This past week Jen, Maisie, and I had the chance to go for a short vacations with our friends Dennis and Karen in Prague. We had a great time…Here are my random thoughts about the trip…in no logical order…
Prague is beautiful. It is beautiful in a different way than Paris. The buildings are definitely more gothic in style, but they also have this weird thing on them that make them look nice: color. Despite the sky being grey most of the time the color and beauty of the buildings make it a really beautiful place. It’s almost too beautiful to really let it soak in. There is so much to see…Old Square, Charles Bridge, St. Vitus Cathedral, the Castle, and every other amazingly designed building!
Tourists are funny…Living in Paris I have acquired a fair amount of annoyance towards non-locals who stop in the middle of the sidewalk to look at their maps, but this week I was in full tourist mode. Map out. In the middle of the sidewalk. Asking if people speak English. Wearing the ‘I don’t know where the heck I am and this place is confusing’ face…At least I didn’t wear a leather fanny-pack (err uhm…bum bags, for the English readers out there-Nick) like some were guilty of!
The Czech Republic has an amazing, sad, turbulent, and inspiring history. We visited the Communist Museum and learned a lot about how much change they have faced over the past century. At the beginning of the century they were a free state, then after WWII adopted a communist government to help fight their economic disaster. Then in 1989, after the Velvet Revolution they were free of communism again. It’s now eighteen years after communism has ended I feel like the people have a lot of reason for hope. Really cool.
Craig and Sarah let us stay in their really cool place in the middle of the city. Since meeting the Springers two years ago, I’ve thought they were cool, but this week they made a large deposit into their cool point bank: they left marshmallows and rice-krispies for us to make rice-krispie treats. Huge.
We love Dennis and Karen. We had an amazing time…we could have been in the most boring city and still would have had a great time with them. In fact, I think we probably saw less of Prague than we could have because we spent so much time talking…but a trade I would take anyday! Karen is half Czech and we went to where the village where her family was from before her great-grandma moved to the US. This village, Lidice, is no longer in existence as the Nazi army destroyed it and killed all of it’s inhabitants because it was linked with the men who assassinated a high ranking Nazi leader. There is a small and extremely powerful museum to honor the people from the village. It was really cool to experience this with Karen as some people in the photographs were relatives from the past that she never met. I felt like these pictures shouted at me to live life for them. I left with a deep sense of the value of life…I see it so much more when it’s contrasted with how life has been disrespected.
Prague has the most steep escalators I’ve ever been on in my life.
The food in Prague is both good and not expensive…I loved the Czech food: lots of meet and dumplings. All tasty. Also,the original Budweiser, from Budvar, is from the Czech Republic and there are signs for it everywhere…almost like we are in the States with all the marketing!
Prague has a Little Caesars and a TGIF’s. I am ashamed to admit it, but we ate at both of them. Long live crazy bread.
Craig and Sarah have a really cool friend named Irena…She’s Czech and an English teacher in Prague. She was really nice and spent an afternoon showing us around a really old place in Prague called High Castle. One of my only regrets of our time in Prague is that we didn’t hang out with Irena at the beginning of our trip! She was a real joy.
There is a really nice girl named Christina that lives in Prague…We knew her in Paris when she lived here too…She came to the airport to pick us up and helped us get into the city. She’s a saint for helping us out so much!
There are vendors on the street that sell huge hot-dogs…for like 50 cents or something! They weren’t bad…ok…I really liked it!
There is so much more to say about our time, but it’s a miracle if anybody is reading this line right now. Especially with all my amazing links in the article. Boo yah.
Justin, I have to admit that I didn’t hit all those links you put in your very lengthy post…but read it all the way through, then had fun going through your incredible pictures. You are a very gifted photographer. Of course my very favorites had to do with the unique beauty of the tourists in Prague! (oh yes, even Dennis and Karen :-). So glad you were able to get away and relax and be a tourist!
Prague, or Praha, was the first stop on our trip to Eastern Europe last Aug/September. Prague was a beautiful city but I have to admit the tourists were a bit too much (even though we were included in that mass, I know). Prague is fast becoming the hippest city to visit in Europe now. There were some fascinating things that we saw - the castle, Charles Bridge, St. Vitus, Old Town square, the astronomical clock, Jewish quarter, Wenceslas square, Municipal House. It is a great place to do a lot of people watching as well. Glad you enjoyed your trip. In a way, I envy you. I would love to go back to Eastern Europe as it is actually my favorite part of Europe. Having Czech friends made the place come alive even more as it is good to get a personal side of things when you are there. If you ever get the chance, check out Budapest as well. But glad you had time to get away and enjoy a great city like Prague.
By the way, I put up a few pics of our trip to Eastern Europe last year so check out our pics to Prague and compare them to yours. Like you, it was a bit overcast and cloudy.
Two questions. . .
1)Do you and your wife wear the same shoes? That is adorable.
2)Did you visit the cathedral with all the human bones in it?
Hey Nicholas…yes we do wear the same shoes..in fairness, she bought hers first. 2nd…we didn’t visit the cathedral with bones all around, but we did go to a cathedral with some coffins and stuff…not as cool as bones though…but I can’t say it enough…Prague rocks.
I envy you. Hope all is well.
I am so jealous about Prauge, on my list of the top five places I want to visit, and not for the legal marijuana.
i see that Organic church is on your wish list. Joe Meyers was actually one of my profs at CCU, great guy. Better author.