Positive Points of Prague Part Two

Last Friday in Prague, my parents and I took the tram to the Prague Castle, which from end to end is a half a mile. When inside the castle, you forget you are inside the castle walls. St. Vitus Cathedral is the most noteworthy building inside the castle walls. The church is so nice that you have to wonder, "Who actually goes to this church on Sundays?" We also went through the History of the Prague Castle Museum. The history lesson was rather helpful.

Leaving the castle, we walked across Charles Bridge, a pedestrian only bridge that has a few dozen statues along the side of it. The bridge would be a nice place to hang out except there are scores of street vendors and hundreds of people walking across it or just sitting on the statues.

Hungry from a long morning full of many long walks uphills, we found a Czech restaurant where my parents experienced Svickova, a popular Czech meal that consists of bread dumplings and roast beef. The bread dumplings are absolutely glorious. They are usually about palm-sized and usually made from potatoes.

After lunch, we went to the old Jewish part of the town. We bought tickets to six sites, including five synagogues and a cemetery. The synagogues featured history lessons on Judaism in Prague and Jewish traditions. The cemetery, not bigger than a football field, is said to held hundreds of thousands of corpses. Most notable of all is Rabbi Low whom is said to have created a golum that nearly terrorized Prague.

The next site we saw was the Astronomical Clock at the Old Town Hall. Everyone about has a heart attack whenever they see the Astronomical Clock. At every hour, a statue of a skelton rings a bell and then statues of the twelve disciples rotate through two small doors that open. I'll admit that it's pretty neat, but neat is as far as I would go. People act like they can finally die after seeing the little statues do their thing.

The last site we saw was the giant metronome. Across one of the bridges and above a hill stands a giant metronome. I wish I would have counted the tempo of it. What is most interesting about the metronome is that a statue of Stalin used to stand where the metronome now stands. The statue of Stalin was quite symbolic: Stalin was always watching you.

Speaking of the time under communism, some of my students taught me the phrase "čest prace" (pronounced: Chest Prats-eh), which means something like "Honor or glory to work." Apparently instead of saying, "Dobry Den" (good day) to people on the streets, people were supposed to say "čest prace." I then wondered how many people said this phrase the day after the Velvet Revolution.

Anyway, Saturday morning, we went to the Prague airport where my parents left. I stayed in Prague for most of the day, traveling to Terezin, a small town outside of Prague where Czech Jews were taken during World War II.

Stay tuned for the Metro Mess! Besides the Metro Mess, the trip was absolutely fantastic. Great sites, great times.