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Tag: FOFAC

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By jfbarszcz

My prompt this week asks me to talk about a custom from my country that I think the US should adopt. While not a "custom," per se, there is one big thing that the Czech Republic does better than the US: money. No, I don't mean the Czech Republic is richer than the United States, or that their spending habits are better, or that Czech monetary policy is better than America's. I mean that their actual money, their cash, is so much better than ours, for several reasons. ...continue reading "Dollars and Crowns"

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By rlubitz

So, uhm, newsflash: London has a pretty fine street treat here that I would like to see directly exported to the United States.

Back in American cities there’s the hotdog and the pretzel and that’s pretty much it. There’s a huge level of shame that comes from standing out in the sun and staring at a cart for ten minutes and then going up and saying “Hot dog, please….and these chips…..how much is a soda? Okay. Yeah. Thanks.” It really shouldn’t be shameful at all, we all know it’s unhealthy but sometimes a honey needs some chips and a soda.

Here, however, there’s NO SHAME in street eating. There’s a bit of fun in it, really. ...continue reading "Reasons to Live: Sausage Rolls"

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By oncptime

Italy, the land of bistecca, and cozze, gelato and prosciutto has—miraculously—turned me into a vegetarian. Whenever my dietary restrictions come up in conversation I have a soft chuckle to myself before regaling my listeners with the harrowing tale of how I singlehandedly liberated an entire farm’s worth of innocent woodland creatures from a sadistic, blood-worshiping cult/sleeper-cell not two blocks from my home. The sick bastards planned on eating those doe-eyed does. Monsters.

Thing is though, I’m the farthest thing from a vegetarian. Unless barking or meowing, animals aren’t people, they’re food. The sadistic cult gathering I crashed? It was a barbecue festival. They wanted €30 to get in. Monsters.

I get away with telling stories like this primarily because these days I’m running on little more than bread, water, and the occasional bowl of Budget brand corn-flecks. I might splurge on some broccoli every now and then or maybe even—wait for it—a bag of potatoes when they go on sale for a single Euro (like today!), but even that is an extravagance that I must be wary of.

If you haven’t put two and two together yet, let me make my point clear: I’m ridiculously, hopelessly, unequivocally broker than broke. And somehow, I’m making it work.

...continue reading "We love our bread, we love our butter, but most of all…we can’t afford meat."

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By rlubitz

This past week was Reading Week here in the UK and while British students read, I decided to see six different European cities in a week.

For those wondering, taking night buses is a very, very bad idea. Buses rock about and can stop abruptly and drivers can keep the lights on and blast the air conditioning on a six hour night bus to Paris and drop you off an hour early at 5:30 am. After this said journey, you look like a very unhappy newborn kitten. Your eyes can’t open and it is so, SO cold and you have no idea where you are and maybe you start crying. Night buses are a very, very bad idea. ...continue reading "People Are Amazing and I Want to Marry an Italian Flight Attendant"

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By tierneybb

Last week we began our independent research period. Handed conspicuous envelopes fed fat with rupees we were wished the best of luck and told to keep in touch. A fellow GW student happens to be staying in the area as well, so we packed up our bags and hailed a cab across the river to the incorporated city of Patan. While housing (especially on a student stipend) in Patan is limited, we have contracted a room in a guesthouse with a communal kitchen (yes, this is my worst nightmare, but at least we have our own bathroom, GW dorms have set my standards a bit too high). But our room is two blocks from Durbar Square, and next to a large market street that turns into a major thoroughfare. ...continue reading "Patan, KTM"

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By oncptime

You can learn a lot about a culture of a place from its grocery stores; hints and clues litter the places. The fresh produce, the types of sales, the music blaring from the tinny overhead speakers—each of them tells you a little something more about the personality of that specific place on the planet.

Florence is host to a number of minimarkets, corner stores, and bodegas of varying size, but it also has its fair share of American-styled grocery...boutiques. They’re not quite Whole Foods but they’re certainly not Safeways; they’re somewhere in between. The Conad on Via Nazionale, is my favorite. Fresh baked bread, Spanish imported mussels, and Alaskan salmon all just a few steps away from my apartment.  Uncle Ben’s brand curry jockeys for shelf space with Patak’s and three brands of pita bread conveniently lie in wait just one shelf down. The store is an exercise in internationality, and strolling down its aisles reminds me of similar stores in D.C.

The Conad outshines a number of other grocery stores in the area for a number of reasons: selection, longer hours, a markedly friendlier staff—but honestly, I’m not here to talk to you about a grocery store. Not really. No, this is a story about how I learned how not to wait in line in Italy.

...continue reading "Aspetta, Prego, Avanti"

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By littlemisadventures

LuxorI’ve gotten used to thinking of Egypt as a city- a vast, congested sea of humanity. However, there’s much more to the country than Cairo. During the recent Eid al Adha, I traveled to Upper Egypt with my mom, who flew in from Chicago ostensibly to see me but actually to see various dead kings and their monuments. I’m fine with that, incidentally.

A professor told me that the years don’t pass very quickly in Upper Egypt. I understood what this meant as soon as I stepped off the train. If it hadn’t been for the tourists’ fancy cameras and the pop music playing in cafés, we could have traveled back in time. The countryside was lush and peaceful. Buffaloes and donkeys sauntered through the streets, unfazed by the motorcycles. Men sat leisurely outside stores sipping tea and chatting. Teenagers hacked enthusiastically at the bodies of strung-up animals in preparation for eid dinners as bone shards, blood, and bits of meat flew everywhere. We took a three-day cruise, visiting tombs and temples during the day then docking at night in Luxor, Edfu, and Aswan. ...continue reading "Death (and Life) on the Nile"

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By hwscott

Two days ago, I gave my ISP presentation proposal in front of the other students in the program, my professors, and other SIT La Paz community members. I am now officially in my Independent Study Project period, living on my own (not actually - still with my host family but with slightly different arrangements), and doing my research. I am researching a priest named Sebastian Obermaier, and his influence and perceptions of him in El Alto. So a lot has happened since my last post! ...continue reading "The Power of One Priest in a Revolutionary Aymara Stronghold"

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By tierneybb

A few weeks ago I found myself in the middle of an argument on the bus. Two young twenty-something Nepalis had gone from a general pleasant conversation about nothing, looking forward to Dasain, but when I made an offhand comment about the stretch of road we were on I set them off. The boy, a well off construction manager was too jaded to even entertain the notion of discussing politics, he just pointed out that peoples interests were not being served by the government and it was too bad, too entrenched to get any better. The girl was a university student studying politics, who was interested in the advancement of her country, and while she wasn't fond of the current government, how was that supposed to change if dissatisfied young Nepalis didn't get involved? I sat back, I was determined not to get involved, but still they kept most of the argument in English, with passioned bursts of Nepali roughly translated for my benefit. But this isn't the only time I've been caught in such arguments, while interviewing a shopkeeper in Namo Buddha a man walked in off the street already hurling political arguments at her, and the interview took a back seat as the two of them discussed local issues with the government, animatedly pacing and gesticulating with their arguments. There always seems to be an odd dynamic where both parties agree with each other, and are very nice, but then point out that the other just happens to be fundamentally wrong about their proposed action. ...continue reading "Patan, KTM"

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By jfbarszcz

I imagine that most GW students would feel similarly when I say that right now, the foremost thing on my mind is Tuesday's presidential election. In the US, the presidential election is always a time of great excitement and dominates the national attention. Here in Prague, as one may expect, the media coverage is not quite so overwhelming, but it's still a very big topic (and of course, I continue to read American news outlets online, where the election remains the top story). Seeing that we exert enormous amounts of global influence in just about every sphere, I don't find this surprising in the least; US policy decisions have effects on the entire globe. Still, it's definitely pretty weird to go to a foreign country and have seemingly everyone there know an impressive amount about my country's politics, when I know so little about theirs, and I'm the one who's in their country! Then again, I guess the same could be said about people here (especially young people) knowing English, American movies, music, etc... in other words, I should be used to this kind of stuff by now. ...continue reading "Electoral Madness"

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