Writer’s Life – Page 2 – An Accidental Vagabond

Go to Cesky Krumluv and Experience a Fairytale

Published on October 21, 2014March 3, 2024 by An Accidental Vagabond1 Comment

A cool night. 8:30 p.m. A full moon. Dark. An empty train station. The ingredients to a horror story.

I came without information. No direction, no reservations, no contacts. I could have taken this moment to berate myself on my lack of preparation, but what was the point. I was here now, and self degradation was a waste of emotional energy. Just walk, I told myself. I didn’t worry about injury just the cold. I walked toward a dark tree lined street, but something told me that I was moving in the wrong direction. I heard the sound of wheeled luggage on pavement behind me, and I turned to watch the silhouettes and shadows of people leaving the train station head down a steep hill. I decided to follow the other passengers.

I could not see the city center or the castle. I knew it was a sleepy city, and that I might not be able to find accommodations for the night, but I felt somehow I would be okay. The moon was full, and a bright rainbow of light cast a ring around the moon. There is a wise tale that say’s if you stand under the moon with a ring it means that you will find true love. In this wise tale you need to be standing under the ringed moon with another person, and that person is your true love. But, what does it mean if the person you are standing with is your mother or father? My mother would have loved that. The last time I had seen her before leaving for China (not knowing I would never see her again) she had been looking at me lovingly, and with a longing that made me feel uncomfortable. “Oh honey,” she had sighed, “I wish it could just be you and me forever.” I had looked at her with scrutiny before I spoke. “That’s great, mom, that’s what every daughter wants to hear from her mother.” “That’s not what I meant.” She had said in a huffed and insulted tone. “Yes it fucking is.” I had said. There were times when she would hug me and I felt that she was trying to absorb me into her flesh till she was pregnant with me. I’d push away from her during those embraces. Now that she’s gone I only feel sadness at my inability to give her what she wanted, but I had desperately wanted to be my own person. I didn’t have to think about it any longer. I could just stand under the ring of a full moon in Cesky Krumluv, that’s all there was now. So, what did it mean to stand under the moon alone? Perhaps it meant I would love this small village?

I was at ease. I was at peace. I didn’t always feel this way. I embraced these moments of calm. I longed for it to stay. There were more days’ of anxiety, and a heavy shadow of worry then there was this feeling of bliss. It would come in strange and unexpected moments. I vowed to find a way to bottle this feeling.

I cut through a park with a cobblestone path. The first leaves of fall sprinkled the ground like an autumn carpet. Although the park was dark and foreign I wasn’t afraid. The woods are not always haunted. Through the trees I saw the castle illuminated and glowing. Lumière chiaroscuro. A painting floating against the canvas of the night.

I stood for a moment staring at the castle taking in as much as I could in the darkness. It was built on a cliff of rocks, medieval and, yes, fairytale romantic.

I walked on till I was out of the woods and at the beginning of the village. I walked toward what looked to be an old guard’s gate, and to the right of it was a huge sign that said “Hostel 99”. That would be my first try. I followed the signs to the hostel over cobblestones, and down a backstreet that lead to a closed door. A light was on in a room, and I looked through the window as I passed. Inside I saw the face of a man that I had seen before. We did not know each other, but I had seen his face many times over the course of many years. He was the friend of my friend Gregg who I had lived with in Prague many years ago. I knew a few stories about him, I had even met his girlfriend briefly at the Clown and Bard the week prior to my trip. His name was Zezo and, because of social media, I had seen his pictures many times, but he knew nothing of me.

I rang the bell. He opened the door. I smiled like I knew him, and even though he did not know me he returned the same smile.

“You are Zezo.” I said.

“Yes.” He said surprised.

“I am a friend of Gregg’s from the Clown and Bard.”

“Oh, hello.” And he hugged me. “What can I do for you?”

“Do you have a room available?”

“Oh shit. No. Only a double for 700 koruna.”

“Do you know of another hostel?”

“Oh, yes, but man it is really fucking far away.”

He grabbed a map.

“How long are you staying?”

“One night.” I said.

“Oh shit. I can take care of that.”

-and he did.

I had shelter for the evening. Zezo directed me to a vegetarian restaurant where I could find some thing to eat. I had a limited time to find food because he told me that things closed early in Krumluv. He also told me that the castle was open for 24 hours so I could walk through the gates if I so chose.I thanked Zezo for his help and hospitality and wandered into the night and medieval city to explore and to find food.

Visit Ceské Budejovice and Experience Goulash and Beer in a Dive Bar

Published on October 20, 2014March 3, 2024 by An Accidental VagabondLeave a comment

If our lives are dominated by a search for happiness, then perhaps few activities reveal as much about the dynamics of this quest- in all its ardor and paradoxes- then our travels.
Alain De Botton, The Art of Travel.

My connecting train to Krumluv was not going to arrive for two hours. I took my pack and wandered into the square near the Ceské Budejovice train station. I was hungry, and had to pee, but I had no idea where to go. I walked toward a sign that pointed to a restaurant in an alleyway. I didn’t know why I picked this particular sign to follow, maybe it was the alleyway or maybe I liked the flowers and stenciled tree on the sign. The sign did not match the restaurant. It wasn’t really a restaurant as much as it was a watering-hole that wanted to be a restaurant, but gave up on the restaurant dream years ago, and kept the sign.

When traveling I always feel awkward. It doesn’t seem to matter how many years or times I have wandered into a strange place in a strange city— that feeling of insecurity of place lingers. I live in a perpetual state of uncertainty, yet float in a state of constant awe that I’ve made it as far as I have. I’m fairly certain there are three of me living inside this one body. One is the great believer and spontaneous adventurer and the other is attempting to return to the cave where the ignorance of fear feels safe. The third is the observer wondering what the other two crazy me(s) are doing and how it is possible that we are still alive. I carry these thoughts— they are steady companions. My observer self is always amused, thankfully. What would I do without that part of me? How can one be concurrently so confident and so frightened? It makes no sense. I think that when I die maybe these three, my personal trinity, will finally become one. Until then I live with this triptych personality; sometimes open, sometimes closed, but some how we make it. I make it. I don’t think this is all entirely on my shoulders. Other humans can make life feel awkward, and more times then not it may be a case of: it’s not me it’s them.

It was a divey little place. Smoky and filled with men having beer during the early part of the day. The only women in the place were a lady in her sixties sitting near the entrance, and a woman, also in her sixties, working behind the bar. As I stepped inside all conversations stopped and all the men turned and silently looked at me, only the smoke moved. I hesitated wondering if this was one of those places that women did not go to, but the woman behind the bar smiled at me and the other women gave me a nod. I sat at a table as two men at the table beside me turned in their chairs to watch. I can never understand the blatant staring and examination of strangers. Do people not know it causes discomfort? Is that the intention? Have they never experienced it? I sat with my back to the men, but I could still feel them staring. The man closest to me leaned toward my shoulder attempting to get a better look at my face. Again, this was a moment of uncertainty; I was uncertain as to why I was still sitting there. I felt the men turn away from me, and the conversations started up again.

The bartender told me the specials, goulash and something I couldn’t understand.

“Dom si goulash prosim e pivo, prosim.”

All I can really do in Czech is order food. As I ordered, the man closest at the table again turned to watch me. He turned back to his friend said something and they began laughing. I pushed aside my discomfort. I had had many Chinese people watch me order food and eat when I was in Zhengzhou, but I still had not grown accustomed to the examinations. Also, there is a difference in feeling when two large men are staring at you like you are not a human being, but an exotic animal and when a small Chinese woman is staring at you like you are an exotic animal. I’ve become increasingly aware of how easily people disassociate themselves from the humanness of others. The examiner is the human the visitor is the strange animal— the other.

I drank my beer and ate my goulash slowly and in silence. The men at the table behind me slowly began to lose interest in my existence. ABBA’s, Fernando played on the radio. Smoke filled the room. Men chatted in Czech and ordered more beers. The carpeting was red and worn. Carpeting is never a good idea in bars, and I wonder why it has ever been done. The lady behind the bar had a tired face and the other woman finished her cigarette and then walked out with a wave of her hand. There was a man at the bar all in black with Motorhead stenciled in white on his black leather. His hair was stringy and died black. He could have lived in Portland, Oregon. I was still hungry after eating the goulash and I resisted the urge to lick my plate. I received a text message from Carol a new friend from the TEFL program. She was now living in Ceske Budejovice with her boyfriend. I had sent her a message earlier that I would be visiting CB. Through serendipitous timing she said she happened to be in the mall very near to the bar. We agreed to meet up. I paid my bill and went to the bathroom. When I returned the bartender handed me a shot. The two men at the table beside me had bought it for me. They could not speak any English except to ask where I was from.

“Ameriky.” I said.

“Na zdraví ” they toasted to my health.

The shot was sweet almost like a plum. I said, thank you and grabbed my pack and walked out of the bar.

I met Carol and her boyfriend Lukas in the mall. We sat in the food cart chatting and discussing my return to CB and what we should do during my visit. They walked me back to the train station and helped me to find my connection.

“It is only 20 minutes to Cesky Krumluv from here, but who knows how many stops the train will make.” Lukas said.

“Hopefully, I will get in before dark.” I said, “I have no idea where I am staying.”

They wished me luck and put me on the train. It took an hour to get to Krumluv, which reinforced the fact that the student agency bus would have been the better choice for travel.

It was dark when I arrived. This sentence was the first line I used to describe my first moments in Prague 14 year’s ago. It was dark when I arrived and I had no idea where to go. I had many memories of my first time in Prague as I traveled on the train. My first journey alone into the Czech Republic was on a train. The train, the darkness, and the blank almost meditative state of mind was a similar sensation to how I had felt all those years ago. I carried caution, but simultaneously moved blindly forward. There is never any way to go except forward.

Take a Train Through Bohemia: Drawing Maps with a Stranger

Published on October 15, 2014March 3, 2024 by An Accidental VagabondLeave a comment

You know I’ve seen a lot of what the world can do
and it’s breaking my heart in two
because I never wanna see you sad girl.

Don’t be a bad girl.

a photo of a train station in Trebon, Czechia taken through the train window.

The Czech man and I shared the train car in silence for about an hour. I am not sure what prompted him to break the silence but he began to speak to me even though I could not understand him. He knew I was going to Cesky Krumluv because I had shown him my ticket before I sat down. I handed him the ticket said, “prosim?” And then pointed to the seats. “Ano, ano,” he replied. I sat down and we smiled those strange tight smiles that you smile when you know that you can not communicate. There is a holding back in the smile because the next instant behind a genuine smile is the impulse to speak. The smile is lost and stuck in a sort of limbo. It doesn’t know if it should stop smiling. There is no where else for it to go. There we were stuck in awkward silence with these lost grins. There was a moment in China when I had first experienced this lost smile. I stood waiting for an elevator in my apartment where the school had housed me, and as the doors slowly parted I saw the kind face of one of the Chinese head teachers at my school. We both greeted each other with a surprised, “ni hao,” and behind this simple hello brimmed the communication, “Hey, what are you doing here? So surprised to run into you here.” Our smiles were bright and open, but just as quickly as the elevator doors slide open and then closed we remembered that we could not speak the same language and our smiles fell into the same tight smiles as the one I shared with the Czech man on the train. That silence of inability is strong. The desire to communicate is visceral and real. There is a poignant moment of realization that the moment is lost like our smiles.

“Cesky Krumluv?” He said.
“Yes. Ano.”
“Ceske Budejovice…”

…And he began to pantomime instructions to me. “Smer”, he said. I had seen this word many times in the train station and metro and I had guessed that the word meant exit. “Ceske Budejovice smer…” and somehow out of only recognizing one or maybe two words I figured out that I needed to get off the train in Cseke Budejovice and transfer to another train. The beauty of all of my understanding of the word smer is that I was incorrect in my translation. The word means direction, but my guess of exit is what saved me from missing my transfer. To clarify my understanding of what the man was telling me I handed him my journal and had him draw his communication. I needed to transfer in Budejovice, but where was I to find my connecting train? I decided to worry about it once I arrived.

A hand made map of directions written in black ink. — Clear enough instructions.

Once the man knew that I understood him he began speaking to me more freely as if I could clearly understand the Czech language. I realized at that moment that I didn’t even know how to say, “I don’t speak Czech.” I continued to smile at him and nod my head, and in truth, I was straining to understand. In retrospect it is amusing that I would attempt to understand words that attached no meaning to my native language, yet I still tried.

“Cesky Krumluv…Ceske… Historicky.”

Any word that I slightly recognized caused me to jump with a small jolt of excitement.

“History? Ano. Ano.”

He grabbed a magazine from his bag. The cover had an image of what looked like a viking and the title ‘Historike Ceske’. He leafed through the pages and showed me a picture of a castle, and then he began naming off places. Then an amazing thing happened. I understood that this man was telling me of all the historic places in Bohemia that I should visit. He also told me how many kilometers by train or walking it would take to get from one place to another. Again, I had him draw me a picture. In my journal he made a scratch pad map of where I should visit and what places to stop to transfer to the next place. We spoke in this manner with drawings, and his use of one or two English words and my understanding of one or two Czech words for thirty minutes. Once we had exhausted our abilities to communicate we both returned to our silence and watched the sky and the trees quickly stream past our window.

Directions to Cesky Krumlov written in a journal.

I felt free as I often do on trains. There is a magic to traveling by train that I never experience or feel when I’m on a plane or traveling by car. Although, all forms of transportation delivers you to a place it is on a train where I feel like I am truly traveling. It is on the train when I feel truly free. It breaths life into the saying, “It is not the destination, but the journey,” for me. I’ve had the experience more than once in my life that it isn’t the moment when I am in a new place or the moment when I am leaving a familiar place that brings me happiness. It is when I am in-between. I am nowhere. I am leaving and going simultaneously. Time is crossing paths with the future and the past and it is in this moment where I am present. Now. Now I am going. I don’t dream of the next place or long for the place I had left. I am only here on the train listening to the wheels singing against the rails, and watching the trees and the life outside, the entire world, flow by like a river. I flow with it into nothingness and everything, and that is when I am free. My home is the train.

We are familiar with the notion that the reality of travel is not what we anticipate.

The Art of Travel- Alain De Botton

Botton, Alain De. The Art of Travel. New York:Pantheon Books,2002. Print.

P.S. A tip on traveling: The best thing to take when traveling from Prague to Cesky Krumluv is the student agency bus. It is cheaper and faster than the train, and it takes you directly to the city center. Still, there was a personal advantage to my making the mistake of taking the train. I just happen to love trains.

Traveling in Bohemia

Published on October 14, 2014March 3, 2024 by An Accidental Vagabond2 Comments

As I grabbed my pack and left the apartment for the final time, Cat Steven’s “Baby it’s a Wild World” played on repeat in my head. My spirits had been low as of late, hell the spirits are all over the place, for reasons and no reasons at all. It’s tender footing and walking on eggshells in this brain. Having Cat Stevens as a companion at the moment was encouraging.

blonde woman with a backpack standing in from of a red and white door. — Leaving the apartment on Kublelikova in Zizkov, Prague.

Oh Baby, baby it’s a wild world. It’s hard to get by just upon a smile girl.”

I sat on a Czech train gently cruising deeper into Bohemia. It has been years since I have ridden a European railway. At first I was confused to where to sit. In China the seats are open and similar to the seating arrangements as Amtrax, America’s rail line. This train was compartmentalized by little rooms with sliding doors and eight seats to a compartment.

I sat in the darkness with an older Czech man as the train went through a tunnel. We had been silent because I don’t speak Czech and he cannot speak English. The light in the train car was dim and I could barely see. It gave me a moment to think on how rarely I travel so impulsively on my own. Although, many people could say I do this all the time, but more often then not I have a place to stay at my destination; this time I did not. I suppose I did the same thing in Ireland many years ago, but that’s another story.

burgundy train seats in a Czech train car. — The train to Cesky Kumluv

Originally I had planned to make this trip with my new friend Keiko. We had met during our TEFL training at The Language House in Prague. Most of the other students had found places to live, and jobs, but Keiko whose final destination was South Korea, and myself whose final destination seems to be god knows where (due to visa and passport issues) were left to our whims while we had money. Keiko had been using couchsurfing a website that connects travelers to people who are happy to open their homes and host them for a night or two. Keiko suggested we should couch surf together for a week. It was decided. We had planned to go to Kunta Hora for a day and then the next day we would head for Cesky Krumluv.

It is amazing how quickly things can change, literally things can change in a mater of five minutes or the click of a link. Keiko has a love affair with Poland. She had been there before and had a friend who was a DJ in Warsaw (I think Warsaw). As we sat on my bed looking on our computers Keiko read a link to her friend’s radio show. He told her to listen because he had mentioned her. She sighed heavily. “I wish I could go to Poland. The only thing that is keeping me from going is money.” She sighed again and then clicked on another link- and there it was an offer for her to volunteer teach in Poland. All she had to do was get there, but the weeks accommodations and food would all be provided. And like that, a wish and a click, plans had been changed and Keiko headed to Poland.

I was solemn for a moment, but only because I knew I would not see Keiko again in person or at least not for many years. This lifestyle brings lasting strong friendships that are maintained through social media. In the past you knew you had to say good-bye possibly forever, but now we can always look at each other’s pictures and send a message on birthdays and on those occasions when we realize it has been years since we have said hello to that dear friend you met in that foreign place. If I am going to be entirely honest with myself another reason for my brief but somber mood had to do with my newly developed and increasingly uneasy anxieties. I would classify it as a fear. Fear of what exactly I’m not too sure. I’ve always struggled with anxiety and worry, but since China, since my mom’s death it seems to be stronger. Although I feel like there have always been twinges of anxiety- after all I’ve had more than one panic attack, I suppose it is fitting for it to manifest itself in new and exotic forms.

With all these nightmares
It’s a wonder that I
ever made it out from
my childhood
bedroom.
– Annabelle, Zizkov

There has always been potential for me to be someone who hides and lives in books and television series, and movies. In a way it was how I was raised. Mother and I always watching movies together. The last few times I had visited her it was hard to get her out of the house at all. A lot of it had to do with the pain that she was in, but she had always hid from the world that was so often cruel to her. The movies and the series, and the books were better, safer, they eased her pain and they helped her forget her sorrows. I know this life very, very well. I grew up with an overwhelming feeling of being trapped. Trapped in poverty, trapped in a small town, trapped with her, always looking out at what other people do. I was afraid if I left she would die, and eventually she did. We all do.

I pushed these feelings away as I watched Keiko do the necessary planning to make her very last minute bookings to Poland, plus her Skype to her concerned mother. Keiko turned to me before she called her mom. “Just wait she’s going to warn me that I could be sold into sex slavery.” That is exactly what her mom worried about. I chuckled remembering my mom having the same worry when I was in Prague fourteen years ago. It must be so hard on parents with their children dashing around the world when the news produces images of such terror. As she spoke with her mother I decided to do our planned trip on my own. I looked for places to book in Krumluv, but for some reason I was not able to book anything. So I would just have to take my chances and hope to find something once I arrived.

Running through the train station with only five minutes left to catch my train, I stumbled through incredibly broken Czech asking people to help me find the platform. Miming in the Czech Republic had been far more successful than my miming attempts in China. Through the assistance of strangers, I found my platform, and my train and sat down in the compartment with the nice older man who shared in the silence and the darkness of the tunnel.

“Oh baby, baby, it’s a wild world, I’ll always remember you as a child girl.”

To be continued…

Traveling Does Not Erase the Loss You Feel, But it Sure is Beautiful

Published on October 13, 2014March 3, 2024 by An Accidental Vagabond1 Comment

Today, I randomly opened my book Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman and read a quote that seemed to answer a common request I’ve had of late.

Not I, not anyone else can travel that road for you,
you must travel it for yourself.

The quote is from his poem, “Song of Myself”. An ex-boyfriend gave me the book nearly ten years ago, and his reason was specifically for me to read “Song of Myself”. It took me a couple of years after he had given it to me for me to read it. When I finally did, I couldn’t remember a poem moving me so greatly and causing me to pause with such huge sighs of awe. How could this man from the 1800’s know how I was feeling today? It is a poem of self empowerment, and a testament to the wonder of life, and what potential we all have, and it is more.

I had grabbed a few books with me on my journey to China. I’ve already left a couple behind when I came to Prague, and I will most likely leave the rest behind, but Leaves of Grass will travel with me. Walt Whitman speaks to all my life longings perfectly as if he had taken words from my own mouth, my own dreams. He answers my questions and soothes my anxieties as if he is here listening to me speak and cry out, but this is impossible because he had these thoughts, these ideas, these wonderments before my existence. Even so, I feel he speaks to me as if we were alive in the same time. Would we be kindred spirits? I like to believe that we would.

This journey, as wonderful as it is, and as grateful as I am to experience it, has been hard. As I look back on my life, I think in most moments I have thought things were almost always hard, and part of this is because there is something wrong with my brain. This is true, it is called depression, and it can cloud even the most amazing experiences. I’m fairly certain it is hereditary based on some of the behaviors and actions of people in my family. I’ve struggled with it since I was a teenager, and at periods of my life it had been pretty bad, coming with its wonderful array of self-loathing and suicidal thoughts- it’s truly a joy to have around. There have been periods when I was able to keep it under control through meditation, yoga, and other forms of exercise. It can sometimes be an extra challenge to the normal challenges of life, like a layer cake of challenge. This year is a great challenge: living in foreign countries, loosing my mom, struggling with the monsters called bureaucracy and soon to be dealing with the issue of no money, and plus this little brain thing. I’m beginning to wonder if I can handle all this shit. My life in the now is rarely happy. It is only in the past that places and experiences look better or they create longing. This is a thinking pattern that really bothers me, but I have yet to change it. There is one particular moment of time where I feel real contentment and peace, and it does involve traveling, but I’ll save it for the next post. I often feel bad about feeling bad, like I’m ungrateful or filled with self pity and misery and I don’t deserve to have these experiences- they should go to people who have a greater appreciation for the adventures of travel. The kind of people you see in photographs.

I had wondered before coming to Prague if it was really the right decision. If I had the strength to make it through the course, if I have the strength to make it through this process of trying to find work to get the visa to deal with the bureaucracies. I also wonder what I’m doing it for. If it is all so hard in the moment then why bother? Why not just go back? At this moment I can’t answer these questions. I kept hoping I would get a sign, something to tell me I am on the right path, that I’m actually on a path and not just flailing about lost in a forest that I don’t even know I’m in because all I see are the trees.

This year (who am I kidding I’ve done this multiple times) has made me throw imaginary arms into the air and cry out, “I give up. I can’t do this can somebody please do this for me? Can somebody else live my life?” But, no, no-one can. Like Whitman said, “no one can travel that road for you, you must travel it yourself.”

All I see are the trees.

It is not far, it is within reach,
perhaps you have always been on it since you were born and did not
know,
perhaps it is everywhere on water and on land.

A few days ago, for the first time, I had felt the prickling of missing China. It was small like I mentioned- a prick. I had wondered if I would miss it. If missing it had been too buried under my culture shock, my mother’s death, the pollution. I was kindly relieved to feel this small feeling of missing this place. It gave me some kind of hope that it wasn’t a mistake that I did learn something there and that over time I will grow from it. Time is never what we think it should be. We don’t heal or grow like we are told we should. We don’t become wise just because we grow older and we don’t get happiness just because we followed the rules. It is never what we expect. I had read Siddhartha while I was in China, and I had asked myself, and I still ask myself, will I ever see my life as Siddhartha saw his; that each experience was purposeful, and carried meaning? Will that self-reflection of one’s own journey- my own journey; will it be seen? Will I see the forest and the mountains, the land and the sea? Siddhartha is a little over a hundred pages, but years had passed in the story. Time is never like a book or a movie. Patience. That is the only word I can really say to myself in this moment. Patience, and perspective, and don’t panic, after all it’s just life, and mine isn’t so bad even with depression.

I know I am not alone in these thoughts. I also know I am not alone in feeling bad of feeling bad about being in a foreign place. After all don’t people dream about traveling? Don’t people wish they could pack it all up and start a new life in an exotic place? But, dreams are not realities, and nothing can be how you expect it especially if you’re bringing yourself along, and maybe yourself has some extra baggage. So, this is my final thought on the matter of someone else doing this whole life thing for me or maybe for you if you ever feel similar. No one can travel the road I’m on as no one can travel the road you are on. I know we are not traveling together, but with all these roads we must be crossing paths. So, with the baggage we carry, the pieces we were born with and the pieces that we’ve accumulated, I hope, that when all the roads converge, we’ll be able to drop our bags and converse before traveling on our own roads, but with our hands free.

Long enough have you dreamed contemptible dreams,
Now I wash the gum from your eyes,
You must habit yourself to the dazzle of light and every
moment of your life.

Long have you timidly waded holding a plank by the shore,
Now I will you to be a bold swimmer,
To jump off in the midst of the sea, rise again, nod to me,
shout, and laughingly dash with your hair.

CIMG5921 — The Burial Tomb of Emperor Qin. Legend is that it is protected by a lake of mercury. Scientists have tested the hill and have found extremely high levels of mercury. It will be many years before the story is told.

A Short Review of The Language House and its TEFL Training Program

Published on October 12, 2014March 3, 2024 by An Accidental Vagabond1 Comment

After leaving China, I decided to get certified. You don’t have to have your TEFL cert to teach in China; I’m evidence of that, but I thought it would broaden my opportunities. It is a good idea if you want to teach overseas. You can get your TEFL pretty much anywhere, but there are a few things you want to keep in mind when deciding where to go. One is that you want to make certain that the TEFL school is accredited. This is really important. Your certificate must be internationally recognized. You’ll also want a program that offers over 100 hours of TEFL training and teaching. You want real teaching hours with real students. You want your teachers to be trained and certified, and you want some help with job placement assistance. If you want to read more in-depth information on hunting for the right TEFL Program you can link here and here.

Now, let me tell you why I chose The Language House in Prague. I’ll start with the completely impractical reason first, and then follow the more researched reason.

I chose Prague because I love Prague. I lived here in 2000, and I had always wanted to return. As some of you who have followed this blog know, I wrote my first (and so far only) novel about living in Prague. The city had haunted my memories for the past 14 years. Since, my mom had died in February, and I was heartbroken and completely lost without having any feeling of home, I thought why not continue to move on to the next place? And, why not have that place be Prague a city that had been on my mind?

There are plenty of places in Prague where you can get your TEFL cert, but I chose the Language House. Their certificate is recognized, fully accredited and externally Monitored by IATQuO. They offer 130 hours of teacher training including the actual teaching of real life students. The main reason I chose them was because they have an extensive social network that allowed me to get in contact with previous students. This network offered me real feedback about the program, and I felt I could trust them once I was able to read reviews, and contact a few folks. I could see that people were actually teaching and that they felt the program was a good program, and one that they were willing to recommend.

Now that I have completed the program I can throw in my two cents. I think The Language House is an excellent program. I can’t say it is the best in Prague because I didn’t go to any of the other schools, but I had met students from other schools who felt their program had lacked the teaching time and the teacher support that we received at the Language House. The teachers are excellent, but using the word excellent is empty without adding a few examples. So here they are:

Anthony, gave us an introduction to Phonetics. He was well versed in the subject and was enthusiastic in his teaching of the classes. He was funny, helpful, and I heard from other students that he was a wonderful observer. (I’ll explain observer in a bit.)

Andrea, is pretty much everything a person would want in a teacher. Hilarious, intelligent, informative, had an incredible command of the class, and during our lesson planning she was there to give us helpful advice. She gave us grammar lessons-focused on conditionals, and CV versus resume information. She is also the jobs go-to person and she is always quick to respond to questions.

Chris Foxwell had the reputation of being the hard-ass out of the teachers. You know that teacher that really pushes you, and you think that he/she may be some kind of a sadists, (but remember you’re the masochist for signing up for the class) till you realize you learned so much from that teacher? That’s Chris. He’s a no excuses type of instructor, and you are going to learn from him. He went over grammar and methodology. You could tell he loved what he was teaching and wanted teachers coming out of The Language House to be the best.

Chris Westergaard, is the program director and owner of The Language House. He is a natural in front of the class. He is engaging and insightful. He offers an enormous breadth of information and TEFL teaching knowledge from ten years of experience. And, he has many funny tales of TEFL teaching life.

There are more people to mention at The Language House, but these were my core instructors. There was also Jitka our Czech language teacher, and Kirrily who taught Young Learners, both great teachers. I had mentioned in a paragraph above about observers. We began teaching real students in the second week of this four week program. We were observed every time, and at the end of classes we were given in-depth feedback on our teaching. You’ll have three different observers and teach three different levels during your course. Expect to feel tired.

Here’s more of what you’ll experience: You will learn your grammar. You will take a grammar test that you need to pass with at least an 80% in order to get your certificate. You will go to class everyday and teach everyday (except on Friday- no teaching). You will freak out about not having a lesson plan. You will freak out when you realize you don’t know your own language’s grammar, but your Czech students do. You will think that you were crazy for signing up for this program. You will get tired of your feedback, until one day someone say’s “that’s an almost a perfect grammar lesson,” then you’ll feel amazing. You’ll learn new teaching methodologies, but you will focus on the ESA method of teaching. You’ll meet really wonderful people. You’ll let loose like crazy on the weekends. Then it will be over.

During my first week of class, as Chris W. taught us about the ESA method (Engage, Study, Activate), right away my mind flashed back to my literature classes in China. It was obvious to me how much this type of training would have assisted me in my classes. I thought about how I could have done things differently and how much it would have improved my lessons.

No, you don’t need your TEFL to teach in China, but I think it can not only increase your pay and your opportunities, but it will help make your classroom experience better for you and your students. If you want to teach overseas I highly recommend you take a course, and if you decide to come to Prague for your training- I sincerely and emphatically recommend The Language House in Prague.

China Diaries: Why am I Struggling to Write About Life in China?

Published on October 14, 2013March 18, 2024 by An Accidental VagabondLeave a comment

Daylight in Zhengzhou, China. Multiple scooters, cars and electric cargo trikes bottle-neck into crowds of pedestrians. — Crowded streets near the Zhengzhou train station

Culture Shock?

I have been in China for a little over a month. In fact, I am one week shy of two months, and I don’t know what to say about it.

There are plenty of topics from which I can choose to write a story. I could write about the air pollution. I could write about the traffic and the driving. I could talk about the cultural differences in ideas surrounding education. I could write about visiting Shaolin and what it felt like to have my picture taken as many times as some of the stunningly rebuilt temples. I could talk about what it is like to be a teacher in a program filled with China’s second generation of wealth. There is the food, the water, the toilets, the westerners there are many topics.

Erqi Memorial Tower at night in Erqi Square, Zhengzhou, China. — Erqi ( pronounced Archie) Memorial Tower in Erqi Square

Yet, when I face this computer screen and this blank page or when I hold a pen in my hand and stare down onto the blank sheets of paper in my journal, my mind is empty. I am unable to communicate into written word my experiences thus far. I’m certain I have been experiencing culture shock. There were days in my first week when I couldn’t go outside. I was like an agoraphobic unable to leave my apartment. It wasn’t only about how different it was, but how different I was in a crowd of thousands. I’ve never experienced these feelings before, and I am struggling to find the words to describe what I have been feeling, especially in the moments of paralysis.

Trouble with Words

Writing is the moment when I, an author, can be like the painter. When words translate impressions, observations, and feelings into verbal expressions. It is the time to recreate inner thoughts and experiences through figurative language in a way that guides others toward understanding those thoughts. Written words allow others to share in those experiences, maybe even pretend that they are the ones living vicariously through the words on the page. This is a particular type of writing. It is the type of writing I want to do. I have these words. I know I have these words. They are in my brain. I know it. I can feel them bubbling and rising to the surface of my mind, resting on the frontal lobe, and like water they soak in between the ropes of my brain. I sit up and grab a pen to write, but when I go to the desk they vanish.

I am left with a feeling of a wanting and an emptiness.

The Zhengzhou international conventaion center lit up at night with glowing purple, pink and blue colored lights. — Zhengzhou International Convention Center at night

I Teach English. Students Memorize English.

“Use your English words.” I say this a lot in my classes.

“What does that mean?” I ask a student that is making a gesture with their hands. I think I know what they mean, by the gesture. I could easily say, “Yes, you are right that is the definition,” and let it go, but instead I say, “Use words. What do you mean by that gesture.” I push them because I have overestimated my understanding before, and communication has been lost. The point of our languages is to communicate. The student looks at me with a pensive look, “ummm… it is very hard. I do not know the words.”

My Chinese students are very good a memorizing. They are very good at taking tests. They are able to read a passage in English out loud, but when I ask them to explain what they have just read, they do not know. Reading skills are strong, but comprehension is low. The tests are not about comprehension, but recognition. They know the words in English, but they do not understand the words.

A class photograph of teachers at a school in China. — Year Book Photo, Teachers at Middle School #47

Language is complicated. It has four parts like a clover, yet within each part of learning a language there are deeper more complex units of understanding. It is beautiful. Multilingual people have a valuable gift. The gift of communication across nations. I don’t have this gift.

“Use your English words”. I suppose that is where I need to begin. I can follow the advice of Raymond Carver and write a word, and then another word until I have a sentence, and then when I finish that sentence I will write another one. It’s like walking Carver said, “you put one foot in front of the other.”

The Beginning is Sometimes at the End

And so, I can begin at the beginning.

I moved to Zhengzhou, pronounced Jengjo, China on the 25th of August. It is a large city in the largest province, in China; the Henan province. There are 80 million people living in Henan. There are 9 million people living in Zhengzhou. Those numbers are not exact, but they are close. There are 600 registered westerners living in Zhengzhou. I am one of those 600 westerners. 9 million Chinese citizens and 600 registered foreigners.

In my part of the city, the Central Business District, I have only seen foreigners who work at my school. Most days, I am the only non-Chinese. The only white person, and people stare and point, following me with their eyes. I am a foreigner. I can not hide this. Growing up white in a predominantly white town, and moving to a predominantly white city, I have never stood out. No, that isn’t right. Standing out can be fun, and positive, this is different. I am seen, yet invisible. All eyes are on me, but when I reach out for help eyes either turn away or turn blank, and some eyes scan me from head to toe, but somehow I am not seen, and my words are foreign.

I know other people have experienced this. People of color experience this even in their own country which must add another layer of otherness. You should be a part of the community because you were born there, but you are not, you are an outsider. The thought of that on top of what I currently am feeling wells up within me. I feel an empathy for others that I once only held as a sympathy. It’s lonely. It is a lonely feeling.

Few people speak English in my neighborhood. I do not speak Chinese. I do not even know the words. I am an alien in China. I am different. I am isolated. I am surrounded but alone. I don’t know the words. I don’t understand. I am alone without the language. My students they know my language, but they do not understand my language. So much is lost in the translation of gestures. It is just memorization without comprehension.

I am wrong. It is not lost in translation because there is no translation. I do not have the language to express to English readers these feelings of isolation within crowds. Yet, I teach English. My English fails me. What I wrote here today is the best I have to offer.

Why I Left America, the Third Time

Published on April 11, 2013March 13, 2024 by An Accidental Vagabond2 Comments

A Final Rejection Letter

“Applicants who have not been notified of admission or placement on the waitlist by April 2, 2013 should assume they will not be offered admission for 2013-2014. Because of the high number of applications and limited staff, it is not possible to send out denial notifications until late spring. Applicants who wish to confirm their application status sooner, may contact the Programs in Writing after April 16, 2013.”

-Love UCI Irvine

Cut out letters of N O — Photo by alleksana on Pexels.com

A lot of people are good enough, and a lot of people are exceptional. However, there are a lot of people in the world, and not enough spaces in elite institutions.

A Great Disappointment

The University of Irvine didn’t bother to send a rejection letter. They just let me and everyone else who appiled to stop waiting around. Our $88.00 dollar application fee wasn’t even worth a standard personal letter of rejection. I wonder how much Universities make from application fees. I also wonder where that money goes. Not back into the students, since they can’t even set up an automated rejection letter that makes it look as if they regarded your application as much as they regarded your fee.

I’d been rejected from Brown, Syracuse, and San Diego, but Irvine was the most insulting. They were the most expensive to apply to and gave the least personalized response. Californians, am I right? I feel, as a Californian, I can make fun of the vanity and superiority complex of the institutions of my home state. were able to send an e-mail rejection.

A Chip on My Shoulder

Anyway… that’s over. I’ve had to ask myself, what now? I had wanted to go to graduate school, but I don’t know if I have the heart to fork out more money when I’m clearly not qualified to go. Honestly, graduate school was just a symbol for me anyway. I symbol of success and escape from the poverty and welfare that I was raised in. It would prove that I was intelligent, that I was not white trash or trailer trash or all the other disparaging words that ended in trash. I had a chip on my shoulder and acceptance into a graduate program was going to remove that chip.

Only, I wasn’t accepted. Maybe if I had the money to apply again, I would have done it, but it was too much money for fees. It felt a bit like getting robbed. Like all these universities had a bridge to sell me.

A Land of Opportunity Elsewhere

Maybe, America wasn’t the land of opportunity, after all. Maybe the land of opportunity was somewhere else. Somewhere beyond the seas, but how could this tailer trash get out there beyond the seas?

I had done it before. I was older now, but not feeling wiser. I was feeling rejected, and a little bit worthless and with a significant amount of money missing from my pocket, but I had left America once, no twice, before, so it was time to find another way out.

How I Wrote My First Novel and Earned a Mastery of Writing Certification

Published on June 7, 2011March 4, 2024 by An Accidental VagabondLeave a comment

A group of people smiling for a group photo. — 2011 the first graduating class of The Attic Atheneum

The Atheneum is Over

The weekend of June 3rd and 4th was the Atheneum’s final retreat. An educational ending to the year program. There was plenty of wine and amazing food. Each teacher/mentor spoke on something that they felt was important for us to take away with us, now that we would be embarking on a post-writing school life.

I proudly walked away with a Certificate in the Mastery of Writing, thank you very much, and I had a nice glass of champagne thanks to Paulann Peterson. Paulann had invited Berry Sanders and his wife to speak to us on our last day. Then we all said, good-bye and good luck.

One Last Assignment

One of the things that we were requested to do was to present a project as a sort of team effort (our teams were, fiction, poetry, and non-fiction) as a part of the fiction group I was asked to write a memoir. I decided to write about what it was like to finish my first novel, and since my first love is theatre, I couldn’t help but to compare the two in the world of endings.

A group of four men and two women posing for a group photo on an outdoor staircase. — Team Fiction Writing

How I Wrote My First Novel

Prague

Although I had wanted to be a writer I never consider myself a writer, because I didn’t feel like a writer. So, I journaled. I journaled from the time I was 16, sometimes daily sometimes with an absence of many months. When I turned 26, I moved to Europe, and I took a journal along with me. I spent two years living abroad sometimes journaling sometimes not, but it was during my short life in Prague that I had faithfully journaled, recording every moment daily. I had captured nuances and conversations, in fact, it may have been the first time I wrote my observations versus my inner feelings.

Colorado to Oregon

When I reluctantly returned to the states, I found myself sitting on my aunt’s bed in her one bedroom apartment hiding out from a hot Colorado summer storm, flipping through the pages of my journaled history in Prague, longingly reading over the transcripts, and it was at that moment (eleven years ago) that I realized I had a story. It wasn’t an amazing story. It wasn’t going to save lives or change the way people felt about the world. It was in the words of Sylvia Plath: a potboiler. Yet, to me, it was a necessary story and it wanted to be told. Right then and there on my aunt’s computer in two to three days I wrote the entire first draft except for the end. I didn’t want it to end how it really ended. But how did I turn fact into fiction?

I traveled across the western United States with a man, his dog, his depressed mother and her bottle of vodka, and ended up in Oregon, but that is another story. I carried a printed copy of my endless manuscript along for the ride. The electronic copy had been lost. I shoved my novel in a folder and ignored it.

Back to School

Two years later, I decided to return to school. I applied to a community college to focus on mathematics, but while there I decided to take a fiction writing class for fun. It rekindled my interest in my previous novel attempt. I thought about finishing it, but it took me another three years before I sat down and retyped the entire thing out again, and still with out the needed ending.

I had an incredible love hate relationship with my work. There were moments when I wanted to burn the thing and moments when I thought it was brilliant, but ultimately it was the characters that kept talking to me. They would interrupt my dreams and daily thoughts living out their lives as if I were still writing them.

An Office Job, A Retreat, and a Recession

In 2007, seven years after I got my initial idea to write the book that I was now calling Žižkov, I started working at a corporate office. It was the most secure job I had ever had in my life. I had actually made payments on my student loans, I could buy clothes, I could save money, but I during my time there I didn’t write. I felt my dreams of living a creative life into a nostalgic past.

a table with chairs in an office meeting room. — Photo by Pixabay on Pexels.com

Around this time my grandmother passed away and I received a small inheritance. I used my inheritance and a small savings; I had saved enough money to quit my job for 3 months and still live comfortably. Once and for all I was going to write this damn book. I was confident I would complete it in three months and then find another corporate job as a receptionist. I would feel accomplished and be safe and secure and sound. September 15th, 2008 was my first day as a full-time writer and it was also the day the stock market plummeted into the sea like a mobster in cement shoes.

I kept writing.

A close up of a hand with black finger nails writing in a note book, and the other hand holding a cup of coffee. — Photo by Lisa Fotios on Pexels.com

I rewrote the entire novel in 3rd person. I created charts and back stories for all the characters. I did research on Prague and read Czech writers in order to refresh my memories of the city. I fantasized about the money my book would make me once it was turned into a movie. I rewrote it again in first person (not recommended). I wrote the first half at least in six different drafts, but never found my way to the true ending. Simultaneously, I was sending out my resume. I sent out many applications. Resume after resume with no response, not even a rejection, till I ran out of all my savings. I lost the room I was renting, and I had to rely on the generosity of my friends to house me until I could find work.

Acting Saved Me for a Bit

When I auditioned for Inviting Desire, I was literally auditioning for my life. It was a miracle of fate that the one job that would save me from homelessness would be theatre. It was almost ironic.

While on tour I wrote a rough draft of an ending for Žižkov. When we ended the tour and talked about future projects I swore up and down that I would complete this book because although it had an ending it was not finished.

A man walking onto a stage with three sitting women. The curtain behind them is burnt orange and slightly open. — Inviting Desire, Calgary, Alberta performance

Acceptance into The Atheneum

Another year passed. I returned to retail, and various side hustles before I could really commit to working daily on my manuscript. On a whim I applied to the Attic Atheneum. At first I was rejected, but due to a drop out and me being next in line, I was accepted. My goal was to complete my novel.

I Wrote a Novel Titled Žižkov

On May 27th, eleven years after I knew I had a story, I finished the book, but it was not like theatre. There was no applause, no one to clink pint glasses with, and no one to drown in the amazement that it was finally completed. There had been people to support me along the way, encouraging friends; friends who helped finance my schooling; my peers and teachers in the atheneum, but at the end of the experience I was alone.

A book cover of a novel titled Zizkov. In the foreground are two strips of pictures of a black man and a white woman from a photo booth. In the background is a photo from Old Town square in Prague. — My Book Cover Idea

It was my idea to take the journey alone and I ended it alone. Sitting in front of my computer typing the last words I whispered a “holy shit it’s done” and felt a whoop rise up inside me like we just won the world cup, but then I looked around the room, and there was no ‘we’. There was only me. I felt empty, weird, almost apathetic toward my work. All those years of fighting and this was it? And that was it in its entirety: who cares but me? I was a writer. I didn’t need an audience to finish the book. I didn’t need anything but me, and what did I really want? What did I expect?

My sketch copy of **Jacob Lawrence’s 1940 Painting Harriet Tubman Series Panel #4** celebrating

How it Feels to Write a Book Vs. Closing Night of a Play

When you create a play, when you perform you perform for an audience. Everything is for the play itself and the audience. I can write for an audience and a publisher, after all I did dream about the movie, but in the end that isn’t what it’s all about. It doesn’t take an audience to write a book. I can put that manuscript in a drawer or erase it because it’s finished already. No one else needs to read it in order for it to be complete. A play just isn’t a play without the audience, but a book is a book even if it isn’t read. Though, it should be published to complete the job. Working toward publishing is something completely different.

So why did I write it? Did I write it to have my voice heard or was it that I wanted to return to Prague? Was it that I wanted to be someone other than me, and be purely me simultaneously? Does it even matter? The answers were not there for me. So, I turned off the light, closed my laptop, and took a walk to shake off the feelings of loneliness. I had felt like I had just gone through a mutual break-up; we both knew it was over, but why, we had so much love? And still it was over.

Feeling Like a Writer?

As I wandered through the streets near my apartment I heard a voice inside my head. The voice of a young girl as she crouched on a rooftop:

“I watched as J.P. threw the television from the roof of Jesse’s parent’s house. I don’t know why he does those things. He’s not even drunk. J.P. is straight edge, he just fucks shit up purely because he’s an asshole, but I don’t give a shit, I’m an asshole too.“

And I knew I was listening to the voice of a new character, she was talking through me, and she was completely fiction —well—mostly.

My friend told me about a writing retreat with A Room of Her Own or AROHO a writing retreat for women. We decided to attend because you can never get enough writing support. I may have completed my novel without fan fair, but I don’t need to learn alone.

I didn’t try to publish Žižkov. I still have it. Perhaps one day it will be seen in print and have a book cover, I’m not sure. My program is over. My first book has been written and I have another story idea brewing in my head, but I still don’t feel like an author. Perhaps one day I will feel like one. As for today, I’ll keep writing. What is a writer supposed to feel like anyway? What a silly thing to want to feel. The saying is actions speak louder than words. If that is true I never need to hear someone tell me that I’m a writer because my actions prove I already am.

Two women posing in a kitchen. — Emily and I at AROHO writing retreat