Moravia (You See What You Look For)

The best bit of photographic advice I ever received was this:

Do not walk into a situation looking for the photograph you want to walk out with. Instead, walk into the situation, look at what’s there, and figure out a way to photograph it.

I fear that describing the entire weekend would consume the rest of my week, but it is unacceptable to me that this wonderful trip be omitted. My solution is to let some of Moravia be captured by my photographs rather than my words. I hope that they convey the beauty and the feelings that I would write about.

Disclaimer: This entry includes clandestine pictures of cathedral insides. If you plan on going to heaven, shield thine eyes.

En route to Moravia, the busses stopped in a village called Tišnov to view the monastery there.

The next stop was a Tesco in Brno. I belonged to a minority that had read the trip notes and had already packed my lunch. I leapt at the chance for more pictures. As a mass of students walked from the bus towards Tesco, I walked from the bus away from Tesco. I paced under a wrought iron train bridge that boomed and reverberated under a barreling train. I’d been looking for a good shot of the cathedral, perched on its hill, but I could not get a clear shot. I realized what I was doing (see above quotation) and paused to soak in the surroundings, which yielded the following photo. The picture is a silhouette of the web of electrical tram lines that cover many of the streets in the Czech Republic.

The little jaunt was successful and I also captured the following photographs.

At the hotel I learned that the Czech Republic had, in fact, discovered the spring bed mattress and that the invention simply had not propagated to its dorms and prisons yet.*

The evening was spent in the hotel, where a group of us had a European-style four-hour dinner in the hotel’s restaurant. A few of us internet junkies were pondering the creation of a “Zdeněk Is My Homie” facebook group when Danny sat down. Danny is a muscular guy with a great sense of humor; he mentioned his sore back and expressed his condolences when he realized that our rooms (unlike his) did not come with a Chinese woman to walk on our backs.

Myself, Danny, Zdeněk, and Andy

The following day began with a tour of Brno. The tour itself was both freezing and difficult to understand. On the bright side I captured a few decent shots with my camera.

We then raced off to Austerlitz, where Napoleon enjoyed the greatest victory of his entire career. Through superior strategy and tactics, his men handily defeated an army that had them outnumbered and outgunned.

Battlefield at Austerlitz

Near Austerlitz is a monument dedicated not to the winners or losers, but rather to peace itself. Andrew pointed out the irony that “the peace monument is way the #@$% in the middle of nowhere.” It seems lamentably metaphoric.

Below is my favorite shot from the entire Moravia trip. It is of one of four peace guardians and his gold shield.
The bus’s final stop for the day was wine tasting at Kraví Hora. As we disembarked, I decided to leave my big camera on the bus. Oops. We walked a mere 300 feet before a sunset leapt into view. Next to me an older student named Mike peered with his saggy eyes and began unzipping his camera bag. I whipped out my pocket camera and started shooting. The main group lost interest, but Mike and I knew what we were doing—this place was full of photographic opportunity, and when it comes to sunsets, you’re under the gun.

Mike and I looked back and the group was gone. In their place were rows and rows of miniature houses—cellars and cellars of fine wine. We maintained our sang-froid. He took one route; I took another. No luck. Where were they? They could have descended into any of these cellars and we wouldn’t know for hours. I saw one open door and ran to it. Two burley men rolled a barrel onto a cart. I met up with Mike again, completely lost. Two men approached. They were the bus drivers. “Thank God,” I thought to myself. The drivers spoke almost no English, but they knew what had happened. Smiling one of them said, “Ya, zis vay.”

Myself and Mike: The Lost Photographers

After another night at the Slovan hotel, the bus rolled into motion. After a snowy drive, we arrived at the tiny village of Křtiny. With some extra time on my hands, I photographed the relatively unimpressive outside of the church.

I have seen Westminster Abby; I have seen Notre Dame Cathedral; and in this tiny Czechoslovakian village was a church whose inside topped them all.

The spectacular Punkva caves that we saw next were almost a letdown after the church in Křtiny. The inside of the caves were a balmy 46.8 degrees F—nearly 35 degrees warmer than it was outside.

The cave tour had a unique twist—the second half of it was on a boat. A Czech man deftly motored us through the river that had carved through the Karst to form the caves.

An enormous group of us rode the trolley back to the busses. It was unclear whether the service was free, but then again, this is Eastern Europe, so maybe it was clear: not free.
“Kolik to stojí?” I asked after many other students had evacuated the trolley as if it were on fire.
“Třicet… (30…)” the man said. He seemed on the verge of tears.
I gave him a 50Kč bill and refused to accept his change—it was my feeble attempt to smooth over US-Czech relations.

The bus ride back was mundane. At one point, we passed an area filled with ugly buildings. Someone pointed and said “Look how communist that is.” Was it? I remembered the bit of photography advice about having preconceptions of the photo you want to take away. There are ugly buildings in the US as well. What about these made them communist? The photographic tip was applicable to more than photography. If you have too many preconceptions, you will notice only what you look for.

A "parting shot." One of my favorites. The other students were focused on the river and trees when I ducked down a side road for this shot.

* I cannot attest to the prison situation, but the dorm beds are a 3” thick piece of foam on a board.**

** In all fairness I sleep reasonably well on my “bed.”

Footsteps

After being rejected by Will, I knew it would be a tough sell. Framed by the doorway, I adjusted my camera-filled backpack and awkwardly peeked in at Helen. My charismatic hands accompanied my spiel:
“Hey, I know this sounds crazy, but I’m gonna go try and get some night shots of Prague… are you doing anything?”
“NOW?”
“Yeah…”
Before she could answer, her cell phone rang. My roommate, Will, was calling her from down the hall. When it became apparent that the evening’s supermarket-bought absinthe plans were falling to pieces, she agreed to come. Not only that, but she convinced Will to come as well. ‘Perfect,’ I smiled to myself. I feel at home with Will and Helen.

We walked through the heavy glass doors into a stiff rush of icy air. After a brief discussion of destinations, we decided on Prague Castle. It would be closed, but at least that area would offer one hell of a view of the city.

We walked for fifteen odd minutes through the labyrinth of antique streets and arrived at the castle. A golden arch over the gate made it appear closed from afar. As we neared the castle, Helen said, “I think it’s open!” My heart leapt to my eyes for a closer look. It did seem open.

“Oh my God…” Helen said as we approached the violent statues of battling titans beside the gate. I peered forward to a Czech guard, clad in dark green camouflage and a black beret. I listened; the only ones there were our footsteps and the guard. As we advanced on the guard, I gave a slight head nod. He subtly nodded back at me as if to say, “It is all yours.” As we walked under the baroque arch, he traversed our path as if he were closing an invisible gate behind us, sealing the rest of the world out… and sealing us in. We walked through the stone courtyard and craned our necks up at St. Vitus’s Cathedral.

There are precious few times in one’s life when one becomes truly stricken with awe. I myself had had two such experiences. This made three.

The dimly lit cathedral reached towards the heavens. The illumination at its base tapered with the steeples to points barely visible to the naked eye. Gargoyles peeled away from the jutting cathedral. They were perched at the ready, straining to keep watch over Prague.

A guard walked from one post to another and paused. The silence was complete. It was a perfectly tranquil moment. We continued to orbit the cathedral, pursued only by echoes of our own footsteps.

It was a unforgettable trip to say the least. The moonstruck, spontaneous, algid journey is sure to be one of my favorite memories of the Czech Republic.