Did some more work during the morning for tonight’s English class. Think I’ll use a Czech story in English translation called “The Sword of St Wenceslas” for the reading. Will allow work on pronunciation and it has some good vocabulary words. Hope it will not be too advanced for “intermediates.” We can always “just talk.” Don’t want to scare anyone off.
It’s another grey, rainy day—hope people will come out for the class in the bad weather. Rain doesn’t keep them inside like it does SoCals.
About 11:00 AM I set out in search of a Tesco “Hypermarket” I saw a sign for over in Modřany the other day. It’s supposed to be “smer [toward] Lhotka”—so I found Lhotka on the map (it adjoins Modřany on the NE), and a couple of buses that go toward what seems to be the intersection of two main grags in Lhotka. That’s where I’d put a Tesco. We’ll see…
3:00 PM—Well, it worked (sorta!). Took the 165 bus to Modřanska station, then walked a way to a stop where could catch the 139 bus that seemed to go the way I wanted (discovered later that the 205 would probably have done the same job—trial and error). Picked up a billboard that said Tesco dead-ahead a couple of km. Got off the bus at the big intersection, and there it was about 700 m down the road.
Took a while looking around the “hypermarket.” Main object of trip was to get some cookies for tonight (which I could have bought in Zbraslav) and a soap-dish with suction cups that will stick it to the tile wall of the shower—a small, but important added convenience (less stooping in a confined space). Scored on both counts. Picked up a baguette sandwich for lunch, too, which was quite tasty for (especially for a pre-made).
Retraced my route on bus 139 and caught bus 165 heading back to Z. Feeling pretty saucy about my “land nav” skills—even though I can only read the tiny bus route numbers on the map if the light is very good, which it is frequently not on these grey days (should have packed my little magnifier). Then, suddenly, the bus driver is looking at me and speaking. I surmise (because everyone else has gotten off the bus) that he is saying, “End of the line gringo, get off the bus, I’m going on my break” (or something like). We are nowhere near Zbraslav, and I’m wondering what’s up, but I get get anywhere with him by listening or questioning, so I get off.
I found out later that some of the 165 buses don’t go all the way through. It’s probably all spelled-out in the several footnotes on the bottom of the bus timetable, but of course, they’re all in Czech. (Once you get below 36pt typeface around here, you’re flat outta English! Guess I should be more thankful for all the helpful translations there are—I am.)
So… What to do? I walk back to the previous bus stop and wait for the next 165 bus and hope the driver isn’t due for a smoke and there are no other shenanigans. This time it works and I’m back in Zbraslav.
Picked some of Jerry’s strawberries in between rainfall (Vlasta Sr. was very insistent about this on Sunday), made some coffee, and have now caught up the journal. Time for a 20 min power nap before I get things set out for tonight’s class.
Vlasta & Vlasta came by about 6:00 to collect the mail. They couldn’t stay as they have a long ride home on public transportation all the way to the other side of metropolitan Prague (Černy Most). Younger Vlasta reminded me that both she and Margareta are going to be missing on Sunday, so Vlasta Sr. and I will be on our own for setup, etc. Jan Pavlik is supposed to be arranging songs for the service.
9:00 PM—Three people showed for the class, all from the same family (Jitka Vaclavikova and her adult daughter, also Jitka, and son, Petr). The others who said they were coming didn’t show up. Jitka was a worship on Sunday and had previously emailed me before I came to express her eagerness to participate in the class. I remember having a couple of brief conversations with Petr at one of the previous English camps. He was at camp once with his father, who, if memory serves (??), is (or was) an officer in a CB church. Petr works in a company that develops computer software for telecommunications. Younger Jitka is a physical therapist, but is taking courses at Charles’ University in deaf education. We had a great time talking about this and that for a couple of hours, working on pronunciation and points of grammar. We tried the story, was it was a bit much for their level of English. I’ll work on something more elementary for next time. But they seemed to enjoy it. Jitka actually asked about going over some of the vocabulary from Sunday’s sermon, but I didn’t have the outline printed out. Note for next time.
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