Praha!

Doing the Bernie all over Europe

This past week, Sciences Poop had a moment of humanity and decided to give all of its hardworking students a much deserved break.  A week off of school? In Europe? Naturally I decided to take a little expedition across the continent.  My roommate Casey and I hightailed it to Prague (PRAHA!) and had our very first post-communist country experience.

Prague Castle

If you ever make it to Prague, don't be fooled by the exceedingly terrifying bus ride from the airport. Seriously, almost 25 years after the fall of communism and it still looked like the KGB could pop out at any moment and force me into a cement building for "interrogation".  Although, if you know me, you probably have correctly guessed that I was loving every second of that (potentially to Siberia) bus ride. While I can't say that I felt as connected to Prague as ma belle ville, Paris... it was absolutely amazing to see such an inherently historical city.  Just walking around Old Town Square and looking at the architecture you can see the different time periods that Prague has experienced.  From the middle ages and the astronomical clock tower built in the 14th century to the imposing and clearly communist era buildings, Prague is an amazing place.  Of course, you have to fight off hoards of tourists to get anywhere near a picture worthy view of these historic but nevertheless it is definitely worth a trip.
Casey and I essentially were able to walk to every monument or building in Prague within the span of 30-40 minutes, definitely a great walking city (just not in heels, unless you're wishing for death by cobblestone).

Charles Bridge

Another plus to Prague is the favorable exchange rate, full three course dinner for the equivalent of 12 euros? Nice one Czech Republic, real nice.  Just don't eat the sausage............................Anthony Bourdain is not always right (much to my stomach's dismay).

Trip Highlights:
1. Climbing to the top of the astronomical clock tower:  Amazing view of Prague, and when the clock hits the hour, you get to see a guy in a silly costume play the trumpet from the balcony for all of the tourists in Old Town Square.

View from Above

2. Prague Castle:  Yeah, that's a big hill...I know. Come on though, if you can climb to the top of Mont-Martre to see Sacre Coeur, you can get to Prague Castle (and you can get buns of steel).  Its essentially a giant compound of every kind of architecture you could imagine all smushed together into one giant castle.

3. World War 2 Tour of Prague:  Definitely the major highlight of my trip, it was amazing to learn all about the Czech Resistance to the German Occupation and even more amazing to see firsthand all of the places they used for meetings etc.. The tour even takes you under the clock tower to a group of rooms built in the 12th century (before they raised the elevation of Prague because of constant flooding), including a 12th century beer hall that Czech resistance fighters used as a makeshift hospital during the occupation.  We had a great tour guide who was full of little anecdotes and tidbits about different places in Prague. He even showed us what used to be the Czech senate building, during WW2, it was used as Hitler's hall for his visits to Prague. As Prague is sometimes called the City of Music, the building had many statues of composers including one of Jewish origin.  Czech construction workers were ordered to remove the statue of the Jewish composer for fear of offending Hitler.  However, not knowing which statue was which, the workers measured each nose and removed the statue with the biggest schnoz....who, in fact, was not Jewish at all.  It was Hitler's favorite composer, Wagner....OOPS.