Valašské Klobouky, a town in Czechia of about 5000 inhabitants, can trace its roots back to the Fourteenth Century. The word klobouky means “hats”, and the town is apparently named after the distinctive hats worn by the settlers called Valachians, who were shepherds — though there is a legend that the name came from using a hat to mark the location of a spring. It’s a well preserved old town with striking architectural antiques, including the old Town Hall, dating to the Sixteenth Century, which now serves as a museum. An altogether pleasant community to spend a month volunteer teaching at a little school.

Having returned to Valašské Klobouky from our hiking/ camping getaway, we have what’s left of the weekend to recuperate and prepare for another week of volunteering. The man who comes every morning during the week to light the furnace does not show up on Sunday (at least not this week), so we are left with no hot water for the shower or the radiators. (We can heat water on the stove for a bath, and we have a little electric heater in our room.)

But at one point, a family arrives toting jugs to fill with water. It’s evidently common in this community for some people to live off-grid, and it seems some of them have an arrangement to obtain water at the school. We ask the father if he knows how to light the furnace, and he does. It doesn’t burn quite as well as normally, but it works for our purposes. This furnace is a complicated state-of-the-art contraption that takes some orientation to be able to use it, and we still don’t know the sorcerer’s secrets.

On Monday, we’re back to assisting in the classrooms. The students have some fascinating arts and crafts projects, and we also have a theatrical session with the lower grades (1, 2, and 3), culminating in teaching them to act out The Boy Who Cried Wolf. Despite being in a rather cramped classroom, it goes off quite swimmingly.

On Wednesday there’s another theatre session with the older students. Trudging up to the town square a few blocks away, we catch a bus to the town of Brumo-Bylnice, where the performing arts center is located. After doing some fun theatre exercises, we get down to rehearsing the performance of a story that will be presented at an upcoming event.

The female lead we have cast is outstanding — quite possibly the best student performer we’ve ever worked with. A real natural. The others are also quite capable. And yet the rehearsal doesn’t go as well as last time; some of the students are sulky and uncooperative, and we don’t know why. As we are soon to learn, there is some drama happening offstage as well as onstage.

By the time we get back to school, the flame in the furnace has died down, and we still don’t know how to reignite the sucker. It’s a complicated state-of-the-art contraption that requires some special mojo that we still haven’t been taught. Along comes a fellow named Jan (he tells us to just call him John) who is the one tasked with cleaning up the dishes, pots, pans, and utensils that are left from the ordeal of making lunch for all the students and staff. We ask him if he knows the lore of the furnace, and he does, so he gives it a go. He’s not quite as adept as the regular furnace wizard, but at least it works enough to get us by for the night.

John is an interesting character, an “old hippie”, he styles himself, and he means that literally– once upon a time, he actually spent a couple of years living communally in Arizona and New Mexico. And while the local community seems heavily steeped in the cultures of Catholicism and Seventh Day Adventism, he is a practicing Buddhist. Tonight he’s feeling out of sorts, and asks Dennis’s help in cleaning a large pot. And he gets it.

The next morning, we have a session with some younger students who have not had us before. They are at the other campus of the school, located in the log cabin complex that is part of a historic site. (We are able to peek inside the old home, where a family is now living, and which still contains antique fireplace/ stoves.) The original plan is to have an outdoor class, featuring a theatre-oriented session, but the rain has put a damper on that scheme. So instead we initially go into the classroom and talk to them about our volunteering activities, the places we’ve been, where we come from, and so on, while holding up a large map. And of course we answer their questions.

Following that, we all traipse over to a nearby gym where we hold the theatrical part. The kiddos have a ball and do some very good stuff. Altogether, a smashing success.

When we return to the main campus, one of the teachers requests a conference with us. Turns out that the girl we’ve cast as the female lead (the one who’s so incredibly good in the part) in the little show we’re putting together has been exhibiting some concerning behavioral problems. Specifically, she’s been guilty of bullying and general arrogance; and the teachers feel that she should not be allowed to continue in the role, because it’s essentially rewarding her. Now we haven’t observed any issue with her at all, but then this might explain why the other students have been so sullen — they resent having her in that part when she’s being such a pain. For the time being, we’re told that, while the teachers think it would be a good idea to take her out of the spotlight, they’ll leave the final decision to us. And after mulling it over, we finally decide that we’d rather give her a chance to improve her behavior, and not make her seem like an outcast, which might cause further behavior problems. (Ultimately, our decision will be overruled, but we’ll get to that in due course.)

The next day, Friday, we have another opportunity to witness Snoezelen (“SNOO-zuh-len”), a term combining two Dutch words meaning “to sniff/explore” and “to doze/relax,” It’s a therapeutic approach developed in the Netherlands in the 1980s, especially for children on the spectrum, that uses a special room, or Controlled Multi-Sensory Environment (MSE), filled with lights, sounds, textures, and scents to provide calming or stimulating sensory experiences. This classroom features lava lamps, dim lighting, a parachute-like canopy, colored stones, and other sensory engagements. School was never like this in our day.

Some of the girls at the school (not just in Snooezelen) have toted along overnight gear so they can have a weekend sleepover at the school for someone’s birthday. Seems like a good time for us to make an exit. Fortunately, we have a good prospect for a place to exit to.

The school director has a rustic cabin near where she lives, a few miles out of town. And she’s invited us to take advantage of it over the weekend, to get away from the hustle and bustle of small town Valašské Klobouky. It probably means an entire weekend without Internet; but hey, we’re tough, and we’re confident we’ll survive.

Events occurred: 3/9-14/2025