Technically, it means little peasant, or little farmer. That was the name and heritage of my great grandmother, Frantiska Sedlacek Vahalik.
In my young adult life, I was not "into" my heritage. It wasn't kings and queens, after all, but peasants who came to Texas from the old world to eake out a living from the soil. It was my best friend from high School, last name Mladenka, who led me to the Czech countryside at long last. She had always been proud of her heritage and so, when I received a random email about a Czech piano student needing a host family, I sent it to her. Jitka was working on her doctorate at Rice, and she came to live with the Mladenka household for several years, eventually marrying their son. So, it was a wedding in southern Bohemia that brought me to the Czech Republic at long last.
Following is my account of my first day in the Czech Republic.
June 15 2007
We entered the Czech Republic on the Deutche Bahn via Nurnberg. As the train crossed the border, my heart sank. Every town looked bleaker than the last. Round-faced Czechs in too-snug uniforms replaced the crisp German conductors. We arrived in Cheb, where we were to transfer to Czech Rail after a two-hour layover. Cheb was ugly. Buildings stared vacantly. The train station was bleak. We cable locked our bags to the platform and sought food and a restroom. I couldn’t translate a word on the signs, and no one spoke English. Worse yet, no one smiled. I was questioning my decision to spend two weeks in this country of my roots.
We found an ATM, withdrawing 4,000 Koruna ($200) so we could use the WC, which required 5 Kc. That’s about a penny. When I paid the fee, the attendant invited me to take some toilet paper. I stared at the dispenser. Right there on the dispenser was the word Sedlacek, my great grandmothers’ maiden name. Am I the long lost relative of a toilet paper dispenser-manufacturing magnate from Pribrm? I zoomed in and snapped the photo.
Back on the platform with our 85 Kc lunch, we struck up a conversation with a 78-year-old woman who had agreed to watch our baggage. She was born in Karlovy Vary, our destination that day, a spa town in the Northwestern Czech Republic. She said that during the War, the townspeople were eagerly awaiting the American soldiers. When the Russians arrived, it was a sad day. She moved to London, where she married. Later she moved near Nurnberg and worked 30 years for Siemens. She wanted to see Karlovy Vary again and she was traveling there with a cigarette smoke coughing friend.
The train arrived, and we settled into our first class cabin: no A/C on a warm stuffy day, seats and rug of threadbare red velvet and the WC, politely put, rustic. I felt like I had boarded a three times used Orient express. The conductress said “jízdenka“ and Carl jumped, taking his feet off the seat. I looked up the word. “Relax”, I said after looking the word up, “ she wants your ticket.”
In Karlovy Vary, commonly known as Carlsbad, our new friend negotiated with a taxi driver to take all of us into town. He kept swearing in Czech as he loaded the luggage. “Ježíš marián.” I recognized those words. We were crammed in, 5 people in a 4-passenger car, and we left two other taxi drivers disgruntled at the stand. He dropped us first at the Hotel Esther. The fare seemed a bit high to me. What do I know of Korunas? It occurs to me that the ladies rode free.
I was relieved that the ugliness of Cheb did not follow us to Carlsbad. Carlsbad is a quaint town, with pastel Baroque buildings lining cobblestone streets that follow the curve of the River Ohre. Our hotel clung to a steep hill. A thundershower poured down, and we waited for a break to cross the street to the Carlsbad Spa. In the lobby, an American couple was trying to make sense of the spa offerings, and the husband became more and more upset that the receptionist did not speak much English. His wife kept saying, “We are not in New York, Saul. They don’t have to speak English.”
After much miscommunication with the girl working the reception desk, we signed up for two treatments and unlimited mineral pool swimming. First we must shower and put on a bath cap. While I was following directions, an Oriental man kept wandering into the ladies showers. He was trying to find his way out of the spa. I saw him later, still looking for the exit, while I was swimming in the mineral pool with the balding but otherwise quite hairy Saul from New York.
It was time for my treatments. For my underwater massage treatment, I climbed three flights of slippery marble stairs in my bare wet feet. The staircase went straight up with no landings, no handrail. There I met the attendant, who motioned me to get in a bathtub. Then she leaned over with her cigarette breath and proceeded to pressure wash me under water. First the front, then the back. I floated up, and she pushed me back under. Done! She motioned. And she left for another smoke break.
I met Carl coming up the stairs. “How is it?” he asked.
“A lady with cigarette breath pressure washes you.”
“Oh boy.”
For Kniepp Therapy, we alternated standing in two pools, water halfway up our calves. One was boiling hot, the other icy. One minute hot, 30 seconds cold. And so on for 15 minutes. At first the cold water was stabbing, then my legs went numb. I was surprised to find that my feet felt pretty good afterwards; circulation must have improved. I capped the experience by walking through a shallow pool on stones, supposed reflexology but mostly painful, and drinking some distasteful mineral water and acceptable hot tea.
The spa receptionist recommended a Czech restaurant (duh) and we had a salty Bohemian meat plate with red and green vinegary cabbage and good beer. We wandered the town back to Hotel Ester, a nice place, not scary like the train stations. We decided to follow the recommendation of our hotel clerk and take the bus to Prague tomorrow.
Oh, and about that toilet paper dispenser. Yes, the company has a website. http://sedlacek.czechtrade.us/ I emailed them about my inheritance, but I have not heard back. Well, not yet.
Posts
No comments:
Post a Comment