Multi-culti

What I enjoy here in Nebraska is its multicultural atmosphere. My room-mate is from South Korea. My best friend here is from South Korea as well. My colleagues in catering are from India. My teachers are respectively from Ethiopia, Philippines, USA and Spain. I met one really nice girl from Japan, I talked to many Latinos from South America. There is huge variety of people from all over the world and all of them are very interesting.

Today we got invited by Indian guys to their place. They cooked for us real Indian food. All I knew about it was that it is usually very spicy. It was, but at the same time I considered in delicious. We ate a lot of rice with many different things, chicken and at the end home-made yogurt. Really delicious!!! And what is more, to fully experience the Indian culture, we ate with our hands. I never tried it before, it might be sometimes quite tough hihi

I am grateful for all these experiences. I guess these are unique moments and it made my life here very lively and interesting.

The Little Mermaid

I kind of believe that some things just find us, because we want them so much and because these things (it can be whatever) are meant to be with us. And if we listen to our intuition, they will come to us. Usually when we less expect it.

Today I went to the second hand bookstore and I was looking for one book. I could not find it, BUT while searching for it, I noticed huge box with Walt Disney books. My heart started beating a little bit faster and I was thinking: "What if..." ... Sleeping Beauty, Lion King... and right between Lion King and Snow White I found it. The Little Mermaid smiled at me and I knew that today I was meant to come to this shop to find this book :-)

Winning the first prize

Today we went for the Chinese night. It was the evening organized by Chinese people from the UNL. We got some good food and several performances took place. Quite interesting. The part of that was also tombola. Hehe and I won one of the two first prizes. Unbelievable. I told Jirka that I never won first prize before. And he told me that my Robitschek Scholarship here at the UNL is also kind of first prize.

It made me thinking about all these first prizes that we actually "win" but sometimes we even do not realize it. I won in so many aspects that I can hardly count it all. I have the best parents on the whole Earth, great brother, wonderful friends, I got uncountable amount of opportunities to experience the world, I "won" healthy body and clear mind...

In reality, I won the first prize so many times in my life. I just do not always realize it.

Money makes a difference

In Czech Republic nor in Slovakia students do not pay for their university studies. Basically, the only expenses they do have to cover are books, housing, food and their leisure. In Nebraska, USA students do have to pay for their studies. Apart tuition there are many different fees such as technology fee and whatsoever. The results are following:

• students can borrow laptops for free
  
• teachers can make as many copies for students as they need, nothing like "we do not have enough paper bla bla bla"
• there are no lines for computers - and there is big computer room even in our dorm which is open during the night as well
  
• computers are fast!!! new!!! and work properly!!!
• computers have new software
• there are music rooms with pianos in our dorm
  
• it is possible to borrow bikes for $10 per day
• any other outdoor equipment can be rented in recreation center for really good price as well as equipment for indoor sports (squash racket for 50cents heh)
  
• university is very well equiped
• recreation center is wonderfully equiped
• etc
  

Well, you can really see the difference comparing to my home university.

Connections

My father went to Monte Negro one month ago. I told him to send me a postcard. He did. But it did not arrive. One month passed and there was still nothing in my mailbox... I was angry and sad, complained about American post services a lot (also because of three other letters that I sent to Slovakia and Czech Republic and which never arrived).

Yesterday I dreamed about the postcard. In my dreams I got it. In the morning we went to the front desk to ask about opening hours of our cafeteria during fall break. Our mailboxes are just next to the front desk. I said to my friends: "Today I dreamed about the postcard from my father." I opened the mailbox ... and it was there ...

:-)

Piano lessons

In the basement of the Selleck Hall (the place where I live) many interesting things could be found. Apart computer and study rooms, there are also music rooms. Three of them. And in each there is one piano.

I somehow always wanted to be able to play at least one song on piano. And of course, my dream is to play the guitar. Therefore, when I realized that I have free access to piano and moreover, I have person willing to teach me to play very nice song, I started to practice. It makes me really happy :-) I spend every other day maybe 30minutes "relaxing" in the music room. When I need break from studies, or when I just feel like playing, I go there. Usually, in the afternoon none of the rooms is taken.

I am already able to play both hands together, however, I will need much more time to be able to play it the way Linkin (my piano teacher) can play it. But I will manage :-) and then I will play it for my parents during Christmas time :-)

Let's go for a coffee!

There is one thing that I love about USA. And that is American coffee and American coffee houses. It might seem surprising but it is absolutely true.

In the country where "the culture" is said to be unknown word, I have found the strong coffee culture. And I totally fell in love with this aspect of the American way of life.

At the very beginning of the semester, we were desperately looking for some nice place to chat, to have fun, something with atmosphere and charm. We thought there was none. Heh not true. There are many of them. And the coffee they brew is just delicious. Never ever had a better one. I love take-away option or in case I have time and nice company, just sit in Kopeli's and observe people studying all around, or the one at the Haymarket where they have tons of books and huge muffins.

Uuuuhm :-) Let's have a coffee!