Traveling to Prague was the first time I entered Eastern Europe. I definitely noticed a difference in the scenery from Austria to the Czech Republic. The rundown buildings and abandoned train stations were evident when we were on the train. It wasn’t third world, but the standard of living seemed lower. It is amazing how forty years under communism can put a toll on a country. When I crossed the border, there was not an entrance sign into the Czech Republic. I noticed the language was different at the train stations. German can be pronounced from an English speaker fairly easily, but Czech is totally different. There seems to ‘^’ on top of at least one letter in every word. I didn’t ever figure out how to pronounce any of these words. When we got to the train station, it didn’t seem very big. Usually the central stations are elaborate and big, but this looked like an ordinary train station. We took one stop on the underground and then took a tram to our hotel. As we were walking to our hostel, it seemed relatively deserted. We found Sir Toby’s Hostel and went on in. Thankfully everything was in English. Emily, Drew, Andrew, Bailey, Kristen, and I went up to our room. To our delight, we had our own room with no bunk beds. We even had our own bathroom. This was much more enjoyable versus the last weekend in Munich. I put my stuff away and we went down for the free BBQ. I had three sausages and bread. It was actually pretty good so I was happy. After dinner , we decided to walk around the neighborhood and find this specific club. Drew had been hyping up this club “Mecca” he had heard about from a friend. It was only two streets away so we were able to take our picture in front of it. Since it was only nine at night, nobody was outside. We also found out that it didn’t open until eleven o’clock at night. Yep, that means it was going to be a late night. After this, we went back to the hostel and got ready to go out. Finally after everyone got ready, we headed on over. The front was lit up with lights and had the appearance of a stereotypical club. There was no cover so we went on in. There was a bar in the first room with lights and white seats on the outside. I had never been to such a nice club before. This wasn’t a hole in the wall but a glitzy club. In the second large room, techno music was playing with people dancing around. There were two girls on separate platforms in suggestive clothing that were dancing. There weren’t too many people there but it wasn’t empty. However, it wasn’t a crowded night at all. The DJ was at the front with a TV screen behind that kept saying “Summer4Free!”. I suppose that meant there wasn’t a cover the entire summer. We went on the dance floor and danced with girls we came with. I did notice that there was a bunch of guys. The other guys usually would move and kind of dance with the music. But mostly stand on the side. There were a lot of lights around as well. We stayed at Mecca until three in the morning and walked on back to the hostel. However, when we left there were still quite a lot of people in the club. I can’t imagine staying there till five in the morning.
Saturday
The next morning, we got up pretty late. Luckily, the breakfast went until noon which was nice. I can safely assume the hostel knows young people are late risers. I had to make my own eggs, but that wasn’t too bad. I had eggs, lots of orange juice, bread, and fruit. It was nice to start the day with a good breakfast. At one, we headed into town to go to a free tour of the city. It was sprinkling a little bit, but at least I had my umbrella. We started in square that had the astronomical clock and church. We went around the center of the city, toured the Jewish district, the Astronomical Clock, Kafka Statue, St. Nicolas’ Church and covered the Prague uprising in WWII. One interesting thing was how the Czech fought back at the Nazi takeover. Unlike Austria, the Czech did not want the Nazi to take them over. Initially, the Nazi took over Prague fairly easily. Near the end of the war, the Czech were getting pretty upset at the Nazi’s. On May 5, 1945 until the 8th, Prague rose up against the Nazi occupation. The Czech were mad about the militarization of the economy, elimination of political rights, forced labor and national oppression. The uprising on the 5th was triggered when a group of Czech policemen tried to overtake the station. There were SS guards in the station which resulted in fighting. The fighting was overheard on the radio which prompted a Czech revolt. The Czech actually drove out the Nazis before the Red Army arrived two days later.
The tour was definitely rainy. Initially the whole group was on the tour, but only Andrew, Emily, and I wanted to stay on the tour. We got pretty wet, but were happy to learn about the history of Prague. In the Jewish corridor, it was surprisingly not damaged as much. In ugly way, Hitler liked Prague because he wanted to retire here. He protected the city heavily so the Allies wouldn’t bomb the city. This is the reason why much of Prague wasn’t destroyed. Luckily he didn’t want to destroy the synagogues. However, he wanted to make a museum out of them for the Jewish race. Yes that it is very disgusting. The end of the tour concluded opposite the Charles Bridge. I could see the castle on top of the hill that our tour guide recommended to us. After the tour, I had finally stopped raining and we headed back to the hostel. We went all had to dry off and get dressed. We then went out for a pizza and called it an evening.
The next morning we headed over to tour the castle. The castle was fairly big but it seemed relatively new. Obviously, it was still over 300 years old. We took our pictures and walked around the castle. There was a large church in the middle was the typical ornate catholic structures. After touring the castle, we walked across the Charles Bridge. This bridge is significant because it had not fallen in over three hundred years. King Charles had other bridges collapse because of floods, but his determination of building this bridge has led it to be a significant monument. The bridge had many people on it with street vendors that sold paintings and other souvenirs. We also walked out to the main square again to see the astronomical clock. At every hour, there is a person that goes to the top of the tour blows his horn. He wears a red suit and blows his trumpet while everyone else watches him. There are also little wooden disciples that go around in a circle when the windows open. It is neat to watch because it added character to the city. After going into the city, went back to hostel. We went decided to call it an early evening because we had an early train back to Vienna.
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