Guten tag from Austria! My name is Brooke Stieber and I am a senior studying agricultural business. This weekend, Jenna, Liam, Daniel, and myself, along with two students from Missouri (Ashleigh and Renee), all took a weekend trip to Salzburg, Austria. We traveled via bus and train. The city was beautiful, nestled between several hills and mountains! Of course, Salzburg is famous because it is where the movie The Sound of Music is set. It is also the birthplace of the composer, Mozart.

While visiting, we stayed in the former home of the von Trapp family which has been transformed into a bed and breakfast. This is the family that the story of The Sound of Music is based off of. The accommodations were very nice, yet surprisingly affordable.

Throughout the weekend, we explored the city of Salzburg and visited many of the filming locations of The Sound of Music including the beautiful Mirabell Palace and Gardens. We strolled down the streets of the old town, saw Mozart’s childhood home, and did a little shopping too. We also hiked up one of the hills surrounding the city. The views from the top were breathtaking! For anyone who enjoys hiking, Austria is the country to go to!

As I write this blog post, we are on the bus back to Prague. Although I am excited to explore the Czech Republic more, I am going to miss these beautiful hills and mountains. The area around Prague is hilly, but nothing to this extent. I can’t stop staring out my window, taking in the sites! This is definitely a place I would love to return to!

Dobry Den everyone! My name is Maddie Frantz and today I’ll be telling you about our second Thursday here in Prague! The day started early as usual with a typical European breakfast and walk to class, where we learned about economic theory, climate change, the history of the Czech Republic during and after World War II, and the effects of globalization on the Czech countryside. The classes explore the idea that economic growth and development do not have to compromise environmental security and health. It is interesting to learn how the Czech Republic and the members of the European Union implement policy and economic incentives to support the success of rural communities and therefore that of the rest of the country.

After class, a group of my trip mates and I took the tram (with the help of some Czech buddies!) to Petrin Hill in Prague. Petrin Hill is a beautiful park in the diplomatic district of Prague where there is a smaller version of the Eiffel Tower, built for the Jubilee Exhibition of 1891. The view from the top was breathtaking…I think it was worth the leg-burning climb up all those stairs! Following the climb and a stroll through the park, our group met the rest of the students for dinner at a Mexican restaurant called Las Adelitas. We were all very excited to indulge in some favorites like guacamole and salsa while listening to a live, traditional Mexican music trio. After eating massive amounts of chips and tacos, we all decided to burn off some calories by going dancing at a club where one of our Czech program Buddies was DJing for the night! Overall, the day was a big cultural mix that will leave us all with a lot of fun memories!

Na Shledanou from Praha!

Hi, my name is Liam Martin. I am a 4th year EEDS major. It is midway through our second week of our time here in the Czech republic. Today, many of us are exhausted because we had a wonderful time last night with our Czech buddies who held a bonfire/cookout for us. We a few interesting classes today, one of which consisted of our lecturer talking about the production of milk and other dairy products and the economics behind it in the Czech Republic. The other interesting class was from our good friend Jaroslav who gave us another wonderful lecture about Czech History concerning the early history of the territory in the 14th century. For lunch today as with most days we had some kind of meat and potatoes, which never seems to get old here haha.

In the afternoon some of us played volleyball with a few Czech students from the university. Other than that the rest of the day was pretty uneventful and many of us either relaxed, did laundry, or went into the city to do some shopping. In the evening we visited a pub in Prague that had many traditional Czech dishes which many of us loved. A big favorite was the steak tartare which many people have never tried before. After our late dinner many of us trickled out of the pub and made our way home. I was one of the last to leave and I was proud of my self for making it back efficiently!

My name is Etienne Pouly. I’m a 4th-year Agribusiness major. This is our second week in the Czech Republic. Last week was pretty crazy with getting to know the city and the excursions. Today was kind of long with having classes from 8 am to 3 pm. The classes overall were very interesting. The second class, which is rural, we received our first paper assignment. The last class of the day was taught by an Ambassador, which was very intriguing. Especially, since most of the professors teach using slide shows, but the Ambassador does not. He really knows how to draw in the audience and keep us awake.

After class, I went with Alex to downtown Prague and helped him get his money exchanged. We got KFC, which for some odd reason tastes way better than it does in America. After classes around 6 pm, the Czech students planned for us a cook out. The cookout was very fun; we got to try Czech sausages, bread, and cheese. The OSU students also got to show the Czech students what s’mores are! Overall the day was good

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Hi everyone!

My name is Alaina Misbrener. Today, Monday the 22^nd, we had an excursion to South Bohemia. After about a two-hour bus ride we arrived at the Budweiser Budvar Brewery. When we arrived, we were greeted by a tour guide and shown around the factory. We were able to tour the fermenting, brewing, and packaging branches of the factory, and it was so interesting to see how the process operated. We were even able to sample freshly brewed Budweiser beer! After the tour, we enjoyed a traditional Czech lunch in the restaurant at the headquarters.

After lunch we travelled about an hour south to the medieval town of Cesky Krumlov. We walked the streets of the beautiful city for about 2 hours, enjoyed some ice cream, and we were even able to climb the Cesky Krumlov castle. The view was absolutely beautiful; one of the best views yet! At around 6 o’clock we were able to enjoy a delicious dinner consisting of roasted chicken, French fries, and sauerkraut at Satlava Restaurant. After dinner, we all got back on the bus and slept for the majority of the three-hour trip home.

What’s up guys! My name is Christian Lui, I’m a 4th year student studying sustainability and business. This is was our first official weekend in Prague and I can safely say that I learned to live, drink and eat like a local. We started our weekend off with a nice stroll through the Stalin Beer Garden. Coupled with a phenomenal view and a few drinks, this was a great way to start off the day.

After, we made our way to the Sparta soccer game. For the most part everyone bought Sparta scarfs and so we were really throwing our support behind this team and getting rowdy for the players. I can finally say that I experienced my first European soccer match. Sparta came out with the win with a final score of 3-2, and the whole stadium erupted.

On Sunday, a few people went to a Czech castle with some of the Czech buddies. I decided to stay back and explore old town for myself and do a little shopping. I’m really glad I had the opportunity to learned the public transportation and live like a local. Once I got into the old town area, I immediately went for a sausage and a drink. After that we went into old town square and spent the evening people watching. Overall I had an amazing first weekend here in Prague and I’m excited for the days to come.

Hi guys!! This is Nikki Mango, coming at you from THE Czech Republic. It is currently 3:3o pm on Friday and I’m sitting outside on the balcony of our campus hotel trying to figure out a way to post about all the interesting things we’ve done here and the places we’ve seen, but that’s just not possible. In less than a week I’ve stood on the grounds of a castle with the most breathtaking views of the entire city of Prague, drank spring water from Karlovy Vary that supposedly has “magical” properties, and learned about Czech culture, something that I have never really come in contact with before. But, even though I’d love to write about everything that we’ve done in the past couple of days, I’m pretty much limited to just today.

So here it is. I’d like to say that today was as eventful as the rest of my first week here, but I regret to tell all of you that it was pretty normal. We had lectures until 3 and our lunch in between and now we’re back at the hotel where everyone is in their own rooms enjoying a much needed nap. I will say though that the lecture with the U.S Ambassador to the Czech Republic, Leslie Alexander, was fascinating. Here was a lecturer who has worked for several presidents such as Ronald Reagan and Richard Nixon and lived in several countries and he was trying to help us to look at the world from a different point of view. It was so interesting to hear about his stories and what he has experienced because we’re all just getting started and have barely even seen the world outside of our own sheltered ways of life. I hope one day that my beliefs and opinions can be as knowledgable and based on personal experience as his are.

Well that’s it for now! Maybe my next post will be a little more exciting but I’m going to go take a nap now 🙂

Oh and here’s the best picture I’ve taken so far so enjoy!!

We started off our day with classes including our first class on the Czech language and a lecture in from a former US Ambassador. While we struggled with pronunciation, we learned many useful phrases in Czech including “dobry den” (hello or good day) and “jak se máš” (how are you). Czech sounds very similar to Russian but has a much easier alphabet to learn. After a couple of classes on agriculture business and Czech history, a former US Ambassador talked to us about his experiences with Europe and the EU and what the future might hold in terms of global relations.

After class, some students stayed at the dorm to rest before going out in the evening while others went to the mall to buy hockey jerseys and a couple more went to watch a hockey game between the Czech Republic and Russia.

We all met back up at 6pm and had dinner at the Giraffe cafe, a French restaurant near campus, before heading out to join some Czech students for a local sports tournament.

My name is DJ Helminiak. Today in Prague was eventful as usual. We began with walking to the University to be lectured on topics such as architecture and economics of Czech Republic. The professors compared the United States and Czech in both subjects. After classes we went to the local campus restaurant and ate their version of spaghetti.

When being lectured about Czech architecture, we were informed that it was a two part lecture in that the second part involved traveling the city to view the various building styles. After the tour of the buildings, we were taken to a restaurant in the city. The food has been amazing with most dishes consisting of chicken and potatoes.

After dinner, the tour guides took some students to a park in the city. The park was huge with locals skate boarding and playing roller hockey. Others were running and rollerblading. The park was high above the city so it was possible to view the entire city from the picture attached. Overall, a Wednesday in Prague was interesting and kept the students involved all day long.