Masopust at the train station

Tuesday was Shrove Tuesday and so Masopust was celebrated in the Czech Republic. I have blogged about Masopust in previous posts and so I will simply share with you this photograph of two Masopusters waiting for the train to Horni Plana in the waiting room at Cesky Krumlov station.

You can see my video of Masopust in my nearest town here: http://czechproperty.blogspot.co.uk/2012/02/masopust.html

and my post about the Masopusters visit to my village here: http://czechproperty.blogspot.co.uk/2009/02/masopust-in-horice-na-sumave.html

Happy 1938

When you start collecting Czech ex libris, you will also be offered PFs. These are New Year cards and usually feature the letters PF (which stands for the French greeting pour feliciter) and the year and perhaps the name of the family sending the card. The Czechs refer to these cards as peefko. Sometimes families will make their own cards and sometimes they will commission artists to produce cards for them.

Some cards are humourous and many reveal the interests of the family sending the card, which is another reason (other than their artistic value) why they are fascinating to collect. This signed card in our collection is by the well-known artist Alois Moravec. As you can see it is a happy new year card for 1938, which was to be a far from a happy year for the Czechs. The choice of subject matter for this card would seem to be indicative of the impending Nazi invasion and Czech determination to resist.

This is a picture of Jan Zizka, the one-eyed military genius who successfully resisted a series of anti-Hussite crusader armies. These invading armies were for a large part made up of the Teutonic knights - the panzer divisions of their day - and on the face of it the Czech Hussites didn't stand a chance in the face of such military superiority. But the undefeated Zizka shattered the knights' reputation and in so doing entered into the Czech nationalist pantheon. No wonder he features on this 1938 PF.

Absinthe

 

The first Czech painting I ever saw in the Czech Republic was The Absinthe Drinker by Viktor Oliva. I had just arrived in a bitterly cold Prague and my friend took me to Cafe Slavia to warm up. The Cafe, which sits opposite the National Theatre on the bank of the Vltava, had always been a meeting place for artists, writers and intellectuals and it was still. As my friend debated the future of the post-Communist Czechoslovakia with her friends, my eyes were drawn to a large painting on the wall opposite. A man sits at a table, head in hands, conversing with the green fairy of absinthe.

Viktor Oliva was a Czech art nouveau painter and illustrator who discovered the green spirit when he lived in the Bohemian quarter of Paris. He died in Prague twenty seven years after painting the work and is buried in Olsany Cemetery.

I came across absinthe again this year. I was walking around Jindrichuv Hradec and came upon a distillery of liqueurs. In the shop window was this bottle of their own brand of absinthe. Jindrichuv Hradec is known for its liqueurs. Another local company, Fruko Schulz, is one of the largest producers of liqueurs and spirits in the Czech Republic. But Hills, the distillery I discovered on my walk, is more of a family affair and invites you in for a tour to learn about distilling and indeed a tasting. As I was driving, I took this photo and hurried on before being tempted in.

As a footnote to this post, I was in the Krumlov Tesco supermarket before Christmas and bought my son a pack of absinthe chocolate. There was also a bar of cannabis chocolate, but I didn't think I would get that through customs!