Rehlovice--the regional homestay

This past week has been the regional homestay and it was pretty much an incredible experience. I was placed with two other girls in a tiny town called Rehlovice in northern Czech Republic, about an hour away from Prague. Our "host" for the week was a ceramic artist who runs a Cultural Center in Rehlovice in a space that was once a farm and brewery. She purchased the land about 15 years ago with her dad and they have been slowly renovating it piece-by-piece since then. The space that used to be the barn is now divided into the host's flat, a small space for guests, her ceramics studio, separate places for large group eating and sleeping, and a display gallery for the art. Other buildings have been used as a small cafe area, an outside space for eating and gathering, and random places for art displays and installations. Overall, it is a really interesting and beautiful place to be. The town of Rehlovice is tiny (you can walk from one end to the other in 10 minutes or so), but still a very interesting place.
So in this space, they hold several retreats and workshops that revolve around the arts and somehow bringing people together. For example, one of the major projects of our host is to hold a 2-week long workshop in the summer (for the last 10 years I believe) at this center and in November in Germany (which I might have the chance to observe!!) that brings together artists from Germany and from the Czech Republic to create individual and collective art pieces on a specific topic (usually about the recent history of these countries). So the most recent themes have been "the Baroque" period of art (2006), "Charter 77" which is a very significant event in 1977 that was instrumental in the Czech revolution in 1989 (2007), and the "Prague Spring" of 1968 which was also huge in the Czech history--research it if you're interested (2008). The reason why it is so important to bring the Czechs and Germans together is also a complicated historical issuing dealing with the former "Sudetenland" (another one to wikipedia if you're interested), but basically right after WWII, the Germans in these border regions were kicked out of their homes and many Czechs moved into these town and destroyed anything German because of their role in WWII. So there is still a lot of resentment and discrimination between these two groups, which is actively being addressed with such programs as the ones at this Cultural Center.
Another kind of program here was happening while we were there. A group of 20 students came to the center for a week-long bonding retreat before they started their first year of university at an art school. So they had certain activities and such, many of which included the arts in some way, throughout the week and it was really neat to get to talk with the teachers (the students were shy about their English). If you are interested in seeing pictures of the place, this website should take you to pictures from this past summer: http://www.kcrehlo.cz/proudeni2008/index.html.

Okay, so that was some background behind my week. The first day we left Prague (last Saturday), we went to a larger town that is close to Rehlovice called Litomerice and explored that city for a couple hours before we went to our host's mom's house for dinner and to sleep that night. I really liked Litomerice--it felt like a good sized town and we went to a wine cafe that night in an old observatory, which was really neat. Then the next day we went to Rehlovice and toured/explored the center and the town.
The next day we went to Usti nad Labem (a larger neighboring town) to interview another woman there who is doing similar work in this city. Usti is a very interesting town because it was one of three cities in the Czech Republic to get bombed during WWII (by the Americans, I believe). So many of the old historical, beautiful buildings are gone and they were rebuilt under Communism as very sterile, blocky, utilitarian buildings, which is very unusual in this area. Anyways, this woman we interviewed worked for an organization in Usti called "Collegium Bohemicum" and she organizes events to promote Czech-German relations also. One example of her work is she arranged for a group of Czech and German students to paint a graffiti mural on a specific space. She said that she really felt like her job was working when she found out that some of the people who had met through this event had gotten together on their own at a later time. So then after the interview we saw the American movie about Annie Leibowitz, which was interesting, but it was actually a little strange to hear that much English again.
Then Tuesday was very interesting because we got the opportunity to go to Terezin (which was a concentration camp/Jewish ghetto). Terezin is unique in that the ghetto (which was basically like a slightly less harsh concentration camp where the Jews lived in super-crowded apartments in a town) was used by the Nazis as the example of what they showed the Red Cross in order to portray a happy facade. So they gave the city a make-over and had the children learn songs to perform and forced people to act like nothing was wrong while the Red Cross toured the town and then reported that the Germans were being nice to the Jews. It was all just sickening propaganda. To show how terribly overcrowded it was, I heard a statistic that the town is built to hold 7,000 residents, but during this time, there were between 50,000 and 60,000 Jews alone (not to mention the guards, etc.). But anyways, Terezin was a strange place because it is still currently a town, so it has this intense history, but yet it still seems like a normal place if you weren't aware of its past. I hope to go back with the whole group of SIT students and have the chance to look into the museum there and tour the concentration camp part (which was a separate area). It was so crazy to actually be at this place, though--it was really hard to believe.
Okay, so Wednesday we helped out with putting a final coating of finishing on a floor that was built as an art piece over the summer, which was neat to be able to be a part of. We also bought the stuff to make s'mores, which none of the Czechs had ever heard of. Although we couldn't find the exactly right ingredients, they actually ended up being fairly tasty and several of the Czechs really liked them. So that was neat to be able to share a part of our culture with them. Several of them had said they'd seen s'mores in American movies, but had never actually had one.
The next day we left in the morning to go to a town in Southern Czech Republic called Cesky Krumlov to meet up with the rest of the group. This town is seriously like a fairy-tale...but not a creepy fairy-tale..like one that is authentically adorable and happy. The town has been well preserved from the 1500s on, so it basically just looks like you stepped back in time--with a huge castle and a baroque theater and buildings with original sgraffito and frescos...its amazing. And to add to that, the couple days we were there coincided with a festival, so the town square was filled with craft vendors and such. So that was neat--it was a great end to a great week.
And now this coming week is super packed with readings and class, so its been nice to have this break from the academics for a week.

So thanks for reading the whole thing--sorry it was so long, but believe it or not, I actually tried to cut out a lot of the details. I had a very busy week filled with lots of new experiences, and hopefully I'll have many more like this.

Betsy