On Wednesday Vaida and I finally went to Vyšehrad, the location that - according to the legend - was the origin of the first settlement which later became Prague.
It is a castle which was probably built in the 10th century and is situated on a hill over the Vltava river which provides a great outlook over the city.
First we discovered the surroundings:







Then we went on to have a look at the cemetery which was established in 1869, it is the final resting place of many composers, artists, sculptors, writers as well as scientists and politicians.
The cemetery itself looked so peaceful with all the fresh snow and many tombs and headstones are simply work of art as you can see here:





Smetana's Grave:









Dvořák's Grave:









Even outside the cemetery there was some art to be found :) :



After that we walked back to the city centre where we stopped by at K4 to warm up a bit, it's one of my favourite bars here:



We finished the day by walking over Charles Bridge (you can see the castle in the background) and enjoying the view:





On the next day Vaida had to leave :(((, so I helped her to carry her luggage to the train station. This is the last photo I took of her and you can also see what the typical dorm room here looks like:





Saying goodbye to her was hard since we shared a lot of good memories, but I'm sure it was not a "goodbye", but a "see you" and I'm already looking forward to see her again :).


Regarding my future plans... As most of you know by now I prolonged my stay here, so now I will return to Germany at the end of June. There are many reasons for this change of plans including the fact that most of the friends I made here are staying for a year and I'm just having a really good time, but I also won't lose any time regarding my studies and there are plenty of interesting subjects offered in the summer semester.
I'm also looking forward to seeing Prague in spring (no more snow, yeah!) and strolling through all the parks...
Since I'll be moving to my flatmate's room next door in March I will have plenty of space, so feel free to come over and visit me! :)

Moreover, I also applied for a Clinical Internship abroad this summer (as mentioned in one of my latest entries) and I got a place in SWITZERLAND!
Yeah, not as exotic as Ghana, but there was only one (!) for the whole of Germany, so I'm rather proud and I'm sure I'll have a great time there.
I don't know yet where the internship will take place or which discipline will be offered to me, but I put Bern, Zürich and Basel as well as Paediatrics, Tropical Medicine, Intensive Care and Oncology (in this order) on my list - I will let you know as soon as I have any news :).

So what's happening in your lives? TELL ME! (I mean it... It would be nice if some of you would contact me and/or reply to my mails on a more regular basis... :/)

Last week I did quite a few cultural things here in Prague:

On Tuesday I went to the state opera with Joris and his flatmate to see "The Swan Lake", it was the second time for me to see a ballet performance (first was in Brno and as you can tell from the blog entry back then I thought "ballet was just not for me").
I have to admit that I loved every minute of it, not only was it a really high-quality performance with impressive costumes and props as well as a stage design that changed several times, but the dancers moved so simultaneously, I loved it!
Moreover, it's very affordable for students to go to the theatre, opera or ballet here as we get a 50%-discount, it's even true for the cinema! :)
Last but not least the opera has got a simply awe-inspiring interior as you can see here:





On Friday I joined Marie, one of my fellow students, her boyfriend and her flatmates to "Laterna Magika" which is a nonverbal theatre and a combination of dance, film and black theatre. It is considered key in the development of modern Czech theatre and is very well-known here in Prague.
I found it a very different approach and it was something I had never seen before, but I really enjoyed myself and would recommend everyone to go there at least once.
That's what the stage looked like (and you have no idea how many things you can do with these few props):



One day later I went to another ballet performance called "Don Quijote" with my Polish friend Marta - there were several acts and therefore intermissions which made the play last forever ;).
Nevertheless, it was again a high-quality performance with colourful Spanish dresses and a flawless (or so it seemed to me at least) orchestra.
Having said that I have to acknowledge that I liked "The Swan Lake" better as it was simply a more classical piece of ballet and I'm looking forward to see more of those.
Here you can see Marta and me during one of the intermissions, coincidentally we were both wearing the same colours :D :



On Sunday Marta, her tandem partner and I went to the closing ceremony of the Short Film Festival were all the awarded short films were shown - all in all we watched four films from Norway, Hungary, Germany and Great Britain.
My personal favourite was "Tuba Atlantica", a Norwegian film from 2010, unfortunately I was unable to find a version on Youtube, but you can read the synopsis here: http://www.nordicil.org/the-nowegian-film-school/2010/film_item.2011-02-02.2041389272 .

As you can see, I am enjoying my time here, I hope you do, too, let me know what's going on in your life, I'm looking forward to hearing from you! :)

Today I left Praha to fly back to Germany to see my family and friends for christmas! :)
I was soooo excited and got up at 6 to make sure I didn't forget to pack anything (...and also because everything I do takes just so much longer with a broken arm).
My mum picked me up from the airport in Cologne-Bonn and took me home, sweet home...
It feels so good to be here again and I can't wait to see everyone again :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hOpK1Euwu5U

On Thursday my friend Sarah from Bonn arrived here in Prague and we went on a trip to South Moravia organized by the International Club from Friday to Sunday.
Since I didn't have any internet access there, I couldn't continue the christmas calendar, but I promise to add some photos of the weekend once I get them from Sarah. :)

This is going to be a very short entry, typing really hurts :(

It has been getting colder over the course of the last couple of days, so I decided to do some shopping for gloves (since normal gloves don't fit over the cast, I had to go for mittens) and a bonnet.

Here's the result:





decoration at Palladium shopping centre

Today started off extremely nicely since I passed my exam in ORL with "very good".
However, things started to change a bit after that...

Last week I fell up (yes, not down..) the stairs in my flat here, I landed on my right side which ended up terribly bruised.
Somehow I must've broken my left radial bone while doing so, but it wasn't until a few days later that it started to really hurt.
So I went to the orthopaedic department of the hospital after my exam where the doctor told me that my arm would most likely be distorted, but not broken, but he wanted to do an X-ray nevertheless to make sure.

Unfortunately, he had some bad news for me: I have to wear a cast on my left arm (remember, I'm left-handed... and I've also got some written exams coming up :( ) for the next four (!) weeks.





Do you remember those photos we took during our surgery class a couple of weeks back when we practised doing casts?



Well, this is what the real one looks like...

Today wasn't too interesting, the day started with my new course of Urology, afterwards I went straight to the library to study for my exam in ORL (Otorhinolaryngology or ENT - Ear, Nose, Throat) where I stayed until the library closed.
Nevertheless, I really enjoyed the outlook from the 5th floor of the urological department in the direction of the castle area during the seemingly never-ending 5 hours full of lectures (...and then it even started to snow for a bit! :) ):

Yesterday I saw that Kristin ( http://kristinsta.wordpress.com/, thanks for the inspiration! :) decided to do a christmas calendar on her blog meaning she will publish a new photo every day.
I really like the idea, so I decided to do something similar and post something small every day (hopefully I will finish my two half-finished posts about my trips to South Bohemia and Poland as well :P ).

So here we go (just pretend it was posted yesterday, I will post another entry for today later on today):

Yesterday I went to the christmas market in the city centre together with my friend and travel mate Vaida from Lithuania, it really made us feel like we were in some kind of fairytale, it looked simply magical:

Time has passed by so quickly, I can't believe that I have been here for almost three months now...
Just to let you all know:
I'll take the night train to Poland tomorrow and will arrive in Krakow early Friday morning. There we will visit the old town and Wawel Castle as well as the Jewish Museum and the Schindler Factory.
On Sunday we will go to Auschwitz to have a look at the concentration camp.
I won't take my laptop, so if you want to reach me, just give me a call or text on my Czech (!) mobile (the German number doesn't work anymore).

I'm sorry that you haven't heard from me for so long, the blog entry about the trip to Český Krumlov is still half-finished...
You will hear back from me once I'm back from Poland - take care in the meantime!

It's been a while since my last blog entry which is partly due to the fact that I'm sick (again! :( ) and also because I have just been busy doing a lot of things (also again ;) ).

Due to the fact that I haven't blogged about any parties here in Prague yet, I decided to catch up on tat:

At the end of November I went to a party that was called "4 Universities Mega Party" and which was held... IN A CHURCH! Yes, you've read it correctly - the church is called Sacre Coeur and is usually reserved for weddings, but this night it was occupied by more than 1000 students.. ;) It also offered two stages, two DJs and a live band.



My Czech tandem partner Petra, Marta and me enjoying the welcome drink (hot wine punch), I don't know the guy, but he begged to be in the photo ;) )

some impressions from the interior of the chapel:







Since the photographer told us that only the top 10% of photos would be uploaded on the internet, us girls decided to do "something crazy" and lift our skirts just the tiniest bit... and what can I say... Marta sneaked out of it, but we still made it... :P


A few days later I followed quite a spontaneous invitation (it was decided upon on the very same day) to organize a surprise birthday party for Ruben, a German guy I got to know at the intensive language course in Brno. One of his friends came up with the idea and about 20 people from the course decided to join! Isn't that awesome? :)
Ruben's friends had told him that they had baked a cake for him and wanted to celebrate a bit in the evening - so that's how they lured him to their flat where we were all waiting.



Ruben's table for presents - I bought him an Advent calendar (even though the chocolates are most likely gone by now... :P ) and some German sweets



Preparations...

When Ruben finally made it there (with about an hour delay), all of us (apart from the people who live there) hid in the bedrooms, the walk-in cupboard and the bathroom. As our code word 'The smeagle (no idea why smeagle and not eagle, but it seemed to be some kind of private joke ;) ) has landed!' resound, we all left our hiding place.
And Ruben couldn't believe his eyes:





It was definitely a night to remember and I still think it's amazing how we managed to organize a big buffet, a table full of presents and lots of guests within such a short amount of time - we rock! :)


We also had the first snow in this season here in Prague and everything looked like in winter wonderland - it only lasted a day though... :(





snowman at Náměstí Míru

Now the weather is back to normal, it's not too cold (not colder than in Germany I guess..) and usually it only rains towards evening / at night time and I love to fall asleep to the sound of rain splashing against my garret windows... ♥
(and in case it doesn't rain there's always http://www.rainymood.com/ - do you remember the page, Lisa? :) )


Talking about plans - I decided to apply for a scholarship next summer that is issued by the IFMSA (International Federation of Medical Students' Associations). They offer part-time scholarships for professional clinical exchanges all over the world. At this point in time it is not clear if I have to go through the application process of Germany or the Czech Republic - unfortunately different people keep telling me all sorts of things, so I hope this gets figured out soon... :(

Nevertheless, I took a compulsory English test this Tuesday - it was the first national English test, so I assume it was harder than in previous years. So much for national test: That meant of course that all universities should start the test at exact the same time - however, Charles University started 45 minutes later due to the fact that apparently someone didn't save the latest changes of the powerpoint presentation they showed us at the very beginning... ;)

To me, the English test itself felt appropriate - for sure not too easy, but I hope I did alright. The test was not about passing, so I could score anything in between 0 - 100 points. Most questions aimed at specific phrases, grammar, rather sophisticated expressions (as in 'Choose the word that fits the best!') and there was also a part where we had to fill in the blanks.

Oh, I only just realized that I didn't even tell you yet where I would like to go (the placements get assigned to us according to the overall score we achieved (consisting of the English test and some other things, though the test itself is quite important) - right now my favourite destinations include countries in Africa (Ghana, Kenya, Mali, Rwanda, Sierra Leone) as well as Baltic States (Estonia, Lithuania) and maybe Thailand.

Of course that's not the only thing I have planned for the next couple of weeks / months:
I will also take part in some more activities organized by the International Club (they really offer awesome activities for us International students! :) ) including a 15-km-hiking-trip to the Czech Central Mountains next Sunday, a trip to Poland from the 22nd - 25th of November (we will be visiting Krakow and Auschwitz) and a trip to South Moravia (Mikulov, Perna, Brno, Olomouc) from the 7th - 9th of December. Since my friend Sarah from Bonn will be here at that time, she decided to join me - yeah! :D

So there are lots of things coming up for me in the near future and I'm really looking forward to that... :)

How have you all been and what are you up to? Is anyone even reading this blog still? :P
Looking forward to hear from you...