Faded White

I got back into London on Monday night and left for Paris at dawn on Thursday by Eurostar. After arriving we check into our hotel and scatter to get lunch on our own. I end up eating a delicious chorizo quiche and throwing away an awful chocolate flan. You win some you lose some. We then took a sightseeing boat trip down the River Seine and went to the Eiffel Tower at sunset. It was bitterly cold and windy on top of the tower but it was a nice view seeing the city gradually light up below me.

I get separated from the group because I take forever photographing but I am not alarmed. I mean last week I was alone in Eastern Europe hundreds of miles from anyone I know. My thoughts though as I walk through the city aren’t those of excitement. I am tired and stereotypes of snobby, rude Parisians are flowing through my mind as I try to make my way back to my hotel room to drop off my camera gear and get some dinner. I end up getting ridiculously lost because the metro system is convoluted with hard to find stops and my map is not detailed enough. Paris turns out to be much larger than London or Prague in terms of the length of a block. Every street looks the same with an optical store, a patisserie, and a pharmacy on each. At this point I decide that Paris isn’t that great of a city. The city itself does not evoke romance. Sure there are lovers but that’s just the people. The city doesn’t emanate romance as it is often portrayed to. I would have to say Petrin Park in Prague or Cesky Krumlov are more romantic as places, but that’s just me.

I end up eating dinner on Rue Pot de Fer, a small street with just restaurants. I started with an avocado & prawn salad which was huge. These are bigger portions than even the United States! It was shocking. I got a whole avocado and tons of shrimp. I could only eat half of it and was afraid that I wouldn’t be able to eat my other courses. Next was a duck confit with fresh chunky potato chips and green breans. The green beans were overcooked but the duck confit and potatoes were heart cloggingly good. I finished with a fruit salad because I was too stuffed for anything heavier. The food is a good value when ordering fixed price menus but drinks are ridiculously priced at 4 euro.

Pumpkin carving in our flats here.

I got up this morning and decided to get breakfast at a cafe. I hopped onto a tram I thought was headed for the Old Town and started talking to this girl who turns out to be going to the Florida State program in London in the same buildling where I take my classes. She’s headed for Prague Castle. I end up going some place out of the city center to who knows where. I get off because I’m afraid I’m getting further and further out of the main city areas in to the suburbs. I have no idea where I am but I am comforted because I see packs of tourists meaning that there has to be something worth seeing around here. I follow them and then split off after a block. Then it unveils itself to me. The city of a hundred spires. A view of Prague from above with a hill with rows of trees to my right and a small vineyard to my left. I am at the top of Petrin Park, Prague’s biggest park situated on the side of a hill.

I start walking down the nearest path and for a moment I am filled with the rare feeling of natural contentment. All my senses are stimulated. The panoramic view of Prague and colored falling leaves all around me, the smell of the brisk autumn air in my nostrils, and the sound of church bells ringing mixed with Smetena’s “Moldau” from a nearby park cafe. These things satisfy me enough that I forgo breakfast in favor for this accidental two hour walk in the park.

I end up at the “Eiffel Tower of Prague.” Petrin Tower is a television tower that was never used and converted into a tourist spot instead. $2 for students to go up and take in the view of the city from its highest point. I am hungry by this time and decide that today is my fast food day in the Czech R to check out what the Czechs eat for street food. I order klobasa ($1.50), a foot long greasy sausage served with a slice of bread and mustard on the side. It is quite good if not downright bad for you. That is enough for the moment and I make my way down through the park back to the city.

I wander among the tourist trap shops looking for souvenirs or good deals. I end up finding a gem on the Charles Bridge. It is the art of Ivan Pavlicek. His son is selling the father’s oil on aluminum abstract work. Nobody else on the crowded bridge seems interested in the art. They are all too busy with the standard caricture artists, musicians, photographs and impressionist paintings of Prague to notice this abstract art bargain. I buy three small pieces at $6 each. I ask and am told that the aluminum comes from the grandfather’s days at an aluminum factory. The oil paint on the scrap aluminum creates a reflectiveness that is interesting and reveals the textures and colors of the paint. I wish I could have bought a two meter large piece and shipped it home at these prices.

I head over to check out the tourist trap stalls in the Old Town Square and settle in a an afternoon snack at the U Prince Hotel’s outdoor patio. Cafe latte and apple strudel a la mode. It’s $8 total but hey it’s a bargain at a five star hotel with outdoor heaters and nice chairs. I still feel uncomfortable about the whole sit where you like thing at cafes and get the waiter to notice you. It seems too unstructured and I feel like it must give the waiters a hard time to remember and notice all these different people sitting and getting up. I spend the rest of the afternoon walking around town just photographing. Here’s an espresso machine shop.

In the evening I go to the State Opera House to see the ballet, Cinderella. It turns out to be more engaging than expected. I was tired but didn’t nod off during the performance. I think it helped that there was humor in the ballet. After my theatre lecture in Cesky Krumlov I am able to greater appreciate the performance and things like the set up of the stage and how the character move through and interact with it. I also realized that when men dance ballet it looks even more graceful than the women because it is a societally unexpected grace being exhibited. This occurred to me when one of the male characters, a dandy dressed in a powdered wig; cane; and baroque style clothing w/ coattails, acted as a ballet teacher for Cinderella’s step sisters. My only complaints was that it wasn’t live music, which meant that the music was directional and didn’t fill the whole soundstage with the richness that a live orchestra would have. And the video background they used to simulate the the forest was also cheesy and amateurish. Other than those two points it was pretty good.

I took a day trip to Cesky Krumlov because it’s a UNESCO World Heritage Site and I have heard it’s really pretty. It earned that designation because it’s a preserved castle and village built in the Italian Renaissance style. It’s about 170km south of Prague so the trip was about 2.5 hours each way by minibus. It was nice because there were only five people on my tour so it was nice and small. It’s great to travel in the off season. The only problem was that the tour guide sucked and the other people on the trip weren’t that interesting. There was this couple from Russia, this English American, and this woman from Venezuela. I mean, a remote Renaissance chateau isn’t exactly a magnet for young people. Thankfully there was a lot of free time to move about the town and castle on my own.

The great thing was that I was able to experience all different types of light conditions in one day while I was there. In the morning it was misty and moody while in the afternoon it was sunny and brilliant. This made photography much more interesting but also meant I was going back to the same places again and again to capture the same scene in different light. What was cool though was how the River Vlatva flows all the way from Prague down to here. I really felt I was able to grasp Smetena’s inspiration for his famous “Moldau” piece of classical music. Moldau is the German translation for Vlatva. He wrote music titled “Ma Vlas” or My Country which was music inspired by his homeland of the Czech Republic. It’s really goosebump inducing to listen to The Moldau while looking over it.

We ate a Czech lunch in this old dungeon turned restaurant. It was the darkest restaurant I have ever been in. First was a garlicky broth with croutons and cheese. Following was pork chop grilled over a big fire with vegetables and roasted potatoes on the side. Dessert was a pear strudel. It was pretty good and pretty authentically Czech I think. It was this tucked away side street restaurant I would never have found on my own had it not been included in my tour. After lunch I wandered around and took pictures. There was a wedding at the local church so it really felt like I was in Italy with its piazzas and all. I can’t imagine this place during the summer packed with tourists in the tiny cramped streets. It would feel like a completely different place. Maybe like a themed land at Disney World or something rather than a historical site.

In the afternoon there was a short tour of the castle led by this flustered girl that was confused because she had just delivered a German tour and was now delivering the same tour in English. This was followed by a lecture on theatre of the time. This lecture really opened my eyes to theatre in a way I have never seen it before. The stage technology was unexpectedly sophisticated at the time. The stage at Cesky Krumlov theatre appeared so deep because of the illusionary effects. It was so convincing. Perfomances used to be 6 hours too and the audience joined in if they liked a performance! I now appreciate live theatre a lot more than I already did before. We headed back to Prague around 5pm.

For dinner I had a traditional goulash of slow cooked beef chunks in a rich broth sauce with bread and vegetables to go with it. It was rather expensive for Czech food so I assume that beef in general is expensive compared to other meats in this country. I finished the meal with and ice coffee with vanilla ice cream. Nothing finishes the day better. Well maybe a view of the city at night.

I overslept this morning because the bed was too comfortable I guess. I don’t even remember switching off my alarm. I was supposed to get up for this morning walking tour of the city in the morning but since I didn’t want to rush I opted to walk around myself. So I walked around Wenceslas Square in front of the national museum and also down Na Prikope street, which is the main fashion shopping street. Basically I was walking mostly around the New Town or Stare Mesto. There was graffiti on the walls and sort of scary. I could totally see how Half-Life 2 is based off Eastern European urban settings. I thought to myself what’s so great about Prague that everybody always talks about? It looks pretty rough. I also noticed that there was a lot of art nouveau architecture. Everything was closed and I couldn’t think why. It was Friday, but businesses can’t possibly be closed on Fridays all the time. So I sat down to eat lunch at Buffalo Bill’s because I’ve been craving Mexican food for months. It was unsuprisingly pretty bad. But while I was eating I was reading my Prague guide book and found out it was a national holiday today. That explains why everything is closed!

After lunch I walked to the river Vlatva and encountered my first breathtaking view of Prague. I was beginning to understand the magic of the city. The river was rushing by while on the otherside of the river was the old architecture of the Lesser Quarter. I rushed back to Wenceslas Square for the afternoon walking tour. The tour took me to the Old Town where most of the beauty and history of Prague is located. Kafka lived there, Mozart’s Don Giovanni premiered there, and the famous Astronomical Clock is there. The clock was covered for refurbishment though. We crossed the Charles Bridge and took a break. I had a straticella chocolate chip ice cream with bananas, whipped cream, and egg nog liquer. $2. We then proceeded to Prague Castle and watched the changing of the guards and the cathedral there.

The afternoon light casting colors of stained glass on the walls of the cathedral was beautiful.

For dinner I ate traditional Czech food at U Tri… The Czech are famous for their beer. It is claimed to be some of the best in world so I had one with my meal. A Pilsner Urquell. I don’t drink much, so as far as beer goes I can see how people like this compared to other beers I’ve tried in England. It costs the same as water and less than a Coke. I ordered a roast duck with potato/bread dumplings, bread, potato pancake, red cabbage, and sauerkraut. The portion size was ridiculous. I got half a duck and all the sides for $10!!

I could only eat half of the meal but this tiny Italian lady sitting next to me downed a jug of beer and finished her entire duck. It’s a Czech practice in casual eateries to seat people at the same table if there are empty seats. So in addition to the Italian lady there was this English couple sitting across from me. I struck up conversation with them and found out that they lived in Brighton and that the man was a retired professor and the wife ran some Anglo-Japanese Society after she visited Japan. They were just living out their retirement traveling and eating. We talked about food, travel, hobbies, politics, drugs, and even the triads’ presence in Great Britain for over three hours. It was interesting because the wife was this anti-globalist and the husband was a more pragmatic realist so they were constantly arguing over the issues. They invited me to join them after dinner at a cafe and bought me a drink. It was an interesting night and intercultural experience with the English that I didn’t really expect to encounter all the way over in the Czech Republic.

I finally went on my first solo trip to a foreign land. On the train to the airport this Spanish family sat next to me. Their Spanish was so expressive that it sounded like Italian. There was this hot blond Italian chick with a Yankees cap also sitting nearby though she and her parents looked German to me. Anyway, I was really nervous about this trip because I had never traveled alone to a foreign country. In addition, I don’t speak Czech or have any idea really what to expect beyond my research on Prague. And research I did for this trip because I was so nervous about arriving at night.

So I landed at the airport outside Prague at 9:30pm. I quickly rushed out of the terminal because I had to get to the information counters to buy a travel pass before they closed at 10:00pm. Thank God for my American passport. I followed the crowds of people to take bus 119 into the city then hopped onto the metro. It was weird being the only Asian person on the train in Eastern Europe. It was uncomfortable at first but in this type of situation that I ecounter all the time when issues of identity crop up in my mind I have to brace down and fight the mental battle. Align myself to an identity of my choosing in order to steel my mind and get on with life at the moment. I chose to embrace Americanism as my identity which is ironic because I don’t usually do that and often feel a stranger in my own country.

While riding the metro I also had an insight into Design. I didn’t understand any of the words written on the signs much less was I able to pronounce them with all the weird accents I’ve never used on roman letters. Yet I was able to navigate the system. The colors coding on the maps and the signage led the way for me. I was reinspired by the power of Design and its potential of its communicative function. Sure there were only three metro lines for the entire city but still. It was dark and I was tired from traveling so give me a break.

Because of my obsessive planning before undertaking the journey, I arrived at my hostel, Miss Sophie’s, in only an hour after landing. However, I broke down and changed my reservation for a single for two of the nights out of four. Originally I had booked all four nights in a dorm room but I was exhausted and wanted a room to myself to sprawl out. They have reallly nice waterfall showers

This post is long overdue. I visited Stonehenge and Bath. Stonehenge wasn’t actually that impressive in person but becaue it’s so famous it’s a necessary sight to see. What was cool though was that we got to see British army forces training on Salisbury plain when our bus passed by.

Bath was much more interesting. The city is the only preserved Georgian period site in the world. It’s so beautiful. Definitely the prettiest city in the United Kingdom I have visited. The city is named after the hot springs located there. The inhabitants in the region moved around the area because of the water’s purported healing powers. When the Romans came they took the city over and built a Roman bath on the site. This is the UNESCO world heritage site there. I spent nearly two hours in the Roman baths photographing that I didn’t have much time to see the rest of the city. I’m seriously debating taking another day trip if I ever find the time. I’m rushing this entry though but leaving you with some photos.

Oh yea. I drank some of the Bath water from this elegant fountain. It smelled sulfurous and tasted like it too. Not too pleasant but I had to do it just to say I’ve done it. It’s 50 pence a glass.