The Czech look


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Joined: 04-Aug-05 21:19
Location: Šumperk; the Czech Republic

Postby withoutaim » 26-Apr-06 9:15

To be honest, I can never recognize that he or she is a Czech - and I am myself Czech.
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Location: USA

Postby Paint » 26-Apr-06 13:41

I must look Dutch because many many Czech people asked me where in the Netherlands I was from. Strangely people asked me that when I was living in Central America as well.
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Postby RavenFighter04 » 29-Apr-06 8:49

Hi, my name's Julia. I'm 1/4 Czech and . . . well, a bunch of stuff I don't know about. Czech is the biggest thing, although I'm afraid I don't really look it. :( I'm pretty much the biggest mutt you can think of. 1/4 Czech, 1/128 Choctaw, and you gotta fill in the gaps. :p

Here's a crappy picture of me. I got a Czech nose, at least, and the same color eyes as Great Grandpa Mocherek, who was full blooded Czech (very uncommon surname, it seems). Long and sharp nose, very fine hair, black eyes.


Not the most flattering (or clear) picture. I was messing around with my webcam.
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Postby Kristyna » 02-May-06 8:24

My family and I are all Czech, plus I know many Czechs and I've come to notice over time that Czechs have very defined jaw-lines (which I have myself and love!), and the eyes are usually very beautiful (Hazel or green), and I noticed that Czech women love to dye their hair... There are always exceptions, but these are deffinatly visible in many Czechs! :D
John Rihacek
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Joined: 10-Feb-06 23:59
Location: Sea Girt, NJ

Postby John Rihacek » 02-May-06 19:58

To: Ravenfighter04

Yep, looks like a Czech nose, but fits your face. Don't change anything as
long as you can breath out of it. Part American Indian, you must be from
the Midwest.

Recently on PBS they had a show on African-Americans and how DNA population markers can pretty much indicate the location of our their
ancestors. The vast majority of the famous African Americans in the show
had majority of their DNA markers located in Northern Europe, UK, Germany, and Holland. Similarly in Camden, NJ a local coffee shop was
offering low cost DNA tests to patrons to trace their ancestors' ethnic and
racial heritage.

It appears to be urban myth that most Americans, White or Black, claim
American Indian heritage.

Does anyone know what heritage urban myth prevails in the Czech Republic? Do Czechs with black hair, and eyes ascribe the genetic traits
to the Mongol and Tartar invasions of Europe? The Mongols and Tartars
may be the European romantic equivalent of the American Indian to USA.

John Rihacek, half Czech and half Italian(Sicilian actually)
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Postby RavenFighter04 » 02-May-06 20:52

Most people I know attribute it to Roma or Hungarian influence. Dunno how accurate this is because I don't know what those two nationalities/ethnicities look like.

I can just barely breathe through my nose. :P I have allergies. It causes problems since I'm thinking of continuing in ROTC at Oklahoma State (yes, I am an Oklahoman). It's nice to know that I have at least one or two Czech features. It gives me a heritage I feel I can belong to.

Can you blame Americans for claiming American Indian heritage? I get a few thousand dollars a year from them for school and I have very little Indian blood in me, far less than Czech or even Irish.

Very little of your DNA actually makes up your race, I think. I heard one time that if your DNA was a mile long, then the first six inches would determine your sex. So race wouldn't be much bigger.

My mom and uncles have the higher cheekbones that Czechs tend to have. They're 1/2 Czech.
John Rihacek
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Joined: 10-Feb-06 23:59
Location: Sea Girt, NJ

Postby John Rihacek » 02-May-06 23:06

To Ravenfighter04

Until I had a nasty horse riding accidentin my early twenties, I could not breath out of my Czech nose. All of my Czech relatives had breathing
difficulties like allergies and asthma. After I had a minor corrective surgery on my nose (like Gogel) I was able to breath much better. I had
a cartilage obstruction of one nostril.

Are you allergic to scallops, all of my male Czech relatives, and cousins are highly allergic to scallops but can eat any of the other shell fish.

My Czech relatives all had varying shades of Hazel or Blue eyes, but my
fourth cousins who are also Rihaceks in New Ringold, Pa were shorter
and darker like Hungarians. My Rihacek relatives were Moravians from
a small village on the Moravian/Slovak border called Kuzelov. My Czech
grandmother's relatives were from Kutna Hora, Bohemia.

In my youth, I attended a Hungarian Catholic School in New Brunswick, NJ
where my Hungarian refugee classmates were much smaller than myself.
They tended to be darker too. Hungary at one point controlled most of
Slovakia and part of Moravia, the Czechs considered them rivals for scarce land. Central Jersey has a fair number of Hungarians from 1956
and most tend to be on the short, and dark side. Their restaurants have
great food though, what is left of them.

When did your Czech relative come to the US, and what port of entry did
they arrive in.? Was it Galveston, Texas. All of my relatives came in through the Port of New York, and were promptly shipped to the coal mines of eastern and western Pennsylvania.

Welcome to the site.

John Rihacek
Posts: 11
Joined: 29-Apr-06 8:44

Postby RavenFighter04 » 03-May-06 2:52

My great grandparents came through Ellis Island in NYC, I think. It was in the 1910s. Grandpa had a WWI draft card for the US, so it was before that. They must have put Austrian or Hungarian on their nationality. He worked in Pennsylvania as well, and his little brother died in one of the coal mines. :cry: He later moved to Cleveland. My grandmother was born in Ohio and came to Oklahoma with her husband later in life.

I have other members of my Czech family that had white blonde hair and blue eyes and some that were very dark, almost black. Grandma said that it had to do with what part of Czechoslovakia they came from. Also, the only Mocherek still in Europe that we know of is from a town in Poland called Lapsze Nizne. It looks to be very close to the Moravian/Slovak border. Of course, it's also possible that there is some Hungarian blood in my family that my great grandparents denied for cultural reasons, much like my grandmother adamantly told me as a child that we had no German blood. :P

I'm allergic to ragweed and smoke. Not severe allergies, although I get sinusitis once in a blue moon. No food allergies, but then I'm a woman. I don't know if that has anything to do with it. I doubt it. XD My grandma gets allergies as well and sinus infections.

I'm awful sorry for rambling. I had three finals today.
John Rihacek
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Joined: 10-Feb-06 23:59
Location: Sea Girt, NJ

Postby John Rihacek » 03-May-06 19:41

To Ravenfighter04

Post a response after your finals are over. It has been long a time since I had that headache.

It looks like your grandparents were recruited by labor recruiters that scoured all of eastern Europe in the 1880's for miners for Pennsylvania.
My grandfather, and two of his brothers, and two male cousins came over
in the 1880's and went through Ellis Island. I still have relatives in the Czech Republic with a great aunt making contact with the Kuzelov Rihaceks. You can only find of reference of Kuzelov in The Lonely Planet
edtion of Czech Republic travel books. During WWI, my grandfather was drafted into the American Army too.

My grandfather John Theodore spent 3 years in the coal fields outside of
Jim Thorpe, Pa the location for the 1960's movie "The Molly Maguires" with
Sean Connery. He then moved back to NYC, and married my grandmother who was a Zadrazilova, from Kutna Hora, Bohemia. They
resided in the high 80's of the Yorkville Section of Manhattan by the old
stock yards, present site of the UN Building. Yorkville was a German and
Czech neighborhood up until the 1970's, and is now completely changed.

My father served in the US Army during WWII, and visited his relatives in
the Czech Republic in 1947 before the Communist Spring of 1948. When my parents met and married they moved to NJ as a mid point between the
two families. I still have many relatives in the Pennsylvania coal country,
and I graduated from University of Pittsburgh.

I agree with you that my Czech relatives never had anything kind to say
about the Germans or Hungarians. From my Polish friends, their grandparents never liked the Czechs who they considered to be germanized slavs, and not strong adherents to Catholicism. Most Czech
emigres that I meet in New Jersey profess no religion whatsoever.

In late June, I will be traveling to the Czech Republc with my mother and
sister to the City of Ceska Budeovice (sp) as my mother will be giving
a speech to the Southern Bohemia Medical School. My mother is a medical doctor and has a close collegue who works with her, and is a
former Czech national having fled in 1968. Likewise my brother is a medical doctor, and studied the Czech language in all places, UCLA. My sister and myself did not follow my mother's desires, and work in different

Good Luck on your finals.

John Rihacek
Posts: 11
Joined: 29-Apr-06 8:44

Postby RavenFighter04 » 03-May-06 20:37

I have no finals today, but a term paper and a cell and molecular biology final tomorrow, so I'll just comment on one thing.

Grandpa and Grandma Mocherek were extremely devout Catholics, which may be odd for Czechs. They prayed the Rosary everyday and never missed Mass. In fact, I got my religious heritage from the Czech side of the family (my father's side, Irish/English/Scottish, are all Protestants). Maybe my grandparents were from Slovakia?

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