Back to Blogging...Whoops

So it's been a while since I last posted... I thought about giving up on this blog altogether, but I'm going to keep going! Warning: this post is LONG. I don't know if anyone is even reading this, but it will at least be something for me to look back on when I can't remember anything that I did my semester in Europe. Because lets face it, I'm having trouble remembering the things I did last week. My two-week Czech course is now long over, and I've just finished my third week of regular classes. As much as I would like to say I am completely fluent in Czech, I still have a long way to go... But at least I am a little more confident in my interactions with the locals and I can navigate unfamiliar places by recognizing the words that I learned in class.

Passing through a market on the way to class

ECES took us to Terezin, which was a pretty eerie place. It was built at the end of the 18th century as a military fortress, but was later turned into a Jewish ghetto and became a concentration camp that served as a transition place where people were held before being sent to their deaths at Auschwitz. Terezin was called the "model camp" because the people living there were always on their best behavior for fear of being sent to the extermination camps. A Nazi propaganda film was made at Terezin, falsely depicting it as an enjoyable place to live. Terezin had two fortresses. The main fortress was the Jewish ghetto and transition camp, and the second served as the Prague Gestapo prison for political prisoners.

The last preserved synagogue in Terezin

A model of what the living conditions were like in the ghetto.

 

So many people died here that they needed to cremate the bodies in this crematorium. 

Outside the Gestapo prison: "Work will set you free."  

Before leaving Terezin, a small group of us ate lunch in a restaurant that supported people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. I was excited to see a sign explaining this on the wall of the restaurant, and towards the end of the meal I noticed that our waiter had special needs, as well as other people working in the small restaurant. It was very cool to see that even in Terezin there are opportunities for employment of people with special needs.

Some more stuff I've been doing since I last posted...
The international club at Czech Technical University hosts country presentations each week, and a few weeks ago I went to the Czech Republic's presentation. It was held at a club, and after a film was shown about life in the Czech Republic, we danced a lot and it was a fun night! Every week they paint flags on everyone's faces, so we all had Czech flags on our cheeks!

Kat, Luke, and I at the Czech presentation

In the last week of Czech class, we had two field trips and a movie day. The movie we watched was all in Czech with English subtitles, called Kolja. It reminded me a lot of Big Daddy with Adam Sandler, and the little boy who starred in the movie was adorable. It was no surprise that the movie won an Academy Award for Best Foreign Language Film. Our class also took a trip to the Dox Center for Contemporary Art, where the featured exhibit was called "The Poster in the Clash of Ideologies: 1914-2014" and displayed propaganda posters over the last 100 years from all over the world. It was crazy to see the posters from Nazi Germany and what the mindset was that contributed to such horrific acts. The museum also had an exhibit called Pharmatopia, expressing a connection between the pharmaceutical industry and utopia.

Pharmatopia

Sad to say goodbye to Suzana, our Czech teacher. Brooke and I got one last picture with her!

I have eaten so much amazing food since being here. This is a picture of an adorable crepe restaurant that Katie, Maxie's roommate, told me about!

Since a lot of us don't have Thursday classes, last Thursday a group of us explored Prague! We walked across Charles Bridge to the Lennon Wall, found the "Dancing House", and saw some cool art and beautiful views along the way.

Back to the Lennon Wall

Posing with the art.

Dancing House

Since last posting, AIFS took us on a a fantastic trip to Moravia and I also went to Budapest. I'll write more about them in my next posts, and I promise to try to be a least a little more consistent with my blogging!