With just two weekends left before I was to leave Frankfurt, I had to travel this weekend (as well as the next). I had originally planned to do my “whirlwind” trip (where I go to Berlin, Hamburg and Heidelberg again) this weekend, but when Pascal told me that he’d be in Hamburg the next weekend, I postponed that for next weekend. So where should I go? That was the question I posed to several colleagues Thursday after work. I was thinking about Cologne—it being the only “major” German city I haven’t been to yet (yeah I know there’s Stuttgart, Nuermberg, Dresden, Dusseldorf, etc., but Cologne came up with greater frequency than those other cities)—but they advised against it. They suggested some other cities, but the one that stood out the most was Prague.
Now, I’ve heard a lot about Prague since (and before) I got here. From Brock wanting to do what I’m doing now in Frankfurt out there (i.e. valuation exchange program in Prague). From Josh saying Prague is the new Amsterdam. From Pascal saying the women walk up to you and offer sex for 10 Euros. From people just telling me it’s a beautiful city. Now, no offense, but I just didn’t figure myself to have the same appreciation for Eastern Europe that many of the people who raved about it have. Like people have told me positive things about Moscow, but I’m sorry, it just doesn’t seem to be my cup of tea. I sort of felt the same about Prague. Nevertheless, I decided to try it out.
On Friday, Martin (the head of valuation) put me in contact with a lady out of our Prague office that does all the hotel bookings for people in the company that come to Eastern Europe. I tried to book the same hotel that Martin stayed at when he visited last year, but they were booked. The lady then sent me an excel file with all the hotels we deal with in Prague. I cross checked one (Hotel Adria) with lonely planet and it seemed all right and centrally located. I then called and, as they had availabilities, booked a room for Saturday night. When I later asked what the rate was, I thought she said 23 Euros (like “wow”), but upon check in I saw it was 93 Euros, which wasn’t too bad. I’m getting ahead of myself…
Because my Eurail pass only covers travel throughout Germany, France and the Netherlands, I would still need to buy a ticket from the German/Czech Republic border to Prague. Luckily, that leg of the trip was only like an hour/hour and a half. So for around 22 Euros going and 196
Korunas coming back, my travel was covered. Oh yeah…”
Korunas.”
Now, I’m not sure if the Czech Republic is part of the EU or not, but their national currency is the
Koruna and, during my stay, the conversion was roughly 25
Korunas to 1 Euro. This was actually “mathematically” cool cause to calculate the equivalent in Euros all you have to do is chop off the last two digits of the price and multiply what’s left by 4. Example, if something is 700 krowns, it’d be 28 Euros (7 x 4 = 28).
Anyways, Saturday started early (5am to be exact) so I could catch the 6:18am train to Dresden. From there I had a little less than 10 minutes to catch (as in transfer to) the 11:10am train to Prague. Two hours later, I was in Prague (and yes, its in the same time zone).
As in Germany, there are no “turnstiles” as we know them (i.e. blocking your entry unless you have paid for a ticket) there are just these stations where you can get a time stamped on the (optional) ticket you’ve purchased (they had the same deal in Munich I believe). Once getting above ground, it took me around 20 to 30 minutes to find my hotel (which was probably a 2 minute walk from the metro exit) because I was wrong to assume that the red signs on buildings at intersections denoted street names. I mean they do the exact same thing in London, only here they don’t state the street but the area of the city you’re in and the building number (which, by the way, is not the same as the address number).
After checking into the hotel (which by the way had motion-sensored lights in the hallways, so when you turn the corner, its completely dark…and when you look behind you its dark as well…way to conserve energy!), I went to the Na Prinkope (Prague’s main retail street), which was nearby. Same ol’, same ol’. Bunch of chain retailers, including H&M and Zara. However, Zara was having a 50% off sale.
Now, Jonah told me about this when he spent his Monday in Frankfurt wandering the streets, and was raving about this suit he bought for like 60 Euro or something. I felt it was a good deal, but I sort of wasn’t that geeked about going out of my way to check out a Zara because they have them in the States, I wasn’t in the market for a suit at the moment and even if they did have something I wanted, I figured all my sizes would be gone—it being a 50% off sale and all.
But here I was in front of the store, in a country I’ve never been in before…”let’s see if they have some cashmere sweaters on sale,” I thought to myself. Try 599 Krowns! At a roughly 25 Krowns to 1 Euro exchange rate, that works out to…24 Euro! Times 1.5 (Euro to dollars conversion) that’s…(drumroll please)…36 Dollars!!!! It’s good deal. AND they had my size in each of the 4 colors they had. Practicing restraint (because after this revelation I was real temped to head over to the shoe and dress shirt sections and see what kind of deals they had there as well), I only purchased two sweaters and was out. I then ventured up the rest of the street, took some pictures of the historic and/or colorful buildings…
…and headed back to the hotel to drop off the sweaters.
OK, here’s where the adventure begins.
As I would find out as the night progressed, Saturday evening in Prague consisted of one recommendation, which I then would check out, followed by another. It all started with late lunch/early dinner. Before leaving the hotel after dropping off the sweaters, I asked the desk lady where was a good place to eat (as I have done for each of the cities in which I have stayed overnight). She gave two recommendations: Café Café and Platy’z.
Café Café was the closest so I headed there first. But upon arriving, I saw that it was basically a coffee bar/lounge that served drinks and sandwiches. Wasn’t my cup of tea (no pun intended), so I headed over to Platy’z…which upon arrival I saw was more my speed (more sit down restaurant than café/bar). And the dish I had there was excellent (I’m actually going to try to make this when I get home. It was basically broccoli, cauliflower, mushrooms and carrots, topped with mozzarella and oregano. Simple enough Italian dish, its just that most of the time something like this would be served with pasta or some sort of starch. But this was it…and it worked! Maybe it was the way in which they sautéed the vegetables or something, I don’t know. Also, to back up a bit, I also asked the lady at the front desk of the hotel (who recommended the places to eat) what are the beers to drink out here. She referred me to one of her colleagues (a dude…of course) who then gave me a list of four Czech beers to try. It was here that I tried the first of the four—Pilsner Urquell.
Backing up again, probably the first thing I noticed (and remembered) once I got off the train and walked through the station was that absinthe is legal (and prominently peddled) in Prague. Now, I’ve had absinthe once before in my life (it tastes like licorice) but the experience was nowhere close to the mind-altering state touted by many an absinthe-head and popularized by stories of Van Gogh. To tell the truth, I don’t even remember getting drunk from it. Backing up even further (I promise this is the last time I’ll use that phrase), when I was in Amsterdam (the other place in Europe where absinthe is sold), they told me you’re better off getting “authentic” absinthe from the Czech republic (where its still homemade in places…I believe) than in Amsterdam. So here I was in Prague and I was in the mood to have an experience with some “authentic” absinthe.
So, after finishing my meal at Platy’z, I asked the waitress where’s the best spot to get a drink. But there was one caveat…they had to serve absinthe as well. She then suggested Tretter’s NY Bar, which (according to her) was close by.
While walking over there, I found a liquor store that sold, amongst other liquors, absinthe. But to my surprise, they basically had all the absinthes that the guy in the store in Amsterdam said were weak and/or not the real thing. I even had the pleasure of schooling a couple U.S. soldiers (and their German girlfriends), who were on duty in Germany but on leave in Prague for the weekend, on absinthe-fare. Anyways, that isn't the point. The point is that it was here that I bought the second of the recommended Czech beers (this one is actually one of my favorites of the Europe entire trip)...Budweiser Budvar:
Anyways, back to the adventure. After circling the same block (where subsequently several people told me it was located) about three times, I finally found Tretter’s NY Bar.
As I walked into the place, this blonde haired girl walked in just before me and took the seat at the bar I was going to sit at. Shortly thereafter, I asked the bartender if they had absinthe, which they did. I then told him I wanted one. The girl who took my seat must have known the bartender cause they struck up a conversation somethin’ fierce (in Czech, of course). And it was during this conversation I heard her say something to the effect of “tourist” after I ordered absinthe. I then told her that this being Tretter’s NY bar, I was actually more at home than her. This sort of love-hate banter continued between us (she spoke very good English) the rest of my stay at the bar. It wasn’t long before another bartender came over and did his little “absinthe thing” (think that Tom Cruise movie where he’s playing a bartender) replete with pouring a shot of absinthe from the top shelf and lighting a brown sugar cube on fire…
Now, this was different than the absinthe from before, it BURNED as it went down. And no I didn’t take the shot “to the face.” I straight baby-sat (i.e. sipped) this bad boy for at least the following 30 minutes. During this time, girl proceeded to tell me how she was recently dumped by her boyfriend cause she would get mad when he smoked around her (to clarify, she didn’t like him smoking altogether, but it was the “smoking around her” that she had the problem with). I told her how most dudes take offense to bossy women cause its like they’re trying to control and/or change them to their liking, and how most of the time that builds up resentment and dissatisfaction with the woman and the relationship. She then tried to justify her request for not smoking by saying something to the effect of, “well, I’ve stopped flirting with other dudes while he’s around, so the least he can do is return the favor and not smoke around me.” Take it for what you will (cause it was around this time that the absinthe started kicking in and the majority of the night from this point on is a bunch of scattered instances remembered)…but I do remember her telling me how she had dude (current boyfriend) purposefully meet her at this bar where one of her exes (which she was on “good terms with”) worked and was “puzzled” why dude (current boyfriend) was acting different. I then asked whether ex was laying on the flirt/”yeah, I hit that” extra thick, to which she giggled and said yeah.
Shortly before I left, I asked where the party was. She told me about 3 places: Bombay, M1 and Radost Fx. The first two were nearby so I went to Bombay first. Not my cup of tea. But I ordered a Mojito with Havana Club Rum before leaving. Next was M1. I wouldn’t say it was wack (the DJ played that T-Pain song “Bartender”), but it was definitely less crowded than Bombay…but then again the night was still young at that point. I ordered a Mojito with Havana Club Rum before leaving…I think (remember, absinthe was taking the cake at this time).
As I made my way back to the hotel before leaving back out to check out the piece-de-resistance (Radost FX), I happened upon this other place (I want to say it was an Irish pub, but I don’t remember) and struck up a conversation with a mixed couple (black woman/white man) whom I believe were both British. He told me about when he was in the military, there was a city he was stationed at and everyday at 4pm they were told to get out of there cause that’s when the British air-calvary would come in and bomb the heck out of the city. He said that’s what happened to Frankfurt during WWII. He continued to say that’s why all of the construction is post-1950 and the one area that survived the bombings (Dom/Roemer—where the Chirstmas Market in Frankfurt is held) is one of the celebrated/touristy areas of the city.
Anyways, I got back to the room, somewhat caught my bearings then caught a cab to Radost FX. Surprisingly, it was wack but then again I think I got there before it really popped off (I got there around like 11 or 12 or something and I believe it popped off between 1 and 2). Again, I got a Mojito cause they make it with Havana Club Rum and was out. I caught another taxi back to the hotel and immediately passed out.
The next morning, I woke up and got the typical European breakfast (bread, cheese and salami), went back to the room and took a shower, then headed down to the front desk to request a late check out. Now, here’s the interesting thing about this hotel…you pay per hour (about 100 Krowns) for late check out. I’m not only surprised that the thought of such a thing has never crossed my mind, but also surprised that I haven’t run across a hotel in the U.S. with such a policy (because if you think about it, that’s a very American thing to do). But after the conversion, 100 Krowns works out to just 4 Euro. So I told them I’d be check out at 2pm.
At this point, I would normally have a long picture reel. But for some reason, even I feel that I took too many pictures on this day (well over 200). Make no mistake, the weather was beautiful, its just that I took like between 2 to 4 pictures of each thing. Nevertheless, I have a lot of very good pictures…in fact, too many to publish on this already super long blog. So, look for the blog with the link to my photo sharing account in the near future.
Anyways, to sum up the walk,
- I witnessed 12 o’clock at the Astrological clock...
(this was supposed to be the “Praha (preview)” blog, but everytime I tried to upload it, it would never work.
- Saw this HUGE metronome that was up on a hill in the distance...
I walked over and (exhaustively) up to it and it turned out to be a pseudo-skatepark/hangout for kids in the city...
And the view was spectacular...
- There’s this famous bridge in Prague (one or more of you all got the post card) so of course I had to take a picture. So I walked to the banks of the adjacent bridge and there was this area with a rack of swans. People were feeding them and the view was awesome...
- At the foot of this bridge, there was this super-small mom-and-pop shop (that sold chips and beer) with a guy outside grilling sausages. It was here that I tried the third of the suggested Czech beers: Gambrinus. From what I remember, nothing special. It tasted like a regular beer we drank at the dojo (Josh's apartment).
- Of all the cities I’ve visited on my jaunt out here in Europe, I’d say this city tops the list when it comes to number of Asian tourists.
I got lost on the way back to the hotel so I had to catch the 4:30 out of Prague. I got to the station just before four though so I had enough time to try the last of the suggested beers: Staropramen. It tasted the same as Gambrinus. After the trip was all said and done, I didn’t end up getting back to Frankfurt til after 1am. I was however able to catch snippets of the Patriots/Chargers game as I traveled on the train thanks to Kadija—we Skyped each other and she faced her laptop to the TV screen; but I say snippets cause the UMTS card kept timing out as I was traveling on the ICE (high speed train) and each cell tower that the card accessed would last at most like 10 minutes. I ain’t complaining though, I love all this new fangled technology!
Cheers.
At the end of the block, all that's left is to cross the street...
At the end of the block, all that's left is to cross the street...
