The Other Side
January 26, 2010
On January 10, 2009, I was at the Hartsfield-Jackson Atlanta International Airport, standing in the immigration line again. Except this time was different. I had a fever close to 40°C, my whole body ached and I was on antibiotics for angina, a nasty disease that produces severe chest pain because the heart is not getting enough oxygen. I was freezing one minute, sweating the other, having coughing spasms in between.
Close to 200 non-U.S. citizens, or aliens, as we are called by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, were waiting in front of me, including almost everyone from my flight. I urgently had to go to the bathroom right when I got off the plane, because I listened to my grandma’s advice and drank tea as much as I could. Now everyone was in front of me.
I quickly eyed the people in the winding line, who were as anxious to get to the other side as I was. All I could think about was my queen-sized bed at home. My eight pillows and my level 6 IKEA down comforter. “Once I get there, everything will be fine,” I thought, as I mustered all of my strength to keep standing.
Eager to make my stop at the immigration booth as short as possible...
Dominik
February 10, 2010
“Dominik!” my mother calls for my brother from the living room. “Can you come here for a minute?”
“Why?” he shouts back over the thunderous sounds coming from his room.
“I want to show you something.”
“Yeah, wait a minute,” he shouts back.
Ten minutes later, my brother is still sitting in his tall, black, reclining office chair in front of the 21.5-inch widescreen monitor in his room. He is playing the World of Warcraft Online, a.k.a. WoW, a massive multi-player online role playing game (or MMORPG). The surface of the desk around his keyboard is damaged by the constant “engraving” done by my brother’s pen, waiting for the game to load. Individual orange pills, receipts, papers and pens, which he had taken apart, are scattered across the entire desk. His computer is hooked up to a 5.1 stereo system with a powerful subwoofer, amplifying the sounds of the battle he is currently fighting, which is why he can’t leave. “It’s real time. You can’t pause it,” he always says.
His bedroom is awkwardly stuck in time. Some of my possessions remain scattered around the room even five years after I moved out...
509 Café
February 19, 2010
It’s a sunny Thursday afternoon, but business is slow for the 509 Café on Greenfield Avenue. The sidewalk in front resembles a narrow trench of melting snow and ice. Kids with colorful backpacks walk by, returning home from the nearby school.
All five black tables in the dining area are empty; the Heinz ketchup, salt and pepper shakers, Cholula sauce, and black container with the usual assortment of colorful sugar packets are precisely positioned in the middle of the tables, waiting to be used. The black metal chairs are neatly tucked in as if nobody used them today.
A six-foot tall blackboard announcing in pink chalk “The 509 Café has bread, milk and eggs!” stands in the corner next to a large display cooler since there is no room on the sidewalk. Behind the cooler that contains randomly scattered meat and cheese is a sliding-door refrigerator filled with breakfast and sandwich ingredients. The beige wall above is bare; the only things left are little pieces of white sticky foam squares that once held the menu posters. The laminated menu now sits on the black-and-white checkered windowsill, hoping to attract the occasional pedestrians.
Life in South Bohemia
March 15, 2010
Jiřina was born in 1927 in a small South Bohemian village in the former Czechoslovakia. Bohemia has referred to the Czech lands since the ancient times, but in the late 19th century, the term came to be more associated with artists and their unconventional lifestyle. Becoming known as “bohemians,” many of them passed through Bohemia on their way to major European cities.
Dotted by countless castles and chateaus hidden in deep forests, Bohemia had strong ties to the neighboring Austria, a political reminder of the Habsburg Empire. Jiřina’s village Červená Lhota was no exception with its pale pink Renaissance chateau, a country retreat for the Austrian Schönburg-Hartenstein aristocracy.
Jiřina spent much of her childhood in close proximity to the chateau. Standing high on a rugged rock formation surrounded by a small lake, the only connection to the mainland was a two-arch stone bridge. Jiřina’s family lived in a wood ranger’s lodge tucked away in the woods behind the chateau, close to the winding dirt road leading to a nearby village. The bright white facade of the lodge contrasted with the green leaves of the majestic oaks surrounding the house. Working as the wood ranger for the Schönburgs for 120 crowns ($6) a month...