America vs. Czech, part two

i'm now back in czech.

its cold.

snow lines the streets.

in honor of both my native land and my new home, i will list my second installment of "america vs. czech"...in this edition i will focus on what habits i will have to unlearn and things to get used to again...

_ no more driving and talking on my cell phone

_ no more drinking a beer and then driving (czech has a no tolerance policy...no .08 limit, .0001 is a DUI

_ when i hear english in the background i can be surprised again

_ no more wearing my shoes inside of houses

_ back to normal sized everything...meals, cars, coffee*

_ back to communion w. real wine! (i just realized the moral dilemma i have when driving to church...is it illegal to drive home after having had communion?)

_ people will stop at crosswalks for me again...in czech, you are required to stop at a crosswalk for pedestrians, not so in america, so there were multiple times in which my life hung by a thread after assuming czech laws while crossing the street in america

_ back to food with cumin...this has to be the worst spice ever invented and czechs use it in everything! even if it is not intended to be in things it still ends up in it.  there are two regular occurrences here that are quite disappointing. 

one: "hidden cumin".  this occurs most often in one of my favorite lunch treats.  it is a roll with sauce, ham, and melted cheese. mmmm, tasty! but, sometimes the baker does the unthinkable: hiding cumin under the melted cheese.  imagine my shock as i take that first bite into tasty goodness and then, 

what? 

what is that terrible taste destroying my tastebuds? 

oh, no, it can't be.  

it is.

[right fist thrust high in the air]

blast you, cumin, blast you!

two: "unintentional cumin".  since cumin is found on many different savoury baked goods, it can be found everywhere in a bakery.  the problem with this is that the little cumin seed hates staying attached to its home.  you see, cumin is a tyrant.  cumin loves to come in (pun, unintentional) and destroy.  it is a home wrecker.   it is a thief of goodness, robbing from delicious.  so, cumin will often detach itself from its home and find its way into pastries! this is the "unintentional cumin".  imagine my surprise when biting into a tasty blueberry danish and again, that nefarious (yeah, i used a thesaurus for that one) spice has made its way into my mouth.  oh, the despair.  oh, wretched cumin, how i hate you!

*side note_i put on [at least] 10 pounds while in america.  i think it was due to many factors not normally experienced in czech:

1. eating out at every meal

2. in czech it is customary to eat all the food on your plate, which normally isn't an issue, but that compulsion never left when i was in america, so while eating enormous meals i just kept eating and eating and eating...

3. [at least] one starbucks a day...often more