Orange, And Its Components

Or Halloween, and basically autumn after all.

I have to admit that for a long while I didn’t really like autumn, and that Ostrava wasn’t a place interesting enough for me, for some reason I couldn’t find the beauty in the city. The people here are awesome, and all the Erasmus related people are far beyond awesome, but still, thanks to the heavy industrialisation, especially in Vítkovice, where I  live, all I could see were the ugly factories and mines. Having translated the word “důl”, which occurs in many tram and bus stops’ names, and means “pit/mine” didn’t help my bad feelings towards the city at all, for it always reminded me that beauty has a price. Not like I didn’t know it anyway, but being reminded of this on a daily basis (at least twice, for I go back and forth between the same stops usually) is a little too much for my fragile soul I believe.

[this is just a part of the industrial area I pass by if I go to the city centre]

Autumn is a little similar for me, it is the annual process of the death of the nature. And even if I know that after a long, cold and white sleep, it will be reborn, it’s a little hard for me to let summer and the green leaves go, and watch as they turn first yellow, then orange and red and brown, and then leave the boughs of the tree, as old people’s hair leave their heads. There are no more flowers, only the colourful leaves paint the ground as they make a protecting carpet for the soil as to help it survive winter. And I think this is partly why I love Scandinavia and all the pines, you can’t see the dying of the evergreens, for they are forever green.

But these feelings changed when I took a walk the other day at the Komenského sady, a beautiful and huge park on the bank of the river Ostravice. That place is wonderful, the grass is green, the trees are enormous, the leaves beautifully paint the ground, and there are many people walking their dogs there, so guess what, it’s a real heaven for me. There I didn’t feel being in the city centre, but being in the nature, surrounded by what I am, living flesh and blood, nature that breathes and what’s heart beats every time I take a step; and not dead brick, metal and plastic.

The other interesting and orange-related thing that happened was the Halloween-party we had at the Marley club yet on the 25^th of October. Even before I came to Ostrava I was super hype, I loved dressing up but for some unknown reason I always caught some cold or other illness that prevented me from going to a Halloween-party, so now I was really careful to stay healthy until the party started. I brought myself costume from home (that I had to fix the sewing of at three different places), and finally we could find a party for ourselves. Two Czech Erasmus-people were waiting for us at the tram stop, however, I was the only one who met them there, the others came later to the place where the party exactly took place. It wasn’t cheap, it cost us 70 CZK, and I have to admit that even though I planned to stay until 3, when the party was planned to end, the music was so horrible that I left at 1:30. Sure, I know, not music but people make the party, but when around 20 people (and like 30-40 more we didn’t know) agree that the party is shit, the chances are that the party is shit. We tried our best to enjoy ourselves, really, and I loved spending my time with those people, who all made real efforts to dress up as Little Red Riding Hoods, Zombies, Vampires, etc… and until the moment we were able to dance for the music, we did so, but now I don’t know what is worse, a Czech DJ or a Latino party… ^^” But even the Czechs disliked it so perhaps it was just that particular DJ who sucked (a lot. really.). But it was funny, Denisa said she really wanted me to live in Poruba (their dormitory) and have a party with them every day.

But Chris, a really adorable Polish guy I’ve already mentioned, asked me to write about this party as well, and I promised him, so here you go man! Next time we should find a better party for ourselves somewhere!