Prague, Czech Republic

I arrived (by bus) in Prague on Wednesday afternoon.  Lucy picked me up, and I did some reading (Bill Bryson's Neither Here Nor There (thanks Lis!)) while she was in her afternoon class, and got a bag of vitamin c gummies because I woke up sick that morning.  After her class, we went to Old Town Square, which is really close to her place.  It was beautiful:

me in Old Town Square

That evening, one of Lucy's roommates joined us for dinner at a cute little restaurant where I got this delicious pizza and ate all but one slice because I was so hungry:

When you go out to dinner here in Europe (and particularly in the Czech Republic) you could seriously sit there for 4 hours, and they wouldn't give you any trouble.  That's nice in that you can relax and not be rushed out, but you have to do all but tackle the waitress in order to get your check.

Thursday morning I was still quite sick so I slept while Lucy was in class that morning.  In the afternoon, we did some shopping on "the shopping street", which connects to Wenceslas Square (you know, 'Good King Wenceslas', the Christmas song?).

Wenceslas Square on a cloudy day

Prague is by far the most beautiful city I have seen yet.  The streets make absolutely no sense, but the city is small enough that if you wander through them, you'll find your way.  They're so narrow - you think you've seen narrow cobble streets - not until you've been to Prague).  I just could not get over how beautiful every nook and cranny of the city was, and these photos don't do it justice.  I wish Berlin hadn't gotten the living daylight bombed out of it after the war, or else I'm sure a lot of it would look much like Prague in that sense.

That night on our way back from meeting up with some other HWS students for one girl's birthday, we stopped at a food stand near Wenceslas to get fried cheese - a very czech food, that Anthony Bourdain recommended.  Let me tell you..... it was AMAZING.

I'm eating my way through Europe.

Friday we went to the Charles Bridge (the big/main bridge in Prague connecting the two parts of the city) and walked across it to the other part of the beautiful city.  From the bridge, you can see the castle, the house where the president lives, and an overall great view of that part of the city because it's on a hill.

On the Charles Bridge.  The castle above, and the waterfront.

We found a cute little restaurant once out of the touristy area.  They didn't have an English menu, but the waiter told us he would translate the whole menu for us if we waited a few minutes!!  It was so nice, and something that would never happen in this part of Germany.  He took our order, and then we waited an hour for our food, trying to surpress our immense hunger.

After lunch, we found the Lenin Wall, which was surprisingly small (especially after walking down the Berlin wall so many times), but cool.  We walked back across the bridge and got another Czech delicacy - a Trdelník.  It is the best thing to ever happen to carbs.  Ever.
It's a pastry that's made by wrapping a long string of dough around a metal rod many times, and then it's  cooked over a fire while it rotates (picture a pig roast).  Afterwards, it's rolled in cinnemon/nut/sugar mix.  You can also get nutella in it.  So with that, I continued to eat my way through the Czech Republic!!

Saturday we did a bit more exploring before my 5pm bus back to Berlin.  It was so nice getting to see Prague, getting to see Lucy again, and meeting all of here awesome flatmates.
On the bus ride back, I had a bit of an issue getting across the border because I didn't have my passport (because the government had it until Thursday [and I left on Wednesday] to give us our visas).  You are supposed to be able to travel via bus or train within the EU with just an ISIC (int'l student ID card) card  and a license, but the bus people weren't having any of that.  Luckily I convinced them to let me on because of a letter I had from my school saying that the authorities have my passport.  We were stopped at the border (because there are no actual border crossings in Europe like we have between Canada - black unmarked BMWs just pull you over at random).  Thank God, after much suspense, the police let me through with the letter and my two forms of ID.  It was a scary experience, and I'll definitely have to let those who advised us on travel that it is not okay to travel without passport back TO Germany, but only from.

But, thankfully, I made it back okay, and have been rushing to unpack, go to the gym (saying no to food is not an option here), and planning out my trip to Paris!  I'm leaving here in an hour, and will be back Saturday.  I can't believe I'm finally going, it's so crazy!

Have a great week!