wandering, but not lost: Quiet day.

Nothing too exciting on the home front today, world. Sleeping in, cleaning, laundry (operating a Czech washing machine is no small feat), consuming our milk before it expired. It was a lazy start to a nice day. I had photography from 4-8, and I left around 2:30 with my roommates for a late lunch. We found a little restaurant near school, and I- yep, you guessed it- enjoyed it immensely. Spinach soup and jacket potatoes (for some reason, they chose to use the British phrase for baked potatoes- although they were really just little potatoes, halved) with red onions and sheep cheese. The waiter originally gave us our menu in Czech, which I'm sure we would have managed, but when he realized we were speaking English, he brought us one we could understand. That was just fine by me! The service was very good, and I feel like it's a place we can definitely come back to. Class was pleasant enough. He critiqued our first assignment, and it was really interesting to hear his perspective. He liked all of my photographs (hooray!), and I was glad to find out that even my least favorite photo wasn't bad. We had to have four photos: two focused on depth of field, and two focused on motion, with an overall theme of first impressions of Prague. The ones I chose were the graffiti shot from May 26th, the guy in the band jumping and the people walking through Old Town Square from May 25th, and another picture that didn't end up on my blog... I'll pop that up here at the end. My least favorite was the one of people walking. I can't explain it, but I feel like it just lacked a certain spark. It had movement, to be sure, but what it was missing was feeling, perhaps. My teacher agreed, saying he didn't dislike it, but that I was far better than that, which made me smile. Class dragged on for awhile after that. It was interesting, but I would rather learn about technique in conjunction with seeing the effects produced. We see all of these incredible photographs- abstract art, and images that just draw you in- but when it comes to replicating those styles, we're on our own. I don't mind this too much, because I enjoy experimentation, but at the same time, a few hints would be nice. Oh well. One of these days, I'm going to go off on my own and have a little photography adventure. I need a creative outlet. I have to say, though, I think this week's project will be good for that. It's an interesting concept: we take one object (an egg, for example) and present it four different ways. He outlined them, but honestly, I'm in no mental state to convey that sort of thing right now. I'll explain later.

I've been thinking a lot lately, about church and friends and being away from home and things like that. I have a lot to say, but I sort of feel like my brain is mush right now. Must be the conglomeration of German and Czech floating around in my head (proof that I really am crazy, if anyone still needed it)... oh, and the giant knot that has blossomed in my back might be playing a role too. I don't want to ramble incoherently, because I feel like I might actually have something valuable to say, and that might get lost in translation. Maybe tomorrow!

Czech word of the day: rhododendrons go by the same name here too! Also, I saw another group of foreign exchange students very excitedly discussing ananas in the grocery store, and it made me smile. I'm glad other people enjoy that word just as much as I do!