Wordless Wednesday: Non-Prague CZ Edition

Plzeň, April 2009

Plzeňský Prazdroj

Katedrála svatého Bartoloměje

the view from St. Bartholomew's tower

Moravský Krumlov, June 2010

Mikulov, June 2010

Český Krumlov, October 2010

Wordless Wednesday: Praha

on the castle end of Karlův most

somewhere in Old Town

St Vitus Cathedral

St George's Basilica, in the castle complex

the Museum of Communism

the art deco Palác Adria

Old Town and Petřín Hill from the clock tower

an old market hall

from across the Vltava, in Letná Park, on a grey All Saints' Day

Jerusalem or Jubilee Synagogue

Lucky

Lucky to have been where I have been

If you followed the link two posts ago and watched the video (I tried to post it here, but the embed option was denied me), you would have noticed Colbie Caillat wandering around on a beach somewhere and Jason Mraz looking classy in some Old World city. The first time I saw the video, a few weeks ago, I thought, 'That place looks familiar.' Then I realized that it was Prague, and that I was going back to Prague for fall break.

This time, instead of the dreaded overnight bus, we took the overnight train. Although I was just a little tiny bit too tall for the bunk, the overall sleeper-cabin experience was much more comfortable than the bus had been. We (Tika, Robin, and Anička, who teaches in Košice) arrived just after 7 a.m. on Friday morning, and dropped our things off at the Old Prague Hostel. This hostel definitely had the previous one beat for proximity to the Old Town. Once we'd left our big bags behind, we walked into the center, and I got to talk about Jan Hus and the Reformation and whatever else I could remember/make up about Old Town Square. And then we went to Bohemia Bagel and ate some bagels and drank some fresh-squeezed OJ and coffee, and that right there made the whole trip pretty much worth it.

So we walked across Charles Bridge, and went to the castle, and saw the cathedral, and walked around Mala Strana, and ate lunch, and climbed the astronomical clock tower, and then actually checked in at the hostel. Rob and Anička wanted to nap (Rob having a cold the whole time we were there and no one having slept fantastically well on the train, despite it being far superior to the bus), so I went looking for a camera shop I'd found online to buy a new battery, and Tika came with. The shop, Foto Škoda, is right off Wenceslas Square, and I highly recommend it if you need any kind of apparatus while you're in Prague.

On Saturday morning we took our day trip, this time to a town south of Prague called Český Krumlov. We endured the world's hottest bus for about three hours, but it was well worth it. The Vltava River, which makes about an 85-degree turn through Prague, horseshoes through Český Krumlov. I really like bridges, and the idea of living near a river, so I was quite taken with the town. It retains its medieval streets, most of which lead up to the chateau, whose round, painted tower is a landmark. The chateau's former moat has been home to bears since around the 17th century, but the bears seemed to be hiding when we looked for them. One of the highlights of our visit was the restaurant we ate at for lunch. Both Rick Steves and Lonely Planet mentioned U dwau Maryi as a good place to eat, and I was all for going, because it's a medieval-type place, but I didn't want to foist my weirdness on anyone else. When we found it, we all agreed that it looked good, so in we went. We sat at the back, right out by the river, with blankets and hot wine to warm us, and I had millet casserole with ham and cabbage, mostly because when I read the words "millet casserole" I was instantly fascinated. It was good, although, as you might imagine, rather hard to describe. The closest thing I can think of would be some kind of casserole made with grits, and yet it wasn't like that at all.
On Sunday we planned to visit the Jewish quarter in the morning. Upon arriving at the Pinkas Synagogue, we saw that there was, of course, a line to get in, and then, upon considering the prices, decided it wasn't really necessary to visit the various sites of the Jewish Museum (which I'd already been to, anyway). I did want to go visit the Old-New Synagogue, though, since it's the oldest synagogue in Prague and I hadn't been there before. The synagogue was built in the second half of the 13th century, and according to legend, the Golem of Prague is stored in its attic.

Besides the religious sites, the other really cool thing about Josefov is the Art Nouveau architecture. There are so many beautiful buildings in the area, and in other parts of the city as well. In the afternoon, I went to the Convent of St Agnes of Bohemia (Klášter Sv Anežky České), which is home to the National Gallery in Prague's Bohemian and Central European medieval art collection. It took me a minute to find the convent, because the signs pointing it out seemed to lead to dead ends; but the entrance is sort of in a corner. The art collection was much larger than I'd expected it to be, and was almost exclusively religious art. There were lots of Madonnas and crucifixes and saints, and the tags in English were very well-written, but made me laugh, because they just use such silly expressions to talk about art sometimes. You could also walk around the oldest parts of the convent, dating from the 13th century, with markers where St Agnes and Wenceslas I and his wife Cunigunde are buried. As trite as it sounds, I had a feeling of peace walking around looking at the art and architecture.

That night being Halloween, we had to go out, although most of the actual parties had been the night before. We managed to end up at Prague's Australian bar, Fat Boy's, which was fantastic because A) it was a non-smoking establishment, B) they had Magners, and C) there was an NFL game (Patriots and Vikings) on the telly. What more can you want out of your Halloween than that?

Monday morning it behooved me to cruise around the mall, and then we watched the astronomical clock ding at noon and had some real hamburgers for lunch. After that I took off for a wander. I ended up on a hilltop park to the northeast of the castle, where there were real Praguers enjoying their day off, walking and playing and running with their dogs. From that vantage point, this is what I saw: And lo, as I looked over the Vltava and the city, I said to myself, 'Hey, isn't there a big cemetery over there in Žižkov? And isn't Alfons Mucha buried there?' And myself said, 'I think you're right. We should go find it.' And though a third part of myself said, 'It's already three and you're supposed to meet the others at five; you'll never make it in time,' the rest of me was ready to go from the word "cemetery." So we all speedwalked down the hill, across the river, past the bus station, and up another hill into Žižkov, and finally reached the cemetery. In the picture above, it's to the left of and past the big TV tower.

The cemetery, Olšany Cemetery, was gorgeous. It turns out that Mucha isn't buried there, and I only got to see a fraction of it, but it was supercool. By the time I got there it was late afternoon, and there were fallen leaves and ivy everywhere, and some of the older mausoleums were broken down and boarded up...it was everything I've ever wanted in a cemetery. I just wish I'd gone earlier so I could have looked around more. It's possible that it was the highlight of my trip. There I felt accomplished and in awe and a little tiny bit creeped out (there were LOTS of angel statues, and it reminded me of "Blink," my favorite episode of Doctor Who) and like I couldn't have picked a better day than All Saints' Day to go. Because it was dusky when I was there, a lot of my pictures are a little out of focus, but I think it adds to the ambience, if photographs can have ambience.

On Tuesday before we left we stocked up on bagels and I had a lemon-lime-ginger presse that was both exorbitantly expensive and wonderfully delicious. Then we got on our trains and subsequent buses and made it back into our dear Slovakia and home to Tisovec.

In conclusion, I have a message for the people of Prague: I hate to break this to you, but I'm pretty sure your city is fake.

You really expect me to believe that that's real? I mean, really?

WATCH THIS VIDEO

This amazing video was projected on the Astronomical Clock tower in Prague for its 600th anniversary. I don't know how they did it, but it's pretty fantastic.

The 600 Years from the macula on Vimeo.

The Long Way Home

I would like to begin by requesting we all pretend that I actually posted this in a timely fashion, not some two months after it all happened.

At the end of June, my parents came out to Tisovec to escort me home for the summer, and we wandered around the area for a little before we left. We went to the SNP Museum in Bystrica, and Bojnice Castle, and then when we left Tisovec we drove north to Kraków, then to Moravský Krumlov in the Czech Republic, and down to Vienna, from whence we flew home.

on the way up to Poland

these two dudes look like the Abbott and Costello of Polish carriage drivers

In Kraków we took a hop-on-hop-off bus tour, and I'd show you the cool video of driving around the city, except Blogger doesn't want me to upload videos anymore. We stayed in Kazimierz, the Jewish district, about a block from the Tempel Synagogue, and we happened to arrive on the last day of the Jewish Culture Festival. That night Matisyahu played an acoustic show at the synagogue, which we could hear from our room. That was cool. There are some videos of the show on Youtube that are better quality, but this one shows some of the interior of the synagogue best.

When we arrived in Moravský Krumlov, about half an hour from Brno, my dad asked why he'd driven out to the back end of beyond. On the map it doesn't look like that bad of a drive, but it kind of is. There's really not much interesting about the town itself. The interesting thing shouldn't even be there. The chateau in Moravský Krumlov houses the Slav Epic, a series of paintings by renowned Art Nouveau artist Alfons Mucha (which is not, in fact, pronounced "Moo-cow," as we called him). Mucha was born in the nearby village of Ivančice. He wanted the Slav Epic to be in Prague, and the government was supposed to find or build a home for the paintings there by this year, but so far that hasn't happened. The chateau isn't a bad site for hosting exhibitions, but it's out of the way and needs to be fixed up. I was concerned about the paintings from a conservation point of view, because although there were barometers about and the exhibit is only open during the summer, it gets humid there, and these paintings really need to be protected.

The Slav Epic consists of 20 huge paintings that tell the story of the Slavic people. Photography was forbidden in the exhibit, the which stricture I actually followed this time; but there is no way photographs do justice to these pictures. They are really amazing. As my mom said, the style is reminiscent of Maxfield Parrish, another artist the commercial use of whose works often seems to overshadow his artistic talent, and Andrew Wyeth. The colors Mucha used are amazing, the size of the canvases is staggering, and the composition is untraditional but effective. It may be out of the way and take a while to get to, but it's totally worth it to go. I really hope the Czech government does right by Mucha's genius and passion and gets it the home it deserves in his native country.

Just north of the Czech-Austrian border is a town called Mikulov. We stopped at the Tesco there to buy some final Kofola and Studentskas before heading into Austria. From the Tesco we could see in the near distance an island of an old town rising above the fields and the newer parts of Mikulov.

The old town of Mikulov is very pretty and well-preserved. It's kind of like a Disney version of a late-medieval/Renaissance town. That probably sounds denigratory, though I don't mean it to be. Somehow--and this could have been more to do with me and when we visited than with the place itself--Mikulov didn't seem like an authentic old town. It had a slightly surreal quality in some way. This is not to say that I didn't like it. If I ever find myself in that area again I'd like to go back, because Mikulov had a significant Jewish community for nearly 500 years, beginning in the 15th century. One can visit the former ghetto, and there is an old cemetery that is supposed to be really cool.

Here's a view of the borderlands from the grounds of the chateau.

I may have mentioned before that even though Slovakia and the Czech Republic border Austria, there is a definite difference between the countries in terms of the divide between Western and Central Europe. The obvious difference is in signage, but there is often a different feel to the areas as well. And then there is visible, tangible evidence:Those crazy Austrians, with their sustainable energy sources.

When we got to Vienna and checked in to our hotel, we went into the center and looked in St. Stephen's and then ate dinner and I had an Almdudler and saw a woman in a kilt playing the bagpipes near the plague column. Then I had the least uncomfortable flights I can ever remember and then we went home and watched all three Jason Bourne movies within the first 48 hours we were back.

Olomouc

Last weekend in Olomouc in the Czech Republic there was a beer festival. Despite the fact that I’d almost rather drink battery acid than most beers, I went along, because I wanted to see Olomouc. We traveled to Cieszyn on Friday night, and then from there to Olomouc on Saturday morning, then back to Cieszyn for Saturday night and Sunday morning. (With all the border crossings and the three currencies we used, I got a bit confused. When we went to the grocery store on Sunday after church, I wasn’t sure what country we were in.)
Fortuitously, it did not rain on Saturday. It had, however, been raining pretty much all week before that, and so the place where the festival was held was a morass of unfortunate-smelling mud. Once we got to the site and I knew how to get there, I returned to the center of town on my own. After I’d explored the city to my satisfaction, I came back to the festival and spent about an hour with garbage bags on my legs, squelching through the mud, listening to a band cover “Sweet Home Alabama” and other classic rock, and drinking a Paulaner hefeweizen. It didn’t suck. About an hour was the proper amount of time for me to be there.

Olomouc’s old town area has a lot of fountains for some reason. Many of them depict Roman deities, like Neptune and Mercury, and there’s a Caesar fountain as well. In the biggest square, Horní náměstí, is the town hall, with the astronomical clock in one wall. By the time I reached the square I’d totally forgotten about the renowned clock, and walked around the corner and went, “Oh, right! Famous astronomical clock.” The various dials and faces of the clock are surrounded by mosaic work from the Communist era. The figures include symbols of the months, with peasant workers getting on with whatever agricultural task needs doing in each month.¹ I liked that the clock also included the name-day calendar.

Also in the square is the Holy Trinity Column, a huge Baroque sculpture. The column is on the UNESCO World Heritage list, because, as the plaque below it reads, “In terms of its size and richness of sculptural decoration, it has no adequate counterpart in the whole of Europe.” I must admit I find that a bit hard to believe, since there are a lot of sculptures lying about the continent, and while this one is definitely Baroque, it didn’t look super especially hardcore Baroque to me; but UNESCO must know what they’re talking about.² Near the column is the newest fountain, one representing the seas. It has a dolphin and a big turtle and some sea people holding fish. The turtle supports a rectangular bit with more jets and fish on it, and on the back of this part there are copies of maps and nautical charts. While a bit strange, as the Czech Republic has no coastline, this fountain was my favorite.
In the square there was a display of photographs taken by two Czech photographers in Afghanistan of joint Czech-US military operations. I didn’t know that the two countries worked together in that part of the world, so it was informative to see the photos. There was also a McDonald’s in the square, and I had a strawberry milkshake and the world’s hottest fries and am unashamed.

Somehow I wandered to Bezručovy sady, one of the big parks in the city. There was a real track and field facility on one edge of the park, with a discus/hammer cage, thus far the only evidence of throwing that I’ve seen in central Europe. In the park I was looking for something that signs said was the “Crown Fortress,” and I think I found the entrance thereto, but it looked closed for renovations. From what I saw, there were barrack-type buildings surrounded by a brick-and-earthworks wall. On one side of the fortress was the Mlýnský potok or mill stream. Not far from the stream was a stretch of wall that looked as if it might have been part of a city wall. There were groups of schoolchildren going to different stations in the park, and one station had a guy dressed as a shepherd with a mop-head wig. I wish I knew what that was about.

As I was walking, and I have no idea where this was, a plaque caught my eye because it said “Lafayette” on it. Upon closer inspection the plaque was in French and Czech, and yes, it was that Lafayette. Apparently the Marquis was imprisoned in Olomouc from 1794-1797.

Like most decent-sized European cities, Olomouc has a lot of churches. The first one I went in was kostel Panny Marie Sněžné, the Church of St Mary of the Snows. The interior is being restored, and is very Baroque. I really liked the organ (right), which was intricately carved with angels playing instruments. I also saw the exteriors of the Evangelic church, a gray, square building, and its polar opposite, the Orthodox church of St Gorazd, in Palm Beach pink and teal. I went in dóm sv Václava (St Wenceslas Cathedral), kostel sv Michala (St Michael church), and chrám sv Mořice³ (St Moritz/Maurice Cathedral). St Wenceslas is all painted on the inside, with patterns of flowers and stars on the white walls.
My favorite was St Moritz. The interior wasn’t impressive in any way, but I wandered through into a side corridor with some statuary on display and the entrance to the Gothic bell tower. I said to myself, “Self, do you really want to go up into a bell tower? You know what those are like and how you feel about coming down those kinds of stairs,” and then I decided to do it anyway. Because come on, they weren’t even charging anything to go up! So I went up the stone spiral staircase, which, to be honest, was a little terrifying, since there were chinks big enough between some of the steps to see through to things below. Those stairs went up to the first landing, which wasn’t very far up at all. There were some artifacts on display, a few old metal crosses from the steeples, that sort of thing, and a metal spiral staircase to see the bells. There are four bells of different sizes, and a view of part of the city. The best part was that I was the only one there the whole time, so I didn’t have to worry about anyone trying to pass me on the stairs. Now that I’m consulting the Lonely Planet to get some facts straight, it says that “The western tower is a remnant of its 13th-century predecessor.” I suppose that explains the scary stairs.

On Sunday we went to the Lutheran church in Cieszyn, one of the largest and, at 300 years, oldest Protestant churches in all of Poland. We sat in the balcony, but there were two more galleries above us. As we’ve previously discussed, Slovak and Polish are not terribly similar, for all they’re Slavic languages, and every time I thought I’d be able to join in the hymns in Polish, they got harder and harder. The two examples I wrote down from the hymnal were przyjdż (no clue what that means) and wszystko (all, which I deduced because it sounds close to the Slovak všetko). After church we went to the supermarket and then had a three-course pierogi lunch, with potato to start, followed by meat with sautéed onions and peppers, and sweet cheese for dessert. And we watched “Shrek” in Polish as we ate, and then took a train and two buses back to Tisovec. And we all lived happily ever after, the end.

¹In Slovak the names of the months are január, február, marec, etc., but the computer calendar uses completely different names. I think this must be a Czech/Slovak difference, because the clock had months like červenec and listopad on it. Listopad is a pretty rad name for a month, though. ↩
²Especially since I think I should get a job there. ↩
³How happy am I that I don’t need to make the ř sound in Slovak? So very, very happy. ↩

Easter Break

or, Five Days in One Pair of Jeans

This time last week I was in Prague, capital of the Czech Republic. One might think that as Slovakia and the Czech Republic used to be one country that a trip to Prague might be accomplished in a weekend. One would be horribly wrong to think that. Three of us went because we had a long weekend for Easter: there was no school from Thursday through Tuesday. We left Tisovec a bit after 6 on Wednesday evening, had about an hour and a half in Banska Bystrica, and then left Bystrica at 9:25. We arrived in Prague just about 5:30 on Thursday morning. It was quite the long bus ride. In contrast, the fourth member of our party, another teacher, was just leaving Bratislava by the time we got to Prague, and he was in Prague before 10 AM.

In Prague we left the bus station and headed to the hostel. This was the first time I’d stayed in a hostel. It was not terribly traumatic. We did have to change rooms twice (once planned and once not), there was a drunk British girl in the hall on Friday night, I glimpsed people making out in the bathroom, and some of our roommates stumbled in just before 6 AM when we were getting up around 7. We got to Hostel Elf, conveniently located just a few minutes’ walk from Florenc bus station, at about 6, so we couldn’t actually check into our room yet. We stowed our bags in the luggage room and then headed out again.

I am now of the opinion that the best time to see Prague, in the spring at least, is in the morning, before anyone else is out. (Overall, the worst part of the trip was having to fight through pushy and often rude tour groups.) On Thursday morning we walked to Old Town, across Charles Bridge, and almost all the way up to the castle. There were no shops open, but there weren’t crowds to fight through, either. It was nice to be able to see everything before it got hectic with tourists.

For the five days we were there the weather was PERFECT. There were blue skies and sun every day, a few clouds but docile, benign ones, and not too warm. We could not have asked for better weather.

One of Prague’s famous sights is Charles Bridge, or Karlův most. The bridge crosses the Vltava River; one end is near Old Town Square, and the other in Hradčany, the general castle area. On the Old Town side you can go into the tower over the bridge. There are lots of statues on the bridge, mostly of saints, and once the day begins there are artists and vendors and lots of people trying to take pictures. Guidebooks warn of pickpockets on the bridge, and in Prague in general, but no one in our group had any trouble. At left is the detail from one of the statues. It's probably morbid, but the grimace on the poor arrowed sheep's face makes me laugh.

Another attraction is Old Town Square (Staromestské námestí) and the Astronomical Clock in particular. On the hour the Astronomical Clock chimes and the apostles appear in a pair of windows. It’s really not that spectacular, even at noon, but huge crowds form to watch it. On the hour is a good time to ascend the clock tower, because everyone else is watching the display. I am hereby ranking the clock tower among the best towers in Europe for the ease with which one can go up and down. From the third floor of the building a ramp takes you up the tower. At the top of the ramp is one spiral staircase with a stoplight at the bottom. When you’re descending, you push a button that makes the light at the bottom red, which prevents people from trying to come up. It’s such a good idea. The views from the top of the tower are good. It was a pleasant tower.

On one side of Old Town Square is the Church of Our Lady before Týn. Its two dark, spiky towers are striking, and some might argue the best thing about it. If you find your way inside, you are not supposed to take pictures or even talk. I would have liked to have taken pictures, and might have done so had they not seemed so stern. Below is the towers of the church as seen from the square, with Easter trees.

There were two things that I really really wanted to see in Prague: the Mucha museum and the castle. The first is a museum about the local Art Nouveau artist Alfons Mucha. Mucha is best known for his posters and advertisements depicting lithe women in flowy dresses framed by flowers and things. He was also a painter and produced a series (not on display in Prague) called the “Slav Epic,” as well as producing posters for specifically Czechoslovak events and issues. Those were the things that I’d not seen before, and of course those were the prints that the gift shop did not have. One feels that the museum could have been bigger; surely there are more originals that could be on display. The Lonely Planet guidebook does say that a museum is being built specifically for the “Slav Epic” and that it should be done around 2010, so that will be worth a visit.

Prague Castle is not a castle in the traditional sense. It’s more a complex of buildings. The thing that you see from afar is St. Vitus Cathedral on the castle grounds. The cathedral is huge and wonderful. In the morning the sun was shining through the stained glass on one side. My favorite window was the one designed by Mucha. After St. Vitus we went to the Basilica of St. George, a much older and simpler building. Another building holds the Story of Prague Castle, an exhibit about the history of the castle with lots of artifacts, including what seemed like kind of a lot of clothing. The exhibit seemed to double back on itself all the time, and I’m not sure I saw everything before I left. Behind the basilica is Golden Lane, a row of cottages where soldiers used to live that are now shops, and at the end is Daliborka tower, which has a little exhibit of old torture devices. There’s even an oubliette.
At the opposite end of the castle grounds there are guards when you first come in, and every day there’s a changing of the guard. We managed a pretty good spot to see it. A little band played, swords were displayed, a banner changed hands, there was marching. It was interesting. The guards didn’t look particularly imposing--no bearskins, and their uniforms are blue--but I think they’re probably pretty no-nonsense.

If you took AP European History in high school, you might remember an event called the Defenestration of Prague. I admit that I don’t really remember the significance of the Defenestration; what I remember is that they threw some people out a window, and that it’s brilliant to have a word for throwing someone out a window. As the name says, the Defenestration occurred in Prague. One instance of defenestration happened in part of the castle, so I was really looking forward to being in that room. Unfortunately, it was closed for “technical reasons.” At the very least I saw the outside of the building, but I suppose I’ll have to go back to be in the actual room.

Prague has a lot of cool Art Nouveau architecture that I really enjoyed seeing. It also has a less well-known style called Czech cubism. And a quite popular modern building is near the river south of Charles Bridge. It’s called the Dancing Building.

An easy day trip from Prague is to the town of Plzeň. From Florenc bus station it takes about an hour and a half to get there. You can travel by train as well, but the bus is a little bit cheaper. Why go to Plzeň? you ask. Well, boys and girls, you go to Plzeň to visit Plzeňský Prazdroj. Since that name probably doesn’t ring any bells either, another hint is that the anglicized name for the town is Pilsen. That’s right, Plzeň is the birthplace of pilsner and the home of the Pilsner Urquell brewery (that’s the prazdroj). You can tour the brewery and see beer being bottled or canned, watch a video of some guys making a huge barrel, learn about the history of the brewery and how the beer is made with a triple-mash process, and taste some unfiltered, unpasteurized beer. I found it as unpalatable as any beer, but I did not embarrass myself or the crew by not finishing my sample--it helped that it wasn’t very much. We bought gifts and ate late lunch at the brewery restaurant, where the service was slow but the food good. I had the garlic soup.

In the main square in Plzeň we went up the church tower to get a view of the city and the surrounding area. Everyone knows that I do not love stairs in general, but stairs going into towers are often even more challenging. They fool you by having nice, stable stone stairs part of the way up, but then they switch to the wooden ones, and eventually you’re going up a glorified ladder. For me the going up is draining, but the going down is nigh well terrifying. I always feel like my feet are too big for the steps and that I never have a good place to step, and falling going down is much worse than falling going up. The views were pretty good, and I did not die on the way down. There is a picture of me coming down the stairs and smiling, but I’m also clutching the railings on both sides. However, I then found genuine cherry Coke at the potraviny. I don’t get how it can get all the way to the eastern Czech Republic, but it can’t get into Slovakia. We ran out of time for the underground tour of Plzeň, and I was also interested in seeing the General Patton memorial museum. Once again, I guess I’ll just have to go back.

Apart from the weather, one nice thing about going when we did was the Easter festivities. Prague has a few Easter markets, one in Old Town Square and one at the end of Wenceslas Square. The booths sell mostly souvenir junk or traditional crafts. These include decorated eggs and special whips made of braided sticks or twigs. On Easter Monday it is tradition for boys to whip girls with these sticks, throw water on them, and put perfume on them. This is supposed to make the girls prettier and give them good luck. In return the girls are supposed to give the boys alcohol or chocolate. Our Tisovec boy found a whip at the bus station on the way to Plzeň, so he “whipped” us on Monday. I was a bit surprised that I only noticed one boy whipping a random girl; she happened to be American and immediately started to complaining to her friends about how “you just don’t do that!” The Easter markets also had food booths selling sausages inna bun, trdelnik or tube donuts, beer and medovina, and the two things that most pleased me, Spanish-style churros (called pikle) and slushies. Since it was so nice, too, the ice cream vendors were doing good business.

Another Easter tradition seemed to be getting branches at church. We saw a lot of people with branches on Sunday afternoon. We didn’t get any, but then again we were at an English-speaking congregation (to whose service we were late because I failed to write down directions to the church. “I’ll recognize the street name when I see it” is not a good plan). For Easter dinner we had Tex-Mex. The restaurant offered free refills on .5 liter sodas. Free refills don’t really exist in Europe, so I chose to abuse that offer and drank two liters of orange soda. I’m rather proud of myself.

There were two things that were a little different in the Czech Republic than I’m used to here in Slovakia. The first is that while the Czech Republic is part of the EU, it does not yet use the euro, so we had to get Czech crowns (Kč or praguies, if you’re Red) and figure out conversions in our heads. The exchange rate is about the same for Czech crowns as it was for Slovak crowns, but I’ve gotten so used to figuring out euros to dollars that it was confusing using yet another currency. The other thing is that while Czech and Slovak are very similar, they are different languages. Most of the people we encountered spoke English, because after all, Prague is the capital and a major tourist destination; but whenever someone said something in Czech it just sounded a little…off. Furthermore, people could probably tell that I know Slovak, rather than Czech, if only because I wasn’t pronouncing “thank you” right. In Slovak it’s ďakujem, but in Czech it’s dekuji.

On the subject of language, there were so many people in Prague speaking so many different languages! I got confused trying to figure out what languages people were speaking and where they were from. I’d also listen to people talk, especially Americans, and think, “Why are you here?” I realize that other people might have thought the same of me, but I didn’t come all the way from the US to be there. I was just very curious about all of the different people there.

It was interesting to go to another place, although it was a bit disconcerting as well. I had a good time and I'd like to go back eventually. If it didn't take so long to get there I'd probably go back again sooner, but as it is, I think there are more places I'd like to visit that are closer before I make the long trek to Prague.

In conclusion, here are some yellow penguins on the river.