Off the Beaten Track: They Leave Their Babies Outside

Our guest today is Amulya Malladi, the author of five novels published by the Random House Publishing Group. Born and raised in India, she has a bachelor’s degree in engineering and a master’s degree in journalism. When she is not writing books, she works as a marketer at a medical device company. She has lived in four countries, 10 cities, and about 14 different houses since she left India 17 years ago and met her husband. Currently, she lives in Copenhagen (technically, just 10 minutes from Copenhagen, but it’s not quite suburbia—just suburbia-ish). The weather is complete crap in Denmark—and she does wonder why she ever left California. On the other hand, she loves Europe, appreciates its charm, and believes that nothing beats Copenhagen on a warm, sunny day. The only problem is warm and sunny days are pretty rare in Copenhagen. You can reach her at www.amulyamalladi.com.

A friend of mine was visiting me in Copenhagen from New York. We went for a walk down to a café and, on our return, she saw my neighbor’s pram outside in the garden. She thought nothing of it until the pram started to move and she heard the wail of a baby. She froze and stared at me. “Are you telling me there’s a baby in there?” When I confirmed her suspicion, she stared at the pram in horror. “They leave their babies outside?”

It was just one of the things that had baffled me about Denmark when I first moved here more than a decade ago.

When I had left India 17 years ago to come to America, everyone told me to be prepared for culture shock. I was so prepared that I didn’t have any. I took everything in my stride. However, when we moved to Denmark, I had not been prepared. I was already an immigrant, and Europe is just about the same as the U.S., I’d thought back then. Not quite, because when I moved to Denmark, I was slammed with culture shock. Denmark was and is very different from the United States and, initially, it was hard to take things in stride—in part, because I was no longer 21 and, partly, because some of the stuff was really out there.

My first brush with Danish weirdness happened before I lived in Denmark. My husband who is Danish and I were living in London and had flown to Denmark for a 115th birthday celebration. Yes, I was confused too. One of the oldest people in the world? No, my husband told me—they do this in Denmark. His aunt and uncle were celebrating their respective 45th birthdays; their daughter, her 15th; and their son, his 10th—hence it was 115 years of birthday celebration.

The party took place in the ass-end of nowhere, in a sort of community house in rural Denmark. The whole family attended and, for the first time, I was very conscious about being the only brown person in a room full of about over a hundred white people. Living in California and even London for the past few months, I was never the only brown person anywhere. But here, it was lily white—all blonde hair and blue eyes and me. Added to that, I didn’t know a lick of Danish then. All my husband had taught me was to say, “Tak for mad,” which means “Thank you for the food.” It’s a Danish thing you say after a meal to the host. According to my husband, even now after a decade of living in Denmark, as far as he’s concerned, as long as I can say “Tak for mad,” that’s all I need to know.

So here I was at a 115^th birthday party with people speaking in Danish all around me, looking at me, and talking to me through Søren at times, and sometimes uncomfortably in English themselves—and I was very aware that I was this exotic doll to my husband’s family. They were all very welcoming and fascinated. But this was an unusual place for me to be.

Still, even this scenario was not the most surprising thing about that party. The most surprising thing happened when, in the middle of the meal, pieces of paper with what looked like Danish poetry was handed out to everyone.

Apparently, it was tradition. When it’s someone’s birthday, someone close to that someone writes a song about them, set to one of the traditional tunes (one that everyone knows), and then, when the person who wrote the song indicates, everyone stands up, holds hands, and sings the song as they sway.

No, really, they do.

My husband grinned at me and said something along the lines of, “Go with the flow, babe,” and I certainly did. I couldn’t read the lyrics and didn’t know the melody, but I held hands and swayed while wondering what the hell kind of a whack job family I had married into. But I also realized something else—that inherently Danish families were no different from Indian families. We had our Bollywood song and dance, and they made up their own song and dance.

By the way, most non-Danes who marry into Danish families will describe this song-singing activity as one of the weirdest things they experience in their new culture.

And then there is that whole leaving babies outside business. I can’t tell you the number of times I have walked down the street to find a wailing baby carriage outside a café or a store. Then I stand by the carriage, shaking it to calm the baby down, while I ask my husband (if he’s with me) to go inside and find the errant mommy. I have knocked on people’s doors, because they can’t hear their baby cry outside. I’m not saying Danes are heartless—they have baby monitors etcetera, and they do love their babies, but they also believe that wrapping babies up in Arctic-grade clothing and leaving them outside is the best way for them to sleep. This also means that Danish babies can only sleep in their prams and, since Danish weather is mostly unpleasant, I have seen many a parent walking around the street during a storm, pushing a pram, trying to put their baby to sleep.

I don’t abide by this. If fresh air is so important to babies, open a window in the house. However, this leaving babies outside to sleep business also shows how comfortable Danish society is with the custom and how safe it is. No one thinks twice about it. You go to a café, and you leave your baby outside in the pram. And no one takes your baby away. I think this is what shocks us non-Danes about the Danes.

There are many, many other things that made me go whoa! when I first moved to Denmark. I was shocked at how culturally different Denmark was from the U.S. I expected Denmark to be different from India, but it was surprising how far apart Europe and the U.S. are.

I’m still baffled at the xenophobia and that the concept of the melting pot is alien to Danes. They sincerely believe that you come to Denmark and become Danish; you leave your old self, culture, and traditions behind.

And after a decade in Denmark, I’m baffled that in the U.S., they’re still talking about gay marriage and abortion, whereas this discussion is just not happening in Scandinavia. It’s been a done deal for some time. Gay people can marry, and women can do what they like with their private parts.

I have now lived in South Asia, the United States, and Europe—and it’s been quite an education. Mostly, what I’ve learnt is that people are different. You can’t box them into a generalization. You can’t say, “All Americans…,” or “All Europeans…,” or even “All Danes…”—because it’s just not true.

New Yorkers are so very different from Californians, who are different from the people down south in Memphis, where I went to school.

The French are so different from the Italians, who are so different from the Brits.

And the Swedes and Norwegians and Danes are very different culturally from each other—though food generally sucks in both Norway and Denmark.

I think I have now moved past culture shock to the point that nothing really surprises me. I have traveled enough, met enough people from around the world, and become a citizen of the world myself that I don’t just tolerate the peccadilloes of various cultures but accept and appreciate them—and when possible, enjoy them.

Amulya and her husband in Milan.

An Expat's Bag

By Beth Green 

My purse and me in Prague, 2004.

When I lived in the States, my purse was always full of predictable contents: a compact, some keys, a pen, and a tube of lip balm that I was never be able to find when I wanted it.

This year marks the tenth year in a row that I’ve lived abroad, and nothing shows the changes along those ten years better than a look back at what I have chosen to tote along with me. 

Let’s spin back, all the way to 2003 when I moved to the Czech Republic to teach English as a foreign language. Fresh out of the U.S. car culture, I was used to being mere seconds away from a huge metal apparatus that comfortably fit not only anything that didn’t go in my pockets or minute handbag, but boxes and suitcases of gear if need be. I had purses, don’t get me wrong, but they weren’t as functional as I found I would need if I was going to rely on public transport in a European city. 

Those first years in Prague, you’d find in my bag: a travel pass, key to the city’s trams, subway and buses; a stack of home-made Czech language flashcards, bound together by sparkly hair elastics; aspirin, because I’d usually been out at a bar the night before; a Czech dictionary, sometimes even two; the paperback novel du jour; a journal; black and blue pens to lend to students and a green pen for journaling and marking students’ papers; scissors, for cutting up photocopiable activities for English classes; and a photocopy of my passport—just in case. After a year or two, I added a laptop to this portable office. So, as you can imagine, my bag those days was more often a backpack than a cute purse. 

My purse and me in Hainan, China.

In 2006, I moved to China. I continued my backpack habit for the first few months, until I met the local pickpocket. He was an apple-cheeked boy of about 10, watched from afar by a variety of hard-faced “handlers,” who worked an intersection I had to cross to get to school. Used to being on the lookout for pickpockets in Europe, I figured out who he was and what he was about pretty quickly. In a country where most children are in school from early morning till after dark, a little boy by himself on the street caught my eye. Especially a little boy who watched people’s bags and then followed passers-by. I tried to switch to a shoulder bag for safety, but one day I felt like it was just too much strain on my neck, so I dumped everything in a backpack and left the apartment. Halfway across the intersection, I felt the back of my neck prickle. I whirled around, risking collision with the busy commuters crossing with me, and found the little pickpocket boy on my heels, hand still outstretched as he went for the zipper on my backpack. 

“Hey!” I said, too flustered to shout in Mandarin. 

He grinned, spun on his back foot, and trotted to the far side of the intersection just as the light changed. 

After this, I began an obsession that I maintain to the present day—finding a pickpocket-proof purse. At first, though, I decided minimal was better. For my job in China, I no longer had to carry school supplies around with me, and I quickly decided leaving my laptop at home was a good idea. Instead, I found a moderate bag with a cross-the body strap and filled it with: a Chinese dictionary; a second-hand digital camera; multiple packets of tissue paper because bathrooms in China are usually unstocked; hand sanitizer for the same reason; eye drops to combat the air pollution; a map of the city; business cards of local landmark institutions, so if I got lost and couldn’t communicate I’d be able to show one to a taxi driver; all the random VIP cards that shops and restaurants seemed to think I needed; and photocopies of my registration papers and passport—just in case. 

Res-Q-Me, key chain size.

I moved to a more rural area in 2008, where bus travel was quick and frightening. I added a dynamo flashlight; a Res-Q-Me tool that can break vehicle windows and sever seatbelts in case of a crash; and a better, shock-proof, camera to my purse. By now, I was using a succession of utilitarian-but-ugly purses, thinking that maybe pickpockets would pass me by in pursuit of a flashier bag. 

The small PacSafe bag.

Then, in 2009, my partner and I took an 18-month sabbatical to travel Southeast Asia. For the trip, I found a bag purporting to be pickpocket-proof from the PacSafe line. It had a reinforced cord as a strap and wire mesh imbedded in its tiny, wallet-sized, body. It fit a phone, rolled-up cash, a small set of keys, a credit card or two, and a tube of lip balm. Finally, I was back to my U.S.-era purse habits. Everything else went in my big backpack—or got left along the way. 

The big PacSafe bag.

Since then, I’ve become a PacSafe fanatic. I’ve replaced the poor dinged-up wallet-bag I took on my long trip with another of the same model for short trips, and for daily wear have purchased a larger one that has RFID-blocking material, a latching zipper, and a reinforced pocket big enough for my netbook or Kindle. 

Now, ten years on, technology has taken over my bag. Depending on where I’m going, I carry a smartphone (combining camera, mirror, flashlight, dictionary, maps, business cards and flashcards), a Kindle, a journal, tissues, pens of varying colors for multiple purposes (blue and black are needed for immigration forms but I hate to write or plan anything creative unless its in color), my Res-Q-me tool, eye drops, lip balm, and photocopies of my paperwork—just in case. 

What’s in your bag when you travel?

The First Big Trip

Jeanine Ertl is a rural, mini-homesteading mother to three young children on the Lost Coast of California. She blogs at RosieDreams. She loves writing, gardening, travel and following her ever-changing passion for learning-something-new-until-thoroughly-sidetracked.

I’m gonna backpack through Europe this summer, I told my boyfriend that day as I watered my mom’s sun parched lawn.

We were twenty years young, in college, living at our parents’, and in love.

I wanted to see with my own eyes one of the many famous landmarks imprinted from years of text books and television. I wanted to venture away from home on something bigger than a road trip.

But on that balmy San Diego evening I was met by a dreadful silence. Honestly, it hadn’t occurred to me that he might not be interested. When I’d heard about “backpacking through Europe” my mind had connected with it immediately.

But now my heart raced, my thoughts canvassing the little I knew about actual “backpacking.” I had many questions, and now, the thought of a solo adventure left me a little worried.

So I re-stated my plans, preparing my thoughts better this time. Don’t you wanna see the Eiffel Tower for yourself? Visit the Louvre? Ride trains around the countryside and feel like you know what lies beyond the USA?

I was holding my breath now. Hoping with all my might that he’d be interested.

Now’s the time. We’ve got nothing holding us back!

The idea hung in the world of anticipated dreams for a few days longer. I thought about it obsessively while batting it down into my subconscious. Midterms were at hand.

A few days later, when it was obvious that I wasn’t changing my course, my boyfriend changed his. And it was with a deep sigh of relief that I set off in research- planning-mode for our first overseas adventure. Backpacking Europe.

I like to hear about people’s first travels. The journeys that pushed them beyond. To soak up more than they’d expected. To go a bit further. To step out of a comfort zone they didn’t know existed.

And Europe was ours. It was our big First Trip. My boyfriend and I had road tripped already a handful of times, borrowing a car and heading off for a few days to check out the coast, mountains, desert.

But Europe taught us to travel.

It was the trip that taught us to breathe in life.

To stop and taste the gelato, on a curb, in the heat of the Italian afternoon.

To sleep with our heads twisted up, one eye open as the train swayed through the night.

To put up with a fresh or stale baguette--morning, noon and night.

And most importantly, Europe taught us to revel in the art of serendipity, both in everyday life and especially in travel. Because truly there is an art to beginning one’s day with an open heart and a willing mind.

Europe started like this for us…

Bag won’t zip shut. Analyze contents again in search of unnecessary items.

Drive to airport late and realize Eurorail Pass tickets are in photocopy machine at local drug store.

Fly across the US and Atlantic, curious how life will shape up for the next six weeks.

Find ourselves safely delivered to England’s doorstep. Heathrow International.

Fifteen years ago that summer, my now-husband and I stood looking at each other, said backpacks claimed from baggage and now teetering on our backs. We stood quietly for a few minutes, watching as families and passengers confidently strode by in a current of togetherness. Our backpacks loaded and our travel know-how at point zero, we were felled by the very first move.

Umm, how do we get to London? we contemplated, not knowing precisely where we were.

Hmmm. Do we want to take a taxi? I don’t think there’s a train station at this airport. I suppose we should exit that way and look for a bus?

Yeah, that would be the cheapest. Definitely a bus.

So off we went, integrating into the lifeblood of flowing busy moving people exiting airports at all hours, our feet moving at last.

And that’s the way it all continued rolling those first few days. After waking at noon to the darkness of velvet wallpaper and tiny beds, crackers neatly waiting at the door, we’d ask each other “What should we do? Bus? Tube? Walk? Where to?”

We were new travelers in every way, in awe of the simple existence of this foreign-to-us-reality--double decker buses, red telephone boxes, the Queen’s guard in all their seriousness.

We rose late, which we learned was our typical style and not actually jet lag. And we walked until way past dark each day. Flipping through our guide books at times and wandering at others, the magic of the day tumbled out at its own pace.

And our trip continued on for six more incredible weeks. Including of course, new friends along the way and missed trains, late night drinks under lit verandas and plenty of stomach ailments, crazy dormitory hostels and tiny, stuccoed apartments, non-admittance to countries we had no visa for (bad planning on my part) and sleeping in train stations and on sidewalks when those closed. And the insanity of finding peace in simply not knowing; a first for me at the time, but a lesson I’ve continued to learn over and over since.

We fell in love with the whole process of traveling. The not knowing where we’d stay that night. What we might see the next day. Who we might meet. What deliciousness, or not (let’s be honest), would fill our bellies when our feet finally stopped walking.

After traveling Europe that summer we were hooked. We felt ready to take on any of the continents. Eager actually. And to this day, though we’re much more homebound with three little children under the age of six, we love the thrill of driving into the night, pulling over to a hotel that fits the moment’s need rather than having a stringently organized itinerary. For as much as I love making an itinerary, they leave our trips feeling too much like a “to do” list and less like an adventure.

So, if you’ll humor me now. Comment with your First Travel? The trip that hooked you? And if you’re so inclined, what moment stole you away to being forever torn between home and craving the next journey?

Off the Beaten Track: Poetry in Prague

Paul Deblinger

By Paul Deblinger

Our guest today is Paul Deblinger. He is an American writer who, in addition to poetry, also creates comedy and encaustic paintings. He has lived in the Czech Republic and has traveled widely in Europe.

One of the first things I learned on my adventure in Prague is that the word "ano" means yes. You have to listen very carefully--even though Czechs accent the first syllable, it still sounds like "no."

At first I wondered why everyone was so negative--I heard “no,” after “no” as the answer to the most obvious questions. Then, I learned what “ano“ meant. I had to listen carefully. This influenced my writing, my thinking and my daily life as an ex-pat. Listen, listen, think!

I arrived in Prague in June 2003, to take part in a four-week creative writing program sponsored by Western Michigan University. I was 51...and was one year removed from a minor heart attack that left me with severe anxiety...so much so...that after one year I could basically leave my home only for work. Panic attacks in grocery stores, farmers' markets, restaurants, had driven me back home.

Then I found myself scanning writer's web pages and ran across an ad for the Prague program. To make a long story short....somehow though the fog of anxiety I signed up for the Prague program, quit my job, and packed for a four-week stint away from my couch and my home.

Prague Castle. Photo by DC Pelka

Arriving in Prague, a city I had visited once before in 1991, I was assigned a room in a rather official-looking building (turns out it was Gestapo headquarters during WWII) that was now a dormitory for foreign students. It was a warren-like building with long halls that made you want to drop breadcrumbs to find your way back to your room. I often felt myself wandering in endless circles, passing the same door many times. Like my new-found expertise in listening, I needed to force myself to remember the most mundane details.

I was up early the first morning in Prague. I had arrived on a Friday and classes didn't start until Monday. In the early morning light, Prague looked handsome and inviting. As a hilly, river city Prague has unusual, wonderful urban light, light that has been twisted and turned down narrow streets for a thousand years, has bounced off facades of almost every imaginable type of architecture rolling across the many green parts of the city.

After just a few blocks I noticed something about my body: I could breathe. After my heart attack each breath seemed labored as if it was a signal for bad things to come. The mysterious weight of anxiety had removed itself from my chest and I felt as light and free as...well, I couldn't even remember.

Prague Jewish Quarter. Photo by Beth Green

I continued my walk through Prague, crossing the Vltava River, entering Josefov, the old Jewish Quarter. When I say old, I mean old--the Old-New Synagogue dates to the 12th century. The graves in the Old Jewish Cemetery are piled 12 deep and the grave of Rabbi Lowe, the 15th century mystic who gave the Jewish community its mythical superman, the Golem, is packed with folded-up prayers from moderns Jews asking for eternal favors.

On the wall of the Pinchas Synagogue are the inscribed names of Czech Jews murdered by the Nazis during the Holocaust. I scanned the wall for names, searching for Deblinger, the way I would search for my name in a phone book in a distant city. To my astonishment my name was on the wall: Yitchak (my Hebrew name) Deblinger from Prague, one of the 80,000 names crammed on the walls of the 600-year-old synagogue.

When I was a kid I imagined there was a me in every country of the world. I could sit for hours and daydream about the "me" in Ghana, France, Japan, Burma. Now I was confronted with a "me" who lived before me and had perished in a horrible way.

As the poetry seminars began I already had a plethora of things to write about....breathing this newly liberating Czech air, discovering “me” from a different era, the wonderful light in this old city. And to compound these visions, my teacher for the first two weeks, Barbara Cully, a writing professor from Arizona, introduced me to lyric poetry, specifically, the motets of the 20th century Italian poet Eugenio Montale:

You know this. I must lose you again and cannot

I am like an old wound every moment,

every cry re-opens, even the salt spray

rising from the piers darkening the Spring

at Sottoripa.

Montale had written the motets, short lyrical poems in a lover's voice addressing a mysterious love interest, in the 30s. They are replete with images from Dante, the Italian Renaissance and even the satiric barbs of T.S. Eliot.

By the time I had encountered Montale (and the lovely motets of Barbara Cully) I had noticed the countdown clock ticking. I would only be in Prague...25 more days, 20 more days, 18 more days. It was a looming sentence.

Prague Old Town Square. Photo by DC Pelka

Then the ignition of an idea. What if I beat the rap...stayed beyond my four-week term. What would happen?

Well, for one thing, my marriage was unlikely to survive, said my wife. And there were many other things to consider, or were there?

I happened to mention to the director of the program my quest for temporary lodging in Prague, and he said he would be sub-letting his family's flat for the 9-month academic term. Voila! Or, perhaps, "Zde!" in Czech.

Deal done.

The transformation started....from tourist...to foreign student...to full-time ex-pat.

Due to the four-week poetry workshops I had amassed dozens of new poems or at least partially written ones, and the program itself gave me a kick in the pants to writing: poems, short stories, essays.

Of course, life doesn't stop because you decide to, at least temporarily, reside in a foreign place: marriage must be dealt with, parents get sick, money starts trickling away, then cascading and your new ex-pat life begins to be fully-formed. A new city and culture and language, new friends, new lovers, new problems: source material for a sheath of poems, a memoir, stories, films or as someone once wrote: "Life is what happens when you're making other plans."

But my heart, which had momentarily failed me, and my writing, which had been on an extended furlough returned: new strong beats, a new voice...a new way of looking at the world...the Old World, at that.

Blood-Red Moon

by Paul Deblinger

On the overnight train to Prague we argue

about the color of the moon.

At the stop at Auschwitz

the moon slips between two buildings on the platform

Photo by Ricardo Wang

and exposes its metaphoric blood-red hue.

Standing in the corridor,

head and neck out the window I call

you to come look at the moon.

You sit twisted, pretzel-like in the compartment,

hand holding a cigarette out the window.

It’s not blood-red, it’s amber, you say—the color of the little ring

you bought in the market in Krakow, the amber stone,

a dome nestled in a swirl of silver.

You hold the ring up to the moon.

Blood-red, I say.

The train pulls out from the station,

passes just meters from the Birkenau killing

fields. The blood-red moon hovers over the camp,

half-lopped off by the earth’s shadow. People

really live here, you ask?

Yet we ride these rails of horror from Prague

to Krakow and back for a hedonistic weekend

while history-jabbing body punches

sway me to numbness.

In the old Jewish Quarter in Krakow I imagined an ancestor,

perhaps a great-grandfather, traveling from Eastern Galicia

for business, for pleasure, or maybe to meet a mistress of his own

to toast the moon with Polish vodka. With the thrill of earthly

pleasures coursing through his veins, he momentarily forgets

the daily miseries, can’t even comprehend the racial future.

And I can’t comprehend my aching

bones; my mundane pain clouding history. In the train’s

cozy compartment I turn to you for comfort

and touch. You don’t touch.

You don’t comfort. I stare again

at the blood-red moon, trying to find

a way to navigate this tortured history around your skin.

The smoke from your cigarette plumes

up and out the window. We stare at each other

with hollow, uncertain eyes. The blood-red moon

rises above the plain.

Icy Days

by Paul Deblinger

This morning, the purple-turning

pink smoke drifts,

gathers across rooftops,

crystallizes the abstract

expression grafted to the panes.

Later, walking to Sinku tears flow again.

In the kavarna I try to talk Czech

but it comes out French. Wine

Photo by Eva McDermott

finally loosens my tongue.

Owl-earred knit hats,

puffy marshmallow coats,

hands jammed way down

in pockets, people stiffly exit the tram.

I’m at ease with high pressure

days, flat smoke, leaden skies sending

icy tears down all the Czech faces.

What in the World

by Paul Deblinger

When I was a kid

I thought there was another me

In every country in the world.

I dreamt about the me in France,

In China, Ghana and Ceylon.

Tonight walking down the narrow

Cobbled streets, I saw you gliding

Down the hill, bouncing, laughing,

With a curly-haired boy half my age.

I followed you down the hill,

Photo by LifeInMegapixels

As you headed into the cinema,

Curly-haired boy in tow.

I ducked into the casino next door,

Tried my luck at 21, lost

Each hand.

Dashed back to the cinema,

Just as the doors flung open

To you and the curly-haired boy.

With the bright city lights smacking you

In the face, I could clearly see it wasn’t you.

And it wasn’t me

Or even the other me

Walking down the cobbled slope

Wondering what in the world

I was doing there thinking of you.

History of a Beer Snob

By Beth Green

I have a confession to make. I’ll eat anything. I’ll go anywhere. I’ll try most things if they won’t put me in the hospital or in prison.

But I won’t drink bad beer.

In a pinch I’ll sleep in an airport or a train station—even (at least that one time) on a park bench. I’m not choosy about what I wear or the company I keep.

But I am a beer snob.

Beer is my particular snobbery.

I blame most of the reason for this on my parents, who in my formative years took an interest in home brewing when we visited New Zealand on our sailboat. I was 12, and years away from drinking beer myself (obviously), but I was intrigued by the whole madcap science of it—the strange giant tins of strong-smelling hops, the crazy jerry-can and tube set-up my dad tinkered with.

My parents got progressively involved and sophisticated with their brewing once we returned to the USA (Mom even took home a prize a few years ago for her Blonde Beaver Pale Ale at the Great Alaskan CraftBeer and Homebrew Festival in Haines, AK.). But I was still a few years away from being a beer snob. In college, perhaps making up for my nontraditional upbringing, I made sure I embraced the all-American university culture of drinking copious amounts of the cheapest beer available, occasionally utilizing household objects, such as funnels, for the consumption thereof.

But everything changed when, during my junior year of university, I went on academic exchange to Spain. I spent months beforehand reading up on wine, assuming in my naivete that that was pretty much all sophisticated Europeans drank.

So it was a complete surprise when I realized all that information I’d been absorbing about wines had actually made me appreciate beer more. I started noticing the metallic taste of canned brews, the nuances in flavor between the stouts, the hefeweizens, the lagers. One weekend trip to Madrid my friends and I ran into two Irish people in town for a rugby match—they introduced me to Guinness while my other friends chose cider or wine spritzers.

The author and her mother in the Czech Republic in 2004.

But even with this newly defined interest, I wouldn’t have called myself a snob of anything. Until, a few years later I moved to the Czech Republic, which, (at least in the

biased opinion of 10.5 million Czechs) is the world’s best place to live if you like beer.

And, boy, the Czechs like it. In 2010, they drank 132 liters per capita, according to the Kirin Institute Food and Lifestyle Report. Think that’s a lot? Well, that amount is down 21 bottles per person from the year before, in part to improved public awareness about the dangers of alcoholism and the creeping realization that too much of a good thing gives you liver problems.

If you ask a Czech, they invented the stuff—pilsner (a type of pale lager) is named, after all, after the city of Pilsen. Now, while their neighbors to the west, the Germans, have their own firm opinions about who truly invented the drink, the Germans haven’t put their money where their mouth is, only consuming a piddling 107 liters per capita per year. Does that give the Czechs the right to call themselves the inventors of modern beer? After a few glasses, I’d say so.

Fresh beer.

In the Czech Republic, beer has a cultural significance I’ve found no other beverage to hold in any other part of the world. In China, tea still reigns—but Chinese people don’t love their 茶 the way Czechs cherish a pivo. The French, Spanish, and Italians bicker over who has the best wine—but their pride in viticulture is shadowed by the Czech mania for beer.

Within the Czech Republic, I soon learned, there are factions of beer lovers. You choose a beer brand to support like in other countries you’d choose a football team. In fact, for Czechs, choosing a beer brand may influence your later choice of brew-sponsored soccer club.

Budvar, the brew from České Budjějovicky which has been involved in convoluted tradmark disputes with American Budweiser beer and is sold in the US as Czechvar, has a certain crowd. Pilsner Urquell, the most famous of Czech beers internationally, is drunk by tourists and certain Pilsen-loyal Czechs. Staropramen is a favorite among native Praguers. The list is long, and the tasting and choosing a laborious, though delightful, process. At long last, I chose Gambrinus.

Image from www.gambrinus.cz.

Gambrinus, made by the Pilsner Urquell brewery and owned by SAB Miller, is a clean, light-colored beer that a non-beer snob could probably quaff as easily as they would drink any other Czech beer. It’s sold in brown bottles to keep the flavor from turning skunky, but tastes best from the tap of a busy pub. After three years of trying the various brews around the country, I realized I could do a blind taste-test and always name Gambrinus as the superior drink. The SAB Miller web page describes it as having a “distinct and refreshing ‘bite’ which does not compromise its soft beer flavour.”

Watching Czech films or reading Czech literature will provide a small insight into the importance of the beverage in daily Czech life. One of the country’s most celebrated and respected authors, Bohumil Hrabal (1914-1997), was a famous beer lover. The brewery Hrabal’s stepfather managed, Pivovaru Nymburk, has Hrabal’s portrait on their Postřižinské beer label. The beer is named after his novel Postřižiny, translated into English as Cutting it Short.

Image from www.postriziny.cz.

Beer is a happy pleasure, a luxury in China (where I now live). Of course China has its own beers, not all of them bad, but none of them as good as a wet, frothy glass of Gambrinus.

So, what’s your secret snobbery?

Rocking and Rolling -- The History of Rollerskates

By Alli Sinclair

My oldest kiddy-bop has just reached the age when rollerskates are a tad more interesting than The Wiggles. (And I can’t tell you how relieved I am about that!) I used to be an avid rollerskater back in my day (not telling how many) and hubby still enjoys the odd rollerblade here and there, so Miss Five is finding herself involved in interesting family discussions -- to rollerskate or rollerblade, that is the question.

So I can back up why rollerskating is better (and yay for its recent revival!), I delved into the history of these strange shoes with wheels and was surprised as to how far back this invention dates. The impact this invention has had on culture is quite impressive.

In Holland, in the early 1700s, the main mode of transport in winter was to skate the frozen canals. A clever Dutchman figured skating on dry land could be a good summer alternative, so he nailed some wooden spools to a strip of wood and attached them to his shoes. Voilà! Skeelers were invented.

In 1760, Joseph Merlin, a London instrument maker and inventor took it a step further, wearing his shoes on wheels to a masquerade party and proceeding to entertain the crowd while skating and playing the violin. Watching Mr Merlin zip around the floor entranced the guests -- until he smashed into a mirror that took up the entire length of one wall.

Taking it mainstream in 1818, a German ballet company held the Ballett Der Maler oder die Wintervergnügungen that was originally planned as an ice-skating extravaganza. When they realised ice on stage was a tad impractical, it opted to perform the ballet with rollerskates. Yay for creativity!

In 1819, Monsieur Petibledin became the first person to get a patent issued for rollerskates. He invented a boot with a wooden sole and fitted four copper rollers to it, arranged in a straight line. By 1823, another patent was submitted, this time by Robert John Tyers from London, who called his contraption the Rolito. This skate had five wheels in a single row, which were attached to the bottom of a boot, but unfortunately it couldn’t follow curved paths. Kind of a problem if there’s a pond straight ahead.

Back to Germany, and in 1840, lucky patrons at the Corse Halle Tavern in Berlin, were served drinks by barmaids rolling through expansive beer halls. Perhaps the halls gave the Londoners the idea of opening up the first public rink in 1857 at Floral Hall. Not to be outdone by the British, the Americans opened The Coliseum in Chicago in1902. Opening night had over 7,000 people attending. Later, in 1908, Madison Square Gardens in New York City, became a skating rink, and soon, from that moment on, hundreds of rinks opened across the States and Europe. The sport grew in popularity and new versions were invented -- ballroom roller dancing, polo skating, speed skating, and good old recreational skating.

In 1863, American James Plimpton designed a pair of skates that were more practical and a little less dangerous (in theory). He placed one pair of wheels under the heel and the other pair under the ball of the foot. The wooden wheels were attached to rubber springs that made the ride a little more comfy and meant the skater could change direction without twisting his or her ankle or breaking a leg. This invention was the closest to what we know as the current version of four-wheeled rollerskates.

As with any invention, improvements were made over time. By 1884, skates became lighter and easier to manoeuvre with the addition of pin ball-bearing wheels. By 1960, plastics improved further, and finally by the time the 1970s and 1980s rolled around (pun intended), disco roller-skating took over skating rinks. Hollywood cottoned on, and movies such as Xanadu and Rollerball appealed to the masses. Seriously, there was no shame in those decades.

In 1979, the Olson brothers, a couple of hockey players who lived in Minnesota, discovered an antique pair of skates that had wheels in a single line as opposed to the two sets of two. The brothers took the elements from these skates and merged them with modern materials, designing what we now know as “inline skates”. They formed the company Rollerblade Inc. in 1983, and sold inline skates exclusively around the world. Unfortunately, their design had many faults, so the brothers sold the company to new owners who improved the design. They incorporated fibreglass, which better protected the wheels so dust couldn’t get in, and the skates were a lot easier to put on. When they shifted the toe break to the back, the new model was complete.

Throughout the years, Rollerblade improved designs, and invented new models that were lighter and faster than previous models. In 1993, Rollerblade found a way to use the skater’s leg to stop the skate without relying on the original breaking method. Thus, Active Brake Technology was formed by attaching a fibreglass post to the top of the boot and the other end to a rubber brake that is hinged at the back wheel. This new change improved safety.

In our house, the halls will forever echo with heated discussions about whether traditional rollerskating or rollerblading is the best. Luckily, our kids have minds of their own and will ultimately decide what they’ll try. Who knows? In a few more years they might be riding the next generation of rollerskates and enjoying an evolved, modern past time for their generation. In the meantime, it’s fun to delve into the history of an invention that has brought great joy to many, and the odd broken bone.

I have to ask: which camp are you in?