all the facets of being an american tourist...

...were covered our second day in Prague lol.

We got up late and had breakfast (the wonderfully american breakfast buffet at our hotel) and then went and wandered around Old Town a bit and then went and signed up for a walking tour! I don't remember the last time I did a real walking tour with a guide (that was unassociated with a school function), but it was cool! It was also freezing, but we survived... mostly. Anyways, we went and saw the old Jewish ghetto (its not a ghetto anymore, it contains the "wealthiest street in {Prague/the Czech Republic/Europe (I can't remember - oops!!)] lined with stores like Cartier, Hermes, Louis Vuitton, stores I haven't even heard of, etc.), a Jewish graveyard with 12 rows of graves (so the top of the graveyard is about 10 feet higher than the ground where we were standing), the oldest synagogue in Eastern Europe (Hitler didn't destroy it because he wanted to turn the whole area into a "museum of the inferior race"), a statue of Kafka that no one understands (see pics - its the one with a man on top of an empty suit: does the suit represent Kafka's father? does it represent Kafka himself as he walks down the street? Does it represent the state? draw your own conclusions, basically), and we made our way to Charles Bridge, which is the most famous bridge in Prague because it's the prettiest and oldest and has towers on each side. We started from Old Town square, so the guide explained the astronomical clock (not even gonna try, but it has roman, arabic and czech/european numbers, all of which tell you time differently. And it tells you when the sun will set. And it has a little show every hour where the two top windows open and you can see the 12 Apostles in them - not completely sure why, but it was cool- and then the rooster crows). He also told us about the Tyn Church, which are in my pics and as you can see (if you're looking at them), there are houses in front of the church, well the houses were there first, even though the church looks wayyy older. And also, the Czech have a thing against restoring old buildings; they think it cheapens them, so (there are some pics) there's a building in the town square, attached to the Tower with damage from WWII and they haven't been restored because they're there as a memorial to WWII. Pretty cool. Oh and [disclaimer: I was depressed upon learning this!] apparently, the entire front facade of the Notre Dame in Paris is completely different from how it used to be when it was made originally and the Czech think that's a shame (as do I, actually).

So that was our walking tour, it was lots of information in 2 hours, but very interesting information. After that, we all split up - Caitlin was freezing so she went home, Rebecca and Conner went a cafe where communist supporters gathered to make plans during WWII and I went to go see Tyn Church. I was actually rather disappointed with it, I guess the name should've warned me: Church, as in, NOT Cathedral lol. But it was cool, just not what I was expected. I couldn't take pictures, so you can't tell exactly what I mean, but I got such a feeling of militarism in the church. There were pieces of armor, swords and staffs on the inside and there was no crucifix. I don't know, it was a cool place, just very different from my image of European churches. From there I went back to Charles Bridge and walked across. the view was incredible, Prague (although freezing for much of the year) is in a beautiful part of the world. There were also street venders along the bridge, which was really cool, but I didn't buy anything. From there I caught the tram back to the hotel, where we met up to go to dinner. We ended up walking back and forth like 4 times, but eventually we found the restaurant and it was good, cheap, Czech food. I got the duck and it came with cabbage and potato dumplings. The duck was excellent, the dumplings were good and the cabbage was, well, not my favorite. From there we went back to the hotel and chilled for a bit and then got ready to go on a pub crawl (lol).

[should probably add a disclaimer here: craziness ensues! haha] We went to the first pub, where everyone gathered and we had free drinks for an hour, but it was a really awkward place, so we didn't drink much. From there we went to another fairly awkward pub, but there was some dancing, so it wasn't as bad. Until an obnoxious british man (like, 30s) sat too close to me and tried to talk to me. Sorry, I'm not interested in men 10+ years older than me, no matter what kind of accent they have. So we got up and wandered around, oh at this point, Conner and Rebecca left because they were bored. The next bar was better, it was more of a discotheque and had lazers and techno/house music. The last club, though, was the reason I stuck it out throw the first awkward ones. When we paid for the pub crawl, we got a free t-shirt and free entry into each pub/bar/club we went to. The last one was 5 stories and the biggest club in Central Europe. It was ridiculous. And awesome. And everything I thought European clubbing would be. Well Caitlin and I got in and checked our coats and then went to find a floor we'd like. We found the American hip-hop floor and it was amazing, they played all the typical american songs that are at parties and clubs, but it wasn't like a typical american club where everyone is having sex all over the dance floor, it was just more fun! And I didn't feel like all the guys in the room were going to roofie me (definite upside and difference from Spain), there was no inappropriate grabbing or anything, such a nice change. It was funny too, guys in Europe go to clubs and they actually dance! And they're actually good! I was dancing with a German kid (who spoke no English and I speak no German, it was interesting) and he was like a mime - interpretively hip-hop dancing but also using facial expressions... that sounds really weird when you read it, but he was really fun to dance with because he was a really good dancer. Eventually, we decided to leave the american floor and check out the other ones: there was a 80s/90s disco ish floor (pretty legit - the floor lit up in squares, like my image of 70s disco dancing, but the music was more 80s), a techno/house floor, a "chill" floor, another american music floor and the basement was part bar and restaurant and part gamish floor - house/hip-hop/techno/american/european, that was cool too.

Anyways, so we decided that we should probably get home eventually so we left around 3:45 am, which by Prague standards I think is pretty early, and went to the tram stop. But we missed both trams we could've taken by oh... TWO minutes. so we walked to the next stop. and the next stop. and the next stop. all the way to the hotel. at 4 am. We never felt unsafe or anything and neither of us were drunk, so don't worry, we made it alright and had a map and phones. But we did end up walking 3 miles and it took us an hour, so we got home at 4:50. bear in mind, the regular tram schedule starts at 5 am. So, we could've stayed at the club and left at 5 and gotten home like 20 minutes later lol. Oh well, moot point now.

So yeah, we got home, went straight to bed and then got up Sunday around 10:30 because we had to pack, shower, get breakfast and check out by 12. insane. but we did it. and then we went and wandered around downtown and spent our last koruny on souvenirs. I bought these beautiful crystal earrings from a crystal store - Czech crystal is really nice (at least, that's what we were told...) and the earrings are certified (they have a certificate!) Czech crystal, so I'm assuming they're good quality, because they were kind of expensive (and by expensive, i mean $25, so really, not that much), but they're really pretty, so I splurged :) And then we came home and then I was exhausted and nearly fell asleep at dinner lol

Anyways, this week has been uneventful since I've been a major slacker, so not much to tell, but I hope you enjoyed my adventures in Prague (because I definitely did! haha) tootles for now <3