Prague! Now You Know Where It Is

Do you have any idea how many people have no idea where Prague is? Guesses included: Russia, Germany, and the Ukraine. All wrong, the correct answer is the Czech Republic, but thank you for playing (and no, it is no longer Czechoslovakia). I remember the days of having to leave hand written directions of a friend's house where I was staying; now people are just guessing at which country I might be in.

So, I loved my stay in Prague. It is beautiful, with so much to see and...buy. It's another one of these giant tourist places with kitschy little shops lining the streets, but there is still plenty to see beyond that. It took me a day to realize that I can understand about a third of the Czech language. Czech and Russian apparently share the same roots and so my Russian helped me out a lot in trying to decipher signs. For some reason I didn't think of that before going there, so at first it felt like I had super powers or something : ) Like this wide-eyed Matrix-esque "I know kung fu" moment.

Prague had everything I like. Scores of multilingual people, every other store selling chessboards and matryoshka dolls (russian nesting dolls), and last but not least: KAFKA. That's right, Kafka grew up in Prague. The highlight of the trip for me was going to the Kafka museum. I loved how they tried to make it a completely immersive and surreal experience for the visitors.
It was quite cold the entire time we were there, so we darted into restaurants and cafes to keep warm. I did an amateur survey of apple pie and coffee from various places in Prague. I also tried a few traditional dishes, which were often similar or identical to German ones. My first day there I had venison in a sweet brown sauce with half a pear filled with pomegranate seeds. It was served with croquettes (fried potato fingers pretty much). It was tasty and strange, but I liked it. My favorite is still duck with Knoedel and red cabbage, though (also in Germany).

The above picture is me standing in front of a tiny house where Kafka once lived for only about a year. He wrote "A Country Doctor" there (one of his short stories) and now it's a tiny store that sells many copies of that story. It's on this teeny tiny little street called the Golden Lane with similar miniature, colorful houses. If my hair looks strange in these, it's because it was really windy and we spent most of the day outside walking around. I have about 100 pictures, so obviously I can't even begin to give the highlights here, but I'll just end this post with a neat shot I got of Prague from high up:

2 Countries, 2 Weeks

That's right, I'm still alive. No, I don't have an excuse - I'm just too lazy to wait for pictures to upload to the blog so I don't do it.

At any rate, I had quite the experience in the past month or so. I spent 4 days in Tannheim in Austria, then 5 days in Prague the next week. Austria looked just as perfect as the postcards make it out to be, with blankets of white snow covering everything, skiers shooting down the slopes, and just a general bustle of winter activity. I was surprised that so many people also brought their tiny lapdogs as well. They looked adorable trotting around in their little tiny dog sweaters past the snow banks. While there, I also got to have a look at the giant castle that the Disney castle is based off of. Unfortunately, it was closed on Christmas Day (suppose I should have thought of that), but I still have some impressive pictures of the outside. I also enjoyed a horse drawn sleigh ride 2 miles to a small lodge that served local dishes: I had my beloved Glühwein along with Kaiserschmand (I think that's how it's written). This was pretty much French toast, but in puffy strips with powdered sugar on top served with apple sauce. Very tasty. One of the highlights was listening to the sleigh driver speak in his funny Austrian dialect and tell jokes the whole way. I only half understand all of it, but laughed anyway. Most of them had to do with stepmothers and kids getting their revenge...I also enjoyed a ride in a ski lift waaaay up to the top of one of the mountains and then back down. While I was up there, I had a nice cup of hot chocolate and watched as braver people than I strapped tiny planks to their feet and went shooting all the way back down. I think the ski lift was enough excitement for me right now. You can't help riding in one of those and thinking "..how much would it take for that cable to snap anyway? Sure looks like a long way down..." The little town looked like just a tiny cluster from up there.

So, this is the beautiful place where I spent my Christmas. It was very relaxing and I hope to maybe see Vienna some day. Next up: Prague. But before then, I have to leave you with one of my favorite pictures. I just love how snow looks on trees: