A Lovely Day In Prague
Okay, I'm so too tired to walk another step, but we really did have a lovely time today. We took a tram downtown, wandered around for a while seeing all the fancy architecture, and saw the synagogue where the first golem was made. This is interesting to us because golems come up often in fantasy roleplaying games (both pen and paper and on the computer).
Old town Prague is (not surprisingly) much more upscale than the area we are staying in. I think usually we stay in old town (except in St. Petersburg), so we are initially exposed to the fancy area. That being said, I still think that St. Petersburg outside of the city center was just incredibly nice. The use of green space was amazing. Prague definitely lacks trees in town (at least compared to St. Petersburg).
(Have I mentioned how awesome I find the way people who live in St. Petersburg view their city? Almost like a person or a living being. Maybe reveling in both the beauty and the difficult climate. I don't think New Yorkers view their city that way. I want to investigate this more. Also, I realized that I can probably take classes in Russian language even when/if I am working, so I can eventually, hopefully find out more about the history of the Russian language and the way the Slavic languages evolved. I will really need to audit some linguistics classes at the U of O before I leave. As another aside, I was comparing population density of the cities we have been in. St. Petersburg and Budapest have about the same population density at 3300 people per square kilometer. They were the most densely populated cities we visited. I was a tad concerned about the population density in St. Petersburg, as when I lived in New York, I found the press of people oppressive and overwhelming. However, Wikipedia tells me that the population density of NYC is 10,500/sq km. So, I don't think that I'll have to worry about it too much.)
After leaving the Jewish quarter, we headed across the river and up a hill to the Prague Castle. We weren't really into the castle, although the view was nice.
There were two cool parts, though. One was that I saw something down the hill that looked a little like a packed together and painted black version of the terra cotta army from China. We decided to go find it. On the way down, we found an opening in the wall enclosing the road that led to a wooden walkway down the hill and lots and lots of green!
It was such a nice change after the unrelenting cityscape. The path led across a paved path and up another hill to the Belvedere, which was a summer palace with gardens. The gardens were nice, but the really funky part was that there was a walled courtyard (kind of) full of closely planted fig trees. There must have been 20 or 30. It was so odd.
Anyway, we left there and tried to find the funky black terra cotta army. We ended up in a different set of royal gardens. There was a huge pool with enormous carp in it. They were just seriously huge, like two feet long. (In answer to my question, yes, goldfish are in the carp family. The carp behaved just like goldfish, and I have always wondered if they were related.) There were also peacocks in the garden. They behaved a lot like chickens. After some more wandering through the gardens, we found an enormous wall that was made to look a little bit like dripping rock. Joel says that it looked clearly artificial, but I couldn't be sure. That was the "terra cotta army". It was quite odd. There was also an aviary with five or so owls in it.
After that, we walked back across one of the famous bridges (the Charles bridge?), which was quite interesting, as there were so many different nationalities of people with such diverse faces on the bridge. That led us back to the Jewish quarter, where we found the statue of the golem, which we had been hoping to find. From there, we walked around trying to find either a vending machine for tram tickets or a post office. We found neither downtown. (However, I did get to speak Russian to a couple who were lost. I think I did an okay job, and I was so pleased.) Eventually, a couple of blocks from our hostel, we finally found a post office and I was able to send out my post cards. We got some food at the store and then stopped by a kebab stand to get some dinner, since we had been seeing them for three cities now and hadn't had any. It wasn't what we think of as kebab, but it was quite good and there was plenty of food. (I got to speak Russian there too, as I know that the numbers are pretty similar. So, when English didn't work, I just used what Russian I had.)
Now, Joel is off at the hostel bar's beer tasting (did I mention that our hostel is five stories tall, plus a basement?), and I'm still trying to make up for the dehydrating qualities of the kebab. Tomorrow, we are going to get ourselves organized for a trip out of town the next day and the trip to London, which needs some organizing. That is fine with me. I think we are both feeling a bit worn out by all the traveling, and ready to go home (we miss our friends and our chickens). Some laying around will probably be very nice.
One of the things that Joel did manage to drill into my head today is that winter coats just do not make one look attractive. You have to choose between warm and having a nice, sleek look, he says. I guess I'm just going to have to bundle up like the Stay-Puft marshmallow man in St. Petersburg. I'll waddle through the snow in the dark, while beautiful, thin women in four inch stiletto heels stride by. I got the impression that they would risk frostbite to look good, but I could have misunderstood. The plus side is that since I won't be riding a bike, I'll be able to wear dresses! I think I can make legwarmers, which will probably be both awesome and strange. So, I kind of have a plan. Yay!
Old town Prague is (not surprisingly) much more upscale than the area we are staying in. I think usually we stay in old town (except in St. Petersburg), so we are initially exposed to the fancy area. That being said, I still think that St. Petersburg outside of the city center was just incredibly nice. The use of green space was amazing. Prague definitely lacks trees in town (at least compared to St. Petersburg).
(Have I mentioned how awesome I find the way people who live in St. Petersburg view their city? Almost like a person or a living being. Maybe reveling in both the beauty and the difficult climate. I don't think New Yorkers view their city that way. I want to investigate this more. Also, I realized that I can probably take classes in Russian language even when/if I am working, so I can eventually, hopefully find out more about the history of the Russian language and the way the Slavic languages evolved. I will really need to audit some linguistics classes at the U of O before I leave. As another aside, I was comparing population density of the cities we have been in. St. Petersburg and Budapest have about the same population density at 3300 people per square kilometer. They were the most densely populated cities we visited. I was a tad concerned about the population density in St. Petersburg, as when I lived in New York, I found the press of people oppressive and overwhelming. However, Wikipedia tells me that the population density of NYC is 10,500/sq km. So, I don't think that I'll have to worry about it too much.)
After leaving the Jewish quarter, we headed across the river and up a hill to the Prague Castle. We weren't really into the castle, although the view was nice.
There were two cool parts, though. One was that I saw something down the hill that looked a little like a packed together and painted black version of the terra cotta army from China. We decided to go find it. On the way down, we found an opening in the wall enclosing the road that led to a wooden walkway down the hill and lots and lots of green!
It was such a nice change after the unrelenting cityscape. The path led across a paved path and up another hill to the Belvedere, which was a summer palace with gardens. The gardens were nice, but the really funky part was that there was a walled courtyard (kind of) full of closely planted fig trees. There must have been 20 or 30. It was so odd.
Anyway, we left there and tried to find the funky black terra cotta army. We ended up in a different set of royal gardens. There was a huge pool with enormous carp in it. They were just seriously huge, like two feet long. (In answer to my question, yes, goldfish are in the carp family. The carp behaved just like goldfish, and I have always wondered if they were related.) There were also peacocks in the garden. They behaved a lot like chickens. After some more wandering through the gardens, we found an enormous wall that was made to look a little bit like dripping rock. Joel says that it looked clearly artificial, but I couldn't be sure. That was the "terra cotta army". It was quite odd. There was also an aviary with five or so owls in it.
After that, we walked back across one of the famous bridges (the Charles bridge?), which was quite interesting, as there were so many different nationalities of people with such diverse faces on the bridge. That led us back to the Jewish quarter, where we found the statue of the golem, which we had been hoping to find. From there, we walked around trying to find either a vending machine for tram tickets or a post office. We found neither downtown. (However, I did get to speak Russian to a couple who were lost. I think I did an okay job, and I was so pleased.) Eventually, a couple of blocks from our hostel, we finally found a post office and I was able to send out my post cards. We got some food at the store and then stopped by a kebab stand to get some dinner, since we had been seeing them for three cities now and hadn't had any. It wasn't what we think of as kebab, but it was quite good and there was plenty of food. (I got to speak Russian there too, as I know that the numbers are pretty similar. So, when English didn't work, I just used what Russian I had.)
Now, Joel is off at the hostel bar's beer tasting (did I mention that our hostel is five stories tall, plus a basement?), and I'm still trying to make up for the dehydrating qualities of the kebab. Tomorrow, we are going to get ourselves organized for a trip out of town the next day and the trip to London, which needs some organizing. That is fine with me. I think we are both feeling a bit worn out by all the traveling, and ready to go home (we miss our friends and our chickens). Some laying around will probably be very nice.
One of the things that Joel did manage to drill into my head today is that winter coats just do not make one look attractive. You have to choose between warm and having a nice, sleek look, he says. I guess I'm just going to have to bundle up like the Stay-Puft marshmallow man in St. Petersburg. I'll waddle through the snow in the dark, while beautiful, thin women in four inch stiletto heels stride by. I got the impression that they would risk frostbite to look good, but I could have misunderstood. The plus side is that since I won't be riding a bike, I'll be able to wear dresses! I think I can make legwarmers, which will probably be both awesome and strange. So, I kind of have a plan. Yay!