Dobry den! (Tuesday in Prague)

By my third day in Prague, I had a few basic words under my belt. Granted, I didn't get to use them much since I was mostly hanging out with Stu and her American friends/ housemates, but hey - now I know some Czech!
dobry den = hello = bonjour
ahoj = hey = salut
prosím = please, here you go, you're welcome = s'il vous plait, voilà, je vous en prie
ano = yes = oui
nay = no = non
kava = coffee = café
dort = cake = gâteau
potraviny = bodega/ mini market = marché

I've overheard quite a bit of French on my trip, too. In fact, in crowds of people (read: tourists), the two languages that stand out the most to my ears are English and French. That's gotta mean something good for my comprehension! French schools have a two week vacation right now for Le Jour de Toussaints, or All Saints' Day, which is 1 Nov, and a pretty big holiday for Catholic France. Prague must be a popular destination for this vacation, and I don't blame them! :)

On Tuesday, me and Stu took it easy since she had class for most of the day. We met to go to the market, but it's basically over by now. We saw some stands with more trdelník and a group of medieval-garbed street musicians. Stu and I opted for potato chip spirals, where they peel a potato in a spiral and fry it on a skewer - yummy! I haven't been having much fried food in France (a good thing, really!) and these were so tasty; hot and fresh.

 street musicians

When Stu had to go back to class, I wandered around the Jewish Quarter for a while. It is one of the best preserved areas because Hitler wanted to turn it into a museum of the "lost race" of Jews during World War Two. Now, you can visit the Kafka statue and the Jewish cemetery; I saw a butcher shop that had Hebrew in the window and looked like it had been around for a loooonngg time, too. At the small cemetery, hundreds of gravestones are jammed into the ground, sticking out at weird angles, and cover almost every inch of the ground; but beneath, there are two to three times as many bodies buried, another testament to the oppression that Jewish people faced, even before the war.

kafka statue

not related... but don't they know about this little thing called mad cow disease?

 old town square in the rain

I wandered back through Old Town Square, and went over a bridge, meaning to head back to Stu's apartment and do some writing (read: blogging). As I walked down what seemed like an unsuspecting street, I watched a woman cross the street and go through a small doorway in a wall. Feeling a bit like Alice in Wonderland, I followed her and found myself in a huge garden!

There were peacocks strutting around, ducks and koi in the fish pond, and fountains along the pathways. I think the garden (Valdštejnská zahrada) is part of the Senate, and it certainly seems pretty regal. I could just imagine nobles and leaders of centuries past wandering around, discussing whatever important topics they had to discuss. Instead, it was just me and a group of old ladies (they seemed like best friends traveling together, it was super cute).

Towards the back of the garden was a huge wall covered in scary Baroque sculpture art.

cameo by one of the older ladies ^^

Since it was quickly getting dark (darn Daylight Savings Time), I left the garden, went to Stu's apartment, got my laptop and things, and hung out at the "Seventh Heaven" café down the street. It isn't actually called Seventh Heaven, but that's what the name translates to in English! Totally a hipster place. When you first walk in, the front room is full of young intellectuals drinking, and smoking cigarettes; I was sitting next to a group of thrift-store-clothed Erasmus students; and all the tables, chairs, and coffee cups were mismatched. I ordered (confusingly) a "large coffee" and ended up getting some sort of latte.

I sat here for a while, eavesdropping on a tutoring session in English going on behind me, until Stu called to say she was done with class and coming home. We went out to dinner at a favourite place of hers, La Cantina, where we had some really good Mexican food (but I still got a Czech beer). Later, we went to another fave spot, a wine bar called Usudu.

It has many, many levels underground of caves filled with tables to sit at. The wine was really cheap; we sat down and saved a lot of seats for Stu's friend who were meeting us; they took a while to arrive so we mingled with some other American students (also on Stu's program, but at another school) until they got there. Overall, a really fun night in some really cool locales :)

xxo, S