Missed it by That Much

Jeff was in London for one day yesterday, leaving last night around 8pm. News has it the UK had their worst earthquake in 20 years just 5 hours later. Missed it by that much.

Jeff was there for work, but managed to walk about Monday night.
[I have a hard time blogging about myself in the 3rd person, so it's "I" from now on. :) ]
I walked a loop around the bridges near Big Ben.
I stayed nearby at the Grange Holborn hotel. If I remember the signs right, that's the Bloomsbury Square neighborhood, but I should ask Michelle R. to be sure.

Obligatory movie snippet ... "Look kids, Big Ben, Parliament"

I walked past the Westminster Abbey. Since watching the Divinci Code only a week ago (finally), I really wanted to see Sir Isaac Newton's tomb. The guard at the gate said that tourist visiting hours were over, but I noticed a couple people just walked past him. Then the guard mentioned that catholic mass started in 15 minutes.

Well, given the choice between attending an evening mass or not getting inside, I took the mass.

So, here's a shot of the Westminster Abbey and the famous globe over Newton's burial spot.

After hearing "Here endeth the lesson" a couple times between the choir boys singing and I couldn't help but think of several Monty Python quotes.

The choral singing was absolutely beautiful, but a big highlight was spotting so many tombs and momuments. It would be unjust to list only a couple here, so here's a link if you want to run through the names yourself.

Just Pictures...

We're noticing some personality differences.
One smiley kid...one grumpy kid.

Mattias: "Get this girl away from me."

"Smile, Schmile...whatever. Just take the shot."


And a quick movie from the "aquarium". Kids all love this screen on the floor, displaying animated fish and water that reacted to movement.
Kids there were loving it, running all around, trying to catch the fish.
The one stationary kid in the middle, just focused on her pretzels - that's Ella.

Relaxing Weekend

First, we're very happy Yaya and Baboo got home safely. A day late, but still in time for Erica's baby shower & party. We are so looking forward to seeing all of you this summer!!

Saturday, Ella and I (Daddy) went to Morsky Svet, or "Seaworld," Prague's aquarium.

Ella absolutely loved it.
Unfortunately for Daddy, he has also seen Chicago's Shedd Aquarium and Boston's New England Aquarium.
Apples and oranges. Like comparing somebody's prized 120 gallon saltwater fish tank to the goldfish-in-a-cup prize you win at the county fair.

After some homework & metric conversion, you compare:
Square Area in square feet
Boston: unknown, but jellyfish exhibit alone is 5,000 square feet
Chicago: 422,000
Prague: 10,700 (...likely including bathrooms and cashdesk)

Total Aquarium Gallons of Water
Boston: 200,000 gallons just in its "centerpiece tank"
Chicago: 750,000
Prague: 19,800

Entry price for 1 Adult & a 2-year old
Boston: $19
Chicago: $18
Prague: ~$15 (240 Kc)

Still, all that's important is, Ella loved it. Especially the 'petting zoo' portion. Ugh...I'll have to post a picture or movie up soon.

What did we do on Sunday? We (Ella and Daddy) finger-painted pictures of our Seaworld adventures. Located just 15 minutes walk away from home, Seaworld is (unfortunately) too close an adventure to ignore. I'm confident that we'll visit often.

Company CEO Update
Klaus Zumwinkel's, who was Jeff's CEO last week, is still being investigated for tax fraud. Klaus has graciously tendered his resignation to Deutsche Post World Net (and the Executive Committee has graciously accepted it).

Klaus Zumwinkel. How neat a name is that? It's best when you pronounce it as a German name should be: "Klaus Tsumvinkel". Just say it out loud to yourself a few times. It's fun, isn't it? But, here, it's neither cute nor fun, it's Dr. Zumwinkel, former CEO Deutsche Post AG.

later, -Jeff

p.s. Baboo - I hung up the 2nd living room lighting fixture. It's more beautiful than the first. :)

p.p.s. New England Aquarium - take a hint from others and update your website with some overall statistics, ok? (It makes it much easier to brag about you.)

Yaya & Baboo have Left for Canada - but stuck in Germany

Twas a sad, sad morning today. May's parents left to return home around 8am today.

Update: Fog delayed flight to Germany; missed their flight to Canada.
New flight to Halifax (from Toronto): flight AC260 at 19:34 (15 Feb)

Words cannot explain how much help they have been. Baboo has become Ella's favorite toy & playmate, and our in-house repairman. Sure, Bill's quite the eager repairman, but in the end, always a craftsman.

Yaya, who's been here since a few days into December, has helped us through so much transition ...the new flat, the new baby, getting to know our new neighborhood and neighbors. Not to mention, Yaya (a.k.a. "Cinderyaya") was invaluable as our indentured servant: laundry, cooking, food shopping, playmate, counselor :)
It's going to be tough, trying to adapt without them.
Thank you, to both of you!! We wouldn't be sane today without you.

In other news, it seems that Jeff's Corporate CEO just had his house raided by the police and served a warrant for tax evasion. Already in the papers, he's accused of stashing some 10 million euro in a Liechtenstein bank account. [Damn that EU bank transparency!]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601100&sid=armdQVOnKaWk

And what was the effect on our stock price? Up over 2% this morning on the news.

Amazing.

Don't Call Us, We'll Call You

(no, ...wait, that's not good either)

Jeff here. Wow. I was just reading the text of President Bush's speech yesterday.

"Director, thank you for joining me. Good morning. At this moment, somewhere in the world, terrorists are planning new attacks on our country."
Soak that statement up for a while. Bush continues...
"Their goal is to bring destruction to our shores that will make September the 11th pale by comparison. To carry out their plans, they must communicate with each other, they must recruit operatives, and they must share information. The lives of countless Americans depend on our ability to monitor these communications. Our intelligence professionals must be able to find out who the terrorists are talking to, what they are saying, and what they're planning."

Bush is pleading for 11th hour approval of the FISA bill. The bill allows listening and tracking of Americans calling Americans.
I realize Bush has become even less popular since we left nearly 2 years ago. But then I read Congress agrees with him. The bill will pass.

Judging by a lack of riots in the streets, I'm thinking there isn't any news coverage about this back home. Where there may be news coverage, it's only focused on legal immunity granted to telephone companies... [is that really a surprise?] Still, the bill will pass.

Here, my coworkers joke at how ironic it is ...how the US has today become what the Soviet Union was when they were children. Then, it was the KGB; today it's NSA & AT&T.
How does it happen?
I studied a lot of Soviet history in college. I remember reading the speeches from Kruschev and Brezhnev. If I substitute the word "capitalists" for "terrorists", I just gush with nostalgia. :)

Oh well. Just an observation. Meanwhile, if you do call, don't tell us anything too private. But we figure, if you have nothing to hide, it's all for the greater good, right?
Right, Comrade?

We're in the Kadastr. It's official!!

It's official - we own our place. :)

Yeah, we first saw the flat and negotiated for it over 1 year ago.
It took nearly a year to move in.
And now, as of yesterday, we're filed in the Land Registry (Kadastr) as owners.

When it comes to owning your own place here, the final step (and nearly the only official one) is getting listed in the Land Registry. But I suppose it's like that anywhere.

Outside of Prague, the process takes days. In Prague, it's known to take several months. Until it happens, there's room for legal issues. Our Kadastr filing was late October, so it took just 3 months ..."not bad!" as one coworker said.

Check it out, here we are:
http://nahlizenidokn.cuzk.cz/ZobrazObjekt.aspx?typobjektu=jednotka&id=1071278101

Update: For techie reasons, the above Czech website may not appear the same as how we see it. Some Czech letters may not appear correctly.

If you wish to get there from the Registry homepage, I'll write out how I got there.
1. Go the Land Registry website:
http://nahlizenidokn.cuzk.cz/

2. Choose "Parcela" (parceled land) on left margin

3. Type in "Bubenec" (our neighborhood is Bubeneč). Hit enter.

4. Then below, fill in our lot numbers: 624 / 1. Hit enter again.
If you're getting the error "Zadaná parcela nebyla nalezena !", be sure "624" is in the left box and "1" in the right.

5. There we are - part owners of lot 624

Individual Flat Listing

1. If you want to see our individual listing (the first website address above), now click on the link "Budova na parcele: č.p. 939"

2. Then click on 939 / 10 (that's flat number 10 of building 939).

3. There we are - sole owners of our place (thankfully) :)

Above all ...so so sorry for the Pats.
Our hearts really sank when we checked the score yesterday morning. Especially felt for Dave and Owen.

An exciting visit tonight, with Vendula and Kristyna. Vendula was Ella's babysitter through 2006 and most of 2007, since she finished graduate school and is working full time, she's no longer doing the babysitting gig. Vendi and Kristyna are good friends ...in fact, Vendi introduced us to and recommended Kristyna for Ella as her nanny/Czech tutor.
So, we had both girls over for supper.
Ella was predictably shy at first, but then she went crazy with energy. What a show-off.
Having cake and iced frosting for dessert probably wasn't the best approach to getting her ready for bed, but she crashed hard in the end. Just an hour late.

Anyway, a picture of the girls together, too.
Ella sitting on Vendi's lap.

And we figure we should post some pictures of our son (lest you forget we had one by the lack of pictures).

The Post Office - A Story From Maylia

Hello All! I'm sure none of you are surprised by my silence these days given renewed motherhood...but I just have to tell about a recent trip to the post office. If you are behind on the blog, please read Jeff's last entry before continuing with this one as the postal slip in question is the one he included a photo of below.

So, I just finished my first 30+ hour solo stint with the 2 kids. I guess I shouldn't find this such an amazing feat as I AM their mother, but I am patting myself on the back for not only surviving, but for actually making it out to do some shopping AND getting a couple loads of laundry done, too! Another "accomplishment" was a trip to the post office.

A couple days ago, I took the "Parker Crew, The Whole" slip to the post office to retrieve our parcel to no avail, they couldn't locate it. I realized after the fact that the slip had just been put in our mailbox that day and more than likely the package had simply not made it back to the post office yet. So with Ella and Mattias in tow (in our awesome double stroller) I decided to try again. Please keep in mind that I have to get by on my horrid Czech at the post office as VERY little English is spoken (why should it be?!).

The first problem I encountered was that the post office clerk indeed thought my name should be "The Whole" and wanted to know who "The Whole" was and why the name on my passport was not "The Whole". With considerable effort I managed to get the idea across that the sender had simply meant the package was for our entire family.

That hurdle crossed, she looked for our package but came back empty-handed. Then went and looked again and came back with a package that I noticed immediately was not addressed to "The Whole Parker Crew" but to "Jeff Parker", and most definitely in Larry's handwriting. Now, this was interesting because a couple weeks ago we received one package from Marilyn and Larry when they had sent two at the same time...and at that time I had expected Jeff to return from the post office with two packages because written on our single postal slip was "x2". My detective mind deduced that the package she had must be that second package. However, we faced another hurdle...that being that my passport also doesn't say "Jeff Parker". How many Parkers live in Prague, let alone at Jana Zajice 8? It doesn't matter, I was not allowed to retain this package.

I couldn't just turn away though, because, I realized, if this was #2 package of the "x2" postal slip, we no longer had the slip and would have no way of retrieving this package. I struggled in Czech to explain my point of view...that without a paper slip we'd have no way to get this package. I wasn't making any progress with the clerk, but I had something on my side....TIME! The longer I stood there stumbling along in broken Czech and English, the more the line behind me grew with people who had to get back to work from their lunch break. A man got out of line and complained to the clerk. Next, another postal worker came from behind the desk to find out what was going on. I assume he was a manager of sorts for after talking to the clerk he made the executive decision that (most likely to get rid of me) I should be able to have the package addressed to Jeff.

VICTORY WAS MINE!!!! Or was it?!?

Because apparently giving someone a package without taking a slip was not an option...so he ceremoniously grabbed the "Parker Crew, The Whole" slip and "filed" it. Hmmm...now how are we ever going to get THAT package?!?!

So I left the post office shaking my head in disbelief, muttering away to Ella (the only person available for me to mutter to), and laughing at this adventure we are on. For what else can you do but laugh? Only, we are not laughing at the fact that someone went through all the trouble (and spent some cash) to send us a package that we most likely will never receive. Whoever you are, we are very, very sorry for this postal mess. We appreciate your generousity and hope by some freak of post office nature we get another slip in our box addressed to "Parker Crew, The Whole". Or that, at least, the package is returned to you. Please let us know if you are the sender.

And the lessons learned...well, there's nothing we can do about the post office losing packages. But, it would probably be best if when you send us some mail you simply put "Parker", that way either Jeff or I can pick it up without any trouble. And next time we will be more assertive if we get a slip with a "x2" or some other note on it.

I'll end with some photos!

Ella stylin' in her kimono from the Manchester contingent of the UT.


Proud Big Sister!


Quiet time with Baboo.