So, Brno, some first impressions. (Blog post, by me) #projectBrno
Frzt mprzns v th Czch Rzpblic (an unfair parody; needs more hacheks, anyway)
The plane comes in over wide, flat, odd-shaped fields, many filled with oilseed rape just like those I have left behind. And on landing, the pilot gets a round of applause. OK, it had been a bit bumpy, but that surprised me.
Tiny regional airport with big gleaming new curvilinear terminal building bolted on the side, conspicuously younger and flashier than the rest... and at about 5PM, mostly closed. No Bureau d'Echange, all but one of the car-hire places shut and so on. I didn't expect that. The way-out sign from baggage-collection was partly labelled in Russian, too; I didn't have time to try to decode it. Distant childhood memories still make this feel ever so slightly ominous.
Outside, there is just one bus, with people crowding on, lots of kids with backpacks, a scattering of older people, some suited, some looking like Russian mafiosi. I suppose that's far less unlikely here. The sign on the front - a modern digital one, on a fairly new bus - says something impenetrable with accents on consonants, and underneath, “main station and centre”. Well, it sounds as good as anything. I get on it. It's rammed. The fifty-something driver nods at my hesitant “English?” and sells me a ticket for 25 crowns, grunting back.
I strap-hang wearing 15kg of backpack. It's flat. Railway lines cross or follow the road. A few minutes of open farmland give way to flat dusty suburbs. It's 20° C, way hotter than London, and I'm sweating in a leather jacket and flat cap, but most of the windows stay unopened, as if no-one else notices.
There are car dealerships, mostly selling familiar brands - Volvo, BMW, more Volvo. From the 'plane, I spotted a Tesco and an IKEA, and these were as reassuring as a small packet of cornflakes. I can decode a few of the signs, and I presume that the chatter I can hear is partly in Czech. It's softer, more lilting, less harsh than Polish, and sounds less Russian. Lots of sibilants and fricatives, lots of “sh” and “zh” and “zz” but less “ch” and “tch”. It doesn't sound like it's going to be easy to parse.
Gradually we near the city centre. There are lots of slightly - or very - run-down buildings, some closed shops and things. I notice, with slight amusement, a boarded-up and derelict Erotic Shop. If even sex is going out of business, that really is bad. But around the corner is a far bigger, thriving one taking half a block - a veritable sex department store. And among the dilapidated buildings are shiny new ones. Some old, traditional blocks have shiny new modernist extensions bolted on in a sort of architectural pastiche of Robocop; it's not pretty. But there are roadworks, building projects and so on. Actually, taken as a whole, there are far more new buildings than old and the place seems vigorous, thriving, growing - and rapidly losing any distinctive vernacular elements or character it had. Typical, I suppose.
Suddenly everyone's piling off the bus, so I follow. There's a big station in the distance across the road, so I guess this is the right place. It's half past 5 now and my colleague said he'd be in the office until 6. I don't want to take the chance of missing him, so I get in a taxi. I ask the drive, “English?” He grunts and nods. “Purkynova?” And we're off for a 20 minute ride half way into the suburbs, featuring rows of office blocks - some identifiable as university buildings - and what I think are street-corner whores, male and female. He doesn't know the company name but he knows the road and says “what number?” I spot it first, he grunts, pulls over and drops me outside the next building. A hundred and ninety crowns. About six quid.
After meeting a few of my new colleagues, one takes me to the couch-surfing host's house where I'll be staying at first, atop one of the city's hills. Pretty houses, tiny front gardens, neat streets with cracking pavement. This is a bit of an old-money district. My host misinterpreted my post-midnight email saying I'd arrive tomorrow (with dates and flight times) as meaning Wednesday and is out at a work do; we go and collect him, he lets me in, shows me around and disappears off out again.
I was too tired to go exploring a strange city without the aid of Google Maps, and too disoriented to really be hungry, so I relaxed, established an internet connection, told a few nearest and dearest I was here and crashed out. And here I am, on the verandah on a sunny morning, with improvised tea made in a coffee-pot (with mleko and cukr), listening to birdsong and bee-hum. And distant traffic and intermittently the furious yapping of the elderly lady next door's small dogs.
More tomorrow.
The plane comes in over wide, flat, odd-shaped fields, many filled with oilseed rape just like those I have left behind. And on landing, the pilot gets a round of applause. OK, it had been a bit bumpy, but that surprised me.
Tiny regional airport with big gleaming new curvilinear terminal building bolted on the side, conspicuously younger and flashier than the rest... and at about 5PM, mostly closed. No Bureau d'Echange, all but one of the car-hire places shut and so on. I didn't expect that. The way-out sign from baggage-collection was partly labelled in Russian, too; I didn't have time to try to decode it. Distant childhood memories still make this feel ever so slightly ominous.
Outside, there is just one bus, with people crowding on, lots of kids with backpacks, a scattering of older people, some suited, some looking like Russian mafiosi. I suppose that's far less unlikely here. The sign on the front - a modern digital one, on a fairly new bus - says something impenetrable with accents on consonants, and underneath, “main station and centre”. Well, it sounds as good as anything. I get on it. It's rammed. The fifty-something driver nods at my hesitant “English?” and sells me a ticket for 25 crowns, grunting back.
I strap-hang wearing 15kg of backpack. It's flat. Railway lines cross or follow the road. A few minutes of open farmland give way to flat dusty suburbs. It's 20° C, way hotter than London, and I'm sweating in a leather jacket and flat cap, but most of the windows stay unopened, as if no-one else notices.
There are car dealerships, mostly selling familiar brands - Volvo, BMW, more Volvo. From the 'plane, I spotted a Tesco and an IKEA, and these were as reassuring as a small packet of cornflakes. I can decode a few of the signs, and I presume that the chatter I can hear is partly in Czech. It's softer, more lilting, less harsh than Polish, and sounds less Russian. Lots of sibilants and fricatives, lots of “sh” and “zh” and “zz” but less “ch” and “tch”. It doesn't sound like it's going to be easy to parse.
Gradually we near the city centre. There are lots of slightly - or very - run-down buildings, some closed shops and things. I notice, with slight amusement, a boarded-up and derelict Erotic Shop. If even sex is going out of business, that really is bad. But around the corner is a far bigger, thriving one taking half a block - a veritable sex department store. And among the dilapidated buildings are shiny new ones. Some old, traditional blocks have shiny new modernist extensions bolted on in a sort of architectural pastiche of Robocop; it's not pretty. But there are roadworks, building projects and so on. Actually, taken as a whole, there are far more new buildings than old and the place seems vigorous, thriving, growing - and rapidly losing any distinctive vernacular elements or character it had. Typical, I suppose.
Suddenly everyone's piling off the bus, so I follow. There's a big station in the distance across the road, so I guess this is the right place. It's half past 5 now and my colleague said he'd be in the office until 6. I don't want to take the chance of missing him, so I get in a taxi. I ask the drive, “English?” He grunts and nods. “Purkynova?” And we're off for a 20 minute ride half way into the suburbs, featuring rows of office blocks - some identifiable as university buildings - and what I think are street-corner whores, male and female. He doesn't know the company name but he knows the road and says “what number?” I spot it first, he grunts, pulls over and drops me outside the next building. A hundred and ninety crowns. About six quid.
After meeting a few of my new colleagues, one takes me to the couch-surfing host's house where I'll be staying at first, atop one of the city's hills. Pretty houses, tiny front gardens, neat streets with cracking pavement. This is a bit of an old-money district. My host misinterpreted my post-midnight email saying I'd arrive tomorrow (with dates and flight times) as meaning Wednesday and is out at a work do; we go and collect him, he lets me in, shows me around and disappears off out again.
I was too tired to go exploring a strange city without the aid of Google Maps, and too disoriented to really be hungry, so I relaxed, established an internet connection, told a few nearest and dearest I was here and crashed out. And here I am, on the verandah on a sunny morning, with improvised tea made in a coffee-pot (with mleko and cukr), listening to birdsong and bee-hum. And distant traffic and intermittently the furious yapping of the elderly lady next door's small dogs.
More tomorrow.