#OPAVA

[hlas-lidu]

ve kterém českém městě aktuálně reziduji:

praha

br(n)o

ostrava

opava

olomouc

plzeň

idk další

[postcard-from-the-past]

Greeting from Troppau, modern-day Opava, Czechia

Austrian vintage postcard

[detournementsmineurs]

"Sylvester II (Gerbert d'Aurillac) et le Diable" d'Antoine Wiertz" de Martin d'Opava dans le "Chronicon Pontificum et Imperatorum" (circa 1460) présentés à la conférence “Les Vampires dans l'Art” par Marine Chaleroux - Historienne d'Art - de l'association Des Mots et Des Arts, octobre 2023.

[witekspicsoldpostcards2]

TROPPAU -> now OPAVA, CZECH REP.

[ingisong]

The devil in Opava:

[liberte-news]

MOL CUP: Slovácko padlo v Kroměříži, ZLÍN opět udolal Opavu

MOL Cup přinesl překvapení v třetím kole, kdy prvoligové týmy Slovácko a Liberec vypadly. Dukla, Teplice a další ligová mužstva postupují.

FOTBAL | Domácí pohárová soutěž MOL Cup má za sebou první zápasy třetího kola, do kterého se zapojily i týmy, které si v minulém soutěžním ročníku vybojovaly účast v evropských soutěžích. POHÁR PRO VÍTEZE MOL CUPU Jako první z druholigových týmů do třetího kola zasáhla pražská Dukla, která postoupila přes Hořovice po vysoké výhře 6:0. Středeční program nabídl také překvapení na úkor…

[witekspicsoldpostcards]

TROPPAU - now OPAVA, CZECH REP.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

A Full Plankton Moon: What glows in the night? This night featured a combination of usual and unusual glows. Perhaps the most usual glow was from the Moon, a potentially familiar object. The full Moon's nearly vertical descent results from the observer being near Earth's equator. As the Moon sets, air and aerosols in Earth's atmosphere preferentially scatter out blue light, making the Sun-reflecting satellite appear reddish when near the horizon. Perhaps the most unusual glow was from the bioluminescent plankton, likely less familiar objects. These microscopic creatures glow blue, it is thought, primarily to surprise and deter predators. In this case, the glow was caused primarily by plankton-containing waves crashing onto the beach. The image was taken on Soneva Fushi Island, Maldives just over one year ago. Credit & Copyright: Petr Horálek / Institute of Physics in Opava Explanation 

[Robert Scott Horton]

* * * *

“Those roads were echoes and footsteps, women, men, agonies, resurrections, days and nights, half dreams and dreams, every obscure instant of yesterday and of the world’s yesterdays, the firm sword of the Dane and the moon of the Persian, the deeds of the dead, shared love, words, Emerson and snow and so many things. Now I can forget them. I reach my center, my algebra and my key, my mirror. Soon I will know who I am.”

— Jorge Luis Borges, In praise of shadow

[alive on all channels]

[leapingmonkeys]

Astronomy Picture of the Day - Comet Pons-Brooks in Northern Spring

[thefreelancehistorywriter]

Silesian Sainte-Chapelle: St Thomas Becket’s Chapel, Piast Castle, Racibórz ~ Guest Post by Katarzyna Ogrodnik-Fujcik

Henry IV the Righteous in Codex Manesse. Photo courtesy of Wikimedia Commons ‘’Will no one rid me of this turbulent priest?’’ The words of King Henry II still echo ominously through the centuries and remain one of the best known in English history. The murder of Thomas Becket at the steps of his own cathedral shocked the Christian world. Henry II himself was deeply shaken. He may have not given…

[apod]

2024 March 11

A Full Plankton Moon Credit & Copyright: Petr Horálek / Institute of Physics in Opava

Explanation: What glows in the night? This night featured a combination of usual and unusual glows. Perhaps the most usual glow was from the Moon, a potentially familiar object. The full Moon's nearly vertical descent results from the observer being near Earth's equator. As the Moon sets, air and aerosols in Earth's atmosphere preferentially scatter out blue light, making the Sun-reflecting satellite appear reddish when near the horizon. Perhaps the most unusual glow was from the bioluminescent plankton, likely less familiar objects. These microscopic creatures glow blue, it is thought, primarily to surprise and deter predators. In this case, the glow was caused primarily by plankton-containing waves crashing onto the beach. The image was taken on Soneva Fushi Island, Maldives just over one year ago.

∞ Source: apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap240311.html

[a-sock-in-a-sandal]

What is happening in Czechia right now - heavy rains and floods

So as a Czech citizen I felt like saying something about it here so here you go, it's mostly my experiences and some official data.

For context, the first week of September 2024 (2nd to 8th) in Czechia was a burning hell - the temperatures were around 30°C or even above for the entire week. Some schools even ended their classes earlier because of the hot weather - they usually ended before afternoon when the weather was worst. So when we found out that everything will stop the next week, we got happy. We were told the temperatures are gonna get under 20°C, sometimes above, but usually under, it's gonna rain and it's gonna get windy.

All of it happened. The first few days of this week (plus maybe the weekend of the previous one) were chilly, windy, and cloudy - it did sometimes rain, but usually only for a few hours a day. Sooner it started to rain more, for more hours a day, somewhere even for the entire day.

But then the Czech government scheduled an emergency meeting because they were worried about the rains - and they had a reason to. Such rains could cause major floods that already happened in Czechia twice. So they didn't want to waste any time on preparing.

The weather progressively got worse - in my region, it rained the whole day for like three days and it is still raining now. The wind is strong and cold and the temperatures are very chilly. I live right next to a stream at the lowest part of my village in lowlands and the water has risen a few meters (like 2 or so).

The worst situation is in Moravia, which is where I live, but where I am it is still good, only heavy rains and the water levels rising but not as much as to cause a trouble - however there is a few places in my village where it is completely underwater, but not anyone's house or cellar. But Northern Moravia/Silesia is flooded, especially parts like Jeseníky and Opava. The more it gets on west the better it is, mostly a few regions on the north-west are the safest ones. It is usually the Karlovarský/Ústecký and maybe a piece of Plzeňský kraj that is safe.

Most events got cancelled and/or delayed due to bad weather and flood warnings. However the schools are still opened, and it's kind of a meme between students that "we're gonna kayak into our schools on Monday!" Electricity stopped working at many places, including my village. When I woke up today there were firefighters in my street but nobody knows why but I heard that someone's cellar might be flooded.

Our Czech subreddit r/Czech is "flooded" (I couldn't help myself) with maps of flood situation and tips on what to do in case you have e.g. an animal in floodplains. If you switch on the news channel ČT24, you get 24/7 segments and reports from different parts of Czechia, interviews with meteorologists, politicians talking about it and such. Most channels stream as normal but there are some emergency broadcasts. Social media is filled with it.

However, there is a group of mostly older people who are those old conspirators and are strongly against our government because their favourite politician isn't the prime minister (the situation is more complicated but that's enough for this), and they claim that all this is fake and "it's actually to keep people at home before elections (there are ones to happen soon) so they can't meet and talk about the politics", or that "it's a punishment for sending help to Ukraine" (Czechia has sent a lot of help there and these people are mad for some reason) and such. It makes me sick because some people already died and many are injured and many homes can be destroyed.

Czechia has already had two major floods in the near past - in 1997 there were ones in Prague and in 2002 over the entire Czechia. They were catastrophic, people died and were injured and lost homes. So that's why everyone is scared and the government tries very hard to keep us safe.

I already shared my experience, but I just talked on a group chat with my friends from different villages in my region so here goes what I found:

Electricity is out on most places because it is flooded near some important place for electricity

Plenty of places are flooded with like 10-20 cm water, people can still walk in it and some cars drive in it

A football pitch right next to a stream in my village is completely flooded, only the nets are visible

Plenty of bridges are closed and plenty of them are also underwater

We're debating whether or not our school is gonna be closed since most of us take bus to school and we don't know if it would be able to arrive, plus electricity isn't working in the town where we have school, but we'll still see, we didn't receive any news about the school closing

It's starting to get clear (less cloudy) as I'm typing this but I hope it'll get better, the rain is not as heavy as it was

I just hope it's gonna get better ❤️ I'll update you tomorrow or even today if anything major happens

[world-beauty]

Mars in Taurus

Credits: Petr Horalek, Institute of Physics in Opava

[francis-ford-kofola]

Pokud vás taky štve situace ohledně Trumpa a Ukrajiny a jste tuhle neděli (23. února) v Praze, od 15:00 se koná demonstrace na Staroměstském náměstí.

Pokud byste chtěli na demonstraci, ale nejste zrovna v Praze, konají se ten den akce i v jiných městech (Brno, Olomouc, Hradec Králové, Nový Jičín, Opava a Turnov).

[witekspicsoldpostcards2]

TROPPAU -> now OPAVA / CZECH REP.

[sametrashpile]

Bringing this TSN feature from Radek Faksa's draft year back (especially since the old YT link is now dead) on the night of his Round One Game 7 game winning goal.

From Wikipedia: “Faksa began his ice hockey career in his birth city of Opava, although at age 11, his single mother was struggling to fund his hockey career. Faksa and his family received an offer from HC Oceláři Třinec for Faksa to play in Třinec’s system, whereupon the Faksas accepted the offer; Faksa moved alone to Třinec, where he lived by himself in a hotel paid for by his team until the age of 17.”

tl;dr Radek Faksa deserves every wonderful thing in the world.