I was starving and really needed to use the loo. The village of Stříbrnice looked like a ghost town, its houses following my every move as I walked down the only street. I looked left and right but couldn't find a spot to relieve myself. A word on a wooden house suddenly caught my attention. I stopped in the middle of the road and read it again: 'Piwo.' That's the Polish word for beer. I took out my Czech phrasebook and looked under the 'Eating and Drinking' section. Sure enough, it's the same word in Czech for beer. I made for the door in long strides. My fingers were inches away from the door-knob when my body just stopped: slumped on the deck beneath me was a massive saint-bernard. The dog stared at me in a disturbing way, like it was taunting me. I almost considered running for my life, but then thought better of it - I would probably not have gotten very far before the dog would jump me, bite my ankle off and run away with it. Instead I took a deep breath, gathered myself and reminded myself that saint-bernards typically save lives and don't bite off human ankles. Under the dog's disturbing stare I reached for the door-knob, carefully opened the door, slid inside the house and quietly closed the door behind me. 
The place seemed to be a rustic restaurant/grocery store: there was a counter on my left, food supplies were stored on shelves behind the counter and a cooler packed with all sorts of drinks stood nearby. An elderly lady sat at the table nearest the door, on my right, and a married couple sat one table down. They looked at me in confusion, perhaps wondering how I managed to walk past the saint-bernard unscathed. I broke the silence by greeting everyone in Czech: 'Dober-Dan.' The elderly lady stood up and walked past me to the counter. I set my gear on the ground, took a seat by a wooden table and leafed through the menu she handed me. As expected: it was all in Czech. What's more (and as expected): the woman didn't speak a word of English, French or Arabic. I took out my Czech phrasebook and looked under 'Typical Local Dishes' section. While I studied my phrasebook she spoke to the married couple. All of a sudden I hear a man's voice address me in perfect American English, "do you speak English?"
That was completely unexpected. Stříbrnice is a village with only a handful of houses, one grocery/restaurant and one church. A disabled person walking with a cane can walk from one end of town to the other in 10 minutes. I figured there'd be no English speakers in the village. At best, someone would know a word or two. Yet, here was someone that addressed me in fluent English. It turns out that this man is a manager in a metal factory in the city of Ostrava, in eastern Moravia. He worked for some time in the United States, has numerous friends and business associates from the United States and travels quite often on business trips to different corners of the world. On weekends he leaves the city with his family to his cottage home where he, his wife and child take things easy: like go out for walks in nature, breathe in the mountain air and enjoy a good lunch at the one restaurant in the nearby village of Stříbrnice. I just happened to be at the same place on a weekend and as they were having lunch.
Naturally, I told him and his wife about my hike and gave them a brief summary of my life. Right away the man related everything to the elderly woman who turned out to be the owner of the establishment. "This is a huge event!" he said, "Here in Stříbrnice they never get to meet anyone as cosmopolitan as you!" He ordered a traditional Czech meal for me: goulash with bread dumpling and beer. After we talked for a while he said I must try a traditional Czech liqueur and ordered two shots of Slivovice - plum brandy. We chugged them down, talked about America, city life, country life, travelling... He mentioned wanting, at one point in his life, to travel just as I'm travelling: "when I was younger I wanted to drop everything and travel - to see the world." He shrugged and gestured with his chin at his wife and child who were in another room, "but now I can't. At least, not like how you're travelling..." We talked some more as I ate. During our conversation I remember covering the left-side of my head with my left hand to keep my hair down because, after being confined in a ski hat for so long, it stuck out to the side like a wing. Half-way through my meal he ordered another two shots of Slivovice. He raised his glass and said: "you will sleep very well after this." We cried out "Nasdroviye!" (cheers!) and chugged them down. Eventually came the time when he and his family had to leave. We shook hands at the front door. I wished him and his wife well, they wished me good luck on my journey and walked out. I sat back down in the now quiet restaurant. As I finished up my meal, it suddenly dawned on me that I don't know the man's name. During the one or two hours we spent talking to each other never once did we ask for the other's name.
*
My head felt really light. I was merry by the time I finished my meal. Before he left, the man with whom I drank two shots of Slivovice helped me book a private room for the night in the grocery/restaurant. Dinner and breakfast were also pre-ordered. I showed the elderly lady the sentence in my phrasebook for the bill so I could pay for lunch. She replied in Czech, paused then walked to her counter and waved at me to come over. I slowly followed. Behind the counter she pointed to her computer monitor. I was expecting to see an electronic bill but instead I recognized the Skype user interface. And the monitor suddenly talked to me: "Hi, this is .... I'm talking to you from Los Angeles. Let me know what you want to say and I'll translate it to Czech." What with my light-headed state of mind, I seriously thought I was trippin'. I gave in to my delusional thoughts, sat down on a stool and chatted with the monitor.
The woman I spoke with is the sister-in-law of the lady that runs the grocery/restaurant. Again I talked about myself and again she remarked that me staying at her sister-in-law's is quite an event as they're not used to receiving cosmopolitan people. She talked about her family, her brother and his daughter who will soon get married. I asked her to convey to her brother and sister-in-law my congratulations. She duly translated my message for them while they stood next to me around the monitor.
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