Prague and such

Author: Ale /

My computer crashed this weekend. Fail. Epic Fail. This is the reason I have not been updating my blog. Also, I was in PRAGUE this weekend…so I’ve been a bit busy. First of all I’m using my host mother’s computer to write this. The comptuer itself is an HP like mine so I understand how to use it…but there are a few things that make it difficult. Everything is in GERMAN. Case and point. Also, some of the letters are changed on the key board. The most annoying is the z and the y are switched. Not to mention the other letters they just tack on for good measure. For example- ä, ö, and ü are all in places I usually find symbols. I cannot find the delete button and every single word I type has a red squiggly line underneath it. Apparently, the spell check is in German. The lines are really really annoying. So know that- feel my pain, and understand if some stuff I write makes no sense….there is a good chance I couldn’t spell it or the computer auto corrected it to a German word.


People leave their locks here and throw away the key so their love will last forever.
Leaving my mark on the Lennon wall.

Me and Amelia. Love us!



On the Prague Brindge....it was SO crowded.

Hare Kirsna people in a parade....it reminded me of home strangely enough.

This is by the clock tower....it is extremely unexciting to see it go off....but thousands of people wait to see it anyway.

Prauge was absolutely amazing! We arrived off of our four hour bus ride and looked around dumbly before two people from our group who had gotten there the night before showed up to help us. We set out for the old town square where we met the rest of group and went on a 3 ½ hour walking tour. Sounds long but we got about 1500 years of Czech history and saw most of the main sights and the best part was….it was FREE.

Krystle and I at the rock concert in the old town square

The hostel....it was kinda a hole.

By the cathedral at Prague Castle

The next day we spent time in the Prague Castle and the cathedral was beautiful. The Bridge was amazing too….but extremely crowded. On Saturday was went to the Lennon Wall. It’s interesting to see the graffitti in Prague. It’s everywhere. The Lennon wall used to be a place where young people would paint peace signs and John Lennon’s face to show they wanted freedom from communism. The police would watch them do it and paint over it. During the Prague spring (a brief lifting of restrictions) the wall was left alone and it stands today as a reminder of that. It’s interesting to see the difference between Vienna and Prague. In Prague the effects of communism are very visable. Then the modern aspect is fun to see along with the oldness of everything else. We watched a rock concert in the square on Saturday….it was so fun…even though the band was not that great. I’m pretty sure they weren’t singing in English, or German either…I suppose it was Czech…and it was weird.

From the hill at Prague castle.

My camera struggles at night...this was just by the Prague Bridge

Two ladies praying on the bridge at night.

Later we checked into our hostel. This was one of the better moments of the trip. The 7 of us were split between two rooms. 5 people in our group had a bed in a 6 bed room with a random stranger (who turned out to be really nice…his name was Chris. I think Chris thought we were crazy when we sat in our room writing in our journals when the rest of the hostel’s population was headed to party until 6 am or later). That situation left two of us in another room with 8 random strangers. We decided to put the one boy with one girl in that room so she felt safer in that room. That girl was me. Will was the boy. He was the only boy with us….so he got the job by default. So, Will and I hauled our backpacks into our room. Sadly, there were no bunks left. We explained our situation to the front desk person. He graciously offered to upgrade us for the night. Not believing our luck we follwed him to the new room. He unlocked our door and we stepped into the honeymoon suite of all suites – in hostels that is. The two single beds (from IKEA) where pushed together to form one bed. For me. And Will. Together. The windows had lovely red curtains (from IKEA) and the walls were adorned with red rose pictures (from IKEA). Other than the overwhelming IKEA motif….the romanic nature of the room was sublime. We thanked the man and he left. We proceeded to get a good laugh about it. We even had matching sleeping bags. It made for many good pictures and vidoes. Eventually it got late and the reality of the situation set in. I had to break the news to Will that waking up to him next to me would just be a little too weird so I was kicking him out. He took it graciously and Krystle came and slept in with me instead. So, I almost slept with a man in Prague. Almost.

Dinner with the meanest waiter ever.

Communism

Can't get away from the man even in Europe...

Contrasting architecture was pretty funny...


Victoria...from Twilight? Anyone....anyone? Sad that I know this...but I can't help but think of here when I saw this woman...

This is where Mozart performed and this is also where he premired Don Giovani. This was also where a lot of Amadeus the movie was filmed.

The clock tower...pretty amazing. The planners asked someone (I forget his name) to build this. After he finished they had his eyes gouged out so he couldn't repeat his work elsewhere. He got a little mad about that and blindly threw himself into the gears of the clock to kill himself and the clock wouldn't work after that for almost one hundred years...


See below for an explanation on this one....

Will and I. He is teaching me how to be gangsta. An asian is teaching me how to be gangsta.

This was created after the fall of communism. Before the wall fell people gathered in the main square to shake their keys in protest of communism. It is made completely out of keys.

The money was a little different there. I'm only holding 50 dollars really...

I thought these pictures were fun. The little boy was forced into a harness. I usually take pictures of dogs and their people….but this fit in quite nicely.

The couple in the pictures were just cute. We saw a wedding while in the main square. They walked around for an hour and drank lots of champange. I loved watching them and took about as many pictures of them as their own photographer…and their videographer for that matter. I love it when she planted her hand on his butt...HA!

The bridge and the castle.

I’m excited to visit Prague again at the end of the summer with my family. The group didn’t get to visit as much of the Jewish quarter as I wanted to. The Jewish quarter in Prauge is amazing and it’s even more amazing that is wasn’t destroyed while occupied by the Nazis in WWII. Aparently, Hitler ordered that it be preserved as a place people could see reminants of an extinct race. It’s sad this was even the case, but good at the same time because the cemetary there has between 30,000 and 100,000 graves in it with thousands of gravestones and the two oldest working synagogs in the world.

Now enough history.

A few things I learned in Prague:

  1. Showering is not always an option. Our hostel was clean but the door didn’t lock and some showers don’t have a curtain. So you can risk being exposed to the world or just go dirty for a few days.
  2. Plan on there being A LOT of drunk people hanging around
  3. You will be invited to go bar hopping at least 10 times a night
  4. People think you are weird. We don’t drink. It comes with the territory.
  5. Owlcity plays EVERYWHERE. I can’t get away from them.´
  6. Starbucks is the only place in town that will take Euros. They also have amazing apple fritters.
  7. Expect rain. And when it rains it doesn’t stop. All day.
  8. Waiters are extremely rude. Especially if you ask for free tap water and you don’t order alcohol.
  9. I‘m capable of backpacking in Europe. I lived out of my book bag all weekend and carried it with me most of the time. This is one of my more amazing accomplishments in my life so far.

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