So far, it’s been more like a vacation, but on the fifth day the euphoria faded and reality set in. It’s like learning to ski, except the first crisis hits not on Day 3 but on Day 5. Cars rumbling past the windows at regular intervals early in the morning. A conspiracy. A building being renovated across the street from another UNES-CO house. Bricks flying through the air, all the way into the middle of the street. Being constantly on the lookout during a kids’ party, because the cars behave like they’re on a racetrack. A hopscotch court that disappears under the tourists’ heels in less than an hour. So we decide to instead herd the kids into a big basin on the sidewalk where they could splash around.

Even the preschool (24 kids and 2 adults) that came to greet us knows how to stand in the street – unlike the dense tour guides and their charges, who stop right in the middle. My husband is already coming up with ideas like going out with Little Josef and a water pistol filled with a mixture of water and vinegar, and to shoot at the tourists who take pictures of us or lean over our duvets to take photographs of the inside of our home, not bothered at all by the fact that we are sitting right there. My husband and I agree that after five days we are both going a little crazy from the constant hustle and bustle, but that we are still hanging in there. We got chewed out by the café next door because they have to pay to take up the sidewalk, while we just keep spreading out. But in the end they guy lent us a table and chairs, and also a funnel for our elderflower cordial. I don’t know – did they notice a drop in customers at the café after we showed up or not?

The man with the cameras calls out familiarly, “Hey there, Šedá-People” and wants to move in for a close-up. But we really don’t need the people at the Biennale to see what we are eating and whether that’s a boy or a girl splashing around in the basin. Local guide Lukáš stops by as well. He wants to support us and organize a BBQ. We’re clearly on the same wavelength, and I can already smell the marinated meat on ŠirokáStreet.

I spend a part of the afternoon getting out of the center in order to carry out the trash and recycling – a trip that takes at least 30 minutes, unless of course you run into foreign visitors looking for the Merlin Hostel, Czechs looking for a cheap place to eat, or kayakers wanting you to take their picture. Marcela the waitress from next door eggs me on, saying I should take the trash all the way to the Children’s Club like everybody else. Along the way, I’d like to buy something to eat, but I look at the prices. Fortunately, my dad calls from across the river to say that he has caught a carp and that it’s already in the freezer. Josef is at an art class, Pepa is grilling, our nephew is playing the guitar with a visiting Silesian street musician humming along, Uncle Jíra is keeping the kids entertained, and I’m crawling around my dad’s attic looking for some toys for the street – bowling is a big hit, but the foam tennis ball flies over the roof of the house and disappears forever.

And then there’s the mysterious scraggly-looking Faldyn – Pepa says he’s a cop – who keeps walking up and down the street 20x a day, and you never what to expect from him.

We get into a confrontation with a local woman who provides tourist accommodations who says that she’s glad the project is here because it will attract more tourists. But I believe that Krumlov definitely doesn’t need any more tourists.

There’s no way we’re going to bed right after the evening cartoons, because even at dusk it feels like it’s high noon. Sleeping with the windows open is out of the question, since the tour groups are still walking around at 9:30pm. And why not, if the town council changed closing time to midnight? And that damn bank machine right in our building – where Little Josef was amazed by the paper receipts that came out of it, which we found really cute – is a gathering place for people who feel the need to converse at any time, day or night. The last straw today, just before lying down to bed, is the nosy tourist looking past the planters with tomatoes right into the darkened room even though I’m sitting here in my nightgown writing these lines.

It’s 10:22pm. Someone is singing by the fountain next to the mirror maze – “To purr like a cat with your eyes closed,” “Life is just a coincidence,” and other classics. Enough fun for one day.

To sum it all up: I’d like to dream of a vacation in a cabin in the woods…

P.S. A note for Kateřina Šedá from Mrs. Peclová: “Separate beds?! What kind of a project is this?!”