Prague Part 2 - The Day

We woke up at 8 a.m. Saturday morning to shower and go down for a complimentary breakfast. When we all heard breakfast we thought eggs, bacon, sausage and pancakes. No. The cake was good, and I ate bread with honey. But everything else was just different. I think we’re all beginning to realize how much we miss our American food. At the end of breakfast, while a friend of mine ate his turkey bologna meat thing, I mentioned waffles with butter and syrup. We had a moment of silence.

It was a bit of a cold day and looked like rain. Thank goodness Abby brought her umbrella!

We had two tour guides on our bus as we drove into town. They talked about the scenery around us and how monotone the colors were. There were definitely many grays and browns. As we entered town, the comments they made became a little ridiculous. For instance, she spoke of this wonderful museum that we were going to see, but only from behind. If we were to be in the front, then, wow, it would be pretty! Good to know!

We got to Prague Castle and split into two groups. Each tour guide had these awesome poles with fabric at the end so we would be able to find them in a crowd. Never did I think I would be so reliant on some blue and red fabric.

The Castle was absolutely gorgeous. It was on a mountain that looked over the town and the river. The cathedral was huge and took 200 years to build. We joked that the people making it would get frustrated after awhile knowing they would never see the end. Our tour guide didn’t like that very much.

Our tour guide was our first introduction to the Czech people and boy was it an interesting one. Apparently they are very fast, impersonal people. We had to run to keep up with her because she would never wait for the 25 people in our group. By the time we found her (the stick didn’t always help) and got close enough to hear her, the story would be done. So we never knew what we were looking at! Luckily one of the girls in our group, Megan, had a Prague guide book and read what it said.

The only ornate rooms we saw were parliamentary rooms and places of worships. I was really hoping to see sleeping quarters and such. When I see where the kings and queens ate and sleep, then I feel like I’m in a real castle. For instance, the castle I saw when I was visiting my family was fantastic. I learned a lot, such as how we have the saying, “the walls have ears.” The walls were thick enough so that servants could walk around inside them in order to serve the royalty. They had little doors that blended in with the wall, and they would go in and out of them.

After Prague castle we went to a shopping area for a break, and long story short, completely lost our tour guide. There were about 15 of us, including a FUBiS employee, and none of us knew where she was. She left without us! When we finally went to the bottom of the hill and found her, she yelled at us for being too slow. Our friend Sam had not shown up at the meeting spot. We were looking for him!

I mention how crazy and unorganized things were throughout this trip, but I must keep you in mind that I had a blast with the people around me. I met knew people and got to know the others better. I laughed so much this weekend. I was really happy. It also helped to have others to complain about frustrations with. I wasn’t the only one!

We went further into town for our lunch break and had the option of staying on the tour after lunch. We did not. We felt that we hadn’t learned much of anything with this woman, so it was pointless! Instead we had a nice sit down lunch with a Czech waitress who embodied all the previous mentioned characteristics. The bill was 3,600 Korunas (for 11 people). We took pictures of the bill!

After lunch, all 11 of us walked to the King Charles Bridge and in that process about 4 of us made it out. We lost everyone! There were tons of people, and Abby and I stopped often to shop. Abby, Francis, Mica, and I were left of the group. The others kept going to the Old Town Square or went back to the hotel.

Walking along the streets of Prague was amazing. I truly felt like I was there. We stopped a few times to look at shops, take pictures, and drink beer. Life was good.

At one point we all went into a book shop because the boys wanted to go in there. Abby and I looked around at all the books and found many books from a writer named Kafka. So many that we were puzzled. Abby said, “Jeez, this place should be his bookshop or something.” I said, “Yeah, you’d think that.” And just as I said that, I looked up to find his picture all over the place and the words, “Kafka Bookshop” at the entrance. We left quickly and burst into laughter outside.

We all wanted to go to the Torture Museum – at this point there were only 3 people. We went in, got totally freaked out and ate pizza at a place nearby. Really good pizza!

There was a store nearby where a friend of mine bought Absinth. While purchasing my own bottle (for a certain someone’s birthday coming up), the guy ringing me up looked at me, and said with huge creepy eyes, “You like alcohol?” Just then Abby said “Look behind you,” and there was a huge cucumber on a chair sitting randomly in the middle of the store. I was scared. We ran away.

Then came the night!

Prague Day 1

We boarded the bus around 4 p.m. on Friday after a role call and “get to know you exercise.” Teresita, a FUBiS employee, grabbed people from the crowd of 61 students and asked them to sing/introduce themselves. Alex avoided her eyes as she passed him but with no luck. Ashley was then grabbed and in my attempts to take a picture I was pulled to the front as well. Abby was also grabbed shortly after me. All four of us talked about random things until we could sit back down. A few screamed for me to sing. I never will understand why.

There were only two Ashley’s on the trip which made life a bit easier. Therefore, every time someone made a funny remark about me I always pretended they were talking about her because NO WAY they would say that to me!

Abby and I sat next to two girls on the bus in a fancy schmancy sitting area with a table. Definitely prime seating!

The bus ride went by pretty fast because we talked a lot with the two girls next to us. Abby and I hadn’t really talked a lot together either so it was wonderful getting to know her too! The guys in our “group” sat behind us, so it was just one big party the whole way there.

Luckily I brought a sandwich with me on the trip, because, if I hadn’t, I would have probably starved. FUBiS evidently did not have a planned spot for us to stop and thought that they would find a place on the way. They stopped at a hotel in the smallest town in the world, thinking that this hotel could accommodate 61 people. It was not so. We eventually found a cheap grocery store just in time for it to close. So we had to run around in 10 minutes purchasing the makings of a sandwich. 61 people in a little store the size of a classroom! Just imagine! This place also did not have public restrooms. This of course did not stop me from walking right through the “employee doors.” I had to go!!

As the ride continued we all ate like kings. Everyone shared their random food and it was good. It also helped that this store sold Jager…There were about 3 bottles of Jager floating around the bus, and the bus sold beer as well. It was truly the Party Bus! A friend of mine, Chris, took his CD Player to the front, put his headsets on the microphone, and played music for about 3 hours. We were all dancing in the aisles! It was a blast!

Then they almost forgot our Passports! When we got to the border, the Czech Police came onto our bus, collected all of our passports and walked into their office. At this point we waited, but I guess the bus driver thought otherwise. As he sped off, we began to wonder, “Where are our passports?” Unfortunately the FUBiS workers with us did not have the same question in their minds. We were screaming PASSPORTS!!! They kept telling us not to worry and making jokes. This is the point in the story well I let you know that this was their answer to anything. Any question asked was answered with a sarcastic remark. It happened so often that we never knew what to believe. It happened so often that we didn’t bother to ask questions.

The bus driver made a massive U-Turn and we drove back to the border to see the laughing Czech police. I got my passport back and swore to never let that happen again. Needless to say we were all very frustrated with our “tour guides.”

We went to an exchange rate place and received our Koruna (pronounced “crowns”). We felt rich holding our 1,100 Koruna which were about 50 E. Pictures were taken.

I was not expecting much from the Hostel which is probably the reason why I thought it was so nice. I thought Hostels were these 18 to a room buildings with one bathroom. This one was huge and pretty nice. Again, we had to pay a deposit for the room and…had to give our PASSPORTS!!!! I was so frustrated because none of this information was given in the beginning.

Abby dealt with the room situation while I watched the bags. We waited to be one of the last rooms so we only had 4 people to a room rather than 5, meaning 2 in each room. The rooms were nice…again, compared to what I thought they would be.

We didn’t feel like sleeping just yet so we decided to walk around the area. It was a little after midnight so we weren’t going to go far and it was also a little cold and rainy. We found the train station and many hedgehogs a long the way. I was so happy to meet Sonic!

On our way back we met a nice Slovakian girl named Lena who was so excited to speak English with us. She was very nice until we said repeatedly how we were tired and wanted to go to bed. She practically followed us to our room! We tried really hard to keep her from knowing our room but every time we said goodbye and walked away she would scream, “No wait” and catch up! We had to pretty much run to our room and lock the door behind us! She knocked for a few minutes but finally left. Needless to say she was quite drunk. Oh the people we meet in Europe!

To end this entry: Friday night was probably the best sleep I had in a long time!