I got up at around 9:00. Until noon I was on the PC. At 10:30 I texted Martin that I was awake. Among other things, I turned on G+ for the first time in ages and posted 3 updates there. I was surprised that it is pretty lively again :-). Then I started getting ready and took all 4 books (2 mine and 2 my mom’s), 2 phones and 1 wallet. I left the house at 12:48 and was somewhat out of breath the whole way. Toward the end I had to run to make it – walking 4.5 km in 45 minutes is probably not exactly easy.
The rest inside
Interestingly, yesterday I walked the same route, just shorter and back again (6.3 km in total) in 58 minutes, and I was not out of breath or sweaty at all; on the contrary, it completely recharged me. At the Ropice Zastavka and Trinec Konska stations, passengers got off on the second track.
That is why first the train from Cesky Tesin arrived, then some Inter-, Euro- or Ex train passed through, and only then did my local train arrive. Of course I was reading the book “Life After Death in the Teachings of World Religions” in case I could not renew it. You see, at the library it works like this: I write to the e-mail address they send me asking whether I can renew the books, and they reply whether I can or not. But I had not sent them any e-mail.
Eventually the train arrived, I do not even know when. All I know is that in Cesky Tesin I bought a ticket to Ostrava Stodolni and paper tissues, which I had left at home again. Luckily they cost only 3 CZK there, so their constant purchasing will hopefully not ruin me. I also let 2 people go ahead of me – first a woman got ahead of me when someone walked away and she reacted faster than I did. But before she finished buying, I gave up and walked away without the tissues. I quickly turned 180 ° though, and again right in front of the kiosk some guy cut in front of me, one I had not even heard coming.
So I told myself, no worries, at least I did a “good deed” today, I let 2 people go ahead of me and I am even glad about it. I got to the platform at around 13:55, I went there right after the purchase, and the *Ivanka* train, packed to the brim, arrived at 14:05. I was the first to the door and so I grabbed a great seat :P. It was a semi-fast train that did not stop, for example, at Ostrava Bartovice:
I started reading the book quickly again, but there was no way I would finish it even by Ostrava Stodolni, so I got off at Ostrava Stred, where they have a waiting room (even 2 of them), and finished it there at around 15:30. In the meantime I went to ask whether the next 2 trains heading to the main station also stop at Ostrava Stodolni. Some girl was buying a ticket there and was apparently very disappointed, because she kept asking “is there really nothing earlier” and so on. I do not know where she was going. She was probably so upset that she left behind her employment contract.
The lady behind the counter noticed it first and called “miss” twice, but the girl kept walking. So I tried. I called “miss” once. She kept walking. So I called her the same way once more. This time she turned around and I could tell her she had forgotten something :). Then I texted Martin about where we would meet, told him I was at Ostrava Stred, and offered to take the train at 15:26 to Ostrava Stodolni and meet there, or to walk to the library. He replied right away that we would meet at the library.
Then I also photographed the last 2 chapters of the book (see the previous 2 posts on this blog), although clumsily at times, because my paw covered the last 2 pages and sometimes the photo angle is bad. I also got off at Ostrava Stred because I did not know exactly where the Dum Jindrich building is, even though I had been there once before. On the way I took a few photos of Nova Karolina, and I also waited 2 hours at 2 traffic lights; luckily the whole of 28 rijna Street is pedestrian-friendly.
There was just some accordion player playing, with 3 people cheering him on, and police officers were already arriving and heading straight for him. I reached the library at about 15:53; I had just looked at the clock and there was a message that Martin was upstairs in the study room. I looked up the cookbook by Magdalena Dobromila Rettigova in the catalog, found out they had it only at the main branch, 2 copies available, filled out a request slip and gave it to the lady, whom I told about my problem (I had not written to them and still wanted to renew a book).
As for the renewal, they sent me to a colleague, and put my slip into the book lift. I returned the 3 books to the very nice colleague and she renewed the one I had asked for. Then I went to find Martin, and he told me that Grudl was supposed to have an interview in Computer magazine about Nette. Unfortunately I did not ask him whether the issue he had borrowed was the current one or not. We headed to some French restaurant and I did most of the talking, mainly about the things I had read in that book. But then Martin asked me how I personally imagine life after death.
I kept starting with one thing and ending up somewhere completely different until, after a few minutes, Martin stopped me and repeated the question. In the end it came out that after death I would like to meet God and have an experience like an NDE. And then I would leave it up to God to judge me, to weigh my sins and my “goodness“/good deeds, and to deal with me justly, according to the punishment He has given to others like me. I cannot go telling God what punishment or reward I would give myself.
The only thing I would not want is some eternal hell and damnation. By then, though, we were already inside the French restaurant. I will not write here what Martin had to eat (I will only say that I could not stand that much sweetness; maybe (really maybe) it does him good as a diabetic, and besides, I am not a fan of apple with cinnamon 😀 ), I had chicken pieces with pineapple, tartar sauce and fries. To drink I had Cappy strawberry juice – a classic. I just could not decide between apricot and strawberry, so I told the waitress that I did not mind which one she brought. From the books we moved on to PTD, to Mirak, to preachers, and we agreed that Martin would someday pass me sermons and lectures by Dominik Duka, since apparently he can present the Bible clearly and understandably.
For example, I told Martin that what struck me about the religions was that the newer the religion, the more information there was in the book. Take the difference between the Jewish Old Testament, where everything revolved mainly around the desert, the rules for sacrificial feasts and a single nation – the Israelites – and then the Christian New Testament, which was better because it contained lots of stories, although I think Jesus performed many more miracles than those in the New Testament, and not every miracle needs to be told almost 4 times :).
But no worries. If you take, for example, the Baha’i faith This link is now just a fossil from the days when people still trusted the internet. The domain has switched off its wifi for good., its sacred writings say far more about the universe, metaphysics, God Himself, the rules of life and so on. The book covered 7 religions (Christianity, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Zoroastrianism and Baha’i), and Baha’i is the only one whose sacred writings I would read immediately if I had them in Czech, because the samples, excerpts and fragments I read thrilled me.
It is nice that the Bible is focused on practice, but someone who does not understand it, like me, then does not grasp the Bible. But it seems to me that Baha’i plus Christianity = the best possible combination :). On the other hand, Buddhism seemed like complete nonsense to me. Islam, in turn, is far too harsh (toward those living here on earth), and the other religions are unknown or foreign to me.
At the end I offered Martin to pay for him if he wanted. But he did not want that, so he paid himself and, like last time, left a 15 CZK tip (280/265 CZK). I also told Martin about the Chinvat Bridge, taught by Zoroastrianism – though the same bridge also appears in Islam and other religions. It works like this: after death a person comes before God, who lets them cross the bridge. The bridge arches over an unimaginably foul-smelling river of utterly black liquid.
Depending on how many sins a person committed in their life, the bridge narrows or widens for them. The least tainted cross by the widest bridge and are even guided by angels. Sinners will have to crawl across the bridge, which is sharp as a razor. For some, even crawling will not help, and as they crawl, demons will leap out of the river and drag them down. And believe me, you will certainly be nervous, especially when God shows you your sins and mistakes and you also see His infinite glory, greatness and power.
And there were hundreds of other really interesting things in that book :). We walked back, and Martin once again checked for me when my train was leaving and whether it was direct or not. Eventually we got to Janackova Street by the FIO bank, where we both got our bearings and knew where we were. In front of the station Martin prayed for me. That reminded me of another thing from the book – that some religions teach that after death a person can make progress only through prayer – either their own or someone else’s. There is no other way.
Based on those prayers, God then grants grace, abundance and blessing. Then we went to the platform, where we had about 20 minutes before the train. A freight train to Frydek-Mistek passed, a freight train from Frydek-Mistek, then a local train from Frenstat pod Radhostem at 17:54, then a local train to Frydek-Mistek at 17:50, and 4 minutes later the semi-fast train to Cesky Tesin. I was already stressing at the :50 one that it was mine, not knowing that 4 minutes later I had a direct train to Tesin. Before boarding I said goodbye to Martin and at my request we even hugged :), aww, lovely :D. Back to that train.
Not only was it semi-fast, it also flew like a dragon, and before a few minutes and a few stops had passed, we were in Havirov. Above all, it was a classic pantograph unit, my beloved type of train, the one I rode so much to Jablunkov. I just managed to call my mom to tell her I had the cookbook for her and read a few pages of the book I had renewed. There were more stops to Cesky Tesin, but it was still fine. This was the train:
In my hometown I went to the church, but I was told that the pastor was not home and would only be back in the evening. It was already almost 18:00, but evening starts at 19:00 and I did not feel like waiting there, so I said I would send him an e-mail. On the way back I called my mom to ask whether someone could pick me up.
Someone did, except that the car’s brake pads were grinding terribly; they had just been replaced, and when we arrived I said that at this rate the tire would soon catch fire. However, I was told that they just were not broken in yet and that it would be OK, which I do not believe. And at home my mom looked through the cookbook and found that she does not understand it :D. I could remember more things, but I cannot write it all out here (because I type slowly on the PC and cannot sacrifice half a day to it) or give everything away.
Some photos from the trip:
The website parked and threw its keys into the river.