Interviews are over and all went well. Not scintillating conversation but when all you talk about is phenomes and elision, what's left to say. The lady from Trinity was very nice. We are now certified by Trinity College of Oxford to teach English as a foreign language. Look out students.
Our last few days in Prague were busy. So many souvenirs to buy and so little time. We took a day trip to the town of Karlsbjrg. It's claim to fame is a picturesque castle sitting on a craggy hill over looking the the quaint little souvenir shops that seem to make up the entire village of Karlsbjrg. It was 45 minute train ride from Prague with trains rolling through every half hour. It was quite quiet the day we visited but I expect that it can be quite a busy place in the high season. It was cold and windy and castles are not exactly energy efficient. Did not spoil the day as the castle was awsome. Once a facility guy always a facility guy.
We woke up Friday, our departure day to find Prague completely fogged in. Ohoh! Hey, we don't fly out for five hours, no problem, the fog will be gone by then. OhOh! We arrived at the gate for our flight from Frankfurt to Vancouver 10 minutes after the flight left the boarding gate. Seems the fog in Prague is denser that other places and so our flight for Frankfurt departed two hours late. Re-booked for Calgary and we only lost 2 hours. Whoohoo! Flight was great arriving to Calgary on time and in the middle of a blizzard. OhOh! Boarded the Vancouver plane 45 minutes late then sat on the tarmac for 80 minutes waiting to be de-iced and the blizzard getting worse. We eventually depart for Vancouver. Flights great, on time to Vancouver arriving in a blizzard. What the hell! It's April for pete's sake. Global warming my ass! Our 14 hour travel time from Prague became 25 hours. Ah but the fun is not over. The snow continues to plague us as we drive from the airport to downtown Vancouver then out to the wilds of Surrey/Langley to find our hotel. Finally a small blizzard to complete the cycle as we drove home through the Hope Princeton highway. Whoohoo! We are home!
Saturday, April 26, 2008
Sunday, April 13, 2008
How Do You Spell /rilef/
Week four has come and gone, two more projects handed in and just the 15 minute interview with the Trinity moderator standing between us and a Trinity CertTesol designation. Will it have all been worth it. Only time will tell. We certainly haven't become expert English teachers but at least now we have some jargon to spout as well as write in phonemes. If anything we can sound almost like an English teacher. The real training will come when we are teaching our own students and not the guinea students that volunteer for the Oxford evening classes where we hem, haw and stutter our way through a lesson in things like using the passive form. I use it all the time but never had to think about it. Some of these students have been taking courses for years and nothing is worse then trying to teach your class something that most of them know better than you. On the whole the experience has been worth it but there were times that we weren't too sure.
We had the entire weekend to explore Prague. We did a quick re-visit to Prague Castle and then on to some palaces, monastaries, churches, an imitation Eiffel tower and finishing off with ride on a 100 year old funicular. That was just Saturday. Today, Sunday we have visted the old Jewish section of Prague. Wearing a yarmulka with no hair was a challenge. One look up and the darn thing slipped off my head and on to the floor. Wearing a yarmulka, is why most Jewish men have good heads of hair. The Jews have lived in Prague since the 13th century. We visited the Old/New Synagogue buit in 1257. It is called the Old/New because they built a new New Synagogue which burned down shortly after it was built. The Old/New synagogue was home to Rabbi Lowe. You may not remember him, but you might remember his creation, the GOLEM. The Golem was a creature created from clay by the Rabbi to help protect the Jews during one of the frequent pogroms. The Golem went a little off and had to be destroyed by the Rabbi. They say that the Golem was the inspiration for Frankenstein's monster.
When we had had enough, we jumped on to the Metro and hit the Prague suburbs for a little malling and exploring. Ikea was our destination as Nonie wanted to replace a plate form the apartment that we had chipped. The burbs are the same as you would see anywhere but with one big difference, no single family homes. The burbs consist of block after block of apartments. Not very esthetic but certainly functional. The malls on the other hand are the same, just the names have been changed so franchise fees don't come into play. Places such as Cotton Ujenny and the Gip along with the Gip for Children. The mall included a huge entertainment complex with golf, bowling, billiards, 8 movie screens, bars, the ever present McDonalds and a KFC. You can buy a beer at the KFC. Great idea, one we should explore for North America. In fact you can buy beer anywhere from the corner store to the kiosk on the street selling hots dogs and bratwursts. Yet despite the easy access to beer you seldom see it flaunted or a huge problem with public drunkeness amongst the Czechs. If we saw any, it was usually a tourist but even then, we have not witnessrd any real problems. Why then in Canada do we hide booze away in bars and pubs. Perhaps if we did not mystify the drinking of alcohol we could have the same attitude as the Czechs. Some beer making lesson would not hurt either.
We had the entire weekend to explore Prague. We did a quick re-visit to Prague Castle and then on to some palaces, monastaries, churches, an imitation Eiffel tower and finishing off with ride on a 100 year old funicular. That was just Saturday. Today, Sunday we have visted the old Jewish section of Prague. Wearing a yarmulka with no hair was a challenge. One look up and the darn thing slipped off my head and on to the floor. Wearing a yarmulka, is why most Jewish men have good heads of hair. The Jews have lived in Prague since the 13th century. We visited the Old/New Synagogue buit in 1257. It is called the Old/New because they built a new New Synagogue which burned down shortly after it was built. The Old/New synagogue was home to Rabbi Lowe. You may not remember him, but you might remember his creation, the GOLEM. The Golem was a creature created from clay by the Rabbi to help protect the Jews during one of the frequent pogroms. The Golem went a little off and had to be destroyed by the Rabbi. They say that the Golem was the inspiration for Frankenstein's monster.
When we had had enough, we jumped on to the Metro and hit the Prague suburbs for a little malling and exploring. Ikea was our destination as Nonie wanted to replace a plate form the apartment that we had chipped. The burbs are the same as you would see anywhere but with one big difference, no single family homes. The burbs consist of block after block of apartments. Not very esthetic but certainly functional. The malls on the other hand are the same, just the names have been changed so franchise fees don't come into play. Places such as Cotton Ujenny and the Gip along with the Gip for Children. The mall included a huge entertainment complex with golf, bowling, billiards, 8 movie screens, bars, the ever present McDonalds and a KFC. You can buy a beer at the KFC. Great idea, one we should explore for North America. In fact you can buy beer anywhere from the corner store to the kiosk on the street selling hots dogs and bratwursts. Yet despite the easy access to beer you seldom see it flaunted or a huge problem with public drunkeness amongst the Czechs. If we saw any, it was usually a tourist but even then, we have not witnessrd any real problems. Why then in Canada do we hide booze away in bars and pubs. Perhaps if we did not mystify the drinking of alcohol we could have the same attitude as the Czechs. Some beer making lesson would not hurt either.
Tuesday, April 8, 2008
Week Three And It Ain't Getting Any Easier
This Monday after the end of week three saw us handing in another project. This one required us to carry out a comprehensive analysis of the ligusitic, phonetical, grammarical, writing and reading skills of one of our students. It was a killer. With little or no understanding of what we were talking about, we had to write 30 pages to complete the project. Hopefully the instructors can be easily baffled by bullshit. If not, I am in trouble. The project basically ate up our weekend. Just some quick walks around to clear out the cobwebs and see more than the four walls and the loft of our apartment. Our biggest outing was a trip to the laundry
Eating out in Prague is a challenge. Mostly because there is not a block or street or lane or alleyway, or knook that does not have a pub, buffet, cafe or restaurant on it. The one we have been frequenting has a grand total seven tables with three of them sized for two midgets. How can they stay in business?
There are other challenges in picking a place beside where. Price! Depending on location the same meal can cost $6.00 all the way up to $26.00. Beware of table clothes, cloth napkins and bread baskets. They are not free. We discovered this when we went into a nice looking pizza joint with what appeared to be reasonable prices. We ordered two glasses of wine and shared a pizza and one salad. We received our bill and it worked out to over $60.00. Seems that they have a cover charge of $9.00 that is automatically added to the bill. Is this purely a money grab from naive tourists or a way to recover laundry and bread costs. You be the judge.
Don't get me started on surly waiters. I think that they all went to some waiter school in Paris to capture that bored look of disdain when they take your order. Not at our local. No cover charge meant a nice tip from Nonie. We now get a big smile and good service. The food is soso but we feel appreciated and that is all that counts.
Brett and Nonie
Eating out in Prague is a challenge. Mostly because there is not a block or street or lane or alleyway, or knook that does not have a pub, buffet, cafe or restaurant on it. The one we have been frequenting has a grand total seven tables with three of them sized for two midgets. How can they stay in business?
There are other challenges in picking a place beside where. Price! Depending on location the same meal can cost $6.00 all the way up to $26.00. Beware of table clothes, cloth napkins and bread baskets. They are not free. We discovered this when we went into a nice looking pizza joint with what appeared to be reasonable prices. We ordered two glasses of wine and shared a pizza and one salad. We received our bill and it worked out to over $60.00. Seems that they have a cover charge of $9.00 that is automatically added to the bill. Is this purely a money grab from naive tourists or a way to recover laundry and bread costs. You be the judge.
Don't get me started on surly waiters. I think that they all went to some waiter school in Paris to capture that bored look of disdain when they take your order. Not at our local. No cover charge meant a nice tip from Nonie. We now get a big smile and good service. The food is soso but we feel appreciated and that is all that counts.
Brett and Nonie
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