The floorball stick saga

(Português no final)

Johan loves playing floorball, a team game that looks like ice hokey without the ice and instead of skating the players run. He didn't know how to take his stick to Sweden. He considered sending it when his parents came by car in October, but he wanted to play a few more times and he didn't send it then. He was hoping to be able to bring it in the plane. At the check-in counter he asked if he was allowed. He was, but he would have to pay a fee that was way higher than the commercial value of the stick. He handed it to me, because my flight was much later and I was still going to the city center, and told me to give it to a little kid or to leave it in a corner. He was sad for leaving it, I could tell. It was a cheap floorball stick, but with many good memories, which for me made the perfect Christmas gift.

I decided to send it to Sweden by post mail. Easy, right? No...

Photo from the internet

1. I went to the main post office in Prague. It's a huge and beautiful building. I asked someone to help me take the right ticket to send a package.

2. I waited for my turn wondering how to send the stick. They probably didn't have a giant envelope or box. All I had was the stick, with its tip wrapped in foam and tape.

3. The numbers moved forward veeery slowly. Only two counters, out of 22, were working on packages. 30 minutes after I sat I realised there was a little shop in the corner selling envelopes and other packages. I should probably go there then! There's 10 numbers to go. It should be ok.

4. I waited in line and in my broken czech I tried to explain my problem. The lady suggested bubble wrap and tape (just like the one I left in the trash in the airport just before). I tried to work fast and I finished with two numbers to go. Perfect! 

5. I also got some paper piece to write the address and tape it to the package. As I was writing I heard an announcement in the speakers, in czech, and I saw everybody hurrying away from the door. A few moments later I understood that the system with the numbers has been turned off and now everybody is queueing...

6. I head to one of the queues, and there were again 20 people in front of me. Great... 5 minutes later a girl says something to the whole queue and everybody disappears. I asked if she could translate and she told me that counter was closing. 

7. Now, there was only one counter working on packages. I headed to that one. 10 minutes later, a lady came to me and in English told me she saw there was a lady with about 200 envelopes in front of me, and advised me to move to a different queue. She also told me that now any queue works. 

8. I chose the shortest queue and waited. 10 min. later I got to the counter. The employee told me I couldn't send it there. I did have to go to a special counter for packages. There were actually 3 of them, as there were 2 more hiding in a corner that I hadn't seen before. 

9. I went and waited in line again. This was my fifth line. I waited for about 20 minutes until my turn. The lady panicked, as they always did when facing a foreigner, but with my broken czech again and a nice smile I tried to explain what I wanted. She complained that I didn't have an address for the sender. I asked her for a piece of paper and that I could quickly put it on. She told me to not block the queue and pointed to the end of the line. It was my turn to panic! As kindly as I could, I asked if I could do it on the side of the counter, so I wouldn't have to queue again. She allowed me.

10. After the following costumer I tried again. The lady was nicer this time. She measured the stick. It was too long to be considered "normal". I needed to fill a special form. She sent me again to side of the counter.

11. After the following costumer and really hoping that was it, I gave her the stick again. By now, I hadn't even asked the price yet, but I didn't care anymore. I just wanted to send the stick and get off the post office! After some funny mixed language dialogues I understood that everything was ready and I had succeeded! I made it!!!

All this time I was not even sure if I could actually send the stick or not, as it had a weird shape. It did cross my mind to give up, but every time I thought about it I thought of J.'s sad eyes and I decided to stay. I had 4h left in the amazing city of Prague and I ended up spending 2h inside the post office. I don't regret it. It was a great surprise and I know it was all worth it! It was almost a Christmas miracle (almost because it got to Sweden after Christmas)!

Feliz Natal /// Merry Christmas /// God Jul /// Veselé Vánoce

A todos os meus leitores um Feliz Natal e beijinhos da cidade mais alta de Portugal!

Sending greetings and a very a Merry Christmas from the highest city in Portugal to all my readers!

Guarda, Portugal

People of Prague

For a while I thought my time in Prague was worthless. Sure I enjoyed living here, in this beautiful city. I enjoyed the runs along the river, the rainy days spent in the sofa with J., and exploring Czech Republic, its language and its culture. However, the feeling of disappointment was always bigger. Professionally, I always felt it was a mistake coming here. I know that now. I never really fitted in the group, both with the people and with the way things were managed, which was very hard to deal with on a daily basis. Still, coming here brought me good things, and especially good people, and I hope as time will pass I will remember those, much more than the hard moments. Coming here was not just a mistake, and in spite of all problems, I feel that my time here was worth it.

Living here brought me the lovely, happy and positive Ana. She is the most hard working person I have ever met, and even though most of the time her efforts were not recognised, she always gave her best. Her positive energy always made me feel better. She loved cycling even more than I love running! She left the job 2 months before me and I know she is happily spreading her energy elsewhere.

Ana and me, cycling in Prague. She let me use her dearest bicycle!!

Living here also brought me Daniela. Even though I don't know much about her, she is the person I met that I am most grateful for. She is my physiotherapist. Before coming here, I had problems in my upper back for years. I had tried different treatments and nothing worked permanently. I was convinced I would feel that pain everyday for the rest of my life. Then I met Daniela and she saved me! She is so good at what she does, and she understands the human body so well, that is impressive. She understood how important running is in my life, and she always encouraged me to keep doing it during the treatment. She also helped me during two running injuries and taught me a lot about my own body. I will never forget her.

Daniela prepared a set of exercises I should do to survive without her! Her drawings will be very helpful!

Living here brought me Bara. I also don't know so much about her. She has a "desk job" by day and she is an aerobics lecturer by night (ok, evening). She is great at Dance Aerobics, with cool and challenging choreographies every week. Her energy is contagious and even when she is not dancing, she looks like a dancer. Her classes always saved my Mondays and I will miss them and our conversations.

Me, Bara and Dana (another happy participant) at the end of my last dance class.

Living here brought me the artistic and selfless Martina. She is bubbly and colourful. She paints, draws, plays guitar, sings, smiles, laughs, and spreads joy around her. On top of that she is an excellent Czech language teacher, with infinite patience and care. She always used her creativity and artistic skills in class. Every time we asked her what a certain word meant, she draw it on the board. We learned Czech Christmas carols with her and her guitar. We acted situations to use more vocabulary, we walked around gardens to find body parts (she started that class by "there has been a catastrophe..." - I will never forget that one), we had to pretend we were Madonna, Arnold Schwarzenegger or the Pope, among some many other things that livened up the classes. What I will miss the most is all our conversations, laughs and to hear her beautiful voice during her concerts.

Martina during her concert last Sunday.

I just noticed they were all girls, which is good for a change. I will miss them all but I'm really glad our paths crossed.

A memorable 1st of December

1st of December has always been a special day in my year. It's my birthday and it used to be a holiday in Portugal. As a child I could have a birthday party with my friends on the exact day of my birthday, while most of them had to wait for the following saturday to celebrate their own birthdays. That always made me feel kind of special, somehow. When I moved out of Portugal, to places where the 1st of December was just another working day, I officially lost my special day but the whole warm feeling that day brings me remained inside of me all over the years. This year however, I had again another memorable 1st of December. 

My sister arrived in Prague the day before, which was also my last day of work in Prague. The past few weeks have been quite tough, with a lot of pressure to finish up everything at work and time running faster and faster. I also got an apprentice, which was fun because she was the colleague I never had here and I wish I did, but it shortened my time even more. When all that was over and I could finally breathe it was my birthday and I had 24h to do the things I like the most, with the two people in the world I care about the most: my sister and my boyfriend. I started by spending the first 8h of my day sleeping, which at first it felt like a waste but in the morning I felt great, as I needed it. I had some fruit-based breakfast in bed with my boyfriend (no awww needed, I prepared it myself) and then we went for a run. Afterwards, we had some more fun with my sister exercising in the carpet - it looked quite funny and we laughed a lot. Then, there was a proper breakfast or maybe I should call it brunch, and we went to explore another new site in Prague and cross another item in our bucket list. After we went back to the center, had some delicious cake and tea to warm up, and we went for a nice walk around the Prague castle. At sunset, we went to a classic music concert, one of the most popular programs in Prague, both for tourists and locals. The concert was held inside a freezing church by a small group of musicians that included a very intense and funny violinist. The sound was amazing and the songs were known even for someone like us, who don't know so much about classical music. After the concert we had dinner in one of my favourite places in Prague: Lokal. Czech food is quite filling so after dinner we went for a walk, admired the season lights and passed by a few different Christmas markets. As for me no day is perfect without involving some travelling, we wrapped up the day packing and planning a small trip we did the following 3 days (more on that later).

It might seem like a normal simple day but it was a nearly perfect birthday day for me...

O 1º de Dezembro sempre foi um dia especial no ano. É o meu aniversário e costumava ser feriado em Portugal. Quando era criança sempre me senti especial por poder fazer a minha festa de anos sempre no próprio dia e por não ter que esperar até o sábado seguinte como faziam os meus amigos da escola. Quando saí de Portugal e fui morar para países onde o 1º de Dezembro não era feriado esse dia tornou-se um dia de trabalho tal como todos os outros. Apesar disso, por dentro continuei sempre a ter aquela sensação de calor nesse dia, a sensação de que era o meu dia. No entanto este ano pude experimentar novamente um 1º de Dezembro especial como antigamente. 

A minha irmã chegou a Praga no dia antes, que foi também o meu último dia de trabalho aqui. As últimas semanas têm sido difíceis com muita pressão no trabalho para acabar as minhas coisas e o tempo a passar cada vez mais depressa. Além disso, juntou-se ao grupo uma nova colega que se tornou numa espécie de aprendiz minha, o que foi divertido porque ela foi a colega que eu nunca tive e gostava de ter tido aqui, mas que me roubou imenso tempo. Quando tudo isso acabou e eu pude finalmente respirar livremente era o dia do meu aniversário e eu tinha 24h para poder fazer as coisas que eu mais gosto, com as duas pessoas que eu mais gosto: a minha irmã e o meu namorado. As primeiras 8h do dia foram passadas a dormir. Primeiro pareceu-me um desperdício de tempo mas na manhã seguinte senti-me melhor que nunca. Tomei um mini pequeno almoço só de frutas ainda na cama com o J. (sem ohhhh que fofos, porque fui eu que o preparei) e depois fomos correr. Quando voltamos a minha irmã juntou-se a nós para uma sessão de exercícios na carpete super divertida e engraçada. Depois tivemos um pequeno almoço como deve ser, ou se calhar deveria chama-lo de brunch, e fomos explorar uma parte nova da cidade e riscar da nossa lista mais um item. Voltamos ao centro onde comemos fatias de bolo deliciosas e tomamos chá para aquecer e fomos passear pela parte mais deserta do castelo. Quando o dia se pôs fomos a um concerto de musica clássica, que é um programa bastante popular em Praga, tanto para turistas como para locais. O concerto foi dentro de uma igreja gelada com um pequeno grupo de músicos que incluía um violinista muito engraçado e intenso. O som era fantástico e as músicas nossas conhecidas, apesar de não percebermos muito de musica clássica. A seguir ao concerto fomos jantar a um dos meus sítios preferidos em Praga, o Lokal. Como a comida checa enche bastante depois de jantar fomos passear pelos mercados de Natal e ver as ruas iluminadas. Porque para mim nenhum dia seria perfeito senão envolvesse viagens, terminamos o dia a fazer a mala e a planear uma pequena viagem de 3 dias que fizemos nos dias seguintes (depois conto).

Pode parecer um dia normal e simples mas para mim foi um dia de aniversário perfeito...