The St. Vitus's Cathedral is a massive structure that houses the crypts of the royals.

May 14, 2008

PRAGUE - Each day a different member of the Purdue volleyball team will give an account of the day's happenings. Tuesday brought a tour of the Prague Castle, a little free time, a 3-2 win over Slavia Praha and a traditional Czech dinner.

The Boilermakers played their first of six matches on the tour against Slavia Praha in a facility that was described by our guides Jirka (yer-kuh) and Corey as very traditional during the communist era. Slavia Praha is a club team that finished fifth in the Czech first division this season. Purdue started a little slow out of the gate, falling 25-16 in Game 1, and dropping Game 2 25-23, but rebounded to win 25-13, 25-19 and 15-10 and take the match.

Outside hitter Lisa Pierce will now offer the rest of the story of Day 3 in Prague.

Day 3 - Prague

9:30 a.m. Prague time (yes, that means it was 3:30 a.m. at home) we woke up to the sound of an alarm clock and birds chirping while the sun glistened through our window. These apartments we are staying in are like you are in a fantasy. (Jaclyn) Hart and I almost felt like princesses up in our loft overlooking the castle outside our window.

We met at 10 a.m. to head to the beautiful castle here in Prague. When we got near the castle, the group had to learn the meaning of sticking together as Sessy (Meagan Sesselmann) and I scattered off to take a picture with the guard (This isn't the first time our guide Jirka had to ask where half of us were.) One f the methods of counting heads was the confusing "body check." When Jirka explained the body check, we all thought it was getting patted down. Instead, it was calling out numbers. Now, when he yells body check, we all lift up our arms to get searched.

The first place we went inside was this absolutely amazing church (St. Vitus's Cathedral). It is where the kings have been buried. To the side of the church is this gigantically enormous tower. Not only did we get to take pictures from the bottom of the tower, we learned that we could go up top. There was only one way up and down and NO it was NOT a good ol' high tech elevator. It was 287 stairs of a three-foot wide winding staircase. You will never understand the meaning of the word dizzy until you walk down these stairs. The hike might have been long, but the view was so worth it. It was like nothing I have ever seen before! (Jealous?)

Lucky for the guards outside the castle, a few of us had a front row spot for the changing of the guard ceremony. There were two guards waiting for the ceremony to begin and we thought how good of an idea it would be to take cute pictures with them. Little did they know that saying yes to us meant having to take 50 other pictures with the other surrounding tourists. We learned that Czech castle guards were into American women because we clearly were their favorites. Even the ones that were supposed to be standing completely still had their eyes moving to see what all the laughter was about.

As we were walking to lunch, we had a clear vision of the fashion difference among people in the Czech Republic. For example, a man was wearing "wouldn't be allowed on the volleyball court" short shorts, a tight black men's tank top with a little belly showing and an extremely fashionable fanny pack. It is always the little things in life that you get a laugh out of. (And have to take a picture of...)

There are about 350 TV stations in our apartments. Hart and I learned something very interesting about these TVs. The American shows are in English, but the commentators of these shows speak Czech. The language barrier can be a slight issue when you can only understand half a show. Also, the whole day, Steph (Lynch) kept telling us how her TV was broken, but only to learn from Brittany (Dildine) that all she had to do was flip her light switch on and the TV will turn on. (That could be confusing for anyone right?)

Riding the tram during what we would call "Rush Hour" can always be an experience. Our ride today was a little longer and our guide Cory made it clear to us MULTIPLE times to make sure we didn't get off at the wrong stop. The only dilemma seemed to be that Roger (Blalock) and his wife were on the attached train in front of us. We all made sure they made it off at the correct stop though.

The match we played was interesting because you had 12 American girls trying to things the European way. Our hitting warm up felt like a whole match. We went from hitting for about five minutes back home to about 20 minutes here. And that was only the hitting, we still had to serve. The most interesting part of the match was when we were in a serve receive. Arty (Kristen Arthurs) was standing at the 10 foot line when I heard the voice of Kelli (Miller) yell "Head's up." Immediately following Kelli yelling, Arty got hit in the head with the ball and it fell to the ground. It was one of those moments where you know you shouldn't laugh, but everyone's face was fighting back a smile. Besides that incident, the match was exciting. We didn't know what to expect when we got here and leaving our first match with a win makes after the match and dinner happier times. Speaking of happier moments, it is always a sight to see J-Bomb (John Shondell) dance with one of the dancers at dinner! (Another mental snapshot you have to keep with you for the rest of your life.)

It is always amazing experiencing the food of the culture. We got to eat goulash and dumplings! I thought it was delicious, but it may have been a culture shock to some of our group. There was a large party next to us singing and dancing to the live Czech band. They started a conga line and Carrie (Gurnell), Blair (Bashen) and I joined on. Apparently, I was so excited that when I got up to dance I spilled a whole glass of Coke all over Hart.

I am sitting here now with Sessy, Hart, Mandy (Nichols), Sam (Ainsworth) and Jess (Ullrich). Nighttime talks are always the greatest because people are tired and the craziest things come out of everyone's mouths. We have come to realize that this apartment is out of toilet paper with multiple reminders from Sessy. Thanks to Sam, we have found out that coffee filters work just as well. (She knows from past experiences). Well, it is just about time to go to bed and wake up to a day of shopping! Let's hope Jess doesn't have to wake up to Mandy talking to some lady named Veronica in her sleep again.

Ciao from Praha!

Lisa

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