all the leaves are falling

Yesterday I recieved two packages...one from home and one from Germany. I can't tell you what it's like to get something from home. So completely surreal. In the package from Germany was my camera charger, which I left in Berlin in early July resulting in a loss of thousands of would-have-been taken photos over the last three month. Regardless, I have the charger now and my digital life is back online. Hooray! Some clothes arrived in the package from home. Very strange to remember in cloth, bits of a life lived elsewhere.

Today I took the morning bus 7:40 to Liberec where I hopped in a car to drive to a company in česka lípa. Richard, director of Swallow schools of English drove me to teach a 'pitch' lesson in order to see if the company wanted to permanently hire Swallow. We drove through a brilliant fall scape and I saw more of the Czech countryside than I ever have. Unbelieveably brilliant organge, red, brown, carmel colored leaves....long rolling hills and countryside covered in old castles and churches. Almost every hill it seemed, had some remains from ancient times. Richard told me about cross country skiiing in the winter, and how well marked all of the trails are. How all you need is a thermos and you can ski all day, explore in the woods with no danger of getting lost as long as you follow groomed trails.

I'm excited to be here...falling asleep on the bus back from Liberec, my mind wandered off to the sound of murmuring Czech, the mystery language and some kind of triumphant orchestral crackling stereo...