no water

So we've been having this problem in the dorms here where they shut off the water randomly. Today it was done at an incredibly inconvenient time..right now. Laura and I just went running and went to the gym in the basement and right when we came up the water was shut off. They made some kind of announcement, but it was in Czech, therefore we have no idea what it said. So, it looks like I'm stuck in my room until I can shower, because I need it! The last time it shut off it lasted most of the day - which is unusual - usually it is fixed within a couple hours. So we'll just have to see!

Anyways, the weekend was good. For the most part I didn't do anything too exciting. Sunday our photography teacher planned a trip to a town in the Czech Republic, Terezin. He wanted us to all go and take pictures. We were supposed to meet at 10:00 to all go, but my flatmate, Laura Torres, and I wanted to go to Palm Sunday mass and then go out to the town. A few of the guys from kstate were supposed to go with the class and we were going to call them when we got there. Well, of course the guys ended up not going because they had a late night out the night before, so Laura and I got to Terezin and really had no idea where the rest of the class was. It is a really small town, though so we just walked around. It really didn't matter if we found them as long we took some pictures.

The story of the town is that during World War II the whole town was turned into a concentration camp. The residents had to leave apparently and thousands and thousands of prisoners were brought through there. It was basically a transport camp that they brought Jews to while waiting to move them to the camps in the East, such as Auschwitz. The whole town is a fortress - there's a wall that goes all the way around it. Unlike the other towns I have been to in the Czech Republic, this one has not really had the renovation work done on it, so these buildings actually look their age and are well worn. Many of the trees in the town had all their limbs chopped off which gave the town even more of a dead look. Despite all of this, it actually seemed pretty lively out. There were people in all the park areas and a lot of kids out playing. It was all a little weird to see these people living their lives in a place where so many awful things had once happened.

Well, Laura and I were pretty proud of ourselves for making our way around on the trains to the town and then walking the almost 3 kilometers from the train station to the actual town. We communicated with many who spoke and understood no english at all. On the way there after finding the correct train to get on (which was a bit confusing for us - we've ridden trains but never by ourselves) we hopped in a cabin in the train. The guy who checks tickets came around, so we handed it to him and he started telling us something in Czech. Through pointing and hand gestures we figured out that we were in the 1 section of the train (which is kinda like first class or reserved I think), when we were supposed to be in section 2. So we quickly went to section 2 where all of the cabins had people in them. We found one where it was a mom and 2 little girls, so we asked without using words if we could share with them. She said it was fine. The girls were adorable and learning how to read on Czech workbooks - I really wanted to join in and learn with them. Well, we had to get off and switch trains which all went smoothly, thank goodness.

Anyhow, we walked around for a few hours, never finding the rest of the class. We couldn't find "the small fortress" which is in the town somewhere and where the class was most of the time I think. So after walking around most of the town and taking pictures we headed back to the train station and caught the train home - here we found many of the other foreign students. The train took us back to a different train station than the main one so I'm glad those students were there because we weren't quite sure where we were going. On the way back we passed a pretty park that had a fair going on in it... it looked awesome. It had rides and games and everything. It looked like a state fair. We figured out where we were on a map and hope to go visit it and we have no idea how long it is going to be there.

Well, we have water now - so no worries there. I better go