How Anička from Zrádci fell asleep in her coffin at Křivoklát. And also about burying hamsters.

Anička Kadlecová from The Traitors is recording a podcast with Funeral Guides Noemi Svobodová and Sandra Šindelářová.

The Traitors! Are you watching?

If you've ever played Mafia (or any of its variations, including Among Us), the concept will feel quite familiar: players complete missions during the day, and at night, the traitors eliminate one of the players. The next day, along with the mission, players vote on who the traitor might be—and thereby eliminate one of "their own."

The Traitors generally revolves around the theme of death. In the second season, players even lay in coffins, were locked inside them, and had flowers thrown into their graves by others... basically experiencing everything we will all face one day... except they get to stand back up out of that grave.

Anička Kadlecová, whom we invited onto the podcast to share her experience on The Traitors, reportedly fell asleep while locked inside her coffin at Křivoklát.

The Traitors is a game, of course: the crew is there with you, and when you lie down in a coffin, you don't do it knowing you've died, but knowing you don't want to be voted out. But when the lid of your coffin really does close and you are truly eliminated, it actually symbolizes death.

Did the crew take their biggest fears into account—like claustrophobia?

How aware were the players of the symbolism of a game about life and death?

Over the course of two weeks, the players live out a whole miniature life without knowing when it will end. That's why they dive into everything fully, without hesitation, just to avoid being eliminated.

How is it that when we have perhaps ninety years instead of two weeks, but with the exact same uncertainty of whether we'll be here tomorrow, we become so comfortable?

And we can continue with the analogies: each of us is convinced of our own uniqueness, but even when we are eliminated from the game, the story goes on. And it is no different in death.

A summer episode about The Traitors (beware of spoilers!), about (im)mortality, and about how a game of life and death teaches a person more about themselves than they might perhaps want to know... also touching on burying hamsters and cryonics! Funeral Guides Noemi Svobodová and Sandra Šindelářová speak with Anička Kadlecová.

Listen on Spotify and other platforms.

Vojta Náprstek: Threats of being boiled alive, the beginnings of cremation, and a spectacular funeral at a railway station. With Pavla Hubáčková from the Náprstek Museum.

Pavla Hubáčková from the Náprstek Museum talks with Sandra Šindelářová in a podcast about the funeral of Vojta Náprstek.

How did we go from threats of being boiled alive to becoming a cremation superpower?

One hundred and fifty years ago, burials took place solely in the ground here. And everyone strongly opposed cremation.

Today, over 80% of funerals in our country are cremations. And yet everyone opposes human composting, also known as teramation. Who knows what it will look like in a hundred years?

Do you know the story of the person who actually pushed for cremation here? Vojta Náprstek was not only one of the first feminists (he founded the American Ladies Club, where he promoted education for women), but also one of the first Czechs to be cremated despite the opposition of both the church and society.

His decision was backed by science: it was supposedly more hygienic, more economical, and cleaner—at a time when graves were regularly robbed and dead bodies sold to young medical students for practice.

We talked (not only) about him with Pavla Hubáčková from the Náprstek Museum in our podcast, and if you also want to know how we got from threats about boiled bullets to the majority choosing cremation, be sure to listen to us!

And definitely make sure to visit the Náprstek Museum this April, where his urn is on display again (as per his wish)!