Saturday, April 01, 2006

Hubert’s Premiere, Potential Floods, Mike and Susan’s Visit

On Monday, fellow Fulbrighter Hubert Ho premiered two contemporary orchestral pieces at the University. Twelve of us went to dinner together before the performance and then met up with Hubert for the show. It was awesome. I need to go hear more contemporary music like his.

The week was busy preparing for a seminar I gave today, and for my Monday class. Mike and Susan, Fulbrighters from Slovakia are visiting this weekend and I wanted all my work preparation out of the way before they arrived.

However, I was distracted from the work several times by the river Vltava, which flows two blocks from my house and is rising. Last weekend, when I walked over the bridge, I notice how brown the water was and wondered if it was always like that and I just woke up to it. It was Wednesday when I heard the first report of flood concerns. It got warm so fast…Tuesday was the first day I went out without my warm winter coat. I actually switched to my Florida winter coat. Apparently the snow melted practically overnight all over the country. Towns to our south were evacuated.

The area where I live does not seem particularly vulnerable to flooding, but did flood in the big flood of 2002 and everyone had to evacuate for weeks. Not a pleasant thought. On Wednesday I went to a (deadly dull) presentation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Human Rights and Freedom of Speech in an Era of Terrorism. I crossed the river and noted that it was very high. There are deep walls down to the river through most of the city. Cruise boats dock along wide sidewalk platforms down a flight of stairs from street level. When I crossed the bridge to go to the presentation, the boats were all gone and the sidewalk-platforms were underwater. Along the far side, were some trees grow along the edge below the street level, the trees were flooded up part way. The water was rushing and had some debris and logs in it. Hmmmm, thought I, having heard nothing of a problem, this does not look good and now I know why the river was brown. As I was going through the security checkpoint at the Ministry, my cell phone rang. It was a Fulbright friend saying that flooding was a potential problem.

I learned that overnight the city had, for the first time in a non-drill operation, begun installing the flood walls they had designed after the 2002 flood. Work on them continued all day Wednesday and Thursday. The river does not seem to be any higher than it was Wednesday, but there is still talk of further precautions.

When I taught my seminar today, in Jinonice a bit outside the downtown area, students told me there was discussion of closing the Metro and flood proofing it. It was inoperable for months after the 2002 flood and cost a bundle to repair because the whole system flooded. But it was operating when class ended, thank goodness…although some roads were closed because of a half-marathon being run in town. You gotta love a place that thinks marathon runners are more important than cars and busses.

This morning Mike and Susan and I went to the Strahovska Monastery. It has a wonderful library, and an eclectic collection of strange items like Florida shells, skeletons of turtles and squid, pine cones, telescopes, and globes. They stayed, had lunch, and wandered that part of the city while I went to teach. Nice day. We are all tired.

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