Far and Away

Featured Image: Swans always gather in droves in this particular inlet on the Vltava. On this particular afternoon, I also saw a muskrat accepting treats and scratches from passersby. What was the most important outcome of your time abroad? When my study abroad program emailed me the final evaluation questionnaire, I didn’t even know where to begin. Since I touched down in Prague, the questions constantly in the back of my mind have been about personal growth, independence, and everything else…

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Featured Image: My friends and I spotted this toy store on a shopping street in Amsterdam’s city center and our inner children couldn’t resist taking a peek. The smell of wet dog flooded the room as Miloslav entered, his brambly gray beard trembling above his plaid-clad potbelly. He parked his huge rolling suitcase in the corner and painstakingly tied the leash to a table leg. Immediately, the hound began leaping up on his lap, its enthusiasm belying the fact that…

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Featured image: “Submergence” installation at Signal Festival. When I picked up a book on the Danish art of hygge for my parents last spring, I had no idea that, only a few months later, I would be experiencing it firsthand. Hygge is to Denmark what freedom is to America—it sort of defines who we are. Rather than being exemplified by screeching eagles or getting hammered and setting off illegal fireworks, though, it’s about being cozy. While there is no English…

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Featured image: Prague Castle (Pražský hrad), St. Vitus Cathedral, and the iconic red roofs of the city viewed from the Petřín Lookout Tower Have you ever been minding your own business on your way to work or school, allowing the tide of commuters to buoy you along as you board the metro, when you suddenly experienced a total collapse of your subjective self-identity? Because I haven’t. In fact, I had no idea this was a normal thing for anyone to experience…

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If I had to sum up my first three weeks in Prague with one word, it would be “trdelník.” My Czech pronunciation leaves a lot to be desired, so I can’t tell you how to pronounce it (I’m still saying “turtleneck” in some type of undefined accent), but I can explain what it is: a cylindrical cake, cooked on a spit, dusted with cinnamon sugar and nuts and sometimes brushed with Nutella or filled with ice cream. In the tourist-packed…

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