Bar-Restaurace U Soni

Beer © Ricky Yates

Three doors down the road from my new home in Stará Oleška, is Bar-Restaurace U Soni. It has been a real find and an absolute godsend since moving here. But if you go online, you will be hard-pushed to find any reference to it at all. It doesn’t have its own website. The building does not appear as a bar-restaurant on any online map.

The one reference I could find, gave the address incorrectly as Stará Oleška 76 when it it should be Stará Oleška 86. Putting the incorrect address into an online map will send you to the completely wrong location. To find the correct location, click on this link.

This . . . → Read More: Bar-Restaurace U Soni

Only in the Czech Republic…..

You are entering the Czech Republic © Ricky Yates

I am very aware that in July and August, I only managed to publish three posts here on my blog. And I also note that today, half of September will have passed without anything being published either. My two excuses are the very hot weather that we experienced during nearly all of both summer months, together with my hospitalisation at the beginning of August and having to attend umpteen subsequent medical appointments.

This post is the beginning of my attempt to start writing and publishing regularly once again. I hope my readers will forgive its slightly more frivolous nature – I do also have planned some more serious subjects to blog about in due course.

‘Only in the Czech Republic’, is the usual comment Sybille and I make, . . . → Read More: Only in the Czech Republic…..

How to be Czech in 10 easy steps – revisited

Half a litre of Gambrinus Czech beer © Ricky Yates

Ten months ago, I published a blog post entitled ‘How to be Czech in 10 easy steps‘, based on my experience at that time, of having lived as a cizinec / foreigner in the Czech Republic for nearly four and a half years. To my utter amazement, this post almost immediately went viral. It resulted in the blog getting 2040 visits on 20th February 2013, the day after it was published, and 1034 visits the following day. It took another three weeks before the daily visitor numbers returned to the more normal figure of around fifty.

I found the main reason for this sudden upsurge of visitor numbers in the social media buttons at the end of the post. The number of ‘likes’ and ‘shares’ on Facebook rapidly rose from zero, to . . . → Read More: How to be Czech in 10 easy steps – revisited

How to be Czech in 10 easy steps

Half a litre of Gambrinus Czech beer © Ricky Yates

A few months ago, a British friend who has lived in Germany for many years, alerted me to this online article entitled, ‘How to be German in 20 easy steps’. It is written by a British man who is obviously trying to become accepted in the country in which he is now resident. The article had both Sybille and I in stitches 🙂 But ever since reading it, I have been formulating in my own mind, the equivalent article. So after nearly four & a half years of living as a cizinec / foreigner in the Czech Republic, here is my guide in ten easy steps as to ‘How to be Czech’.

1. Drink beer

The Czech Republic has the highest per capita consumption of beer of any nation in the world. The country also . . . → Read More: How to be Czech in 10 easy steps

Football and beer

Phillip at Stadion FK Viktoria Žižkov © Ricky Yates

I hope the regular readers of my blog will forgive the rather sharp contrast between some of my more recent writings on faith related issues and this post. But then I do live in the Czech Republic where football is a major sport and where both the production and drinking of beer are deemed to be highly important activities.

Back on the evening of Sunday 6th November, my son Phillip flew into Prague to spend a few days with me, his first visit here since January 2010. As football and beer are two of his interests, I was pleased that we were able to enjoy both of them together during the short time he was here.

The top tier of Czech football is called the Gambrinus liga as it is sponsored by the producers of . . . → Read More: Football and beer