Thursday 17 March 2011

Umbrellas, fate and nationality

It occurs to me that I should find the fact that it rained today and that I'm feeling like I'm teetering on the brink of having a horrible cold really rather funny, in light of yesterday's post.  But I seem to have had a sense of humour bypass.  I've been feeling utterly miserable. I've even taken a picture of my umbrella (now that it's had a chance to dry off) in an attempt to cheer myself up that at least I do have a nice umbrella and it's good thing that it had the opportunity to serve its purpose today.


I suppose it's fair enough.  I was almost hinting that it was a shame the umbrella hadn't been used.  And it's probably a good thing that my local area gets a reminder that there is an 'angličanka' among them.  (Who else would be as eccentric?)  After all, we are a rare bunch in this architecturally stunning city.  

We had a conversation in my Czech lesson today about how unique it is in our class to have an English girl, i.e. me.  No other English people have set foot in this language school.  Indeed, I have to report that, somewhat predictably, I've been here six months and still not come across one other Brit.  Not one.  Americans, yes, but a Brit?  Absolutely not.  And the only other Brit my teacher knew of (a friend of a friend) had not set foot in a language school either.  Am I ashamed of my nationality and its apparent inability to seriously try to learn a foreign language of any description, let alone a rather difficult language such as Czech? Well, yes, actually.  

It must be in our genes.  Americans mostly came from other places and settled in America.  Brits just grew up and assumed no-where was worth learning a foreign language for.  So they stayed put.  (Mind you, I've met a few Americans here but not one has said they've made an effort to go to Czech classes.)

So the only English girl in Prague with her red, frilly, polka dot umbrella, stands out a mile.  In more ways than one.  But I suppose that's the way I like it. 

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