Majales and the First of May

The past week has been nice, despite the fact that I have felt especially unstable. I keep swinging back and forth between really happy and oppressively obsessive/sad. Poor David has really been a great support, but I’ve still felt very overwhelmed much of this week. In between crises, though, I’ve managed to have a good week.

On Wednesday, I attended a music festival called “Majales.” It was the tenth anniversary of this student festival, and it was much bigger than I’d expected. It was held a park towards the edge of town that I had never been to before. The entire festival, consisting of promotional booths, food and drink stands, a few small stages, and three big stages, occupied about half of the park. There were events going on at the festival from 12:30pm to 4am, but I was only there from 2:30pm to 9:30pm. The day was beautiful, a little hot when the sun peeked out from the behind the clouds, and little cold when it went hiding again.  All but one of the five or six bands I saw sang in Czech, and each was good in their own rite. Being at a music festival made me think about hanging out with my dad and Grace at ACL, so it was kind of weird to be there alone. It was remarkable, actually, how similar Majales was to ACL. It was less crowded and the food was less inventive, but the crowds behaved similarly, interacting in friendlier ways than they would on the streets and getting progressively rowdier as the night went on. After the headliner (Tomas Klus) performed at 8pm, the quality of music seemed to deteriorate and my feet decided they were done, so I headed home. 

Walking from the metro stop to the festival

Festival entrance. Looks like ACL, right?

First band I saw. They were all wearing crazy black and white prints.

Next band. The power went out on them three times in the same song and they still managed to put on a great show.

These guys were like a rock orchestra thing. And the lead singer had awesome hair.

The rock orchestra-y band had a witch come out on stage during their set. Czechs traditionally burn witches on April 31st (not actually, but they have bonfires and call the events "witch burnings").

The headliner, Tomas Klus.

    The next day, I had most of the day to myself. In the morning, I went to Petrin Hill because apparently it's a tradition that on May 1st, people go to Petrin and couples kiss under cherry blossom trees. David was in a group meeting, so I decided to be romantic on my own. Later on, I went to Choco-Café to get some hot chocolate and do homework. On my way there, it poured and when I stepped inside there was a line of people waiting for table. The couple in front of me invited me to come sit with them because their table had three chairs. They turned out to be a couple from Hong Kong who had both studied in the States, and I talked with them for about half an hour before another table opened up. Even there, I didn’t get too much homework done, but I did manage to get my chocolate fix.

Cute chalk drawings in Petrin

Couple waiting to kiss under the statue of this poet, whose name I've forgotten. He wrote the poem that inspired the kissing-under-a-cherry-blossom-tree-on-May-1st thing.

            On Friday, David and I went to the Prague Museum at the Florenc metro stop near his apartment. The museum was excellent, and while we were there, it absolutely poured. We ended up having to run through the rain to the grocery store to get food for dinner, before heading back to his place to cook. The next day we went to Choco-Café again (gotta fit in as much chocolate as possible before we leave) and I actually managed to get some homework done.

            Sunday morning we worked out and then went to Lenka, the park where the Olympic Park was held towards the beginning of our time here. This time, with the park in its normal state, it’s enormity was even clearer. I actually tried going for a little run, and ended up going for one and a half miles. That turned out to be a little ambitious, though it felt fine at the time. On Monday, though, I was limping everywhere and taking elevators again. I also had my second therapy session on Monday, and it is really sinking in that I am going to have to address these issues myself. My therapist, though valuable, is just a guide. She can’t do the work for me. She can only help keep me accountable for facing my issues. It’s official: there is no magic pill to make me feel confident. This is going to be a hard-fought war, and I’m just now realizing I have to figure out how to build weapons.