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Saturday, July 07, 2007: Today we semi-woke up…in what would be more considered a zombie like trance. We headed off to the train station at Kutna Hora. After arriving an hour later we were now on foot. Not knowing exactly how the day was going to unfold we began walking toward the center of town approximately 2 kilometers away. On the way we stopped at the Sedlec Bone Church. This must be one of the man made seven wonders of Eastern Europe. A few hundred years ago a pastor/priest of this church went to Jerusalem and brought back soil to consecrate the cemetery. Around the same time Europe was struck with the Bubonic Plague. It seemed like everyone wanted their remains to be buried at the “Holy Cemetery.” In all there were 40,000 bodies left stacked inside the church because they obviously ran out of room. A creative monk decided to decorate the church with the human remains. Included: a coat of arms, a chandelier of skulls and every bone in the human body, piles of skulls, and ornate decorative pieces with shoulder blades? Little creepy, but you will not see this in the states. Next we walked to the center of town and tried to schedule a tour of a former silver mine. The tour was to begin in 45 minutes, so we went to grab something to eat. This was probably the worst service that I have had…ever. We were told the only two tables outside were reserved…so we went inside. When the server finally showed up, we told her our drink orders and let her know we were in a hurry. She came back in 5 minutes, and we told her that we needed the check to pay upfront.. she never came back. Thirty minutes later another girl brought our sausages without silverware…waiting for 5 minutes I went and sifted through their drawers and found the silverware myself. Well enough of the dining experience…we missed our tour time at the silver mine; so we went to St. Barbara’s Cathedral. Absolutely beautiful, however I felt guilty paying 20 Kc to get into a church. Only in Europe will you pay to get into a church. It was beautiful inside but there were so many ornate decorations, graven man made images, and vending booths inside I felt guilty being there. I felt if Jesus were there He would have flipped over the tables. The Pulpits are so heavily decorated it felt as if it were there to honor man and not God. We left. Now off to the silver mines….Jennifer and Chris now hate me….another tour…in a mine! And our English tour was in Czech….the English portion was on paper. Hard to read in the dark ehh! They gave us white robes, a miners helmet, and a flashlight. We were asked if we were afraid of the dark and if we were claustrophobic. Needless to say we are 160 meters underground with water dripping on our heads and the only thing mentioned in English was “don’t drink the water, it has arsenic in it!” At one point I thought Chris was going to get stuck in one of the walkways. After our excursion we left and walked two kilometers back to Nadrazi Kutna Hora (Train station). An hour later we were home. Goodnight light outs!
Aaron,
I love you
I love you and I will be praying for you and your team members. Have a safe journey while there and on uyour retun to America.
Your favorite grandma JuneA
jJune Crawford () - 14 07 07 - 20:50
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