Warm Welcome (and rum)

Our Christmas was a quiet family day overall since it was just the four of us. However, we were invited for 4:30 tea at the home of our landlords, Marie and Josef Pekarek. They have the second floor of the building next to ours. From previous readings on Czech customs we took our shoes off as soon as we entered. While this would seem logical in any country it is often overlooked in the U.S. yet apparently a given here. They had a wonderful spread of breads, cookies and other treats set out on a table by the sofa. To the girls' delight they also had small presents for each of the girls under their Christmas tree for them to open. With our tea I was offered a spot of rum. I had never heard of rum with tea and didn't even realize rum was a drink common to Czechs. To be polite, that's the only reason of course, I accepted; tea and rum are wonderful combination it turns out. With continuous encouragement to eat all their remaining food I tried to consume as much bread and cookies as I could manage.

Josef speaks relatively good English and Marie's is not quite as strong; on occasion she and Jospeh would work something out in a mix of Czech and English before they would continue a conversation. We chatted a lot about the kids, my work and began chatting about their apartment; a large wonderfully decorated apartment. There were many beautiful paintings on the walls, mostly of nature scenes. Those were all originals handed down through Marie's family. We learned at this time that Marie's grandparents had built the two buildings they now own. While I was curious to ask what happened with the buildings with the entry, and in 1989, removal of communists from power, that's a subject we can discuss at another tea.

One of the reasons I selected this apartment was that Josef and Marie was so kind, so eager to help, and seemed to take so much pride in the apartments they owned. In spending more time with them we realized that they are good people who seem to take an interest in our lives and adore our children. Having such a warm Christmas welcome from our landlords, I should just say neighbors, certainly helps us feel at home here.

Note on the rum: after Googling Czech rum while writing this post I found that rum tuzernsky is a very common Czech product, with history dating back to a traditional mid-19th century product from the Austrio-Hungarian Empire. It is referred to as tuzernsky, loosely translated as domestic, rum to distinguish it from Caribbean rums, real Rum, made from distilled sugar-cane. Rum tuzernsky, also referred to as Tea Rum, is made from potatoes or sugar beets with added rum flavor.