The happenings of Monday August 26, 2024 in Prague, Czechia
Our train to Prague was uneventful. Thank goodness. We arrived as scheduled and then took our time looking for food at the station and using the toilets. It was getting dark by the time we were ready to leave, so we took an Uber to our new home where we would sojourn for the next three weeks.
In contrast to our overarching experience in Prague, our first impression was that things might be a little sketchier than we’d expected. To retrieve our apartment keys, we were told to jimmy the lock of a designated mailbox to open it. The apartment was located on the fourth floor so we opted for the elevator, which was exactly big enough for two thin people, could handle a total weight of 160kg, and had no door so you could feel the interior wall as it moved up and down. It took multiple trips to bring our bags upstairs. Chaim found the experience exceedingly uncomfortable. As our last bag reached the fourth floor, he turned to me and exasperatedly said, “I am never going in that thing again.” He may have told us not to use it either, but none of us listened and he eventually relaxed enough to use it again. As they say, when in Rome…or in this case, when in Prague…
Upon entering our flat, we noticed that in the entryway there were a coatrack, small refrigerator, dryer with a microwave on top, and a small work table. The first door to our right, which could only be opened when the main door was closed, was the toilet. The door immediately after that was the shower room, which had a jet tub that we did not use, and a sink. The next door hid a washing machine and then the next was to a teeny, tiny kitchen with no oven and in the shape of a scalene triangle. The rest of our flat was certainly spacious. Straight ahead from the entryway was a huge bedroom that could fit a queen and a twin bed comfortably along with a dresser, a tall closet, bedside table, and luggage table. A door between the master bedroom and kitchen led to a large living and dining room area with exactly four dining chairs, two very low lounge chairs, and a couch made of a wire frame with four cushions that easily fell off. An attempt was made to cover up their shabby state with one large red curtain sheet. It fell off as soon as we sat on the couch. A door at the far side of the living room led to an office space with three twin beds inside and a door that opened to a narrow balcony. Chaim moved the twin bed from the master bedroom into the office space so that all of the boys could be together, which meant we were unable to access the balcony.
It was a rough adjustment at first. Even the houseboat felt cozier and homier than this. Chaim looked crestfallen. He was less than thrilled about staying in this new abode for three weeks. I wasn’t as bothered, but I admit that I had been hoping for something a little nicer when I reserved it back in February. The boys, on the other hand, couldn’t understand our initial reaction. They thought the spaciousness was great and were eager to settle in. Amichai kept telling us he liked because he thought it would help Chaim feel better about it. Maybe knowing it was ours for a longer, and still temporary, period did it, or perhaps just recognizing that our boys could be happy anywhere helped. I don’t know why our feelings about the apartment changed, but in some odd way it’s Spartan-esque charm grew on Chaim and me.
While the boys settled into their new bedroom space, I worked on writing a Kirby Family Brit/Contract for school. Like most places around the Northern Hemisphere, we were about to begin a more formal school schedule. The contract I created was based on a Kirby Family meeting we had back in Paris when we discussed the mission, vision, and purpose of our Kirby World School and talked about the kinds of values we believed in. It went about as well as one can expect when working with two seven-year-olds, a nine-year-old, and an eleven-year-old who were hungry and tired during the conversation. Nevertheless, we came up with some important values that we are working to uphold.
We had a second Kirby Family Meeting before bedtime to make sure we were all on the same page about expectations. We read the Family Brit/Contract aloud and then everyone, including Chaim and me, took turns signing our names on my laptop. We finished with the boys writing their own goals for their schooling. Three of the boys were able to take the task seriously, one was still in summer vacation mode. It would be interesting to see how the next few weeks would go. Last, we reviewed the schedule for the week, which included formal learning times, field trips, and a toranut/chores schedule.
Satisfied that we had all reached an agreement about how things would work and knowing the next day was our last day of summer vacation, we went to sleep.
