Spring in Slovakia
25 March, 2006. 8.59 pm. Trnava, Slovakia.
Late this afternoon I returned from a three and a half day teaching adventure in the High Tatras (organized by CLIP Centrum, a private language school in Trnava). After finishing my classes at Obchodna Akademia on Wednesday I took a train to Poprad (the Gateway to the Tatras) and I led an intensive English course for four employees of a geographical informations company at Hotel FIS in Štrbské Pleso (a popular ski resort-town). This dramatic change of scenery (Trnava is situated on a plain) was refreshing. My teaching resposibilities were also refreshing as the students were very keen to learn. Teaching adults, who pay for their lessons, is remarkably more rewarding than teaching high school students who only come to class because they have to. Not only am I paid handsomely, but the students participate actively! And when you consider my surroundings for these three days (see picture below), it was like a dream! Unfortunately I haven't skiied since I was thirteen years old, so I decided this was not the right time--I didn't want to risk breaking my legs when I was expected to teach! Nonetheless, it was a nice place just to walk around, taking in the scenery. Coincidently, I was in Štrbské Pleso this past summer with Miro as well....
Last weekend I visited the Galérie mesta Bratislavy (City Gallery of Bratislava). On permanent display at the gallery is Pasáž (Passage) by Matej Krén. This consists of two walls of books, surrounded on the floor and ceiling by mirrors. When you walk into this small room, it feels as though you are in an endless tunnel of books! I have a picture of this on my mobile phone, but at the moment I don't have the technological know-how to transfer it to a computer! In the meantime, here's a website (in Czech) with some information and pictures: http://www.matejkren.cz/cs/passage/ . This gallery, at the moment, also has an exhibition on modern Slovak and Czech art that is excellent.
Late this afternoon I returned from a three and a half day teaching adventure in the High Tatras (organized by CLIP Centrum, a private language school in Trnava). After finishing my classes at Obchodna Akademia on Wednesday I took a train to Poprad (the Gateway to the Tatras) and I led an intensive English course for four employees of a geographical informations company at Hotel FIS in Štrbské Pleso (a popular ski resort-town). This dramatic change of scenery (Trnava is situated on a plain) was refreshing. My teaching resposibilities were also refreshing as the students were very keen to learn. Teaching adults, who pay for their lessons, is remarkably more rewarding than teaching high school students who only come to class because they have to. Not only am I paid handsomely, but the students participate actively! And when you consider my surroundings for these three days (see picture below), it was like a dream! Unfortunately I haven't skiied since I was thirteen years old, so I decided this was not the right time--I didn't want to risk breaking my legs when I was expected to teach! Nonetheless, it was a nice place just to walk around, taking in the scenery. Coincidently, I was in Štrbské Pleso this past summer with Miro as well....
Last weekend I visited the Galérie mesta Bratislavy (City Gallery of Bratislava). On permanent display at the gallery is Pasáž (Passage) by Matej Krén. This consists of two walls of books, surrounded on the floor and ceiling by mirrors. When you walk into this small room, it feels as though you are in an endless tunnel of books! I have a picture of this on my mobile phone, but at the moment I don't have the technological know-how to transfer it to a computer! In the meantime, here's a website (in Czech) with some information and pictures: http://www.matejkren.cz/cs/passage/ . This gallery, at the moment, also has an exhibition on modern Slovak and Czech art that is excellent.
Teaching at Štrbské Pleso...
posted by BFRE at 9:00 p.m.
3 Comments:
Wow, that book tunnel seems really neat!
Do you expect to get many opportunities to travel around the country teaching "on the side" like this, or is this going to be a very rare thing?
Looks gorgeous. I had no idea that Europe had much for "real" mountains aside from the Alps and most of Norway.
NICE ! Your teaching job sounds like so much fun ! Getting to see the Mountain, now in the winter as compared to last summer's visit. Glad you did not try to ski...broken legs etc. are not much fun or very profitable ! All our love, and keep having fun ! MOM and DAD
This is very interesting, You are a very skilled blogger.
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