Hi, all... Both sets of my great great grandparents, on my mother's side, emigrated to the USA in 1871 from South Bohemia and settled in a village, which they founded, Veseli, Minnesota. The village was named after Veselí nad Lužničí. I located the birth homes of one set of my great great grandparents. One home is in Drahotěšice and the other is in Pelejovice. My cousins, to this day, still live in the home in Pelejovice. We were ignorant of each other's existence until 2004. My ancestors hailed from those two villages, but also from Dolní Bukovsko, and Neplachov. The people who founded Veselí, Minnesota all came from the area from České Budějovice to Dolní Bukovsko to Veselí nad Lužničí to Lomnice nad Lužničí. Veselí, Minnesota was 100% Czech and settled by people with one common Czech accent and style of speaking. So, my mother, to this day, speaks with the sound and style of a South bohemian Czech. She has never been to Českoslvensko/Čech Republik. I was the first in the family line to not be 100% Czech, as my father was not Czech. I heard much Czech as a child but I did not begin learning it until I was an adult. I have been to the Czech Republic seven times, staying each time 2 weeks to a month. Czechs tell me that I speak Czech without an accent, but I am very confusing, because I dress American and look "American." That bewilders people who don't know me. I need to perfect my grammar and vocabulary. The Czech language and Czech people are so close to my heart, that when I hear Czech spoken by a Czech, I actually smell the aroma of my grandma's poppy seed koláče. A proto jsem napsál... Čeština voní jako mák. Dan
After two months living in the Czech Republic, I got to where I could pick out a lone American in a crowd without hearing them speak a word. There are certain types of clothes that Americans wear, and a certain way that Americans walk and otherwise carry themselves that is very un-Czechlike. I've heard it said that smell is the sense most strongly associated with memories, that is in the sense of recalling old memories.
Oh, Dan, you must have been wearing white sneakers! :lol: I used to look around on the metro and the only person wearing white sneakers was me (from the US). Not sure what it is about the white shoes, but I hardly ever saw them on a Czech person.
Yep, that's one big tipoff. Also jeans are not as common in the Czech Republic, and the cut of the American jeans is different. T-shirts and shorts, plus sandals with no socks (we've already hashed the sock and sandal topic in Czech here). Certain hair styles stick out, and of course as I've said, there's the American swagger.
Dear all, Thanks for your insight and input. However, you are addressing something other than what I meant or said. I do look American, and I know that. I have no question as to why that is, it simply is. What I meant to say, my friends, is that Czechs are bewildered when they hear me speak Czech because I was born in the USA and learned Czech in the USA. I have grammar problems, yet I do speak quite well with hardly any accent at all. Many Czechs I have met take that as a compliment and seem touched. Sorry if I was unclear. Dan
No, nothing you said was confusing. I was merely pointing out why you would stand out as looking American. Kudos to your parents, grandparents, great-grandparents and great-great-grandparents for continuing a language tradition so well for so many generations. That's quite a feat! It is definitely worthy of compliments from anyone, especially Czechs. Czech grammar definitely has its peculiarities and takes lots of work--I'm still working on it!
