Bohemian Rhapsody: Looking for the silhouette of a panda

I spent the next few days of my non-lethal panda hunt in the small towns of Telč, Třebíč, and Třeboň. The B&B where I slept was one of many colorful houses (the blue one to the left of the orange/red house in the photo below) that lined the central square of Telč (Telch). The town is a sleepy one of ~6,000 and while much of the income is tourism-derived, when I would get out of that main square it was like I was one among many Bohemians.

Actually, that was one of the differences with traveling in Europe vs in China. I'm sure my American apparel is obvious, but I don't stand out among the Czechs like I do in China. Either that or they're more discrete in staring.

windows of a castle

some artistic decrepitude

On Easter Sunday I visited Třebíč (Treh-beach) and got into town early for Church meetings. They watched the General Conference talks from Salt Lake the previous week, but in Czech. Unfortunately for me, I had no miraculous gift of tongues, but I was able to enjoy the milieu of ~20 Czech Mormons. After the meeting they invited me for a lunch of spaghetti at the church. Not quite an Easter ham, but the company was charming.

Třebíč is a substantially larger town (37,000) with an incredibly well-preserved Jewish Quarter with two former synagogues and a Jewish cemetery. However, all of the Jews in the area were deported during WWII and none live in the Quarter anymore. Interestingly, many of the inhabitants are Roma (often mistakenly called Gypsies), another group that has experienced marginalization and discrimination.

At one point I climbed up the tower in the main square to get a better view.

I was really surprised at how few people I saw out and about. I knew that it wasn't a tourist season (which gave me all the sites to myself) but there was surprisingly little activity of locals, considering it was a holiday. Nearly all of the markets and restaurants were closed for the holiday.

On Monday I visited Třeboň (Trey-bonne). This is another ancient town and was once run by the Habsburgs. Hundreds of years ago, some city planners had the foresight to transform the marshes into ponds for fish culture and that was the source of significant income for quite a while. There's a Soviet-era relief featuring fish above the bank near in the town square.

Like Sunday, I saw few other tourists, but the locals came out for Easter traditions!  One included tying dyed and colored eggs to trees a la Christmas ornaments.

The other tradition that initially confused me featured roaming groups of stick-wielding boys and men. Driving through small towns on my way to Třeboň, I would see three to seven boys, teens, and men walking door-to-door with baskets and switches consisting of braided pussy willows.

After conveying the observation to my sis, Bev, she came to the cultural rescue and wrote that they are pomlázkas and used in an Easter trick-or-treat. Apparently males gently rap females to impart good luck and health, and the girls give eggs, chocolate, or other treats in return and tie a ribbon to the stick. I have to say, though, that even though 95% of the faux floggers I saw consisted solely of guys, I did see one small group of intrepid girls carrying sticks and staking claim to eggs and candy.

I finished my excursion into the countryside without spotting any pandas. But I got a mouthful of spaghetti, a few colored eggs, and street after street of vibrant houses. I consider it a win.

In the Czech countryside?

This shouldn't come as a surprise to you, but pandas are from China. However, when I was told a few months back that I would have a conference in Prague, I decided that I should go a few days early and drive around the Czech Republic countryside to verify the absence of the indigenous Czech panda. The lengths I through go for humanity are exhausting.

I felt a bit disoriented as I exited the Prague airport. Something was amiss... but what? After a bit of thinking, I figured it out. You probably do this unintentionally,  but have you ever noticed that you track the painted stripes on the highway lane as you zip by, and that you adjust your gait down stairs by automatically following steps in your peripheral vision? Well I've become so accustomed to a sea of black-mopped heads bobbing just below eye level that in a country with greater genetic variation, I felt a bit of vertigo as blonde, brown, and black heads of hair swirled around me.

My first hurdle cleared, I made my way to the car rental area. I had done a good amount of online shopping to find a good deal, which lead to a reservation of a compact economy car with some off-brand company for $35/day. Pretty good, if you ask me. Well, the guy at the counter reported that they were out of that class of car, but that they'd upgrade me for free. Ok, so I wasn't going to be crammed into a VW Golf, so when he gave me the key I thought it'd have something like "Ford Taurus" on the label. Oh how wrong I was. When I turned the corner in the garage and pressed the "unlock" button on the fob, I found a pleasant surprise.

I'm not a car nut, but I was ecstatic to see 2012 BMW convertible with leather interior. Oh, and this steed has GPS. I felt very posh as I cruised--at a totally safe and responsible speed--while blasting Czech composers Dvorak and Smetana over the speakers.

The first stop in my non-lethal panda hunt was Konopiště Castle. Originally built in the 13th century, the castle was the last residence of Archduke Franz Ferdinand (a bell from high school world history class should be going off). Our friend Franz lurved hunting; he shot up to 300,000 pieces of game in his life. The hallways were lined with mounted antlers and weapons. Travis would've really enjoyed this place. I mostly had to fight off daydreams of the ending scene in Bednobs and Broomsticks where the suits of armor come to life to save the castle (wait, did Professor McGonagall rip off Angel Landsbury in the end of HP??)

My tour of the interior complete, I checked out the grounds (for pandas, of course). I said "hey" to a few peacocks before finding an old pavilion tucked behind a lake. It was there that Austrian Franz had a lil chat with the German Kaiser Wilhelm regarding control of power in Balkan states. Franz liked shooting animals, but wanted to maintain stability and secure an allied relationship with Germany should a war break out. Unfortunately, Franz Ferdinanad and his wife Sofie were assassinated two weeks later during a visit to Serbia. In a tragic twist of irony, the man who so loved shooting suffered a fatal gunshot wound that led immediately to World War I (that's what you vaguely remember from history class).

Panda count: 0.

Pseudo-panda count: 2 (two bears live in the moat. And Franz had some Chinese pottery on exhibit from an Asian hunting tour.)