Sunday, April 8, 2012

mm mm prague

2 of 5

So after I met up with Kathy, we got on a bus for 13 hours to Prague. There were like 14 of us on the bus (41 on the trip total), but we didn't know about the option of flying straight to Prague. Good one becca. I definitely could NOT sleep on the bus. There is no comfortable position of lying down on a coach bus. I woke up like every hour. Also, our trip was full of Boston people, it was crazy! There was Needham (me, duh), Concord, Littleton, Framingham, Lexington, and Franklin. MA represent. At our rest stop on the way there, a couple of girls and I made a realization that if anyone from outside of MA knew one town in Mass, it would be Newton. Just everyone in the world knows of Newton. Craziness.

So we get to Prague after 13 hours of on and off sleep and our leader tells us that we have 10 minutes to get ready. Not cool. So then we went on our 3 hour walking tour. There were a couple characters on our trip. First of all, this youtube celebrity, Dom Mazzetti was on our trip, who was being paid to be there. Work? And this kid who literally is an alcoholic who carried a bottle of alcohol in a paper bag with him at all times. So great start. Our tour guide in Prague was this crazy man who was hyperactive and super strange. He looked like a leprechaun and called himself the Swedish ninja and leaped everywhere and fought people with waterbottles as swords. Dude, this guy was not okay. He also made really awkward jokes that weren't funny and like hugged people and made them uncomfortable. I'd say it might have been the most uncomfortable 3 hours of my life. We walked through the Old Town, the New Town, and the Jewish Quarter. After the tour we went to the Jewish Museum (look mom! i'm jewish!), which was really really interesting. The walls had every person's name who died from the Holocaust from Prague, including which area they lived in. The museum also had a room of drawings that children did during the Holocaust and this woman saved them all and hid them. It was amazing to see the Holocaust from the perspective of a child. Behind the museum was the jewish cemetery. There were piles and piles of gravestones packed on top of each other. And the cemetery was 11 rows deep of people because they didn't have a lot of room so they built on top of it. So sad.

Then we went to the center of the Old Town and went to the market and got a Czech sausage and this spiral pastry called a Trdelnik. The whole center was full of easter decorations because of the week and there were handmade easter eggs everywhere that were beautifullllly decorated. Then we went and climbed to the top of the clock tower and saw an amazing view from the top. At the top of every hour, the clock comes to life and little figures start moving and a man plays a trumpet from the top.

We took the metro home and went up the longest escalator in Europe...the things we see. On the way home, we happened to get on the prague news from a window (like the today show) and a little girl followed us for a couple blocks (scary cause we thought she was going to pickpocket us). We stayed in a really nice hostel with great showers. That night we went on a REALLY fun pub crawl and met up with my friend Emily from WashU who is also living in Madrid. One of the bars had like random ruins in it...what's going on in Prague?

The next day (Saturday) we went to the Prague Castle, so so cool. It was a whole little town and the cathedral there was GORGEOUS. The most amazing stained glass I've ever seen. Then we walked to the Lennon wall, which was also superrrrr cool. People are just allowed to do whatever they want to do to it, so people spray painted on it and wrote on it. My name is on it! We then walked over the Charles Bridge. We had lunch with our tour group at this Czech restaurant where two men played the accordion and tuba while we ate. I had a typical Czech lunch: beer, vegetable soup, goulash, and apple strudel. I felt like such a native. It actually was pretty good too.

After lunch I met up with Pavla (my old au pair from when I was 5), her daughter Christina, her boyfriend, and her sister Petra. So crazy to see them after so long and they look exactly the same. It was so good to see them! Then we were in a rush for dinner so we went to this Chinese restaurant right next to our hostel, which was the funniest place I've ever been to. The woman didn't speak english and we had to correspond pictures of the food to a menu with numbers on it. They had items like chicken with strange taste, chicken with mysterious taste, and eight treasures with spicy sauce)...ummmm? I had no idea what I was ordering. And Kathy, trying to communicate with this woman, thanked her with a bow...and wild hand motions. It was so hilarious, but the food was actually okay.

that night we went to an 80s and 90s club where they showed they music videos on a huge screen. it was all older people, but it was fun to listen to older music for a change.

Overall I love love Prague and want to go back ASAP.

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