It's almost 9 years since I left England and moved to the Czech Republic. I started in Prague, the capital city with a population of just over 2 million. In September 2007 I moved to Litoměřice, a small town with a population of around 26,000 and 7 years later I find myself here, in Byšice, a village which now boasts 1054 people.
**This is where I wanted to put a picture of the village but I googled it and it's about as pretty as a war torn town in the Ukraine so I will take my own camera and try to take some soon**
I still work in Litoměřice so I have a daily commute of around an hour. That's something I wasn't looking forward to but four weeks in and I really enjoy it. I'm actually fresh when I get to work as opposed to before when I woke up 20 minutes before the school bell and walked up the street. The commute is something I look forward to now because I decided to switch the radio off after discovering podcasts. I'm listening to around 7 hours worth weekly. My current playlist is:
606 phone in with Robbie Savage
The Football Ramble
Guardian Football Weekly
Justin Moorhouse - about 30 minutes never more than 45
WTF with Marc Maron
Real Time with Bill Mayer
Stuff you missed in history class
Brilliant. If there are some good podcasts I don't know about please tell me!
The downside to the commute is I'm on the road more which means I have to deal with Czech drivers. Now, we all know I'm a very calm and relaxed guy and it takes a lot to wind me up but MY GOD the drivers here manage it at least 6 times a day. I've driven hundreds of thousands of miles over the last 13 years in/through 23 countries and 2 continents. Hundreds of miles up the coast of Australia, all through Europe from non existent Serbian roads to landmine infested Bosnian country roads and none of those countries have a driving standard as bad as the Czech Republic. It's embarrassing. It's not everybody of course, I know some good drivers BUT it's a ridiculous majority. The women are actually much better than the men. For some reason they think they are amazing drivers but they are so dangerous. Overtaking on corners, driving 80kmph above the speed limit. Even today I saw about 3 near misses with oncoming traffic. Then you have the cyclists who don't use lights in the dark, wtf!? Seriously one of these nights I'm gonna hit one and I won't feel guilty. It's funny because every time I speak to an expat with a car one of the first topics is how bad the drivers are. You really have to experience it to believe it.
Enough moaning. So the village is small, nice and in a great location. It also has a big factory in the middle. Vitana. It's the Czech version of Bachelors. We've spent the last 8 weekends reconstructing the bathroom and toilet and re-wiring the entire flat. I say we, it was mainly Radka's dad. He worked ridiculously hard and taught me how to do stuff like dig a hole in a wall for the cables, plaster the walls and some other stuff. I expected to hate it because it's really not my kind of thing but after a 60 hour work week it was actually refreshing to do something different and I enjoyed it. We lived with Radka's dad for 3 weeks because of the dust and final touches before finally moving into the flat last Saturday. There are a few pubs in the village and I still haven't had the time to try one but it's on my list. That's about it really. There's a post office and a football pitch. Still, it's 5 mins from Mělník, 20 mins to Prague and 25 mins to Mladá Boleslav so it's really handy.
I don't know how village life will work out for us but at the moment we both really like it. I like the flat, we have a garage, a cellar, 2 balconies and now a brand new bathroom. The kitchen is the next project early next year. I'm also enjoying the peace and quiet, especially early mornings, at least until the milk truck comes through. It's like an old English ice cream van with chimes but instead of a song it has a cow going 'moooo, fresh milk and yoghurts'. I tried the milk once, tasted like shit.
I went to the doctors last week because I've been having asthma issues (mainly as a result of the dust when breaking into walls). I haven't been able to stop coughing for about a month. I like my doctor, he's friendly enough and always looks so relaxed. He wears his doctors coat with bright orange rejoice shorts, woolly socks and sandals (all year round). It's strangely comforting as most of them are like robots. We usually have a very informal chat and check up, I get a new inhaler, some pills and I'm on my way. Not this time. My doctor had professional looking clothes, there were 2 nurses and another doctor in the room with him. The other doctor looked very serious and my doctor stood up and asked me what the problem was. He was speaking very formally. I quickly realised he was being assessed by the other doctor. I froze and forgot what my problem was. I don't mind speaking Czech to people I know and I'm comfortable with but when there are strangers listening to me explain something important, for example at the doctors, hospital, bank, town offices etc I hate it. I told him the cough was bad and he knew what to do and what to give me because it's on repeat prescription but I also wanted to mention another issue. I had played squash 3 weeks earlier with Vita and I ran into the wall sideways, at pace, when trying to reach a shot. I didn't think much of it at the time but later in the pub it was sore and hurt when I sat in the car etc It was around the chest area. I explained it badly in Czech because of the other people in the room. I wanted to say I played squash and hurt my chest but i said I played squash and my chest hurt. I wanted him to send me for an x-ray but he assumed I was talking about a heart attack type problem and immediately instructed the nurses to hook me up to some machine. I had to strip to my boxers, lie on the bed and have about 7 different instruments suctioned onto my chest. The other doctor came over for a closer look, they studied the results on the computer before coming to the conclusion that my heart was fine. I wanted to say "ok but that's not what I meant" but I think I said something like "ok that's good, phew, thanks". Idiot.
I'm looking forward to being back in England for Christmas. We have one year here one year there. It's the fairest way. I've only been to Blackpool once in 14 months. That's sad. It's costing an absolute fortune to get over there this year. I tried to book flights back in August but they were really expensive so I checked every month and nothing had changed. In the end they wanted 16,000kc for two tickets on easy jet. We usually pay 2500kc each. I know it's christmas but that's just taking the piss. I can't pay that much, sit down and have to pay three quid for a coffee. I wouldn't mind paying 16,000kc for British Airways or Czech Airlines but I'm not paying £600 for two tickets on a budget airline which gets me to England at midnight. We decided to drive. It's fine and I always enjoyed driving from here to England. We have planned the route and are gonna stop at a hotel in Dunkerque on the way over and Essen on the way back. Not the best towns but it's just somewhere to relax. We are leaving Sunday morning, ferry Monday morning and should be in Blackpool Monday afternoon.
Can't wait to see you all next week!!!! Enjoy your pre-christmas stuff and please buy mini pork pies and mini scotch eggs in preparation for our arrival.
**This is where I wanted to put a picture of the village but I googled it and it's about as pretty as a war torn town in the Ukraine so I will take my own camera and try to take some soon**
I still work in Litoměřice so I have a daily commute of around an hour. That's something I wasn't looking forward to but four weeks in and I really enjoy it. I'm actually fresh when I get to work as opposed to before when I woke up 20 minutes before the school bell and walked up the street. The commute is something I look forward to now because I decided to switch the radio off after discovering podcasts. I'm listening to around 7 hours worth weekly. My current playlist is:
606 phone in with Robbie Savage
The Football Ramble
Guardian Football Weekly
Justin Moorhouse - about 30 minutes never more than 45
WTF with Marc Maron
Real Time with Bill Mayer
Stuff you missed in history class
Brilliant. If there are some good podcasts I don't know about please tell me!
The downside to the commute is I'm on the road more which means I have to deal with Czech drivers. Now, we all know I'm a very calm and relaxed guy and it takes a lot to wind me up but MY GOD the drivers here manage it at least 6 times a day. I've driven hundreds of thousands of miles over the last 13 years in/through 23 countries and 2 continents. Hundreds of miles up the coast of Australia, all through Europe from non existent Serbian roads to landmine infested Bosnian country roads and none of those countries have a driving standard as bad as the Czech Republic. It's embarrassing. It's not everybody of course, I know some good drivers BUT it's a ridiculous majority. The women are actually much better than the men. For some reason they think they are amazing drivers but they are so dangerous. Overtaking on corners, driving 80kmph above the speed limit. Even today I saw about 3 near misses with oncoming traffic. Then you have the cyclists who don't use lights in the dark, wtf!? Seriously one of these nights I'm gonna hit one and I won't feel guilty. It's funny because every time I speak to an expat with a car one of the first topics is how bad the drivers are. You really have to experience it to believe it.
Enough moaning. So the village is small, nice and in a great location. It also has a big factory in the middle. Vitana. It's the Czech version of Bachelors. We've spent the last 8 weekends reconstructing the bathroom and toilet and re-wiring the entire flat. I say we, it was mainly Radka's dad. He worked ridiculously hard and taught me how to do stuff like dig a hole in a wall for the cables, plaster the walls and some other stuff. I expected to hate it because it's really not my kind of thing but after a 60 hour work week it was actually refreshing to do something different and I enjoyed it. We lived with Radka's dad for 3 weeks because of the dust and final touches before finally moving into the flat last Saturday. There are a few pubs in the village and I still haven't had the time to try one but it's on my list. That's about it really. There's a post office and a football pitch. Still, it's 5 mins from Mělník, 20 mins to Prague and 25 mins to Mladá Boleslav so it's really handy.
I don't know how village life will work out for us but at the moment we both really like it. I like the flat, we have a garage, a cellar, 2 balconies and now a brand new bathroom. The kitchen is the next project early next year. I'm also enjoying the peace and quiet, especially early mornings, at least until the milk truck comes through. It's like an old English ice cream van with chimes but instead of a song it has a cow going 'moooo, fresh milk and yoghurts'. I tried the milk once, tasted like shit.
I went to the doctors last week because I've been having asthma issues (mainly as a result of the dust when breaking into walls). I haven't been able to stop coughing for about a month. I like my doctor, he's friendly enough and always looks so relaxed. He wears his doctors coat with bright orange rejoice shorts, woolly socks and sandals (all year round). It's strangely comforting as most of them are like robots. We usually have a very informal chat and check up, I get a new inhaler, some pills and I'm on my way. Not this time. My doctor had professional looking clothes, there were 2 nurses and another doctor in the room with him. The other doctor looked very serious and my doctor stood up and asked me what the problem was. He was speaking very formally. I quickly realised he was being assessed by the other doctor. I froze and forgot what my problem was. I don't mind speaking Czech to people I know and I'm comfortable with but when there are strangers listening to me explain something important, for example at the doctors, hospital, bank, town offices etc I hate it. I told him the cough was bad and he knew what to do and what to give me because it's on repeat prescription but I also wanted to mention another issue. I had played squash 3 weeks earlier with Vita and I ran into the wall sideways, at pace, when trying to reach a shot. I didn't think much of it at the time but later in the pub it was sore and hurt when I sat in the car etc It was around the chest area. I explained it badly in Czech because of the other people in the room. I wanted to say I played squash and hurt my chest but i said I played squash and my chest hurt. I wanted him to send me for an x-ray but he assumed I was talking about a heart attack type problem and immediately instructed the nurses to hook me up to some machine. I had to strip to my boxers, lie on the bed and have about 7 different instruments suctioned onto my chest. The other doctor came over for a closer look, they studied the results on the computer before coming to the conclusion that my heart was fine. I wanted to say "ok but that's not what I meant" but I think I said something like "ok that's good, phew, thanks". Idiot.
I'm looking forward to being back in England for Christmas. We have one year here one year there. It's the fairest way. I've only been to Blackpool once in 14 months. That's sad. It's costing an absolute fortune to get over there this year. I tried to book flights back in August but they were really expensive so I checked every month and nothing had changed. In the end they wanted 16,000kc for two tickets on easy jet. We usually pay 2500kc each. I know it's christmas but that's just taking the piss. I can't pay that much, sit down and have to pay three quid for a coffee. I wouldn't mind paying 16,000kc for British Airways or Czech Airlines but I'm not paying £600 for two tickets on a budget airline which gets me to England at midnight. We decided to drive. It's fine and I always enjoyed driving from here to England. We have planned the route and are gonna stop at a hotel in Dunkerque on the way over and Essen on the way back. Not the best towns but it's just somewhere to relax. We are leaving Sunday morning, ferry Monday morning and should be in Blackpool Monday afternoon.
Can't wait to see you all next week!!!! Enjoy your pre-christmas stuff and please buy mini pork pies and mini scotch eggs in preparation for our arrival.
