Haha Praha

PRAGUE. Great times in Prague. Carly, Nicki, and I took a 5 hour train from Vienna and while they slept I read my Top 10 book and prepared for Prague. It was unfortunately really rainy when we got there so we just went to the hostel, went to lunch, and hung out in a mall for a little bit. Carly and I went to a Passover seder at the Prague Chabad and that was a very interesting experience. There were almost 30 tables filled with 15 or so people (can't do the math on that one) and it was complete chaos. We didn't know when to eat what, we couldn't hear over the crying babies, and there was a table of drunk Israeli guys singing for the whole time without fail...it was an experience, and thankfully they were generous with the wine. Saturday we went on a walking tour around the city and had lunch in Old Town Square.

tourist trap

We walked down the Charles Bridge and then we walked back across the bridge and back to our hostel to meet up with Dan and Elyssa, our Rochester friends who are studying in London this semester.

Dan, Elyssa, Carly, and me

Me, Carly, Dan and Elyssa had dinner in Old Town Square then got ready for a pub crawl. It was really fun and funny and random and when we met a Danish couple, Nicki and I just screamed Danish words at them like "sommetider" (sometimes) and "gulerødder" (carrots). Why they kept talking to us, we will never know. The pub crawl ended up at Karlovy Lazne, a 5 story club, but we were so tired that we just did a run-through and went home to break passover and got pizza. 

the club

The next day we went back across the Charles Bridge and up to the church at the top of the hill, where we stopped to take pictures and record a video for Rochester's Relay for Life - we were all on the executive board of Colleges Against Cancer together last year so we made the video to show our support for this year's Relay. Then it started to snow on us and as we walked towards Old Town Square the snow didn't let up so we sought solace in the Starbucks and took advantage of its free wifi so I could instagram some picz. 

snow happy

We then walked back across Charles Bridge to see the lock bridge and the John Lennon wall - super artsy indeed.

We walked back across Charles Bridge and to Old Town Square for some more snacks - at this point we had tried one of everything - and headed back to rest up.

fried dough with cheese on top

The next day, Monday, we went to Terezin, the concentration camp north of Prague, and had a tour there. It was really sad so I don't really want to elaborate on it. We then came back, had lunch at Old Town Square, and then saw the 5 Synagogues and a cemetery in the Jewish Quarter. We started to get loopy around synagogue number 3 so we decided to head back to the hostel and rest before going out for our last night in Prague. Our tour guide had told us that Czechs drink beer by the meter - so we decided it was our duty as tourists to drink a meter of beer at dinner - it started out as an individual effort but then it became a collective task. After dinner we decided to go to a casino and Elyssa won 1250 Czech Koruna, so like 55 bucks, playing blackjack. It was random.


Overall, Prague was awesome. It was so great to be reunited with Rochester friends and eating good salty, meaty food and drinking good beers. It was really great and despite all the climate changes I had a blast. Definitely going back to Prague at some point. I mean how can you resist a zebra party boat in front of an old church and palace? Answer: you can't.