Crazy Day!

Tim and I don't exactly know how to explain today - the pictures will have to do the talking.  

First, here's a picture from last Sunday after church,
with Katie.  :-)   Forgot to post it on the mountain blog!

We were in the teachers' room this morning, and all of a sudden there was a LOT of loud talking in the hall, then a big group of students rushed in, all wearing black clothing and whiteface masks, and a cameraman was taking movies of it all.  It was absolutely wild!

This was the apparition in the teacher workroom....

The students frantically looked through the teachers' desks, but
mostly in and around the V's class teacher's area.  

The movie cameraman was running all over getting shots of the action!

I went out into the hallway after they left and found out from some of the teachers that it was the V class (Roman numeral 5 - the "seniors"), doing something to get ready for their stuškova, i.e. senior party in November.  Evidently we'll see a video at the party!  :-)

The V class in the hallway

More V's --- they look so spooky!!

And the guys looked like robbers with their black stocking caps and
black nylons over their faces!

Then today, we had heard about a concert tonight at the Jewish synagogue, so when Tim went on his after school run (too cold for me!), he found out that it was at 7:30 and free.  There were TV trucks, trailers, and police cars around, so he figured it was a pretty big deal!  We have been wanting to see the inside of the synagogue, but it's only open for tourists in the summer, so this was a great chance to see it.  We went to a restaurant that is right across an alley from there, and we enjoyed a delicious meal first.  People started lining up before 7:00, so we waited in line until the doors opened.  The synagogue was unused for many years after WWII, but now a restoration effort is underway.  It's still in pretty tough shape, but you can see it's a beautiful structure with remains of some ornate decorations.  

The exterior of the Jewish synagogue in Liptovsky Mikuláš

The synagogue's interior, set up for the TV taping with lights,
cameras, etc.  There were about 100 candles lit all around the
perimeter of the stage area.  

The beautiful, high domed ceilings had some ornate paintings

The musical performance turned out to be quite interesting!  It was definitely alternative and very unusual!!  The individual performers were extremely talented, and they were really creative --- lots of experimentation with unusual sounds on all the instruments, much improvisation, and it was unlike anything we'd ever experienced before! 

The pianist used cloth, metal, leather, and I'm not sure what else inside the piano to alter the timbres.
The violinist also sang/vocalised in sort of scat syllables and other animal-like sounds.
The man in the light suit played a large recorder-type woodwind as well as the soprano sax.
The trumpet was an altered instrument, and many different mutes were also used.  

Walking home after the concert we were laughing about what a crazy day it was - stuff we never would have believed we'd be experiencing.  Oh my goodness!!  It's a wild world!   :-)