New Washing Machine

Old washer

Last week my washing machine stopped working.  A repairman come over for a service call and for 500 Kč ($22) I got confirmation that it's officially broken.  

Service call invoice

I thought that the washing machine came with my flat but I found out that it didn't.  The previous tenant purchased the washing machine but left in the flat when he moved back to Norway.  So, (1) I had a washing machine that doesn't work, (2) it was out of warranty, and (3) I needed a new washing machine before  I have a flat full of houseguests in a few days.

I entertained the thought of replacing the old washer with an integrated washer and dryer combo.  My old flat had a washer/dryer combo but I really only used the dryer once a week for bed linens.

Yes, having a dryer would be nice once in a while, but after having gotten by without one for the past eight years it just didn't seem necessary.  

In the end I went with another Whirlpool machine for 11.000 Kč ($475) and it comes with a ten-year warranty.  

I suppose I can take it with me if I move out.  More importantly, I can catch up on a week's worth of laundry before the girls show up.

My New Sofa

The old sofa

My new sofa arrived yesterday.  I liked my old couch, which was huge, but the leather had started to crack and was just a mess.  I just wanted the old one gone and I didn't have the time to list it on Facebook for whomever wanted to come take it away for free.  

The leather was shot

Technically, the delivery guys would take away the old sofa but it needed to be on the street.  However, when I was contacted for delivery the dispatcher agreed that it wouldn't be a problem for the guys to remove the couch from my flat.  The delivery guys were great.

My old sofa broke was a four-piece unit and the new one is three pieces.  My old sofa was a bit larger and the centre section could sit three people whereas the new sofa can accommodate two people sitting in the centre.

However, the new sofa has a pull out bed so I've got another spot of guests to sleep over.  And the best part is that both side sections come with some much needed storage. 

There definitely won't be any kids jumping on Uncle CJ's new couch this Czechsgiving.

Ordered a New Couch

I recently ordered a new mattress and now I ordered a new couch.  My previous sofa was partially leather but after years of sunlight, and it probably doesn't help that it is next to the radiator, the leather is quickly breaking apart.  So I've been on the hunt for a new couch.

I wanted something big that is U-shaped.  Definitely not leather.  No objections if if pulls out to a bed but it would be great if it had some storage.  It took a while but I finally found something that ticked all of the boxes.  The hunt was was harder than I expected it to be.

I found it at a furniture shop called XXXLutz.  Someone is going to have to explain the name of the shop to me because in the USA anything with "XXX" usually refers to some kind of porn.  

Anyway, my couch is ordered and it needs to come from Prague so I should get contacted in around 3 weeks for delivery.  

It ended up costing me about 40.000 Kč ($1700).  Not quite as wide as my old couch, about 10 cm (4 inches) smaller but it pulls out to a bed and both sides have storage.  

Now the problem is dealing with my old couch.  The delivery company will take away my old sofa as long as it is on the street.  Maybe if I slip the delivery guys some cash and some beer then they'll take the old sofa from my flat.  

There will definitely not be any kids jumping on the new couch this year at Czechsgiving.  

New Mattress

The old mattress

Back in 2011, I bought a mattress from Ikea.  It was 160 cm (63 inches) wide.  Well after 11 years the mattress was getting a bit lumpy and it was well past time for a new one.

This time I actually went to a mattress store for something a bit better.  The first thing is that I wanted the maximum size mattress which is 180 cm (71 inches) wide.  My first adventure at the shop was explaining to the shop assistant that I didn't want to go with two individual (90 cm) mattresses.  

The shop assistant asked me which side of the bed I slept on and I said "the middle" which is why I don't want to sleep on the crack between two smaller mattresses.  He then tried to explain to me why it is so much better to go with two smaller mattresses.  He asked if I was married and tried to suggest that perhaps my future wife would prefer two mattresses.  I was starting to get annoyed.  Not just because he assumed that I was straight and would have a wife but because I came in to spend money and he was making me not want to give him my money.

I finally just put my foot down and said that this is what I wanted and that was it.  Because the mattress is not a standard size it would take longer to make and to ship it to me from Slovakia where it would be manufactured.  I was told it would take about five weeks and it arrived today.

I'm so looking forward to a good night's sleep.  Now I just have to get rid of my old mattress.  The company didn't offer a service to remove the old one.  It looks like I'll put a message up on the Brno Facebook page to see if anyone wants a free mattress.

My First Money Order

My energy provider is Bohemia Energy.  I switched to them about three plus years ago and they've been fine.  Every three months they send me a bill notification to my mobile.

Apparently I overpaid and I received a rebate.  Czech Post delivered a money order to me for 351 Kč ($16).  The money order is only valid until 18.5.  

Many people use the Czech post office for financial services to the money order wasn't that weird to me. 

I don't understand why Bohemia Energy just didn't give me a credit on my next bill.  That would have been more convenient for me.  Or if they wanted to pay me back the money then they could have asked for my banking details so that they could have transferred the 351 Kč to me.  Instead, they paid the post office to deliver me a money order which gives me a limited period of time to collect.  I don't know what would happen if I didn't cash it in time.  Does the money go back to Bohemia Energy?  Or does Česká Pošta keep the money?  

Update:  It took me a few minutes to figure out where in the post office to cash it.  Once I found the correct window I had my money in about five minutes.

This was my first Czech money order.  It's incredible to me that after almost 12 years here in Czechland I'm still having new experiences.  

New Street Work

There's some street work going on in front of my new flat.  building.  The sidewalk has been dug up for just a couple of days so far.

It shouldn't be too bad and hopefully it won't take as long as the pipe work lasted in front of my old flat.

I get to miss a bit of the inconvenience as I'm headed off to Gothenburg, Sweden for a few days.  Fingers crossed that everything will be back to normal by the time I'm back.

Finally Moved In

Over the last month I've been moving things over to the new flat bit by bit.  Basically things I could live without until I was finally out of the old flat.  Claudia helped out with a few car runs after work a couple of times.  There were a couple of reasons for the phased approach.  One was I already have the new flat and I have the old flat until the end of March.  But the main reason was the bed.

My old flat came furnished but I didn't like the two single mattresses it came with.  So a few years ago I purchased a new mattress but I was still using my landlords's bed frame.  The new place came unfurnished but I purchased the bed frame from the previous tenant.  So I was't going to do the final move until I would be able to have my mattress in the frame.  Yeah, I know...first world problems.

Anyways...the chaps from Foreigners.cz ,who built my new furniture, showed up with a van and we moved everything over in a few hours.

I did feel great to actually spend the first night in my new place.  Although I was pretty close to the centre, my old place was pretty quite.  Now I know what quite really is.  This neighbourhood is very peaceful.  The only noise in the morning comes from the nearby church bells.

It's wonderful to be officially moved in and I've even had my first guests.  Helena, Claudia and Tünde stopped by this afternoon for coffee and cake.

I need to do a final cleaning at the old place and at the end of the month I'll turn over the keys to the landlords and sort out the security deposit.  While moving is one of my least favourite things at least now it's over and time to start nesting here.

Furniture Building Time

Before wardrobe photo

My current flat came furnished and my new flat is unfurnished which means that I've spent the last couple of weekends at Ikea getting some decorating ideas and ordering some furniture.  I'm looking forward to moving in to my new place once everything is set up.  The new place is great but on the downside there is no closet or much storage to speak of.  I hired a couple of guys to come over help assemble furniture.  Here are a few of the before and after photos.

The completed wardrobe

There was no way I was going to put together a three meter wardrobe together by myself.  Especially this one with the pull out storage bins and shoe racks.

Pre-storage unit

At the entrance there's now a storage unit and a coat rack.

There's a sideboard now next to the dining table.


There's now a secretary desk in the living room.  I'm thinking of turning it in to a bar.


The poor guys were here for most of the day yesterday.  Aside from the wardrobe, storage unit, sideboard and secretary desk, they also put together a couple of bookshelves, an office chair, and hung up a mirror.  It was't just them though.  I did manage to take care of the coat rack, a footstool, another storage bin, and a few shelves.  The best part was that they hauled off all of the cardboard boxes.  I've been slowly moving things over to the new place.  In a few weeks the same guys will show up with a moving van and help haul all of my boxes over here.

New Flat

It's been a busy month with lots going on but I managed to find a new flat.  It's in Stránice in the Masarykova čtvrť (Masaryk Quarter) part of town.  This is the north west part of Brno's centre.  It's a quiet area with many old villas and not far from Kraví hora (Cow Mountain) and the observatory.



The building is quite modern looking and stands out among all of the surrounding houses.  The owner is the architect and I assume that he must have had some pull with the city.  It has been recently renovated and I will be the second person to have the flat.

When I started looking for flats I considered downsizing and wanted another furnished flat.  Fast forward a bit and I ended up choosing a slightly larger place and unfurnished which means now I need to buy some furniture.  The flat is a 3+kk which is a two-bedroom flat with a living room and a corner kitchenette.

Things in the kitchen are a bit smaller.  The refrigerator and freezer are smaller than what I have now.  There's a little less counter space and no dishwasher but I don't think that will be a problem.



It will only be a challenge for when I cook Thanksgiving dinner.  Oh, and the washing machine (no dryer) is next to the oven.

The bathroom has a tub with the traditional Czech hand shower wand but I should be able to sort out a shower attachment.

There's a separate loo and it has a sink.  It also has a hot air dryer.  I can honestly say that I've never seen an air dryer in a flat before.

I will lose my view of the castle and cathedral but I do have a balcony with a view of the garden.

The highlight of the flat is the onyx wall next to the kitchen.  It is beautiful and it lights up.  I may have to call the place mini Tugendhat. 

The biggest drawback is that there is no closet but built in closets are not the norm over here.  It looks like I'll be spending some time at Ikea so that I can pick up a wardrobe and other furnishings.  I'll post a future update once I'm all moved in.

Time to Move On

Looks like I will be moving.  My landlords asked for a meeting so they come over this evening and dropped a bomb on me.  They let me know that although I have been a great tenant for the past six years, they were sorry to inform me that they would not be able to renew my lease next year.

This flat is the only place I've had in Brno.  I've been here for the last six years.  When I moved in, back in 2009, their oldest son was in high school.  Well now he has finished university and needs a place to live.

My landlords have been great.  I've never had any difficulty with them.  They've never even raised the rent.  They were quite apologetic and I believe that they've appreciated having me as a tenant.  Under Czech law, unless mutually agreed to by both the landlord and tenant, a three month notice is required.  My current lease expires at the end of March so I now have four months to move.

Truth be told, I kind of had a gut feeling that this would be coming sometime soon.  The downside is that I've been spoiled and now need to try to find a new flat.  I doubt that I'll find a place with the same view.  So it looks like this Saturday will be the last Czechsgiving at Sokolská. 

An English Sign

My building is definitely a Czech building and it is full of Czechs.  Other than a Croatian girl who lived in the building for a year, I'm the only foreigner here.  At least I was the only foreigner.  Now a Portuguese couple have moved in.  They are Erasmus* students so they will only be here for six months to a year.

*Erasmus is an EU-wide foreign exchange programme.

I guess that since there are now more foreigners the door sign has been translated in to English.  In typical EngRish, I love how instead of "occupants", the word "occupiers" was used.

A Stupid Note

There was a stupid note posted in my building this week.  Perhaps not stupid.  More like painfully obvious.  Here's the gist of the note...

Heat in our building is regulated by radiators.
5 is the maximum heat setting.
Don't regulate the heat in your flat by opening the window. 

I think that I was more annoyed that there was this big notice posted in Czech.  Thinking that it must be something important, I made an effort to figure out what it said and then became disappointed that it wasn't something more substantial.

So maybe it wasn't a stupid note.  Perhaps it was just annoyingly disappointing.

Stuck in an Elevator

When I left for work this morning I was preoccupied with thinking about all of the things I needed to get done at the office and how booked my calendar was with meetings.  While in my building's lift (elevator) I felt a quick jolt and suddenly found myself stuck between the 4th and 3rd floors.  Great.  My mind immediately started racing.  How long am I going to stuck in here by myself?  My mobile phone was 1/2 charged but I had limited reception in the elevator.  At what time do I call someone at the office to start shuffling my meetings around? Who has time to be stuck in an elevator?

I pushed the alarm button a few times but nothing happened.  Of course all of the lift information is only in Czech but I figured out that I had to press and hold the alarm button for at least five seconds.  Then a man's voice came across the speaker.  I explained to him that I only speak a little Czech, that the elevator didn't work and where I lived.  I guess explaining that I only speak a little Czech didn't register because he began to speak faster and use even bigger words and then hung up.

So I decided to call the service number that was posted.  All I got was a recording that, I assume, said was that they were not open yet and to call back later.  So then I called the "non stop" (24 hour) number.  I swear that it was the same guy I spoke with before.  I asked if he spoke English, German, French or Spanish.  Of course not.  So I explained again that I was a foreigner and could only speak a little Czech.  Again, he started to speak even faster.  So I asked him to slow down.  This cycle of fun when on for a few minutes.  He said he notified a woman about it.  I finally got him to tell me that it would only be another five minutes.

A few minutes later I heard a woman's voice saying "hello".  The head of my building's co-op went upstairs and basically rebooted the elevator so that it started moving again.  When I got out of the elevator I walked upstairs one flight to say "thank you".  There were two women there, one of whom is the concierge and she only speaks Czech.  She asked me if I need to go upstairs.  "No, I needed to head to work but I'm fine and thanks for letting me out".  She then yelled up the stairs to the woman who fixed the elevator saying "Mrs Bartová!  Everything is fine!  It was just the American!  Nice. 

I only ended up stuck in the lift for 15 minutes.  But it's a long 15 minutes when you're by yourself, in a foreign country, and with everything posted in a different language.  I guess next week I'll ask my Czech teacher for the vocabulary for "Help!  I'm trapped in this f*@#ing elevator!  Please get me out!"

Two Deaths

On Saturday, I was headed out, to do some grocery shopping for the baby shower, and saw some police officers in the foyer of my apartment building.  They then went outside with some people.  I assumed that maybe someone's car was hit or something.

A couple of days later I found out what had actually happened.  On the 9th, a woman in our building died at home.  Then on the 10th, someone else in our building died.  Both were older and died of natural causes.  The odd thing was that their flats were each sealed with police tape for a few days.

I didn't know either person who passed away.  I remember meeting the woman though back in 2009 on the day I moved in to my flat.  I was coming in the front door of the building, behind her, and she asked me who I was there to see.  She didn't speak English but she spoke basic German.  I explained to her that I now lived here which caught her obviously by surprise.  She wasn't able to quite figure out why an American was living in ČR or how could an American speak German.  She was nice, and would always says hello when we ran in to each other, but we probably only saw each other a half-dozen times in almost four years.

Prohibition

While I was in the USA in September, I got a Facebook message from a friend that said I got out of Czech Republic in time because prohibition was imposed.  Actually, prohibition only on alcohol over 20%.  Of course beer and wine were OK.  And most people have home-made slivovice anyway.  But, for weeks, you could not buy any hard liquor in shops, bars or restaurants.

The government took action because people were getting methanol poisoning from drinking bootleg vodka and rum.  Around 80 people in ČR suffered methanol poisoning.  Some of these people have gone blind and others have been put in to induced comas by their doctors.  Almost 30 people have died.  Cases were also reported in Poland and Slovakia.

Methanol is not manufactured in ČR so it qualifies as for a tax exemption so it is cheaper than ethanol (normal drinking alcohol).  Bootleggers have been known to mix methanol with ethanol in order to increase their profits.  So far, police in Moravia have two main suspects, a dozen other accomplices and have seized more than 5,000 liters of spirits plus counterfeit labels.

In addition to the human tragedy, this has cost the government a lot of money.  Monthly tax revenues from liquor sales are about 750 million Kč ($40.4 million).

I did get another Facebook message at the end of September which said prohibition was over and I could come back.

Another thing I missed out on was that the Prague airport has been renamed.  It is now the Václav Havel Airport.  The former dissident, and Czech President, died last year.

It seems that the pipe work made good progress while I was gone.  While not completely finished it does now look a lot better in front of my building.