• “Don’t be scientific. Sometimes you just need to light things on fire. One time I lit a piece of fried chicken on fire.”
• On Czech cuisine: “The meat flows like a river.”
• “We just juice things.”
• “It looks like a horrible poodle accident.”
• “This is the most real that unreal is.”
• ” … because it’s like you’re facing something that’s too big to wrap yourself around.” “What, like a really fat girl?”
• “You can sing the song. Just don’t touch the wing.”
• “I need you to be zen. You’re messing up my chai [sic].”
• “Why solve a problem when you can belligerize it?”
• “I’m saving myself for tonight.”
• “How does ‘Golden Scissors’ remind you of a strip club?” “You know, like … cutting loose. [Picks up cell phone] Oh hey, mom!”
• “You don’t have a space sharpie?”
• ” … that ol’ bi-racial luck of the draw.”
• On feminism: “I’m cracking that window … that glass ceiling.”
• “If you can’t beat ‘em, outbreed ‘em.”
• “I’m gastronomically promiscuous.”
• On discovering the Czech parliament meets in a room that was historically a large horse stable: “I wonder if there’s more or less horseshit in here now.”
• On trying to get out of bed to go to the bar: “It’s like you’re playing a high-stakes card game and trying really hard to concentrate, but there’s this hot bitch all over you, and you can’t concentrate. My bed is that hot bitch.”
• On obligations: “I just took the shot from hell for you. You’re going out tonight!”
• On drink choices: “Velvet whatever. I’ll get anything with ‘velvet’ in the name.”
• “There was a time when everything was legit.” “What about race-relations?” “Well, it was real.”
• “Do you have a word in Czech for a girl, not necessarily a slut, but who’s just really messed up and drunk?” “Um, yeah … British.”
• [In Slavic accent] “But … is for children.”
• On liquid courage: “I’ll kill the king of the Nazguls!”
• “I don’t want to be a girl with this person.”
• On prosthetics: “You only need one hand to grope.”
• “Oxtail is the best meat. It’s closest to the asshole.”
• “The inside joke is not that you like testes.”
• “Me and Alex decided that we and me were the drunkest people here.”

Oh, and the official phrase of the trip: “Hot tranny mess.”

Anyway, these are a few of my favorite shots from Prague containing a. people, and b. were either shot from the hip, or were hot reflexes at work.

I was trying to get a shot of…her from the front, but my Rebel decided that was the opportune moment to Error 99 me into woe, so I whipped around once the street cleared out, next to this French guy with a DSLR and got the mannequin and this couple. Mystery: Where is the guy who dragged the mannequin out there?

Like 30 seconds after this topless, chestpainted group of mixed company peace protestors drummed and sang their way by with a banner, this wedding procession shot out of nowhere.

These women were definitely British, definitely going somewhere nice, definitely did not get their heads in the frame. But I think it almost works better this way because you basically know all you need to know just looking at their clothes and hands, and the white dress and light pink shawl in contrast with the Old Battle Axe at right.

Just chilling in front of Starbucks waiting for the tram. Like you do. Sad story: J. Crew is probably trying to sell that sweater to a 25 year-old guy, and he’s probably buying it. RIGHT NOW.

And even though this isn’t QUITE all the way candid, this is just a good picture of John and Sarah, and I may as well put it up.

1.) Czech dog training: This is the only place I’ve ever been where dogs are constantly unleashed and yet completely obedient. Seriously– they walk, calmly and rationally(or as rationally as any poodle can be), next to their owners. With no leash. If I tried that with my dog, she’d run faster than Ussain Bolt in the opposite direction.Without stopping. Is there special Czech dog training? Specific breeds? And more importantly, where can I get one?

2.) Czech male fashion: Man-pris. Mullets. Tall socks with shorts. It’s a cross between a Billy-Ray Cyrus music video and a retirement home. Of course, there are your tragically hip Czech dudes with their skinny-leg suits, but for every one of them there is some guy on the tram with a mohawk-mullet (yes, I said “mohawk mullet”) and jorts. I think the UN should get involved.

3.) PDAs: I’ve seen more make-out sessions than one would during the season premiere of The Real World. This would make more sense if it were at a bar, but this is during early morning rush hour. I have theories as to the reasoning for this phenomenon, but generally I try to pretend it’s not happening.

4.) Czech bar music: Think of a cross between 2003 MTV and Europop. Then add more Shakira, a touch of Lady Gaga, and a dash of dance hall. We watched Vh1 Europe during lunch yesterday and were disturbed but oddly transfixed. One final note: very little rap. Thankfully, your friends Jane, Casey and CJ have been remedying the situation by referencing Jay-Z, T.I., and Lupe Fiasco every fourteen seconds.

5.) The Niceness: Look, I’m not good with tourists. In Ann Arbor, I’m either ignoring them or attempting to intentionally confuse them. Not so in Prague– people seem remarkably willing to help us, despite the language barrier. Who knew Central Europe could be so friendly?

Josh and I went to the huge Fakultni Nemocnice Motol (Hospital Motol) that’s part new, and part old ghetto Soviet. No joke:

On the other side behind us, the windows actually opened all the way. Josh was like “I’ve never seen windows like that at a hospital, it’s like they’re inviting people to jump out.” This side of the building also offered what we assume is Czech wheelchair accessibility:

So, yeah, guess where the foreigners’ department is.

Of course, the woman with the least job satisfaction of anyone in the Czech Republic happens to be the blond woman at the foreigners desk at Hospital Motol. Despite wearing what I Dream of Jeanie would wear if she were in her early fifties and at her beach house (white peasant blouse, pink cotton elastic waist pants, gold Tevas), she had all the charm and cheer of this woman.

She just DID NOT KNOW when we’d get doctor, because the CLINIC CLOSED AT THREE, which we SHOULD HAVE KNOWN even though we were told it was four and how DARE we come at 3:05, but we COULD TRY if we wanted, but first we MUST PUT DOWN DEPOSIT. And deposit 1,000 Crowns which must be HUGE INCONVENIENCE for us even though you might realize that 1,000 Crowns is only $50. And if my throat had bothered me for THREE OR FOUR DAYS, WHY didn’t we come SOONER?

And just to be clear, she reminded us, before giving us frankly sparse directions to the appropriate department:

“There are sick Czechs here, too. They need doctors. This is Czech hospital.”

So, we wandered our way up to the next floor that had a color scheme of Cocoa Cocoa Puff Brown and the color Michelle Obama wore on Inauguration Day, except a little brighter. Since there was no clear reception area, no English signs, and reading Czech pretty much amounts to “DMRPXXTEOSM BEZ SKUVTSPY” and guessing, we wandered around every possible hallway option, up to and including going into an area apparently for doctors only. We know because we were immediately yelled at in Czech. Naturally, in a city where everyone seems to speak English, the only place they do not speak English is the hospital.

Despite Eastern Bloc Jeanie prophesizing our deaths in the 2nd floor waiting room after an anguished 100 years of solitude waiting for a doctor to come down, there was like one couple there waiting and no one else, and a doctor was there in about fifteen minutes.

“Millerovska, Katerina?”

That’s me!

So, it took very little time to establish I have strep throat. It was pretty much like a normal doctor’s visit, except there was no rapid strep test, my doctor looked like she was 25 (though notably the only pleasant person I met at Motol), and we had to employ Czech Google to translate Sulfa and Suprax to make sure she wasn’t prescribing me something I was allergic to. She also hilariously asked me, “This is not your normal voice, no?” Yeah, no kidding, I spent three days rasping and squeaking like a 13 year-old boy or a 45 year-old chain smoker, and a Venn diagram of those two voices includes only me with strep throat and Miley Cyrus on a Tuesday.

Anyway, Dr. Eva told me to drink tea and stay in and take my antiobiotics at the appropriate time, and that was it. Josh and I rolled on back to the foreigners department where Rosa Klebb pointedly ignored us for like five minutes, in visceral fury that the Ugly Americans were back so quickly when every Czech citizen was in that hospital, that day needing doctors. All in all, the doctor’s visit and the prescription ended up costing about $100, which is absurdly cheap.

And so I can only conclude with what Lauren Bruns emailed me yesterday: “Hahahahah. Not that I think the fact that you have strep is funny. But let’s be honest. That would ONLY happen to YOU. Typical.”

From our tour last Sunday, in Old Town Square:

From GSJC

And while I’m at it, an homage to two of the most beautiful things I’ve seen in Prague so far:

From GSJC

1) Plums marinated in plum liqueur and wrapped in bacon.

From GSJC

2) Budvar Dark.

Both, perhaps not coincidentally, from U Medvidku.

It was not until yesterday, when we had the opportunity to listen to Jan Urban, a journalism  professor from NYU in Prague, that I finally began to understand just what life in the Czechoslovak Socialist Republic was like.  Having lived under the Communist regime, Mr. Urban knew just how oppressive the system was, noting several times that there was absolutely no way around the system.  The state was the Communist Party, and it controlled everything.  The Czechoslovak Socialist Republic was by far the most centralized of the Eastern Soviet bloc countries, partially because the industrial nature of the country had a well-organized labor movement that provided the foundation necessary to support a Communist regime.

One of the most telling examples Mr Urban gave was that of parents trying to send their children to school.  Although children did receive primary education – for what it was worth – children’s ability to attend college, and even high school, was dependent on their parents’ political loyalty and nothing else.  Simply put, children were hostages of the parents.  The Party knew that parents would not risk their children’s education by doing anything that would seem to go against the Communist Party.  People knew that they basically only had one chance to resist because that would most likely be their last, as they would be punished either through their children, prison, or worse.

Yesterday, however, we visited the Jewish Quarter, which Jane has already discussed part of, and I will defer to her excellent post there. But courtesy the Amazing Adventures of Kavalier & Clay, which I recently read, the trip got to be less a traipse around the set of Prince Caspian. Somehow, the fictional fact that Michael Chabon wrote Joe Kavalier living and escaping from Prague while the rest of his family died either in the ghetto or attempting escape themselves, provided me with a lot of context. So, yes, fake people’s lives make Prague less fake for me.

Anyway! We visited the Spanish Synagogue (built in the 1860s in the Moorish style — i.e. it looks like a Mosque with extremely intricate patterns, very rich, dark greens, reds, and golds) and the Old-New Synagogue which was built in the mid-1200s. Which means IT IS OLD. Also, old, the Old Jewish Cemetery:

While I can’t provide any scale to show just how prolific this thing is, I can give you the perspective of the density from another angle:

Highly ornate tombstones are just piled on top of tombstones on top of tombstones. This is the description from the brochure for the tour the Jewish Museum of Prague runs:

“The Old Jewish Cemetery was established in the first half of the 15th century. The oldest tombstone, which marks the grave of the poet and scholar Avigdor Kara, dates from the year 1439. Burials took place in the cemtery until 1787. Today the cemetery contains almost 12,000 tomstones, although the number of persons buried there is much greater.”

It’s OLD. But everything here is old. I feel like Colin Mochrie in this Whose Line Is It Anyway sketch constantly (which I would embed below but WordPress hates me. Suffice to say, he hates old, British things.).

The trick for the whole, “Prague is the Most Beautiful City” thing is to go out at night. Any restoration done in Prague is a private enterprise (for serious, which is incredible), and all the colorful buildings were varying shades of gray per the Soviets only 20 years ago, but even so, every building with like Saints peppered on the roof like ninjas about to descend or sherbet paint or whatever has that faint sheen of dirt over top it. But at night! At night, the cobblestones reflect the abundant old school streetlamp mood lighting, the dirt fades, and your fear of it all ending courtesy something embarrassing like a Saab or a Volvo fades, because fewer people drive at night. See?

Excuse the blatantly touristy area, we were on our way back from dinner. Or a bar. Whichever.

I admit, the history of the Second World War is my “thing”. Since I was in grade school, I’ve been fascinated (some might say “obsessed” with the European Theater, the Eastern Front, and the history of the Third Reich. I wrote my honors thesis at Michigan on Nazi propaganda before and after the Battle of Stalingrad. I’m used to seeing materials that blame Jews for the war,  materials that urged Germans to hate Jews. I’ve seen the images from Dachau and Bergen-Belsen and Auschwitz-Birkenau– women being forced to strip before being shot, bodies being burned by special commando units of Jews who themselves would be gassed soon after, the bodies of children lying in heaps. I hate to say it, but until today, I thought I was almost….immune to the Holocaust. I’d seen too much, knew too much, thought about it too much.

But walking into the Pinkas Synagogue was like a slap in the face. On the walls of the synogoguge are printed the names of the over 80,000 Bohemian and Moravian Jews murdered during the Holocaust– their family name, their birth date, and the year of death. Some names were followed by years that indicated that the person was over eighty years old. But the moment that hit me the hardest was one name followed by “11.2 1940-1944″. A four-year-old, maybe just learning how to read and write, sent to die.

Upstairs, there was a room dedicated to the “Children’s Drawings from Terezin 1942-1944″. Terezin, or Thieresenstadt in German, was to be a “model camp”. The Nazis brought the Red Cross to the camp to show them how well Jews were being treated, and made a propaganda film about the camp, “The Führer Gives a City to the Jews”. But virtually all of the inhabitants were quickly shipped further east to death camps. The drawings were of the camp and daily life. Some were doodles– one had German language lessons (“Eins für alles und alles für eins”- One for all and all for one). The children who drew these pictures were four and five years old, some a little older. Almost all of them died.

It’s almost impossible for me to explain what the Pinkas Synogogue made me feel. I felt…robbed, in a sense. These people could have been parents, grandparents. They could have been artists or architects or academics. But because of a political ideology, they were deemed “unworthy” of life and brutally murdered. I want to know who these people were and who they could have been. But I never will. No one will. And I think that is one of the greatest tragedies of the Holocaust.