This weekend there was an optional AIFS trip to the Moravian city of Brno, which is basically in Czech wine country. We left on Friday morning, around 10:30 and stopped by a town called Tisnov on our way to the hotel. While we were there, we saw a church with the most amazing archway for an entrance, it's called the "Porta Coeli" or the "Gate to Heaven". When we got there, I saw the first cats I've seen in all of Europe from this trip, but they looked a little wild, so I didn't go play with them. The church was beautiful inside, but yet again, it was a place where they wouldn't allow people to take pictures inside. I guess in this area, it's considered disrespectful to take photos of the inside of a church, which seems so weird to me. From there, we drove to our hotel, which was a really nice hotel that made our dorms look tiny and uncomfortable. A group of us just wandered into the town to get ice cream, because we were craving it for some reason, and just wanted to relax for a little while before meeting for dinner and a wine tasting that evening. When we got to the wine tasting and dinner, first we went down this flight of stairs, into the dining area. The walls were arched over our heads and it felt like we were really in a cellar eating our food. On the table, there were pitchers of red and white wine, bottles of sparkling water, and some appetizers that tasted kind of like a hummus with peppers and some pickles in it. We were all enjoying those things when the meal came out, it was some of the best chicken I've ever had. It was falling off the bone and we were all picking as much of the meat off those bones as we could. While I was eating, I noticed something brush up against my leg and looked down to find a cat running around the table, running against people. It was so cute. After we all finished, we went to the room where they process the grapes for making the wine. While in there, we tried three different kinds of white wine and then two types of red, all of which tasted wonderful. We then headed back to the dining area to finish off the wine from the table and just talk for a while.
The next day, we started off with a trip to Gregor Mendel's Garden and Museum. The museum is right outside of the monastery where Mendel lived and grew those peas, which helped him learn the basics of genetics. It was really cool to see where something that has effected us so much started out. After that, we boarded the bus again and headed to fields near Austerlitz, where Napoleon battled in 1805 in a fight which would later be known as the Battle of Three Emperors. We saw the whole battle field from the spot where Napoleon was standing, so that he could see all that was happening. From there, we went to the Memorial of Peace, which was built to commemorate this battle. The thing that made this memorial so interesting is that, unlike most, it was not for one side or another, it was in memory of all people who lost their lives to this battle. At the sight of the memorial, there is also a really weird museum. We went to it, and it felt like we were being herded from room to room. As we entered each room, the door would close behind us and we would have to stay and watch some repetitive presentation about the war. After each weird presentation, a door would open up, and we would have to move onto the next one. It was a very weird place and I felt like I didn't learn a lot of what they were trying to teach us there. After that, we went on a walking tour of the city of Brno, which is a fascinating city. Everything was so beautiful and each building seemed to have an interesting story to it.
The next day, we woke up and checked out of the hotel to start seeing the sights for the day. The first place we visited was a baroque church nicknamed the "Pearl of Moravia", but it was kind of awkward when we visited. We didn't know that they were going to be in the middle of their mass when we got there, so we walked into the room and just stood silently looking around. We ended up leaving that rather quickly, so we didn't bother people too much and headed to the second church we were going to visit in a town called Adamov. The cool thing about this church was the elaborate wooden alter carved in the 16th century. The alter was divided into three main areas, the bottom, the middle, and the top. On the bottom, there was a scene depicting the apostles gathering to watch the the Virgin Mary ascend to heaven. In the middle, the Virgin Mary is gathering with the angels on her way to heaven. On the top, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are gathered to crown her as a queen of heaven. Along the sides, there are statues of saints and lots of elaborate carvings. From there, we headed to the coolest part of the day, a system of underground caves called the Moravian Karst. In the caves, there is a river that flows and we took a boat ride down that river. It was the most beautiful cave system that I have ever seen and I can't even figure out the words to describe it. For this one, honestly, it'd be better to just look at my pictures of the trip there.
Today, I'm starting my first class in a little over an hour. I'm going to be taking an intensive two week course in Czech language, which I'm hoping will be very useful and that I'll learn a lot.
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