A Particular Set of Skills

    Living in Prague for nearly a decade has given me a unique skill set that only other Prague Expats can truly achieve. The city will hone your body over the years and give you nearly superhuman attributes leaving friends and strangers back home in wonder and awe. Remember people, with greater power comes greater responsibility. If you decide to live abroad for a number of years, you too will gain these powers. 

I couldn't possibly list them all, but here are the main ones.

Tram Grip Strength (Raw Power): From years of riding Prague trams and giving my seat up to the elderly, my tram grip strength borders on the level of being superhuman. Nothing can break it. Whether it's holding onto a tree branch to survive a deadly tsunami or riding a bull, my tram grip strength will never fail me.

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Bagging Skills (Blinding Dexterity): In Prague you have to do all of your own grocery bagging. It's intense in the beginning and you will fail miserably the first time. The years of practice will give you lightening quick response times that will make others marvel at your new skills. I'm a lefty by nature but when it comes to bagging groceries, both of my hands are skillfully equal. I can do the one hand feed and other hand place technique or I can double stuff with both simultaneously with lightening speed and efficiency. Grocery baggers at Trader Joes or Whole Foods ain't got nothing on me. 

Eating While Walking (Expert Multi-tasking): The nature of English teaching is that you might not really have a proper lunch hour. You're going to be eating on the go a lot. I've reached the level of multitasking where I can maintain a brisk walking speed while talking on my phone, chewing gum, planning a lesson all as I wolf down a smazeny syr in a matter of seconds and giving the occasional bewildered Czech a high-five. 

Drinking Hard Liquor (Improved Constitution): Czechs make their own form of plum brandy moonshine (Slivovice) and man is it rough. Worse off (or better off if you're an alcoholic) is that they always want to share it with you. If you ever are invited to a Czech's cottage (and you will be) you are going to be offered this stuff and you are going to be offered it often. Everybody seems to make it from uncles to grandmothers and the older the generation's concoction , the more powerful and vile it is.  If you think you can look the ninety year old Czech granny in the eyes and tell her 'no thanks', you are surely mistaken. The first time you drink homemade Slivovice, you will believe with all your soul that you are about to die. After years of giving into Granny and the rest of the town folk (they all make their own) your body will become a steel trap. You will have the ability to ingest and digest any liquid or solid with ease. 

Eyes of Cold Blue Steel (Dominating Presence): Czech's like to stare and they will stare at you often. In the beginning of your training you will try to stare back, but you will lose. Years of training though will give you this same ability and your stare can be used as a weapon. No more will you be intimidated by snobby waiters, office bureaucrats, rude drivers...etc Flash them your  Cold Blue Steels and they'll turn away with their tails between their legs.

Resistance to Body Odor and Other Nasty Smells (Improved Toughness): It's getting better with the youth in the city, but the older generation, especially men, like to lay off the Right Guard or any other kind of deodorant. The smell sometimes on a hot summer day in a crowded metro can be overpowering. Dozens of men with years upon years of deodorant neglect - their body odors mixing and combining to make a vapor more potent than riot tear gas. At first it's unbearable, but in time your sense of smell will toughen to that of a police K9 dog unit. Nothing phases me now.

Dog Poop Avoidance (Improved Eyesight and Tracking):  Czechs love dogs, have dogs and walk dogs all over the city. These dogs poop everywhere and their owners seldom clean up. Every Expat in Prague at sometime (usually multiple times) has stepped directly into a hot steamy pile of dog poop. There's a lot in the city and your untrained, novice and dare I say pathetic eyes,  can't possibly notice it all. And God help you if walk off the beaten path of the cobblestone sidewalks...God help you. Walking on patches of grass in Prague is akin to walking through a minefield in Afghanistan. 

Years of sidestepping and scanning for the brown, orange, yellow, yellow-brown, brown-black, black, orange-yellow-purple substance, has given my eyes hawk-like observational abilities. I could play ultimate frisbee for a 5 weeks straight in Letna Park and you ain't seeing nothin' on my white sneakers.

   There are so many more that I could list, but I don't want to overload anyone's brain with the possibilities. Take caution young students and heed my warning.  Keep these abilities to yourselves and use them responsibly. The world is often afraid of people with powers that they don't understand.

Cheers

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