Friday we woke up early (7:45 a.m.) because we had orientation at our school Charles University Law School at 9:00 a.m. I decided to try out our new cereal and milk before school. Turns out that the milk over here tastes pretty normal and the cereal tastes like candy. The problem is they don't give you very much cereal in a package. I guess I'll have to learn to eat less for breakfast.
Because we had made the walk past the school yesterday (and because we haven't gotten our public transportation passes yet) we decided to walk, although it was lightly drizzling. Our walk to school took about 20 minutes. Luckily, at school someone had posted a sign telling us to go to "Room 121, Ground Floor." Apparently, however, "ground floor" doesn't mean the same thing in the US as it does in the Czech Republic, because our room was actually upstairs (not on our version of the ground floor). When we finally found Room 121, most of our classmates had already gathered and were enjoying the complimentary coffee, tea, and water.
Sidenote: Since moving to Prague I've learned that I don't like mineral water -- not only don't I like it, I actually hate it. Because things are named differently here, we bought "bubbly mineral water" instead of "still water" at the grocery store. I will NEVER make this mistake again. From now on, I am only buying Bonaqua!
Anyways, we began orientation by taking care of the administrative things like getting our tram cards and student IDs and meeting our teachers and Czech student mentors. Then, a Czech professor and historian of the law school gave a 2 1/2 hour lecture on the history of law in the Czech Republic, starting with the establishment of the country in the 1300s all the way through today (the post communist era). While interesting at first, we found it hard to stay awake as the time wore on--not to mention that some of the students had just arrived that day or the previous night and were suffering from some serious jet-lag.
After the lecture, our Czech law student mentors gave us a tour of the law school (including the location of the water closets, i.e. bathrooms), the library (where we will go to print materials), and the cafeteria. They also gave us vouchers for free lunch in the cafeteria. I can guarantee that I will not be eating there again during my stay here. They gave us about 5 pounds of cut-up boiled potatoes, one small slice of fried pork (if you could even call it pork -- yuck), plain shredded cabbage, and a doughnut sliced open and filled with some kind of weird, awful-tasting cream. Turns out, it is possible to ruin a perfectly good doughnut. From now on we will be eating out or bringing our own lunch from home.
Sidenote: Other than our cafeteria lunch, everything I've eaten over here has been delicious!
After lunch, we met in the main lobby of school for a tour of the law school of Universitas Carolinus, built before King Charles IV was king (ruler in the early 1300s) and the oldest college building in central Europe. A section of this building, the "Graduation Hall," holds semesterly graduation ceremonies for law students and promotion ceremonies for professors. This hall also houses a HUGE bronze statue of Charles IV and a large tapestry of St. Wenceslas and Charles IV. Formerly this hall was a dining room for the professors and students who lived (a floor below), ate and learned together in this building. Apparently King Charles IV bought Universitas Carolinus from some rich guy and turned it into the first building of Charles University.
Then the Vice Dean of the law school took us into the room where the Deans and other important members of the school administration dress in traditional attire for the ceremonies. He even put on the robe, hood, and gold chain that he wears during the ceremonies. Apparently the ceremonies are still very traditional and done entirely in Latin, although nobody really understands it anymore.
Afterward, Schawnne and I headed back to the apartment to rest. On our way back, we stumbled upon Bohemian Bagels, i.e. a little piece of heaven with the tastiest bagels ever! I will probably be frequenting this shop often.
We wanted to go out later that evening so we posted on the trip's facebook page to see if anyone was interested in going to the bar beneath out apartment - U Maleho Glena, i.e. "at little glen." Two guys from our school decided to trek across the Charles Bridge to meet us. We sat for 4 hours, drinking Czech beer, eating American appetizers, and talking. One of the guys, Tim, also talked us into trying absinthe.
Apparently taking a shot of absinthe is a procedure. First, you take a small spoon and fill it with sugar and then dunk it into the alcohol so that the sugar becomes saturated. Then you use a lighter to light the sugar on fire and wait for the sugar to caramelize. Once it caramelizes, you stir the flaming spoon in the liquor. Then, you blow the flame out of the glass and take the shot. Tim was the first to take the shot and made such a bad face that Schawnne and I were a bit scared to take it. Being brave, I took mine and found that it wasn't as bad as I was expecting (apparently Tim's a baby). It definitely had a bite to it but definitely wasn't like drinking fire, which is how Tim made it seem. I will not be making it my drink of choice, but at least I can check it off my bucket list.
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