INDIA!

David and I leave for India tomorrow! I am so excited!

My main concern however is to get healthy as soon as possible. For the past 3 days I have been having the worst sore throat of my life. I also haven't been able to sleep and have a constant headache. Today I feel a tad bit better but it's still pretty bad. David is in the same exact state as me too. Right now he's in bed trying to recover. We are doing our best though, medicating, taking tons of vitamins, and eating good soup. I had to miss class yesterday, and I should miss class today to sleep in bed and recover... But... I have many things I need to do and I have this one class I can't miss. I also need to finally pay my tuition (always a grim day), and then buy some things at the store for India. I need to buy some sun lotion, tissues, hand sanitizer, and food. I would also like to find something nice for our friend Rohun. Rohun is a cool Indian guy that went to our high school and is now letting us crash with him for about a week. He lives in Mumbai(Bombay), and that's where we'll be flying into.

David and I will be flying from Prague (departing 11:45am) to Istanbul, and then from Istanbul to Mumbai. We will arrive in Mumbai at 4 am! Pretty dang early, but I guess Rohun will be there with a car waiting for us (thank god). The total time of travel with connections will be 12 hours and 45 minutes. We will return may 3rd at 5:25pm. I'll write more later about our itinerary.

Dilli Delhi Resturant

Today David and I went to Dilli Delhi at U Vodárny 10 in Prague 3. We ended up having a good experience there. Our waitress even spoke great English and was super nice.

I ordered sweet Lassi drink and David tried the Masala tea. I believe the Lassi (40 crowns) is made with blending some yogurt and milk and Indian spices. It was interesting tasting, but not bad at all. David's spiced tea (40 crowns) was very good, I liked it.

We also ordered this delicious Mulligatawny Soup (50 crowns), it was a curry flavored lentil soup.
I ordered the Paneer Masala (155 crowns) (Cubes of Homemade Cheese Simmered in a Thick Creamy Tomato Gravy with Bell Peppers). David ordered the Chicken Biryani (145 crowns) (Basmati Rice Cooked with Pieces of Chicken in a Delicate Blend of Exotic Spices and Flavoured with Saffron). We both ate our meals with the yummy Indian bread naan. Sooo good! I don't know much about Indian food, so I'm not sure how this meal compares to others or the real deal, but I enjoyed it so whatever!

After our meal we headed out and met up with our friends Katie, Kara, Ben and Victor. It's great having then back in Prague for a visit. :)

Also, if anyone is interested, I found this great Naan recipe at Allrecipes.com. Click here to see it.

14 servings

Ingredients

• 1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
• 1 cup warm water
• 1/4 cup white sugar
• 3 tablespoons milk
• 1 egg, beaten
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 4 1/2 cups bread flour
• 2 teaspoons minced garlic (optional)
• 1/4 cup butter, melted

Directions

1. In a large bowl, dissolve yeast in warm water. Let stand about 10 minutes, until frothy. Stir in sugar, milk, egg, salt, and enough flour to make a soft dough. Knead for 6 to 8 minutes on a lightly floured surface, or until smooth. Place dough in a well oiled bowl, cover with a damp cloth, and set aside to rise. Let it rise 1 hour, until the dough has doubled in volume.
2. Punch down dough, and knead in garlic. Pinch off small handfuls of dough about the size of a golf ball. Roll into balls, and place on a tray. Cover with a towel, and allow to rise until doubled in size, about 30 minutes.
3. During the second rising, preheat grill to high heat.
4. At grill side, roll one ball of dough out into a thin circle. Lightly oil grill. Place dough on grill, and cook for 2 to 3 minutes, or until puffy and lightly browned. Brush uncooked side with butter, and turn over. Brush cooked side with butter, and cook until browned, another 2 to 4 minutes. Remove from grill, and continue the process until all the naan has been prepared.

Enjoy!

Beautiful day in Prague

My friends and I decided to go to Riegrovy Sady (park) yesterday. We relaxed and ejoyed a few beers. Check it out!

1... 2... 3.... GO!!!

Let the thesis writing begin!

Today is the day that I am finally sitting down and getting started. I went to the library yesterday and picked up about 8 books and I intend to get into them today. I also saved many articles from Jstor that I need to read.

I guess I should begin by explaining a little bit about what my topic is and how I intend to go about it.

I will be discussing the relation between economic and political freedom, how they feed and affect each other. I will used the United States and China in the modern context as examples and case studies relating to my concept of economic and political freedom. I will also justify my reasoning for why I believe that maintaining freedom in economic and political realms is important and needs to be preserved. I believe in the idea that once economic freedom is lost, political and other freedoms will also follow suite. I believe that Socialism trades society’s supreme ideal of freedom for the hazy concept of “fairness”.

I think I'll be breaking my paper up into these chapters:

Introduction
Political Freedom
Economic Freedom
The combination together & separate
The American example
The Chinese example
Conclusions

The cartoon below actually depicts my life a bit right now. But I know I can get through this fine.

Linnea Visits Prague

The very first day that Linnea flew into Prague it was so sunny and beautiful. She was so amazed at how gorgeous all the architecture was. I love seeing everyone's faces when they first get to see Prague. The pictures are one thing, but seeing it in person is quite another.


Castle view from Charles Bridge.
I recently ran into this interesting bit of information: According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the Prague Castle is the largest coherent castle complex in the world, with an area of almost 70,000 m².
The castle was founded way back around 880 by Prince Bořivoj of the Premyslid Dynasty and features many architectural styles, from Roman-style buildings from the 10th century through Gothic modifications in the 14th century.


One nice thing about Prague is that there's no worries when walking around with a bottle of beer. As you can see Linnea is taking advantage of being able to be on the go with some good Czech beer. The best thing though is during the spring and summer time when we go to the beer gardens or just walk around the park with some beer in our hands. It's finally getting to be nice weather here so I'm totally going to take advantage of heading to the park and relaxing in the sun with my beer. The only thing that will be missing is my sweet little pups that I had to leave behind in the States. :(
Below we are on our way to Karlštejn Castle. I've already been there several times, David and I wanted to take our new friends (who David met on the plane ride from Frankfurt to Prague) and Linnea to see it. When we went it was pretty cold, but we survived and enjoyed the view.
The castle was actually built by Czech King and Roman Emperor Charles IV in 1348 as a place for safekeeping of royal treasures like Charles’s collection of holy relics and the coronation jewels of the Roman Empire. The coronation jewels were kept there for almost 200 years during and after the Hussite wars in the 15th and 16th century. And for all the architecture buffs out there, the castle was originally built in the Gothic style and reconstructed in the Renaissance style in the 16th century. It owes its present look to the purist Neo-Gothic style designed by architect Josef Mocker at the end of the 19th century.

One night we invited the new friends (Mira & Jeff) to our flat where we had them try a flaming shot of absinthe. Now when they go home they can show everyone their awesome pictures of the flaming shots. Below, as we're posing, Linnea is melting the sugar which she'll then drop into the absinthe shot.
We were going to get the shots at our local bar the Růžák, but then decided it would be cheaper to just buy the bottle and take it back to our place. :)
Now that Linnea is back in Paris I can look forward to showing my friend Jessica around. Jess is coming to Prague in May (so the weather should be really nice). Basically right when David and I get back from India, we will be welcoming her our amazing city. I can't wait!

Heading Back to Praha

It's been nice to be back in the States where I have my own car, am able to enjoy my hobbies and have normal American grocery stores. :) However I'm heading back to the homeland for another 4 months this Sunday the 27th. I'm pretty estatic that I have a good flight back, total duration of only 13 hours (YES!). No 20 hours like I'm used to... I only hope that I can sleep. I'll be arriving in Prague 2:40pm. I saved some crowns for the trip back to the apartment, so I don't need to have Pepa come get me... but I do need some kind of way to get inside since I didn't take the keys with me.

Everything is coming up so quickly! I only have like 4 days left. Aye! I need to start packing to see what I have and if I need anything to take back. I think I'll be making a trip to Walmart or Target to pick up any items I need this Saturday. I will not forget the tampons this time! Seriously I know it's strange that I bring this up, but one thing that hasn't made it's way to Czech yet is regular tampons with an applicator.

Alright I have to do this, I'm making a list of all the things I'm going to miss here in the good 'ol USA:
1. Friends & Family (duh)
2. Fresh Coastal Air
3. American grocery stores
4. Affordable clothing stores
5. My sewing machine
6. GOOD martinis
7. Brewed coffee with Coffeemate creamer
8. My car
9. Chipoltle Mexican Grill
10. Running route where nobody stares at you
11. Baking & cooking with American ingredients ;)

At the Salon

So today should be fun, Lindsay had a client at her salon so I got to tag along and after she's done with him I get the VIP treatment. I'm really excited for that. I guess I'll be doing a facial, pedicure, and a deep cleansing wash. Lindsay's little shop is pretty cute, very quaint and pretty much like any other nice salon shops.

So far the trip here has been really fun. We mostly just hang out and talk. We tried to go buy that Dance Central game for the Xbox 360 but Walmart didn't have it. I was excited for that because I'm pretty sure we would have danced for hours, so that was kinda a bummer.