings are a lighthearted token of the tradition. From noon on, originally, the women anointed the men with perfumed oil, but in modern times the oil treatment has more often than not been replaced with buckets of ice cold water.

After noon on Easter Monday, you can see groups of boy coming home, exchanging their experiences and showing off their loot, as well as groups of dripping wet, drunken teenagers and men stumbling home after them.

On Easter Monday 2003, my stroll through the Old Town resulted in nothing but empty vendor stands and not a pomlazka in sight. Wanting to have a better sense of the festivities, I joined my boyfriend Radek and his friends for a drive into the country. The real celebrating goes on in the small towns and villages, they assured me. After a pleasant drive we arrived at family friend’s cottage and knocked on the door. Since my trip mates were Czech and male, they were greeted with decorated eggs and shots of liquor.

Being both female and a foreigner, I presented a problematic situation. Should our hostess offer me chocolate eggs and liquor as she did her male friends? Should she offer me nothing? In the end, I was given a warm welcome and a glass of red wine. Was this group of family and friends representative of a traditional Czech Easter? I wasn’t sure. For one thing, my male friends didn’t bring pomlazkas and the females didn’t hide in the attic.

Freezing Prague...

2008-03-19T09:04:00.005+01:00

Well, the temperatures in Prague have dipped in recent days to the low 30s, and there is a dusting of snow on the ground for the first time in two months, but the "Prague freezing" that i'm talking about isn't related to the weather.

"Freezings" have occured in other cities before - New York, Paris and even Portland - and involve a flash mob showing up at a predetermined location and then standing still and quiet, freezing" for two minutes.

We had our first Prague freezing yesterday at the Muzeum metro station at 5:09 PM. I was in the same metro station at 5:32 PM so I missed the event by about 20 minutes. What did I miss? Well, thanks to YouTube here is a video from last night's freezing.

The Prague Daily Monitor reports on the freezing today. It's an interesting article, but I have to admit that it seems to me that this is justproof that a bunch of slackers habe too much time on their hands. This is just a varient of the chinese fire drills that we used to do with friends in cars at intersections. The article doesn't mention any motive, such as protest, so maybe it's supposed to be performance art. But as I have told people before, if I could do it then it is by definition not art.

Freezing Prague 2008: Hundreds block metro station
By Jan Flemr / Prague Daily Monitor / Published 19 March 2008

Hundreds of Czechs, mostly in their early twenties, flooded and then literally blocked access to the Muzeum metro station from Wenceslas Square after 5pm Tuesday. They all wanted to freeze.

Following the example of the public stunts held in New York's Grand Central Station in January and in London's Trafalgar Square a month later, the organisers sent out e-mails to recruit participants. But things got out of hand.

The idea behind the "flash mob" event was to bring together people who would "freeze" in the same place at the same moment and hold for two minutes. "If you are eating a banana, freeze with the banana in your mouth!" read the invitation.

"At 17:09 a man dressed all in orange will move around the [metro station] vestibule to alert all the people that the flash mob will start soon," said the message. The "Orange Man", wearing an orange tracksuit with a hood, appeared bang on time. He was visibly surprised by the crowd that he had to fight his way through. Then he raised his arm and the mob froze and fell silent.

"Where are you?" one of the rare passers-by who dared to force their way through the crowd cried, drawing a few smiles. Someone laughed out loud. "Máňo!" called another, prompting more laughs. Two policemen stood nearby, watching incredulously.

Then the Orange Man moved, and the crowd started to disperse. Several people clapped, and a small group around the man in the tracksuit made a speedy – considering the circumstances – retreat to Wenceslas Square. On the way out, the Orange Man took off his hood as if to puzzle the crowd that was chasing him with cameras held high.

A while later, resting at the foot of the St Wenceslas statue, the Orange Man, who refused to give his real name, said, "I thought it was for 30 to 40 people, not for 1,500." He was exaggerating, but when asked about his estimate, he just shrugged: "Many. I have no idea."

And, asked if he was happy with the outcome, he was quick with a response. "No. It should have been different."

The next freezing event is scheduled to take place in two months, said a young man standing next to the Orange Man. "Next time it will be strictly unofficial," he added, still shaking his head in disbelief.

Early Easter celebration...

2008-03-18T13:01:00.001+01:00

Last Sunday wasn't just Palm Sunday, it was also Easter. Let me explain. This Friday is Good Friday, and is a holiday for most in the Czech Republic. Many (like me) also get Easter Monday off. That's a four day weekend, and many families will use the long weekend as an opportunity to travel somewhere. Our friends our going to Berlin and Istanbul and Venice, and so won't be here Easter weekend. So the decision was made to celebrate Easter a week early to afford the kids an opportunity to hunt Easter eggs and consume mass quantities of candy. [Note: This early celebration was not sanctioned by the Pontiff].

Here are some pictures of the festivities. Not pictured here are the Peeps (marshmallow chicks) that someone had brought from the States (since they aren't available here). Alas, I had none, since I am on my Lent diet and am still shunning all alcohol and sweets. An attempt was made to convince me that since we were celebrating Easter that I could forego the diet, but I was unconvinced.

Palm Sunday...

2008-03-16T21:13:00.005+01:00

Yesterday was Palm Sunday and we again joined the procession of the combined, Czech, English and Spanish communities within the parish. We met at the Church of the Infant Jesus at 9:30 a.m. and then the procession, with a child on a donkey representing Christ, journeyed to St. Thomas church, passing other churches within the parish along the way. The procession only took about 15 minutes and was a walk of just about six blocks.

Here is the inside of the Church of the Infant Jesus (also known as the Church of the lady Victorious). The web site angelfire.com has this to say about the church: The history of the Infant Jesus of Prague started in the 17th century when a statue of the Infant Jesus was brought into Bohemia (now the Czech Republic) and eventually was given to the Discalced Carmelites in Prague. Since then, the statue has remained in Prague and has drawn many devotees worldwide to go and honor the Holy Child. It has been said that many graces, blessings, favors and miraculous healings have been received by many who petitioned before the Infant Jesus. In 1776 the altar was rebuilt using marble and two huge sculptures of the Blessed Virgin Mary and Saint Joseph were placed to the left and right sides of the altar. The Holy Infant was kept in a glass case standing on a pedestal engraved with crystals, and surrounding the Infant are twenty angels in gold.

The procession wound through back streets an near to the Charles bridge on its way to St. Thomas. Many tourists seemed surprised to have stumbled across the procession, not sure what it was (a parade?) and quickly snapped pictures.

The procession and boy on the donkey (in red) approach St. Thomas. The web site for the Church of St. Thomas is here, and includes church history.

Biking in Horomerice...

2008-03-16T07:42:00.005+01:00

It was a nice day on Saturday - cloudless sky and low 50s. Noah and I decided to take a little bike ride on our usual route, from our house to a little path that runs to the forest just outside Nebusice. We don't go all the way to Nebusice, just to a spa at the top of the hill at the edge of the forest. It's not that far, probably about a mile and a half, but it's a pretty ride and no traffic.

Later in the day we all took a drive to a neighborhood on the hill (there are lots of hills in and around Prague) near Dejvicka, where we pick up the metro at the end of the green line. The neighborhood is called Hanspaulka, and it's very nice with sweeping views of the Prague skyline, including the Castle and the TV tower.

The house we are renting in Horomerice has been sold and the new owners plan on living in it, so when our lease is up at the end of August we will have to move one way or the other. We can either go back to Minnesota (or elsewhere in the States) or find another place to live in Prague. If we stay in Prague we will probably have to go to an apartment rather than a house or townhouse like we have now because of the cost.

I get a housing allowance of $1,500 per month, which was about 35,000 Czech crowns when we moved here two years ago, but now is worth about 26,000 crowns. Rent for houses anywhere near the international school (like we have now) are high already and the falling dollar makes them unaffordable to us. So the most likely solution would be to move into an apartment in a nice neighborhood within the city but with good access to the international school. That describes Hanspaulka.

Hanspaulka is the Twin Cities equivalent of the Grand and Summit neighborhoods. It has large villas that have been split into apartments. The villas have decent sized yards, which is unusual for within the city.

Bowling in Horomerice...

2008-03-14T09:45:00.004+01:00

The weekend before last we had another bowling party at the local alley and restaurant in our litle village of Horomerice. There are only four lanes so it is usually crowded, especially in the winter.

We rented two lanes for an hour and the kids bowled on one and the adults on the other. I bowled in the 170s, which is higher than the 150 that I usually bowl. When we move back to the States I may get in a bowling league again. I still have the bowling ball that I bought in 7th grade, but I would probably upgrade. Bowling, like golf, has been greatly influenced by technology and just using the latest and greatest tools will inprove scores.

Anyway, Noah did better this time. Even though the bumpers were up to prevent gutter balls he was able to (mostly) throw the ball down the middle, and actually got a strike or two.

After bowling it was upstairs to the restaurant for dinner. For a bowling alley the restauant is excellent and reasonably priced. We made reservations ahead of time and they actually took our orders while we were still bowling, which worked out well. The only problem came when two in our group ordered a chicken dish, even though it was on the menu, they no longer served. The staff decided, instead of going back and having the two people reorder, to substitute a different dish with pork. This might have worked had the two people not been Jewish. The dish had pork, ham and bacon, so it was pretty obvious that the couldn't eat it. Anyway, they replaced the meals with a different chicken dish, but it took 30 minutes to prepare those.

A nice Thursday lunch...

2008-03-13T16:00:00.005+01:00

Kathy and I met for lunch today at a nice place called Parliament, near Old Town square. Kathy had found the place when she and her friends stopped for lunch while they were in Prague.

The place is small but well appointed - lots of dark wood. The menu has listings in English and Russian in addition to Czech, and the waiter spoke very good English.

The most notable thing abuot the restaurant was the service. The waiter came promptly and took our drink order (just 2 Coke Lights) and when he brought those (also promptly) he took our food order. The food arrived in about 10 minutes, which is lightning fast around these parts.

I had basic pork roast with potatoe dumplings and sauerkraut, and everything was fantastic. The pork was tender with a nice light gravy, the dumplings were light compared to most I've had from other places, and the sauerkraut was obvioulsy very fresh. Good portion size, too.

The total bill came to about 240 crowns, or about $15 (not bad, but that same 240 crowns would have cost us just a little over $10 when we first got to Prague).

About the only negative was the amount of smoke in the air, and that is just a fact of life when dining out in Prague during winter. Once the outdoor cafes open it's much nicer - less smoke, better views, great weather.

Kathy and I try to meet for lunch or morning coffee at least once a month. It's a real treat.

Malostranska namesti...

2008-03-12T21:20:00.008+01:00

We did the usual Sunday school and Mass last weekend. I had the camera with me in case Kathy and I went for a walk while Noah was at Sunday school, but we decided to go for coffee instead since it was chilly. However, after Mass we were waiting for the #20 tram at Malostranska namesti that takes us back to Dejvicka where we park the car, and I decided to take a series of pictures form that one spot.

The Easter markets are open now. Maolstranska namesti is quite small compared to Old Town square and Wenceslas square, and even Namesti miru. But they have room for half a dozen or so stalls.

There was a brisk business on the square, being noon on a Sunday. The new Starbucks is in the background - it was busy as always.

This is a fresco (mural?) on the other side of the street from the Easter market stalls. I am not sure what the building is, but it sure is a pretty work of art.

Some of the other buildings along the small square.

Palladium Mall fire cause - Nothing to see here...

2008-03-11T08:54:00.006+01:00

Today's article in the Prague Daily Monitor happily reports that no one was to blame for the fire that seriously damaged the mall's electrical systems and forced a closure since February 20. It was just a "technical defect" that "could happen anywhere". I guess these things just happen. Really, though, equipment that is less than 6 months old shouldn't have this kind of defect.

The rumor mill had been pushing several possible base causes for the fire (all unsubstantiated as far as I know) including that a subcontractor who had not been paid left the job without the work being done which caused the fire, or that a replacement subcontractor was brought in and, not being familiar with the power system, did something to cause damage to the system that resulted in the fire.

At least the mall owner has decided that the tenants won't have to pay rent for the time that the mall is closed. It seemed a bit harsh to charge rent when the landord couldn't even have the mall operating.

Oh, and they are still shooting for a reopening by Easter, actually by March 20th, which is the Thursday before Easter. Many offices are closed on Good Friday (March 21) and the Monday after Easter (March 24) so that long weekend would generate some good business. I say that there is only a 50/50 chance that the mall will be open by Easter.

Here is today's article in the Prague Daily Monitor:

Palladium to waive rent
By DOMINIKA PATROVSKÁ, ZUZANA LUŇÁKOVÁ / HOSPODÁŘSKÉ NOVINY / Published 11 March 2008 Translated with permission by the Prague Daily Monitor

Nobody will face charges for the 20 February fire in Prague's Palladium mall. "The blaze was caused by a technical defect," Vít Pernica, head of the Prague fire department, told the Czech News Agency.

The shopping mall will reopen by Easter, said Palladium spokeswoman Veronika Kozová. The fire hit the power distribution system. The damaged equipment now needs a repair or replacement, and the systems must be checked.

"It could happen anywhere, no human error was involved," Pernica said. He added that Palladium did not even make mistakes in fire protection, criticised by Asis International, an organisation of security professionals. The organisation said the mall should have been divided into zones and equipped with a backup power source.

Preliminary estimates put the losses at CZK 200 million [ED. over $12 million], Hospodářské noviny reported earlier.

"Our winter collection is in the store. Nobody will buy it three weeks from now," says Miroslav Hájek from the C&A clothes chain.

Still, the Palladium owner will not compensate the 170 shops and 30 cafes for lost profits, saying the contractors must have insurance against a shutdown.

But the owner said retailers would not have to pay rent during the four-week shutdown. "The decision is a result of our negotiations with insurers," Kozová said.

"We will not pay the rent but we still have to pay the marketing fees to Palladium. The mall plans to launch a big marketing campaign shortly after it reopens," says Jakub Střeštík of the Starbucks chain, which has two cafes in Palladium.

"We didn't receive any specific information at a meeting last Friday. But the shopping centre already confirmed it was starting trial operation and wanted to reopen on 20 March," Střeštík adds.

Prague's newest shopping mall has been closed since 20 February when a fire broke out on its underground storey, cutting the centre off from electric power. The chief contractor of Palladium was the Czech branch of the Austrian builder Strabag.

European Property Development (EPD) bought Palladium, former barracks in Prague's Náměstí Republiky, from the Defence Ministry for CZK 911 million in 1994. The company invested another CZK 6.6 billion to rebuild the centre. Last year, EPD sold the mall to Hannover Leasing for EUR 530 million.

Originally published in Czech in Hospodáŕské noviny and translated into English by Monitor CE.
Republished in the Prague Daily Monitor in cooperation with iHNed.cz.

Music Videos that Suck...

2008-03-09T15:37:00.005+01:00

I came about this new blog called Music Videos that Suck. It looks like it just got underway on March 1st. Anyway, here is the link if you want to take a peak. I will also add it to my list of links on the left side of the page.

Fittingly, the first post of this blog was on the music video for Video Killed the Radio Star, by the Buggles. Every one should know that this was the first music video shown on MTV when it went on cable on August 1st, 1981.

From Wikipedia:

"Video Killed the Radio Star", released in late 1979, was the 444th number one in the UK charts, spending one week at the top and shooting Buggles to fame. At the time of the single's original release Buggles did not actually have an album's worth of material to record, and so they wrote most of the other tracks for their debut album The Age of Plastic (1980) while travelling around Europe promoting "Video Killed the Radio Star".

The novelty value of the song led to the Buggles' being perceived as being a one-hit wonder (three subsequent singles also charted, although they were largely ignored by radio and did not perform well), but its success was sufficient to launch both members of the band onto successful careers. The video for the song, directed by Russell Mulcahy, was the first video aired on MTV two years later, at midnight on the 1st of August 1981.

What have the Tischlers been up to?...

2008-03-08T22:02:00.003+01:00

Now much, apparently. If you have looked over the blog lately most of my posts have dealt not with the goings on of the Tischlers but on other things - the fall of the dollar, the fire and closing of the Palladium mall, the arrival of Starbucks in Prague, and the recent murder of a visiting American, Mike Murray.

I was wondering why so many of my posts have addressed more general news items and have not been more family specific. Then I realized that we just having been doing much. Over the winter we tend to stay in and that isn't much grist for posting.

I started posting last April, so spring had already arrived and we were doing all kinds of things in and around Prague. Once winter came, though, we didn't do that much. Sure, we had trips that I posted about - to Berchtesgaden, Rome and Dresden. But our daily actitivities in Prague have been pretty dull. Even the old stalwart of Noah's sports activities has been slow. He was signed up for Saturday basketball but the coach got sick so the start has been delayed several weeks.

We had couple of Kathy's friends visit last month, and I have a friend visiting in two weeks and those visits are always good for a few posts (including the obligatory visit to U Flecku). And we're not that far away from spring which means the opening of the sidewalk cafes and the recommencememt of our little trips in and around Prague which I can post about.

If the weather is good tomorrow morning Kathy and I will take our little Sunday stroll while Noah is at Sunday school. If the weather is too cold or rainy we will probably end up at a cafe for a cup of coffee instead (but probably not at Starbucks this time).

Palladium Mall update (Starbucks was open for just one day before the fire)...

2008-03-07T09:31:00.006+01:00

I wrote in an earlier post that I doubted that the Palladium would reopen by Easter (March 23rd) and it now appears that I was right. A Palladium spokeswoman now says that "I think Easter is an unrealistic date".

Also, it turns out that Starbucks opened its second store in Prague (the first was at Malostranska namesti last month) at the Palladium the day before the fire occured. Fortunately, Starbucks is a multi-billion dollar company that can absorb the costs of a prolonged shutdown. It is likely that may other shops and restaurants at the Palladium that don't have such deep pockets will be able to survive without some kind of insurance or legal settlement.

Here is the latest from today's Prague Daily Monitor.

Losses at closed Palladium reach CZK 200m
By ZUZANA LUŇÁKOVÁ / HOSPODÁŘSKÉ NOVINY / Published 7 March 2008
Translated with permission by the Prague Daily Monitor

The fire that started on an underground storey in Prague's Palladium shopping centre two weeks ago caused more damage than initially estimated. Preliminary estimates put the losses at CZK 200 million, and lawyers and insurers say the Palladium itself should cover the damage.

The shopping centre has so far insisted that the leaseholders' insurers should pay.

"The leaseholders are insured against a shutdown due to fire. But this does not concern losses on rent and profits," says Tomáš Kratochvíl, the executive of Claims Adjusters, which represents clients in dealings with insurers.

He adds that if it turns out the fire was caused by a wiring defect, the Palladium's insurance should cover the losses, according to law. Several other companies from the shopping centre have already asked Claims Adjusters for assistance.

The Palladium's 170 shops and 30 bars and cafes are calculating damages, but it is already clear the sum will not be low. "Our losses are in the millions of crowns," says Libor Kytýr from Ahold, which runs the Albert supermarket in the centre.

Cell phone, clothes and coffee shops are also calculating losses. "The total loss estimate is about CZK 200 million," says Kratochvíl.

Shop and restaurant owners are also suggesting the Palladium should pay.

"So far, our insurers have told us we should negotiate coverage with the Palladium," says Jakub Střeštík from Starbucks, which runs two cafes at the centre. The company's priority is still to strike a deal with the centre, he adds, so it will continue to comply with all obligations, including rent payments.

Starbucks was hit hard by the shutdown because it opened its cafes during a marketing campaign one day before the fire.

The shopping centre isn't jumping to action for the moment. "We are in talks with lawyers and insurers, and opinions differ. Of course, we do have liability insurance," says Palladium spokeswoman Veronika Kozová, adding that investigations over the cause of the fire are still under way.

Nobody has said whether Strabag, the chief contractor, has already given the owner the technology units on which the wire defect could have happened. Strabag still runs parts of the centre.

"We will not comment on the situation," said Strabag spokeswoman Miroslava Köhlerová.

Lawyers say the Palladium may exact the damages from Strabag in the end. "We will wait for the investigations to end and deal with potential claims only then," said Kozová.

She says it will be impossible to calculate the losses until the centre has reopened. "We expect this to happen before Easter," Kozová adds.

But the leaseholders are reluctant to believe this. "If the transformer has burnt out, it will take several weeks. Then there must be further checks. I think Easter is an unrealistic date," said a shop owner who wished to go unnamed.

Originally published in Czech in Hospodáŕské noviny and translated into English by Monitor CE. Republished in the Prague Daily Monitor in cooperation with iHNed.cz.

Inflation in the Czech Republic (February)...

2008-03-06T08:44:00.003+01:00

The Prague Monitor reports on new inflation data for February. It's not good news for expats paid in dollars and points to a further weakening of the dollar versus the koruna. Inflation is high, growth is strong (so far), and unemployment is low which is leading to higher union demands and bidding up of salaries. This all points to a tightening of the money supply by raising interest rates. Here is the story.

Analysts: February inflation flat at 7.5%
By ČTK / Published 6 March 2008

Prague, March 5 (CTK) - Inflation in the Czech Republic remained at January's 7.5 percent in February, according to analysts polled by CTK.

Unemployment dropped to 5.9-to-6 percent in February from January's 6.1 percent, they said.

The inflation data will be published by the Czech Statistical Office and the jobless data by the Labour and Social Affairs Ministry on Monday.

UniCredit Bank analyst Pavel Sobisek said inflation did not accelerate in February thanks to the firming Czech crown.

Raiffeisenbank analyst Ales Michl said if the inflation figure is higher than the market expects the crown may firm further [Ed. - this would be bad for the dollar].

"Inflation still remains far from the central bank's inflation target and there is still the risk that it may be projected into inflation expectations and wage demands. This would be a factor against an interest rate cut in the near future. On the other hand, the market believes there is still the chance that the CNB will tighten monetary policy again," said Marek.

PPF Asset Management analyst Radomir Jac said inflation is likely to remain at 7.5 percent also in March.

"In April, inflation will begin to slow gradually, and fall to 5.5 percent in December. I expect it at slightly above 3 percent in Q1 2009," said Jac.

Next Finance analyst Vladimir Pikora said the jobless rate fell thanks to favourable weather and the fast growth of the economy.

"A further decline can be expected in the coming months. Unemployment will most probably drop under 5 percent in May and hiring new staff will become very difficult," said Pikora.

"There will be a record number of vacancies. Unions wage demands and the actual wage growth will be an indicator of whether interest rates will be raised further or not," said Michl.

Michl expects a record wage growth this year and the fiercest ever wage bargaining before the end of the year.

Kathy visits two museums...

2008-03-05T23:59:00.001+01:00

Kathy visited two museums with a friend yesterday. After meeting at the friend's house they walked the 20 minutes to the first museum - the Museum of Czech Cubism, which is housed in the House at the Black Madonna (great name).

As the web site praha.eu says:

Prague is the Mecca of Cubism lovers. This is not only because some of the Prague pre war art collectors were in favour of this style but mainly due to the fact that Prague is the only city with so many cubist buildings. The worlds unique buildings were build within four years from 1911 until the beginning of the First World War

Here is a picture that kathy snapped on the walk to the museum. It took her through nice neighborhoods that she hadn't been in before.

Kathy in the Museum of Czech Cubism.

Looking down the stairwell at the Museum of Czech Cubism (I need to give Kathy the camera more often).

After the Cubsim museum they went to the Kinsky Palac (built from 1755-1765) which has the permanent exhibition "Landscape in Czech Art from 17th – 20th centuries" and includes:

Czech Baroque landscape (Karel Skréta, Jan Rudolf Bys, Jan Jakub and Frantisek Antonín Hartmann),

19th century landscape (the landscapist movement lead by Max Haushofer, Antonín Chittussi, Antonín Slavícek, Julius Marák),

20th century landscape (Pravoslav Kotík, Bedrich Piskac, Stanislav Kolíbal, Milos Sejn).

Palladium Mall fire - Update...

2008-03-04T16:51:00.005+01:00

Reports are now saying that the Palladium Mall will be closed through Easter, or March 23rd. That's a few days later than I indicated in a previous report here when it appeared that the opening might occur sooner. There was a reported "3 week" delay, which from the date of the fire would be March 12th, and from the date of the report would be March 19th. It turns out it was neither. I would suspect that the March 23rd date may itself might be optimistic.

I found a video on YouTube that provides details on the construction of the mall, although I didn't see anything regarding the electrical room design.

Prague's new National Library (aka 'the Blob")...

2008-03-04T08:42:00.010+01:00

There is a big controversy in Prague regarding the winning design for the proposed new National Library to be constructed in Letna park. No one denies that the design is, um, unusual. Decide for yourself what you think from the computer generated photo below. Notice how it blends [note: //sarcasm//) with its surroundings.

Here are portions from an article in today's Prague Daily Monitor.

Praguescape: What about the blob?
By Kristina Alda / Prague Daily Monitor / Published 4 March 2008

It's been exactly a year since Jan Kaplický's design won the competition for Prague's new National Library building on Letná hill.

[T]he undulating, golden-hued library has acquired cute monikers like "the blob" and "the octopus", and everyone, including school children, has an opinion. The building has appeared in so many computer-generated visualisations, depicting what the library will look like in context from various angles throughout Prague, that when you pass by Letná, you're almost surprised not to see the blob there, in reality.

The library plan has by now grown beyond its initial function: to create new space for the National Library's vast collections. It's become a barometer of taste, separating those enlightened enough to appreciate Kaplický's brilliance from the obtusely conservative cultural illiterates [Ed. - That would be me, an obtusely conservative cultural illiterate] – or so one would be led to believe, based on the ongoing public debate.

Four months ago, a group of intellectuals [Ed. - Intellectuals. Is there anything they don't know?] called on the city to go ahead with Kaplický's project, saying the city deserves a bold, modern library design. No one seemed to question why a group of artists and academics should be influencing the outcome of a public tender for a CZK 3 billion project to be paid for from taxpayers' pockets. Two weeks ago, a group of musicians organised a concert called Chci to na Letné (I want it on Letná) to publicly support Kaplický's project. It seems the octopus mania is spiraling out of proportion.

When cultures collide - Line dancing to Iron Butterfly...

2008-03-03T17:15:00.006+01:00

I know this is a minute of your life that you'll never get back, but I remember Iron Butterfly's In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida from when I was a kid. Gilbert ("Gib") Quinn, an older friend down the block, had this album and that is where I got to know it. The song is 17 minutes and takes up the entire second side of the album (for those of you who remember what albums are).

As a piece of trivia from wikipeida, "the sales of "In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida" were so tremendous that the Gold award was meaningless, having been surpassed more than 20 times over. The Platinum award was created by Ahmet Ertegun, President of Atlantic Records, to address the unprecedented new level set by this album".

Anyway, I was tickled by this video, both because I have a soft spot in my heart for Iron Butterfly, and second because I hate line dancing (mostly because to me it seems to be the poor stepchild of that other awful dance form - disco). The juxtapositioning is pretty severe, and may cause disorientation.

Expats getting sick in the Czech Republic...

2008-03-03T14:09:00.002+01:00

Kathy and Noah, but thankfully not me (*knocks wood) have needed the Czech medical system since we moved here over one and a half years ago. While we have found the level of care and service to be generally good, it is not without a good deal of frustration, both due to language barriers and differences in how US and Czech doctors view medical treatment.

Emily Prucha is an American married to a Czech (who we purchased our Ford Mondeo from) and has an article in Friday's Prague Daily Monitor about dealing with the Czech medical system. It's spot on.

Being sick is never fun
By Emily Prucha / Prague Daily Monitor / Published 29 February 2008

I never feel more like a foreigner living in Prague than when I’m sick. The emotion only intensifies when one of my children is under the weather or needs medical treatment. Although we have received excellent care in the Czech Republic, linguistic as well as cultural differences often complicate our doctor visits.

Part of my anxiety is related to the challenges of describing ailments in a foreign language. I have to remember that “throat” and “neck” are simultaneously krk in Czech and then I pantomime my way past unknown vocabulary to a diagnosis. No wonder visiting the doctor can bring on a case of the nerves.

Although I would prefer to avoid going to the doctor, as the mom of two young children finding a pediatrician was one of our first priorities when we moved back to Prague. Luckily, we found a doctor whose office is just a short walk from our apartment. Between regular check-ups, immunization visits, and the occasional illness, I’ve gotten to know our pediatrician (and the route to and from her office) fairly well. Yet, no matter how many times I've been there, and despite my good experiences there, as soon as her nurse calls out “Pruchoví,” (our family name) I feel my palms start to sweat.

Over the past two years, my pediatrician and I have translated names of illness and immunizations, and we’ve compared treatments on a variety of childhood ailments. Although she initially dissuaded me from giving my children some of the non-standard immunizations like pneumococcal, citing it as too expensive, when I explained that it was part of the recommended vaccine set in the US, she agreed to write a prescription for me. When I asked about the possibility of other “non-essential” vaccinations, such as varicella (chicken pox) or the flu shot, that are very common in the US, she just laughed.

Our pediatrician’s theory on vaccinations falls in line with the general Czech medical theory of less-is-better when treating any illness. “Why use the strong antibiotic when the weaker one might work?” one doctor told me. “We like to keep the strong ones in reserve.” While I agree with him that it doesn’t make sense to over-prescribe, especially to children, the wait-and-see theory can be infuriating when dealing with a sick child.

This theory also contradicts my American sensibilities, since I was raised to believe that an antibiotic could treat anything worse than the common cold. I was also raised to believe that about 24 hours after starting an antibiotic, I would be germ-free and could resume my normal activities like school or daycare. When I mentioned taking Anna Lee downtown while she was still taking a round of antibiotics, my husband Radek firmly deterred me. “She’s sick and needs to rest at home,” he proclaimed. It didn’t take much arguing for him to win me over, but I must say that my initial response is to take antibiotics and keep on functioning.

Differences in healthcare systems could explain some cultural differences in diagnosing and treating illnesses. Unlike in the US, where healthcare is privatized and each individual must purchase his own health insurance coverage, the Czech Republic has a national healthcare system where every citizen has the right to health insurance regardless of his financial situation. Traditionally, children have been almost fully covered within the Czech Republic’s system regardless of their parents’ income. However, a recent system overall has instituted a mandatory CZK 30 fee for each regular doctor visit, which jumps to CZK 90 after hours, as well as higher co-payments for prescription medicines. There is some backlash from the public regarding the changes, especially as they pertain to children.

I experienced the new system in effect when my 9-month-old son Oliver ran a high fever over the weekend. Since his fever was at 39 C (102 F) and didn’t respond well to the infant fever-reducer I had at home, we decided to take Oliver to the nearest after hours clinic on Saturday morning. When we arrived at the Kralovské Vinohrady clinic, Radek checked in with the nurse. “Have you paid?” was her first question. She pointed to the parking lot where an automatic machine stood. At first glance, it looked like a parking meter, but in fact, this was machine to pay the doctor's fees. Unfortunately it didn’t take any paper money or even make change from coins. I heard several other people around me also grumbling. I couldn’t tell if they were annoyed that they had to pay or just annoyed that the machine made the procedure so difficult. On the upside the machines kept the nurses from having to change their habits to accommodate the new payment system. Radek left to find a change machine for the CZK 90 in coins that we needed, while I waited with Oliver.

After the pediatrician on duty examined Oliver, he sent us to an ENT specialist for an ear check. We walked the few hundred yards to a different building and were greeted by another nurse asking “Have you paid?” When we showed her our receipt, she accepted it, and since we had paid the higher after hour fee, we were not asked to pay again (that day). Although on a subsequent follow-up visit the following day, I had to pay CZK 90 again, and then on Monday I was required to paid CZK 30 at both offices since it was a regular working day. While the amount we ultimately paid was probably comparable to one regular American co-payment, the procedure of locating exact change and going outside to deposit it into the automatic machine was particularly annoying.

During the various examinations, Radek and I held a screaming Oliver down while the doctors or nurses performed their tasks. While telling us that Oliver had a middle ear infection, the ENT picked up a sharp instrument which he stuck into Oliver’s ear to pierce and drain the infection. The procedure seemed painful and strange to me, although Czech friends who’ve experienced it claimed that it actually releases the uncomfortable pressure. Later, I raised my eyebrows again when neither of the nurses drawing blood from Oliver’s arm wore any gloves. The third time they checked his blood, it actually splashed up into the nurse’s mouth. She rushed to rinse it off, but otherwise carried on as usual.

Over time, I’m getting used to the no-frills approach I encounter from medical professional here, and I believe the doctors and nurses I’ve seen here are as competent as doctors anywhere. Although it’s been harder for me to make a personal connection with my Czech doctors and nurses, but when I recognize this more as a cultural difference than a language shortcoming or a personal affront, it usually helps. But being sick is just not much fun, regardless of the circumstances.

The Falling Dollar - March edition...

2008-03-02T15:30:00.003+01:00

Well, it's the first week of the new month so it's time to take a look at what has happened to the dollar since my last report in early February. I also had previous waxings on the dollar here, here, here, here, here, and here.

For those of you who remember, I did a mid-month report on January 21st when the dollar was at 18.15 Czech crowns to the dollar. Here is the link. At that time I predicted that "the dollar will trend upwards for the foreseeable future." As Homer Simpson would say, "D'oh!!".

Here is what has happened to the dollar compared to the Czech crown (koruna) since my last report.

The dollar has done nothing but slide since then and in six weeks has gone from 18.15 to 16.54, a drop of about 9%. For those of you keeping score at home, since our arrival in Prague in the summer of 2006, the dollar has gone from 22.75 to 16.54. This has cut the buying power of my salary by over 27%. When you add Czech inflation of about 10% for the same period (and factor in the meager 2.5% cost of living adjustment we got from RFE/RL) my salary is worth 1/3 less.

From my previous erroneous predictions I am glad that I am not in arbritrage for a living. I still believe that the dollar is near the bottom, but could break though the 15 crowns per dollar floor before it goes up. The economy in the US is slowing and may already be in recession (something that you only can tell in hindsight) but the European economy, I think, will go through the same economic downturn that the US is experiencing. When that happens and rates start dropping here the dollar will get stronger. Lower oil prices, back to the mid-$80s, would help the dollar as well.

In like a lion...

2008-03-01T21:52:00.007+01:00

If the old saying is true about March - in like a lion, out like a lamb - then the end of March in Prague should be nice indeed. This morning we had some of the strangest weather since arriving in Prague. It started overcast and windy, but by mid-morning it was starting to break up, but was still very windy. Then it suddenly clouded up again and we had a squall that provided lightning and thunder as well as a combination of sleet, snow and hail.

Here is what it looked like outside of our house.

The lights flickered several times during the storm, which only lasted about 20 minutes. The clouds again broke (but again the wind remained) and an hour later we did lose power for about an hour. Not sure why, unless they had to do some repairs related to the earlier storm.

The rest of the day was very windy with very fast moving low clouds. Very interesting weather.

More on Dresden...

2008-02-29T14:36:00.002+01:00

Here we are in Dresden along the river Elbe (with the help my trusty tripod).

A quaint street in the city center.

During our walk we turned away from the river to go back into the center and found ourselves staring at this amazing mural. This is Sachsen Palace and this is what I found on the web about the mural.

Called the Procession of Dukes, this mural looks like a pencil drawing, almost in the style of currently -- with its richly detailed figures in black, white, and gray, on a mosaic-like background of gold and gray. The mural was about one hundred yards long or more and some five yards high, depicting every ruler of Saxony from the middle ages to the Prussian expansion, each dressed in period costume.