First day at school

Our main reason for making the move to Prague at this stage, considering that there is a big relocate to Reading in March, was to have the girls attend a proper international school. The informal tuition that they have had thus far with student teachers has just not been working.

Amber is enrolled into Grade 1 at the Christian International School of Prague. Unfortunately, although Sarah should be going into Grade 1 according to UK standards, this is not the norm for Czech or the American system on which CISP is based. Also, added to this, the Grade 1 class is full, resulting in Sarah still being in the kindergarten this year. Fortunately for us though, the Czech school in the same building has a great government run kindergarten which Sarah is attending. Sarah was very disappointed that she has had to go to a Czech school while Amber gets to go to an English school, but she is very linguistically capable and will probably be fluent in Czech before we leave next year.

Anyway, there has been much excitement amongst the girls at the prospect of going to a "big school", after they have been in a very cosy 10 kids total school since we have been in the CZ.

Sarah's school started on Monday, 1st September while Amber's school opening was only on Wednesday, 3rd September.

Sarah at the entrance to her school:

In the hallway:

Sarah's teacher "Teacher Jana", giving instructions to Helena:

Saz settling in to her new class and playing with some mates, these two are Nigerian, but there are also, American, Russian and Ukranian kids in the same class:

   

On Tuesday afternoon, there was a "meet the Teachers" at Ambers school, and then the first big day was Wednesday 3rd September.

Both babies ready for school with their new backpacks:

Amber's teacher, Mrs Hartman, waited in the foyer of the school for all the grade 1's and 2's (they are a joint class). Sava, the boy in the blue shirt is a lively character, and is already entertaining his mates with stories and games:

    

A quick pose with Mrs Hartman:

and then they all lined up, waved good bye, and went off to their class:

New Teacher Helena

We thankfully managed to find an au-pair for the girls! They had 2 weeks in Prague before school started and Colin desperately needed to get back to writing. Also, once the school starts, we are eager to get them into extra-mural lessons for ballet and swimming, and so would need an au-pair to fetch them from school and cart them to lessons, as well as take them for outings and do fun activities after school.

Teacher Helena is a student, completing a psychology / teaching degree specialising in teaching the sensory handicapped children. She is also very artistic, having done theatre, dance, music, piano and art - right up the girls alleys! These photos are taken from one of their first days together when they went to the top of the TV tower near our apartment.

 

 

The BIG move to Prague

I still cannot believe that we immigrated 18 months ago with only a handful of suitcases, and did it all on easyjet and on the London underground.... and it ALL fitted into a city golf!!!

I am not sure how, or why, but we have managed to collect a whole lot more that I ever intended. We hired a Skoda Fabia (like a small station wagon), but ended up doing over 20 trips between Plzen and Prague, and then also had to rope in a mate who had a big enough vehicle to transport our fridge and washing machine.

From our furnished flat in Plzen, we moved into an empty flat and had to spend close on 50,000 CZK (about R25k) furnishing it - with the absolute basics. Fortunately IKEA delivers and so we spent a good couple of week-ends mopping and cleaning, and then building flatpacked furniture.

This is the lounge / dining room, the small balcony you can see through the doors, looks into the centre of the block - full of trees and greenery, very quiet too.

Work that mop!

The girls bedroom - this looks out over the street, we're on the 5th floor again, but at least we don't have the main road going by with all the late-night speed freaks and heavies - this road is quiet in comparison.

The stairs going up to our room and the bathroom. No shower here... Booo Hooo and only one bathroom, toilet downstairs for the kids, and only 2 bedrooms, but at least the bedrooms are bigger.

This is what a diningroom table, a bunkbed, a couch, a TV table, a book case, a chest of drawers and a double bed look like when they arrive from Ikea...

All we did was screw and hammer the whole weekend!

A pink chest of drawers begins to take shape in the girls room...

The big move eventually happened on the 22-23 of August and the girls enjoyed their new bedrooms, kitted with working desk and bunk beds. Here we are having our first supper in our Novy Zeleny Dum (New Green House - yip, another Green House!!).

Remember all them flat cardboard boxes...

Last day at School in Plzen - Eufrat Skolka

The very sad day arrived when Amber and Sarah had to say good bye to their school and to their most loved teachers and friends, especially Teacher Hanka. The girls planned their party on the Thursday of the last week, taking gifts for the teachers and goodies for treats. Their last day would be the Friday, but it would be spent riding horsies on a farm, so not ideal for flowers and cakes.

Teachers and classmates posing for the camera (before the festivities began)

Class in action

Ever wondered how "Head, shoulders, knees and toes" sounds in Czech?...

(waiting for video)

The girls were very spoilt as they were showered with gifts from their class mates and teachers, thank you so much everyone!

The Eufrat teachers know how to get the class in high spirits and ready for games, inventing dress up themes that the kids love. Not sure what manner of princesses these are, but you can be sure that princesses they were.

I don't think that Teacher Hanka was trying to imitate a princess here - more like an air guitarist...

Teacher Katka behind the mountain of chocolate gifts and flowers

Thank you Eufrat for making our last 18 months in Plzen memorable and enjoyable for our 2 girls - you will be missed!

Swimming at Liberec

After all the touring that we have done lately, we decided to book a week-end that was purely for the kids. We had been promising the girls for the whole summer that we would make a plan to take them to a pool, and so decided that we would find an aqua park and spend the week-end on slides and in pools.

This is one of the things that the girls miss the most. In ZA the entire summer is spent in the pool, there's one 5m from the front door! Here, it's a different game, living in apartments means no pool nearby, not even a paddle pool like you'd find in a town-house complex. Public venues are the only viable alternative, (or friends with a pool - Mike and Stepanka are the girls heroes for being so generous with their pool!) and this makes swimming quite a rare thing. Add to this the absence of nearby beaches, the reluctance of parents to swim in public waters and you have a pair of girls starved for swimming. Poor things - hopefully we will remedy this now that we have a pool within walking distance, and some regular lessons in the offing.

Looking nice there baby :D

The entire complex is indoors - can only be when you're this far North - and all things taken together, it was a great experience. The kids had an absolute ball and got brave enough to do some pretty decent tube slides... hundreds of them actually - it was Dad's job to wait at the bottom of the slide and catch flying babies, pass them on to the steps so that they could scoot up to the top for the next descent.

It takes some discernment and practice to sift your own kid from the stream of little (and sometimes really big) bodies coming down the slides though. When we were first getting the method worked out, I would wait in the pool at the bottom of the slide, Hayley would take the girls up to the top of the slide and teach them how to read the timer at the top of each slide. The theory is, that, when obeyed, this timer spaces sliders wide enough apart so that there are no collisions on, or after the tube ride. In practice the timers can tend to be more of a vague suggestion than a hard rule. I was to discover the merits of having a timer...

So, watching from the pool at the bottom of the slide, I could see the wife and kids a the top of this particular slide, there were others that were a little more tricky, but we'll get to that later... The plan was, that, just before embarking on the slide, girls to go first, followed by mom, that they would wave to me, signaling their departure. By this, I would know that one more body should plop out of the slide, and then, the next person should be baby number one. Which is how it worked out for both girls. The first one came down at speed, can't remember which it was now, Amber I think, anyway, the catch was completed perfectly and she bobbed in the water while we waited for Saz to come down the tube.

After a few seconds, sure enough Saz appeared around the bend and I prepared to catch her. She was going at a good pace, but what neither of us suspected was that her mom was right behind her going at about 10 times faster. I knew there was going to be trouble. Saz was completely unaware of the speeding mom behind her. I caught her and turned away from the slide immediately, as I got myself between Saz and the slide, mom, without brakes of any kind at her disposal, smacked into us. It was quite something... the force of the impact sent us both underwater and pushed me completely off my feet. Poor Saz fortunately didn't feel much of the thump but got a good dunking. Not fazed about being torpedoed by her mother she set off for the top of the slide again - she is still fearless...

Can't wait to get rid of those arm-bands... roll on swimming lessons!

Sarah without a runaway mom behind her.

The complex we swam at is huge with many different, some quite unique slides. The other tame-ish slide the girls tried was a longer version of the red one you see pictured here. Its mouth is about 5m to the right of this one, but you can't see the top of the slide from the mouth... So, it was agreed, that when the girls were en-route, they would call to make sure I was ready to catch them. The idea was that they would get to the last set of curves and scream, or call out. What happened in practice though was that they began calling from the moment their little bums touched the slide at the top. The result was loud calling... "Daaaad!!! Daaaad!!! Daaaad!!!" coming from the roof of the complex and tracing the route of the yellow slide. Crude as it may have been, and attract attention it did, it worked just fine! If there's noise in a place - the Woods are there.

The most novel water slide I've ever seen was one with a standard tube, perfectly straight but descending at a heck of a rate. The drop is made in complete darkness, so there is no clue that a turn is coming, and then the tube empties out into what looks like a giant, curved funnel. If toilet bowls were spherical, this would have been a giant toilet bowl. Anyway, you get shot out of the tube into this bowl, going at a cracking speed. At which, your momentum makes you swirl round the bowl in a helix until you eventually are going slow enough to drop out of the hole in the bottom into the pool below.

Here is Jane Public doing her slide...

In case you are vaguely interested in where Liberec (say Liberets) is in relation to other things, it's up in the north of the CR - see the map below.

Visit with the Oosthuizens

On one of our recent visits to the UK, we were able to catch up with Oom and family.

Mariette, cooking up a storm in die kombuis, and looking radiant at 6 months. Just to illustrate how tardy we are in getting this post up... the baby was born on Sept 5... slack ne?

Miracle upon Miracle, it was a sunny afternoon in Oxford, one of the very few in the whole summer according to Pieter. Amber and Sarah try their hand at badminton... we have a long way to go.

We got spoilt with the rare treat of a good ol' SA Braai! If the die-hard boerewors and braai tong mense will excuse the use of a gas braai! It actually works really well... might even consider one myself when we stop in one location long enough to warrant it. Please notice the castle in the background - haven't seen one of those in 18 months or more. They still taste good, but I don't know if they top a PU...

Amber was introduced to WII tennis and was developing a smashing forehand... almost literally - I was worried about the virtual game getting a little too realistic - putting some top-spin on Pieters new HD TV or something like it! nothing is safe in the environment when this game is being played - furniture, light fixtures, passing people etc are all in grave danger of swinging remotes. Watch this space at Christmas time... (Sorry luv!!)

With a little luck, occasions like this will happen more often than once a year when we're in that neck of the woods.

Thanks for a stunning day guys! And good luck with the new arrival!

Greetings from the Grand People (Final Chapter)

Dear All,

Well here we are back in good old South Africa, but not home yet.  However we are safely back with all our baggage intact after a fairly pleasant flight with Emirates Airline via Dubai.

Last weekend was special as we spent Saturday exploring the quaint German town of Regensburg built alongside the Danube River.  It was only about a two hour drive from Plzen so we left early and only went for the day.  When we arrived we found parking in a car park which was half occupied by a type of farmers market, reminiscent of the Sedgefield Farmers Market and after looking at all the stalls we went off to explore the town.   We walked along the river bank watching the river boats full of tourists as far as an old stone bridge which was well photographed and then headed into the old town with an old Roman Fort built in 179AD, which we duly photographed (from all angles!).

 

We then explored some very quaint old streets until we arrived opposite a very old church where we made a pitstop for Beer, Coffee, Cool Drinks and hot Chocolate, under the shade of a large umbrella.  We had to go through the pub to get to the loos and I was so impressed with the pub I took a couple of photos.

From there, refreshed, we continued to explore the town, ending up back at the old stone bridge at lunch time to have sausages and sauerkraut at an open air restaurant on the bank of the Danube.  However this was no ordinary Wors!  It was The Historical Wurstkuchl of Regensburg!  The oldest sausage tavern of the world! 

"By the Danube whirlpools right next to the Old Stone Bridge you'll find the over 500 year old historical WURSTKUCHL!  Little has changed since the days where in the Middle Ages Regensburger stonemasons and dockers treated themselves to refreshments at this tavern: with it's charcoal grill, homemade sausages purely of ham and pork, sauerkraut fermented in their own cellar and of course the Wurstkuchl mustard following the original recipe of Elsa Schricker."    Most enjoyable, but very busy and of course there is only one item on the menu.  The only variation is the number of sausages you order with your sauerkraut.  We went the most economical route and ordered three plates of twelve sausages and shared between the six of us, plus beer and cooldrinks.

Suitably refreshed we continued our exploration which included a couple of very old and ornate cathedrals with very colourfully painted ceilings and lots of statues.  Needless to say we used up lots of our camera memories with all the pics we took.  We also found a few town squares filled with lots of people attracted by various bands and singers entertaining the crowds.  The people were all very well behaved and Jolly and I'm sure the beer sales were excellent.  What a pleasant vibe everywhere.   We left Regensburg after five PM having had a lovely last day of exploration.

Sunday was pack up day.  Hayley had found out that our bus to Zurich stopped in Plzen so we did not have to go all the way to Prague to catch it.  This saved a lot of traveling and it left from Plzen an hour later than Prague, giving us more time with the family.   We said our good byes  to Colin and the girls at the flat and Hayley drove us to the Bus Station with all our luggage.  The bus trip, starting about 22h30, did not give us much sleep.  After about an hour we stopped at a Macdonald's for a 15min pitstop and then  at the border the lights came on again and we all had to produce our Passports.   A few hours later, possibly at the Swiss Border on came the lights again and we had to hand over our passports which were taken away and scrutinized before being handed back to us.  It was about 06h00 when we got to Zurich and all got out at the bus station.  Luckily there was a coffee shop and a hotel right there so we made our way there and treated ourselves to a magnificent mug of hot chocolate whilst finding out how to find our hotel, The Europe Hotel.  We learned we could catch the No 4 tram nearby which would take us there, we had to get off at the Opera House stop and it was just around the corner.  We reached the Hotel safely and they had an empty room which we could occupy right away, so had a bit of a ziz until near midday.  The hotel organised for us to do a two and a half hour bus tour of Zurich starting at 13h00.  We caught the tour from the bus station where we arrived so it was easy to find.  We enjoyed the tour and the guide was good and after landing back at the bus station we decided to walk back  to our hotel, taking in the sights alongside the water/river.  We also found the Tourist Info Centre who suggested we do a round train, hike, cable car and train round trip by ourselves the next day.   We found a pleasant restaurant for supper and then crashed quite early after a tiring night and lovely day.

Tuesday dawned fine after intermittent rain the previous day.  After a good breakfast we packed our bags and left them in Reception and arranged for the airport shuttle bus to take us to the airport at 18h50, in plenty of time to catch our flight home.    We caught the No 4 tram again to the main station where we caught the S10 train from Platform 2 to Uetliberg.  That was the end of the line and we hiked up quite a hill to get to "The Top Of Zurich".  It is the summit of the highest hill in Zurich at 869.6 meters with lovely panoramic views of Zurich and surrounds below.   From there we did a super walk of approx. 6kms through forests all along the ridge with many undulations to the cable station at a place called Felsenegg.  Here we had a jolly good lunch of Goulash soup and bread rolls plus a beer for me and apple drink for Mom.  The cable car ride down was interesting because we stopped half way down whilst a technician in the car coming up stopped at a pylon while he climbed out and onto the top of the pylon superstructure to carry out some repairs or inspection.  Anyway it added interest to the ride down to Adliswil.   From there we had a short walk through the town to the railway station where we caught the S4 train back to Zurich station. It was a thoroughly enjoyable outing.   We then strolled along the waterfront and stopped at a pub built out over the water for a rest in deck chairs and refreshments until it was time to go back to our hotel to catch the shuttle bus to the airport.   We both loved Zurich which is a clean city and nearly everyone is smartly dressed and pleasant. They are helpful and one can normally find someone who understands the English language, so getting around is that much easier.  It is a beautiful city.

Our flight back to Cape town was uneventful and quite pleasant.  From Zurich we had the two seats on the side with a good window position so could see the approach to Dubai.  From there ,however, in the larger plane we were not able to get seats in the centre on the isle, but had the window and centre seats of the three on the side, so had to ask the isle set passenger to let us out every time we needed to go walkabout.   However it was a day time flight so the window was an advantage at times when there was no cloud cover and we could see the ground.

As you may have heard, Michelle took a tumble down the stairs at her home last week and ended up in hospital with a couple of crushed vertebrae (compression fractures) so we have broken our journey in Cape Town and will only fly back to PE on 31st July.  It was so fortunate that we flew overseas from CT and not Joburg and are able to be here to help the family.   Michelle is coming on nicely now. She must spend most of the time over the next month on her back, but has been given a brace to strap on to be able to get around the house a bit.  She must either be on her back or she can stand or walk a bit, but cannot sit for more than 15 minutes a day!    So, here we are in Cape town for a while and since we arrived on Wednesday it has been very cold and wet.  Yesterday we woke to find fairly heavy snow on the mountains to the north, which we can see from their home.  Today dawned clear and sunny but not very hot. All the spectacular views from the house are very clear after the rains and as it was such a nice day Pierre suggested we go and climb Lion's Head after lunch.   He, Michael and I set off after lunch and had a super climb in perfect weather.  Mike managed the climb extremely well and even managed the scrambles up the chains without help from Pierre.   The views after the rains were clear and spectacular and we had a thoroughly enjoyable afternoon.

Well, that about sums up our holiday, with our very grateful thanks to Colin and Hayley for all they did for us and making it all possible.   A holiday and travel experience we will never forget!!!

As I write this The Wood family are in London!    Hayley learned just a few days before we left that she had to fly to Zurich and then go on to Zug on the same Monday we arrived in Zurich.  She had to attend a two day meeting in Switzerland and then back home and on to London on the Thursday for more meetings until the weekend.  Next week, Wednesday she has to fly to Johannesburg for more meetings, returning home to Plzen next weekend.  Wow, what a busy girl!   Anyway,we were surprised to get an SMS to say she was in London with the whole family for a few days, until Monday!   No doubt they will have more interesting news on their Blog in a few days time and we look forward to reading all about it.

Bed calls so it's time to stop my waffling.   Lots of love to you all from us all in Cape Town.

(Greetings Chapter 2)

Greetings from the Grand People (Chapter 2)

Dear All,
Our wonderful holiday is galloping to an end at a rate of knots and it seems that in a blink of an eye it will be all over!!  Boo Hoo!   Wow, have we had a tremendous time with the family!  Time has flown by since our last letter round about 10th June and we  have crowded so much into the time.
During the weekend 14th/15th we all went to explore two quaint old towns built around hot mineral springs, Marianske Lazne and Karlovy Vary, which are very beautiful with quaint buildings and beautiful Garden Parks.  People come from far and wide to experience the therapeutic benefits of the mineral waters and the hot baths. 

  Everywhere one walks in the towns there are mineral fountains with people drinking the mineral water or collecting it in bottles and containers.  As you can imagine, our cameras worked overtime.

The next weekend was the cherry on the top, our trip into the Arctic Circle!   On Friday afternoon, 20th we flew to Tromso in Northern Norway via Oslo, arriving there in the evening.  The trip was for Hayley to run the "Midnight Sun Marathon" and because there was no available accommodation in Tromso we were billeted in cabins in a caravan park in Skittenellv about 21kms out of Tromso.  This again was a bonus because of the beautiful setting. 

On Sat evening Hayley ran the marathon and finished in a very creditable time of 4hrs 32min, looking very good as she crossed the finishing line.    Next day was an easy day, naturally, for Hayley to recover and we spent most of the afternoon in Tromso.   Next day, Monday and Hayley's birth day, we did a spectacular tour of the area by bus which crossed two fjords by ferry to a place called Skjervoy. The bus and ferry trip left Tromso at 14h00 and arrived at Skjervoy at 18h00, where we had a two hour break before boarding a passenger liner for the journey back to Tromso, arriving there at midnight, but of course it is still daylight!!.  

We got back to our cabins at 01h00, still light enough to take photographs.
Next day we did a car tour of the other side of Tromso, stopping for photos along the way and having a lovely meal of fish and chips at a cafe in a small fishing village. 

It was early to bed on Tuesday night as we had to be up at 03h00 to pack and get to Tromso to catch our early flight home, as Hayley had to go to office in the afternoon.
This last weekend we went South and explored two Castle Towns, Hluboka and Cesky Krumlov, and once again our tour guide, Hayley, cracked the jackpot!  We first explored Hluboka and toured the Castle and surrounds before moving on to Cesky Krumlov where we found a super Pension for the night. 

It was delightful accom with a stunning view of the town below.  Sunday was spent exploring Cesky Krumlov and doing the Castle tour. 

The town has a river meandering through it which is a huge attraction with hundreds of people hiring canoes and drifting down the river shooting a few rapids built over wiers and all along the river are restaurants with tables on varandas under umbrellas.  Here again these towns are crowded with weekend visitors and tourists, with a tremendous vibe.

This coming Saturday we are going to another old and quaint town in Germany about 2hrs drive from here, a favourite of the family.  It will be our swan song, as we depart on Sunday night from Prague by bus for Zurich. It is an overnight bus journey arriving in Zurich at seven in the morning.  We will have Monday and Tuesday to explore Zurich before flying home.  Our Emirates Airlines flight leaves on Tuesday evening, 8th July, via Dubai and arrives in Cape town on Wednesday 9th July, flight EK seven seven 0, at 16h25 if all goes according to plan. (the seven key on our keyboard no longer works!)
We fly from Cape Town to Port Elizabeth on Thursday 10th July, flight 1391, departing five pm and arriving in PE at 18h10.  Mishie. we hope you will be able to meet us in CT and drop us off next day and Dennis, can you do the necessary at the PE end please??  If it is at all inconvenient, Trevor has also offered to collect us, or we may be able to rope Rick in if he is not out of town on business.  Anyway we will phone from Cape town before arriving. 
Looking forward to coming home and catching up with you all.  Lots of love from all the family here.   Dad and Mom.   Geoff and Marion.

(Greetings Chapter 1)

(Greetings Final Chapter)