PRAGUE a.k.a PRAHA

NOTE:  I wrote this on my tablet while we were on our "Waltz Down the Danube" adventure and sent it by email to myself since I cannot access the "compose" part of my "A Nichols Worth..." blog anywhere except the desktop computer at home.  But I wanted to edit it and add the beautiful picture on the postcard I bought for our memory book.  

Little did I know it would take more than two months before I could carve out some time at the computer to do those simple things.  Soooo, there may have to be a re-read of the first vacation post to get in the "cruise groove" with me, once again.

                        DAYS 1-3

The tour guide on our tour of Prague said that thirty years ago the city was dark and dismal.  Yep!  It was thirty two years ago this month that I was last in Prague--May 1985 just before we returned to the United States after living in West Berlin, Germany.  The Soviets were still in control and everything looked bleak. Though the countryside was in the full bloom of its spring  season, the city itself was drab with little color.

I don't remember much more than that as we drove through that May day because the main objective of our trip was a visit to Budapest.   Though I DO remember we had a good time for the two days we had spent here a few months before when we actually stayed overnight before going on to Vienna and down into Italy during the winter break from school.

It was two days after Christmas that we had driven across a snow swept landscape from East Germany down into Czechoslovakia, approaching Prague about 10 o'clock at night.  We looked in vain for the city's lights which would signal the approaching end of a long day's trip.  After all, this was a city of about 1 million people.  

What we didn't realize is that we were already in the city.  But, because of  Soviet restrictions, there were no street lights other than a bare minimum.  It had seemed strange and felt like it did at home when the power goes out and the normally well-lighted neighborhoods are dark.

I don't remember what hotel we stayed at.  There were only a few available and our choice had to be selected and paid for in advance when we applied for the outrageously expensive  24 hour visa.  Ross had taken care of that weeks before.

We were all a little apprehensive about lodging with the Soviets.  But when the kids made comments like our room was probably going to be bugged and other stuff they'd seen in the movies about the repressive government in the Soviet Bloc countries, Ross and I pooh-poohed it and said all was well.  Secretly, I had the same images running through my mind.

On our way into the city that winter the kids had made bets with each other as to who was going to spot McDonald's first.  HAHA!  There was NO McDonald's!  So, I was a little worried if the kids would turn their noses up to the food since it was bound to be very different than what they were used to eating.  Surprise, surprise....they liked the Spies Karte which was kind of a goulash.

We went walking in the city to have a look around.  I believe it was the Palladium Shopping Centrum where we went--down a long, long escalator into the bowels of the earth where there were a few stores which had a limited amount of merchandise in them.  In spite of that, we had a good time window shopping--until we realized Burgandy was no longer with us.  Somewhere, somehow we had gotten separated from her.

Ross and I were frantic, darting into and out of shop after shop without catching sight of her, calling her name as we went.  Finally Ross reminded us that we had always said if we got separated, we were to stay in the last place we had been together.  And that's how we found Burgandy--blithely looking in a store window very near where the rest of us had moved onto the next store and we got separated with the crowds of people thronging around us.

Prague was also the first place I had ever seen how the "Black Market" worked.  I had heard of it for years yet had no idea how it became tangible.  But that day in Prague as we walked down the street--two very obvious American adults with a half-dozen kids--I saw a guy raise his arm above his head and rub his fingers together as he slipped into an alley.  Ross followed him and exchanged our very in-demand American money with him for some Czech bills.  I thought for sure we were all going to go to jail!  But it didn't seem that anyone even paid attention.

It was also in Prague I noticed that old beat-up American cars were a status symbol.  Some dating back twenty years or more with fins on the rear chassis--but also missing fenders and bumpers and other such details that Western drivers would never drive around without.

It was during the time we were wandering around the only area of Prague the Soviets would allow visitors that we had a significantly emotional experience.  As I mentioned, it wouldn't have been too difficult for people to see us and rightly assess that we were American. 

However, to one elderly woman we were the representation of all that was good about the Americans after World War II.   She laid her hand on Ross' arm and said that if she could--without repercussion from the Soviets--she would take us home with her where she would feed us as thanks for  America and for American integrity after the war ended.  Meaning no rape and pillage of the conquered countries like the Soviets did to such devastating effect.

So, that was the Prague I remembered.  A good memory.

As we drove into the city from the airport yesterday, these were the thoughts I had.  But instead of seeing the drab, dismal city I had seen before, here was a vibrant city that has done a lot of work in the last 30 plus years to reclaim its place as one of the jewels of Central Europe.  The people in the Czech Republic, and indeed most of Eastern Europe, refer to Prague in its native spelling:  Praha.  And that brings me to another point.  I have now added another country to my list of "have visited", only this time I had already been to this country. It's only the name that has changed.

The buildings are no longer black and sooty but the rich cream and light colors they were originally--as far back as the 900's.  This is a city steeped in the history of empires and family dynasties with beautiful parks and waterways that add to its charm.  The streets are still medieval, twisting and turning cobblestone paths into hidden courtyards and and open plazas.  Churches, palaces, and statues are plentiful, all with a story....like the palace of Good King Wenceslas, who distributed goods to the poor and for whom the English wrote a Christmas carol with which we are all familiar.

So, here are my observations about Prague today:  It reminds me a lot of Berlin.  Lots of color.  Lots of cars.  Lots of shops with beautiful cut glass, art work, wooden toys like marionettes, stacking dolls now prevalent from their Russian neighbors, plus crystal and ceramics.

I found a beautiful, but simple, color-washed Nativity--just Mary, Joseph, the Baby Jesus, and a lamb on a wooden base. Hand made in the Czech Republic (there were two others but with minor differences) for just 7,000 Korun.  I just about had the shopkeeper wrap it up (I was prepared to pay as much as $100 for a beautiful souvenir like that) when Louis had the clerk convert that to American dollars.  It was $330.  YIKES!!!!!!!  You have to know that was too much even for me--who has been known to drop a $100 here and there for something really unusual for my collection of Nativity sets.

This is a country that is known for its blown glass ornaments, too.  But I still have to see some in the stores.  So far, nothing like that.

However, I did tell Louis I wanted to eat at McDonald's so I could say I had eaten at McDonald's in every capitol of Europe,  and be able to leave off the disclaimer--except Prague.  Eating at McDonald's was like I remember, too, not the same as at home.  The sandwiches are different and the beef doesn't taste like American corn-fed beef.

I don't remember the name of the hotel we stayed at in Prague in 1985.  This time we are staying at the Art Nouveau Palace Hotel--Viking Cruises choice--and it is nice!  Old, but not tacky.  And the included breakfast is splendiferous!

I thought the one we had at the Stephanie Hotel was super during that same vacation when we couldn't find a pension to stay in while we were in Vienna (the hotel bill was $118 and it made me so physically ill that we had had to spend so much money on one night's stay, I couldn't even enjoy it!  This was the occasion of Dad's lesson to me:  "What difference is it going to make a year from now, 10 years, 100 years?  Just enjoy it!"  But I couldn't.  I know better NOW!)

Beautiful weather.  Blue skies and abundant green everywhere.  The same kind of weather that in 1985 made me realize--out in the countryside of the Soviet Bloc nations--that beauty knows no political boundaries.

Today we did a walking tour of the "old" and "new" cities.  Actually the old and the new happened about a 100 years apart from each other more than seven or eight centuries ago.  Praha is the old.  Prague is the new.  It all looked pretty much the same to me, only one is across the bridge from the other. 

And I didn't know Prague was such hilly country.  I think the guide said nine hills.  Most of it was walking (nearly 10,000 steps for that part alone when I got back to the hotel) and then on the bus to a castle and churches on another hill.  As the bus was driving through what the guide called the Castle District, the road was winding and every curve brought a beautiful panoramic view of Prague.

I am still feeling kind of weak, but I figured if my pioneer ancestors could put one foot before the other to escape mob-ism and prejudice to cross the Great American Desert, I could suck it up and go on a jet plane in a few hours to do some really terrific sightseeing.  But I was ready for a rest when we finally got back to the hotel.   Only a couple of coughing spasms attacked me--I think they were triggered by the strong tobacco smoke (no "NO Smoking" laws here--yet, until two weeks from now) and the pungent odors from all the restaurants and eateries.  Like fingers reaching down my throat to tickle that one raw spot.

When we started out early this morning there were few people on the streets.  By noon, the streets were full of people from practically every continent and a good measure of people who were probably local.  And by that I mean from somewhere close around Prague.  There was a mix of languages and people that made the whole city seem positively cosmopolitan.  Fortunately, enough people spoke English so I could pretty much understand and be understood when I wanted to look at or buy something.  The shopping streets around the hotel were full of upscale and high end merchandise I would never think of purchasing. So, I concentrated my time on the souvenir shops and the odd, unusual little item hiding among a plethora of goods for sale.

We stay here until we leave for Passau, Germany, by "motor coach, as Europeans call the bus.  This is a wonderful three-day introduction to a long-awaited real vacation.  I am enjoying every minute of it!