Why does a 'c' make a 'th' sound?

So I have been pondering the matter of language recently, having in the last six weeks been spoilt with material. Examples served up in my ponderings like some lavish international linguistic buffet.

On the metro to Ruzyne airport in Prague this morning, I was staring over a girl's shoulder, which doesn't sound as rude as it might in peak commuting periods, you don't get much choice. Over the shoulder, up under the armpit....

She was reading a novel, and it was all in Czech. Which just looks nothing like English. Is it the romantic languages, like Italian and Spanish? And German, I don't think that's romantic, it doesn't sound it when spoken. But, those languages all look familiar, even if they don't sound it when spoken by a native. This book did not look like anything i have read. And it just confounded me, sent me spiralling out on a weird out of body thought pattern about how she was doing something so utterly natural. Those foreign jumbled up symbols were being translated for her as she read, into, I don't know, it could have been some tacky Sweet Valley High equivalent.

I have learnt to walk around with a permanent apologetic or full beam smile on my face. Hmmm, actually I have probably learnt, harder, that sometimes five foot three and a bit, 50 odd kilos, and blonde hair needs to be counter balanced with a penetrating, suspicious glare. But when communicating normally the smile usually trumps. And "thank you" is obvious in any language. "Hey baby, wanna come for a ride" in Italian was also fairly self explanatory. "You are not listening to me" in rather vehement Italian, has also been dished up on my plate. A nice young Moravian boy I befriended on the train from Vienna to Prague taught me hello and goodbye in Czech, but in five hours I was spellbound by his life, how much he has seen and travelled, his gentle perspective on humanity and by the time we bashfully shook hands and parted ways, him to his mother's dumplings and me to a veritable banquet for a fraction of what we had been paying up to Prague, well, i had forgotten how to say those two words. And felt utterly rewarded for overcoming any language difficulties we had encountered.

The thing that I love the most, is that look, reflected on both parties, when you manage to communicate in two different languages, you in yours, them in theirs, and still come to some happy conclusion. Like the Czech man who gave me directions to the departures terminal at the airport when I made a swooping upwards gesture with my hand. That look. A little bit of pride, a little bit of phew, and a lot of, See. We aren't all that different really.