My goodness do I have a lot of pictures to share with you! First, a quick update on my life - I spent last weekend having awesome amounts of fun in Prague so I wasn't able to do any blogging, now I've been back in London for six days and I'm all packed up to go to Portugal tomorrow morning. I've even spent a bit of time this week doing some school work so that I won't feel as guilty about all the holiday-taking I've got planned. I'll be in Portugal from tomorrow until Friday morning, then I'm renting a cottage next weekend in Devon with Marissa, Valerie and her flatmate Ellen. I spend the next four days in London, celebrate Purim, and then go on my first official London Surf Club trip down in Bude. Basically I'm going to spend more time surfing in the next two weeks than I have in the past six months. Which is just how I like it.
As you may have guessed from the blog title, the things that happened in the past couple of weeks were a Valentine's Day celebration and my trip to Prague. For Valentine's Day Valerie planned a potluck. I signed up to bring dips, and things to dip in those dips, which was pretty simple to supply. My plans changed when I saw that Erica posted a 3 ingredient nutella brownie recipe on facebook the day before. With one tub of Nutella, 10 tablespoons of flour and two eggs I whipped up some fantastic brownies in Valerie's kitchen.
I wasn't the only one making desserts, the menu was heavily weighted in that direction
We brought all the food down to the Atlas common room and served it buffet style
Then sat down on the couches and stuffed ourselves before watching Clueless.
The food was amazing and sharing Clueless with people who haven't seen it before was eye-opening - I never realized there were so many different plots in that movie! Also, "Be home in 20 minutes! But Daddy... "Everywhere in LA takes 20 minutes!" ahahahaha.
The next day Valerie and I recovered from the Valentine's Day food coma by going to a Jewish Society bagel lunch with Jardena. It made me realize that I don't think I've had a bagel since I've moved to London. It was delicious and totally worth it for being free. Possibly not worth it - getting stuck in a conversation with an English dude that really really wanted to talk American football with someone.
Thursday night I decided to be responsible and stay in instead of going out to party. I had an early flight to Prague so I went to the gym, packed, and then did not sleep even one minute. I had to wake up at 3:45 to leave to the airport. Somehow I got tired around 3:30 am. Until then I chatted with my sister and caught up on TV while regretting over and over again thinking that a flight out of Heathrow at dawn was ever a good idea. I also compulsively overpacked because I was flying British Air so my checked bag was free and I could bring a carryon and a handbag. Plus, I was terrified of being cold, so I packed close to every piece of clothing that I owned. For four days I packed
I know, it's mortifying.
My flight was so early that I had to drag those bags all around London on my way to the airport since the Tube doesn't run early enough to get me there on time. As I was switching buses at Trafalgar Square I had an unsettling experience with a girl who walked across the street towards me screaming for someone to help her and in tears. I stopped to see what I could do and she was sobbing about needing to take a bus back to Middlesex (maybe? I don't remember) and could I give her the money and she would give me her name and her engagement ring, anything. She looked a mess, missing teeth, blood on her face, obviously not in good shape. On the off-chance she really needed someone to help her out I gave her a fiver. She looked at it, and was like "the bus costs 8.35." I just, I couldn't. Five was all I could bring myself to give. I hope for her sake she got the other three she needed from someone.
Despite all my careful planning I messed around so long in Heathrow and didn't really believe that the flight gate closed at the time given that I had to sprint for the gate and was the second to last person to make it onto the gate transport to the plane. The flight was two hours so I caught just a bit of sleep of the way. From the airport I took the bus (for another 1/2 hour of sleep) to the metro and then made my way to the apartment we were staying in. I got lucky and overheard someone being directed into the correct random storefront/hallway down which I was able to find the reception. I was too early to check in, but another girl on the trip, Carolina, had already been by and asked if she could check in early to sleep so I only had to amuse myself for half an hour before I could come back and take a nap. I wandered around Wenceslas square, on which the hotel faced, changed some money, admired a big statue of King Wenceslas, and then staggered back to the reception to find Carolina there at the same time. We were both absolutely wasted from a lack of sleep, it turns out she had been on my flight as well and both of us really needed a nap. We dragged our bags (her one tiny little duffel to my year's worth of clothing) up to our apartment. Which kind of looked like an apartment from the show The Real World
The place was bright and cheery and had enough beds to sleep 10 and four bathrooms. Despite our efforts the Satellite TV would not work and you had to turn the shower on using a butcher knife, but the quality of the accommodations was way higher than I'm used to, especially at only about 14 euro a night. Carolina and I settled into the bedroom (third picture) and caught up on our sleep. We woke a few hours later, in the late afternoon and decided to do some belated exploring before the other girls arrived. From the apartment we headed towards the Old Town, where we were greeted by the astronomical clock and Tyn Church.
Carolina stopped to buy some of the pork that was slow roasting over an open fire on the square. This was the first time one of us was robbed (figuratively speaking) in Prague. She asked for a portion, and since it was sold by the weight and she didn't specify NOT a kilogram's worth she ended up with a piece that was 16 EUROS worth of pork.
She made a valiant effort to finish while we commiserated with a couple of tourists sharing our table that had met the same fate. Once the pork mountain was vanquished we took a walk down the luxury shopping street, past the oldest Synagogue in (central?) Europe [where legend has it the Golem was put to rest in the attic] and down to the river. From the river bank we had an incredible view of the Castle (the largest in the world!) lit up for the night.
It was cold so we followed the signs (haha just kidding, all the tourist signs are written in Czech)
to a nearby cafe for a hot drink and then once we were warmed up back to the Wenceslas Square for some grocery shopping. The National Museum sits up at the top of the square in an incredible blaze of light.
In the grocery store we were treated to an unpleasant display of domestic violence that neither of us felt comfortable addressing (the police woman continued her shopping undisturbed so who were we to step in) but twice I was almost run over by this rampaging couple as they disagreed their way violently across the store. It was super weird. We got back to the apartment just about as everyone else showed up. I'm in class with Camila and I had met Andrea and Maria Luisa before, but I had only met Natalia in passing and I don't think I knew Lina before. Everyone settled in and we snacked and decided to head back to the Old Town for dinner. We ate outside in one of the tented locations that ring the square (to the right of this picture)
It was a leisurely dinner that lasted for a couple of hours and the weather was nice enough and the heaters warm enough that jackets were unnecessary. As we wrapped up the meal we asked our waiter where he suggested we go out for some drinking and maybe dancing. He suggested the Golden Tree. For confirmation we asked the manager the same question when he came to swipe our credit cards. He also gave the Golden Tree the thumbs up, labeling it "clean and safe." It was an odd choice of words that we didn't think much of at the time. The directions were to "walk straight towards the river, it's by the Charles bridge." Of course straight wasn't straight but we muddled through. Stopping at a convenience store to pick a couple things up on the way. My total bill was 77 koruna. I gave the old man 200. He gave me back 17. I was like, um, no. That's not what just happened. I forced him to count out the correct change. And then he did the exact same thing to my friend who was next in line! I saw him do it and was like, dude we JUST talked about this.
We kept going, and though we passed a "MUSIC CLUB" we didn't see the Golden Tree by the time we had reached the Charles Bridge. The bridge at night is fantastic, and we had no idea so we started across. It's loooong, about 500 yards long, and has all these great statues that are lit up at night. On the way over the river we stopped and asked some stoners if they knew were the Golden Tree was. They confidently directed us across the river. So did the taxi driver at the end of the bridge (just keep going up the road!) and the next taxi driver a couple blocks up. They were all wrong. Turns out it was that "MUSIC CLUB" we had already walked past. We trekked back across the bridge, which felt longer and less magical this time, took one more wrong turn and walked along the river for about a block before turning around and eventually, miraculously arrived at our destination. It was a bar with a number of different levels. Downstairs was a techno dance club with a tiny dance floor and a lot of lasers. We went upstairs to look for a table. That's when we noticed the grotto. The one with the naked ladies. Turns out "safe and clean" was an apt description. We left shortly after discovering the go-go dancers, which was not exactly what we had signed up for when we were thinking of a night out. We decided it was time to call it a night and walked back through the surprisingly quiet and empty streets (for a weekend night there was almost no one out and nothing open) to the apartment, where we drank a couple of bottles of wine and played "never have I ever..." It was close to three, maybe even after, before we made it to sleep.
The late night led to a rather late start the next day. We woke up, staggered around, and eventually redeemed ourselves with coffee. We started by trying to get tickets to a Black Light Theatre show that night. The Black Light Theatre is a uniquely Czech form of theatre that comes pretty highly recommended as a thing you should check out if you are ever in the country. The tickets were sold out but there was a chance that a large group would miss their upcoming ticket pick up and we could swoop in a buy some. We had to kill about an hour before the time window for the group ticket ran out and so we decided to explore the city from the top of the tower in the Old Square. Luckily there was an elevator. Even better, the elevator had a mirrored ceiling.
The Tower had great views of Prague
The Prague Castle
Me and Andrea
We came down from the Tower and cheered for a random wedding party taking pictures by the astronomical clock
The group had never come for their 30 tickets so we were able to pick up our tickets for that night's show. Then we continued on down the luxury shopping street, past the Old-New Synagogue
across the river, and then up this really long and deceptively steep staircase to the castle
It was quite a relief to make it to the top, which also had great views of the river, something you can see behind these lovely ladies (Andrea, Camila, and Lina) in the foreground
The Prague castle is certified in the Guinness Book of World records as the largest castle in the world. It's definitely big, but it's not quite as impressive as it sounds because it's more of a village that sits and occupies its own hill. A loose collection of many buildings, where the government is still headquartered and is large enough area to have its own cathedral. It is also home to the Toy Museum:
Above, the outside of the Cathedral, and below the inside.
We walked around the outside of the buildings inside the Castle walls but decided against going inside any of the museums and instead watched the changing of the guards
And then hunted down the one off-duty guard that was willing to smile for a photograph (with Natalia, Lina and Maria Luisa)
We walked back through the castle grounds
to the Panorama cafe (blankets included!)
for a beer
Then walked back down the stairs past this beggar, who was kneeling in the apparently normal and accepted begging pose because I saw this all over the city.
We took the long way back from the castle, stopping briefly at the Carnival celebrations in the Little Quarter, where this woman was standing around with large birds of prey
elaborately costumed revelers
and folk dancers + live band
in a crowded little corner of the city
I had my face swiped with colored paint by a particularly enthusiastic participant as we walked through the crowd. We walked back across the Charles Bridge for the first time in the daylight, stopping to take a few pictures on the way
looking up the river
the bridge is lined with statues, this one apparently a result of a disagreement within the Jewish community, where one man was turned in to the authorities by the rest of the Jews and then forced to pay for the construction of this statue. There wasn't too much of an explanation beyond that (like one with details, that would make it make sense).
then through the tower gateway at the end of the bridge
and past this extremely cool looking car
and finally, through the Old Town where there was yet another Carnival celebration underway.
It was late and we were starving and so we finally sat down to an extremely large meal
We paid for staying out that late the next morning when everyone had to wake up early so that we could be at the Old Square in time to meet the "free tour" tour guide. The weather was cold and miserable and drizzly. I forgot my umbrella and was exhausted. The tour guide was a bit late and then even though she got there at 10:00, wanted to wait until 10:30 to see if anyone else joined up for the tour. An few more couples did join us while we all waited huddled inside the tourist information office.
Our tour guide, Jana, started by telling us that the "free" tour meant they worked for tips, and that the accepted tip was 10 euros. She started in the Old Square, giving us background information on the history of the country and I took pictures of the mural of King Wenceslas and shivered a lot.
Our next stop was this area of the city that used to be reserved for foreign merchants who were locked in at night for their own safety and under the protection of the ruler.
The area included the residence of a merchant who decorated his property like an Italian mural
which did not apparently do too well in the Czech weather and had to be restored
Our next stop was the inside of a Baroque church where it was miraculously colder than it was outside. So cold you could actually see your breath.
the outside frankly looked pretty cold as well.
I loved that our guide was there to point out things we otherwise would have missed, like this cubist Virgin Mary statue on the side of a building
and then out of the older part of the city through this gateway/spire
which looked even cooler from the outside
It was freeeeezing, so Jana had mercy on us by doing some of her spiel in the local H&M outlet before we ventured back outside for the second half of the tour. Some of us were so cold and miserable in the weather we considered going back to the apartment but Jana made it clear that was a stupid idea so we kept on. I'm glad we did, she was able to point out things I would never have noticed on my own, like this above-street-level work of art
Our tour ended in the Jewish Quarter but because of the cold she covered the important parts while we huddled inside a restaurant. I took a couple pictures that I thought my parents would get a kick out of
and we ended the tour outside the Spanish Synagogue by the sculpture celebrating Franz Kafka
We were near frozen to the core so we went to the closest warmest looking restaurant for lunch, located right next to the Old-New Synagogue. The place seemed nice and was definitely warm, but our waiter (who was also apparently the assistant-manager) was never anything other than a total jerk. He was rude, brusque and condescending. He questioned a request for cheese to be grated on seafood ("that's what you want it for?") and finally ended by attempting to cheat us. I noticed when we were divvying up the bill that he had added a 20 euro charge for bread and olive oil. 20 EUROS! When we said that was ridiculous to be charged so much for something that is free at most places he tried to argue that it was a per person charge. Even though he only gave us two baskets of bread for seven people. Then it was how expensive the olive oil was, we can check on the internet! Then it was how he didn't charge us for the cheese! Then it was me asking if we could talk to the manager (no because he was the assistant manager) and the manager was not there and there was no better business bureau he could think of we could talk to and then it was me accusing him of being a thief. Eventually he just accepted that we weren't going to pay that part and took it out on someone who needed change by giving her it in pennies which took about five minutes to count out.
I was still tired and now I was full so I went back to the apartment for a nap while most of the other girls went shopping and Carolina caught her flight back to London. We lost a few more to evening flights and those of us remaining spent the night out at a pub that is older than the US. It was great. Super authentic. They had beer and an accordion player. No options for beer. Just beer.
And an awesome chandelier
truly delicious beer
the last ones standing
We noticed when we left that the sign points out that the pub was established in 1499.
It was a nice way to spend a Sunday night before everyone that was left except for me went back in the morning.
And now that I've caught up a full week I will post and let you all revel in the relatively recent pictures. I've been super busy traveling for the past few weeks so I have a perfectly good excuse not to be blogging, but it also means that I've been so busy that I've got tons to tell you! As I write this, I'm holed up in a beautiful house across from the beach at Widemouth bay with about 15 other London Surf Club members and I'm hoping that the tide comes in enough to make the bay rideable before dark.
Much love,
As you may have guessed from the blog title, the things that happened in the past couple of weeks were a Valentine's Day celebration and my trip to Prague. For Valentine's Day Valerie planned a potluck. I signed up to bring dips, and things to dip in those dips, which was pretty simple to supply. My plans changed when I saw that Erica posted a 3 ingredient nutella brownie recipe on facebook the day before. With one tub of Nutella, 10 tablespoons of flour and two eggs I whipped up some fantastic brownies in Valerie's kitchen.
The next day Valerie and I recovered from the Valentine's Day food coma by going to a Jewish Society bagel lunch with Jardena. It made me realize that I don't think I've had a bagel since I've moved to London. It was delicious and totally worth it for being free. Possibly not worth it - getting stuck in a conversation with an English dude that really really wanted to talk American football with someone.
Thursday night I decided to be responsible and stay in instead of going out to party. I had an early flight to Prague so I went to the gym, packed, and then did not sleep even one minute. I had to wake up at 3:45 to leave to the airport. Somehow I got tired around 3:30 am. Until then I chatted with my sister and caught up on TV while regretting over and over again thinking that a flight out of Heathrow at dawn was ever a good idea. I also compulsively overpacked because I was flying British Air so my checked bag was free and I could bring a carryon and a handbag. Plus, I was terrified of being cold, so I packed close to every piece of clothing that I owned. For four days I packed
My flight was so early that I had to drag those bags all around London on my way to the airport since the Tube doesn't run early enough to get me there on time. As I was switching buses at Trafalgar Square I had an unsettling experience with a girl who walked across the street towards me screaming for someone to help her and in tears. I stopped to see what I could do and she was sobbing about needing to take a bus back to Middlesex (maybe? I don't remember) and could I give her the money and she would give me her name and her engagement ring, anything. She looked a mess, missing teeth, blood on her face, obviously not in good shape. On the off-chance she really needed someone to help her out I gave her a fiver. She looked at it, and was like "the bus costs 8.35." I just, I couldn't. Five was all I could bring myself to give. I hope for her sake she got the other three she needed from someone.
Despite all my careful planning I messed around so long in Heathrow and didn't really believe that the flight gate closed at the time given that I had to sprint for the gate and was the second to last person to make it onto the gate transport to the plane. The flight was two hours so I caught just a bit of sleep of the way. From the airport I took the bus (for another 1/2 hour of sleep) to the metro and then made my way to the apartment we were staying in. I got lucky and overheard someone being directed into the correct random storefront/hallway down which I was able to find the reception. I was too early to check in, but another girl on the trip, Carolina, had already been by and asked if she could check in early to sleep so I only had to amuse myself for half an hour before I could come back and take a nap. I wandered around Wenceslas square, on which the hotel faced, changed some money, admired a big statue of King Wenceslas, and then staggered back to the reception to find Carolina there at the same time. We were both absolutely wasted from a lack of sleep, it turns out she had been on my flight as well and both of us really needed a nap. We dragged our bags (her one tiny little duffel to my year's worth of clothing) up to our apartment. Which kind of looked like an apartment from the show The Real World
It was cold so we followed the signs (haha just kidding, all the tourist signs are written in Czech)
It was a leisurely dinner that lasted for a couple of hours and the weather was nice enough and the heaters warm enough that jackets were unnecessary. As we wrapped up the meal we asked our waiter where he suggested we go out for some drinking and maybe dancing. He suggested the Golden Tree. For confirmation we asked the manager the same question when he came to swipe our credit cards. He also gave the Golden Tree the thumbs up, labeling it "clean and safe." It was an odd choice of words that we didn't think much of at the time. The directions were to "walk straight towards the river, it's by the Charles bridge." Of course straight wasn't straight but we muddled through. Stopping at a convenience store to pick a couple things up on the way. My total bill was 77 koruna. I gave the old man 200. He gave me back 17. I was like, um, no. That's not what just happened. I forced him to count out the correct change. And then he did the exact same thing to my friend who was next in line! I saw him do it and was like, dude we JUST talked about this.
We kept going, and though we passed a "MUSIC CLUB" we didn't see the Golden Tree by the time we had reached the Charles Bridge. The bridge at night is fantastic, and we had no idea so we started across. It's loooong, about 500 yards long, and has all these great statues that are lit up at night. On the way over the river we stopped and asked some stoners if they knew were the Golden Tree was. They confidently directed us across the river. So did the taxi driver at the end of the bridge (just keep going up the road!) and the next taxi driver a couple blocks up. They were all wrong. Turns out it was that "MUSIC CLUB" we had already walked past. We trekked back across the bridge, which felt longer and less magical this time, took one more wrong turn and walked along the river for about a block before turning around and eventually, miraculously arrived at our destination. It was a bar with a number of different levels. Downstairs was a techno dance club with a tiny dance floor and a lot of lasers. We went upstairs to look for a table. That's when we noticed the grotto. The one with the naked ladies. Turns out "safe and clean" was an apt description. We left shortly after discovering the go-go dancers, which was not exactly what we had signed up for when we were thinking of a night out. We decided it was time to call it a night and walked back through the surprisingly quiet and empty streets (for a weekend night there was almost no one out and nothing open) to the apartment, where we drank a couple of bottles of wine and played "never have I ever..." It was close to three, maybe even after, before we made it to sleep.
The late night led to a rather late start the next day. We woke up, staggered around, and eventually redeemed ourselves with coffee. We started by trying to get tickets to a Black Light Theatre show that night. The Black Light Theatre is a uniquely Czech form of theatre that comes pretty highly recommended as a thing you should check out if you are ever in the country. The tickets were sold out but there was a chance that a large group would miss their upcoming ticket pick up and we could swoop in a buy some. We had to kill about an hour before the time window for the group ticket ran out and so we decided to explore the city from the top of the tower in the Old Square. Luckily there was an elevator. Even better, the elevator had a mirrored ceiling.
The Tower had great views of Prague
The group had never come for their 30 tickets so we were able to pick up our tickets for that night's show. Then we continued on down the luxury shopping street, past the Old-New Synagogue
across the river, and then up this really long and deceptively steep staircase to the castle
That we finished off with flaming shots of absinthe. Technically first you put sugar on a spoon, then melt the sugar with a lighter, then dip it into the shot and mix it in, it's complicated and involved and in the end it still tastes like very alcoholic toothpaste.
After dinner we had just enough time to walk to the Image theatre for our night of Black Light Theatre fun. It's a weird art form that revolves around miming, vaudeville and dance acrobatics that use neon costumes and props under blacklight to create optical illusions. It was really interesting but also maybe a little too long. By the time it was over most everyone was exhausted. Camila and I decided to stick it out and stay out a while longer. We ended up at a British bar with a live musician doing an excellent job of performing cover songs. There was also a boxing match on TV that we were just in time to see and we made friends with an American and his Czech girlfriend and then a bunch of Brits, who stayed with us until the place closed.
We paid for staying out that late the next morning when everyone had to wake up early so that we could be at the Old Square in time to meet the "free tour" tour guide. The weather was cold and miserable and drizzly. I forgot my umbrella and was exhausted. The tour guide was a bit late and then even though she got there at 10:00, wanted to wait until 10:30 to see if anyone else joined up for the tour. An few more couples did join us while we all waited huddled inside the tourist information office.
I loved that our guide was there to point out things we otherwise would have missed, like this cubist Virgin Mary statue on the side of a building
Our tour ended in the Jewish Quarter but because of the cold she covered the important parts while we huddled inside a restaurant. I took a couple pictures that I thought my parents would get a kick out of
We were near frozen to the core so we went to the closest warmest looking restaurant for lunch, located right next to the Old-New Synagogue. The place seemed nice and was definitely warm, but our waiter (who was also apparently the assistant-manager) was never anything other than a total jerk. He was rude, brusque and condescending. He questioned a request for cheese to be grated on seafood ("that's what you want it for?") and finally ended by attempting to cheat us. I noticed when we were divvying up the bill that he had added a 20 euro charge for bread and olive oil. 20 EUROS! When we said that was ridiculous to be charged so much for something that is free at most places he tried to argue that it was a per person charge. Even though he only gave us two baskets of bread for seven people. Then it was how expensive the olive oil was, we can check on the internet! Then it was how he didn't charge us for the cheese! Then it was me asking if we could talk to the manager (no because he was the assistant manager) and the manager was not there and there was no better business bureau he could think of we could talk to and then it was me accusing him of being a thief. Eventually he just accepted that we weren't going to pay that part and took it out on someone who needed change by giving her it in pennies which took about five minutes to count out.
I was still tired and now I was full so I went back to the apartment for a nap while most of the other girls went shopping and Carolina caught her flight back to London. We lost a few more to evening flights and those of us remaining spent the night out at a pub that is older than the US. It was great. Super authentic. They had beer and an accordion player. No options for beer. Just beer.
And now that I've caught up a full week I will post and let you all revel in the relatively recent pictures. I've been super busy traveling for the past few weeks so I have a perfectly good excuse not to be blogging, but it also means that I've been so busy that I've got tons to tell you! As I write this, I'm holed up in a beautiful house across from the beach at Widemouth bay with about 15 other London Surf Club members and I'm hoping that the tide comes in enough to make the bay rideable before dark.
Much love,
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