endearing euro idiosyncracies?

The oddities of the modern European: ( list should be updated soon)

1. Body Odor runs rampant, most noticeable when one is on close proximity to others on the metro, Mustek or Muzeum stop!

2. The floors here include floor -1, and Floor 0, There 0 floor is our 1st floor- so it gets confusing

3. Despite the 5inch thick hefty cobble, sometimes half a foot in length with deep abyssmal crevice between cobble women sport the thinnest stilletos. I suspect they had a course in highschool to in conjunction with home economics class

4. Praha loves its dogs, and these dogs run all over without leashes, doxens and furry labs!

5. Their fashion seems like a hyrbid of the 80s and early 90s, very Hasselhoff, denim paired with denim, etc.

6. They have awesome street art, stencil graffitii is big, or stickers since grafitti is taken extra seriously here. Hardcore jail time for desecrating any structure so artists place weird toys on facades of buildings or sticker them up.

7. Hair color, PDA : All the kids here have such funky hair! I love it, little punks and their girlfriends are constantly making out

8. No flip flops, but here socks with sandals is a must

9. There's no such thing as an alcoholic- recreational drinking! Pubs open as early as 10am, they even serve Gambrinus in our school cafeteria and McDonalds! Sa-weeet! The only difference is in degrees, you'll order a decatka, 10 degree beer in the afternoon and somethign stronger at night, dvenatska, 12 degree.

10. Animals at the zoo are way more liberal, my roomate saw some Hyena sex and incestuous monkeys- Father on son action

11. They adore dairy and especially yogurt, There are as many diff type of yogurts here and new emo bands that sprout out of LI ;TESCO may be the mecca for yogurt lovers, 3 aisles of different brands to be exact, right now im hooked on Activia with pieces of Grain inside

12. Pickled everything! They pickle their sausages too, you can get a whole jar full

13. People are pretty quite on the trams, face forward unless there is a rambuncious group of Czech youth who pregrame on the trams.

WORK MAKES YOU FREE / The secret Jewish prayer hall in Terezin

Trip to Lidice, Litomerice and Terezin and Umela Hmota @ Vagon!

SOoo this nite I got 3 hours of asleep! The night before we went to Chateau Rouge for Latin dancing. There was a Cuban band playing downstairs, and things got sweaty. A lot of people we fucked up so they kept dropping their beer glasses, this place really should introduce plastic. So in the style of an authentic Jewish wedding, glass incessantly broke through out the night. I was struggling to dodge the shards of broken glass. Afterwards we went to this American bar across the street. This blonde guy played acoustic guitar, all trite American songs like Sweet Home Alabama. Then we requested Brown eyed girl!!! YEAAA.
SO it was 3:30 am by now and our dear 22/23 tram line stops running at midnight so we had to wait for the 57 for 40min in tru Brooklyn style. I gotta hand it to the local Czech women for still rockin stilletos and heels because I nearly twisted my ankle in heels, the cobblestone is not merciful!
3 hours later we got up for the trip to Lidice, a town that was destroyed by the Nazis in 1942, it was razed to the ground, all that remained was the door of their former Church, which was on display at the museum. Their was a big picture of a school picture of the children of the local school, 2 weeks later they were all taken away in trucks and gassed. OUt of the 100 children in the town only 15 survived, the ones Aryan looking enough that were sent to SS families for Germanification. Their was a video of the letter they wrote from the concentration camp asking parents for food and warm clothes. Outside was a memorial statue for the kids. It portrays all of them, different ages and is beautiful, beside the statue are toys that people bring to them. The site was also newly renovated and revered because after the Communist regime, people interpreted such sites as part of their propoganda, they took credit for the memorial when there was no affiliation to it. Then we went to Terezin. It was a small fortress but actually a whole town that served as labor camp. People constantly died from the horredous unsanitary conditions but when the Red Cross came for a visit to do an evaluation, they gave it a favorable review. For the 4 hour visit they spent 2 hours of it having lunch with the SS and didn't even look inside. They published a review saying that the Jews were looking to have such a nice place, they should be grateful to Hitler! There was even a propaganda film made where this little boy says that he likes it and doesn't miss anything, a week later he was gassed. But this town was creepy b/c its a modern day functioning town outside the fortress with just a population of 2,000. The fortress inside was designated for political prisoners, we came to Gavrilo Princip's isolation cell. He assasinated the arch Duke Franz Ferdinand and since he was not even 18 he couldnt be sentenced to death. He was given life but died of TB 2 years later. The trip was good and it reminded me of Yad Vashem in Israel, there are so many memorials and gravesites. Its disturbing to think that in 50 years there will be more for the victims of Darfur.

We got back at 6ish. We went to Tulip Cafe with Olivia's friends, expats Kyle, Tony, and this German chic which I later elbowed in the face by accident when we were dancing! It has never been easier to get weed. You go up to the bar order a Pilsner then just say how many grams you want. The bartender kneels down and resurfaces with a blak bag full of ziploc bags! 250cz a gram! niiiice! So we chill there then we went to Vagon! This place was awesome. We came in to see this sickk Czech band called Umela Hmota! ( accent mark on the e! ) Plastic Matter in English! The lead singer was in his late 50s , hair as hell, rocked out with no shirt. He wrapped the mike cord around his neck like a noose and blurted out random angry Czech lyrics whilst singing the same note on his harmnonica. It was so bad it was good. That one harmonica note was hypnotizing! The key boardist was soo hot. He had long Rapunnzel like shoulder lenght hair. And he was soo high, he kept on making this weird faces. The pseudo Ozzy singer roared and the only lyric we understood was komrade which means friend. The headbangers in the crowd wore 90s grungeKurtCobain sweaters or flannel Ts. It felt like a time warp, everyone seemed to have long greasy hair. When they finished their set, Rapunzel blew me and Olivia a kiss we melted so we wanted to go up 2 him and say hi. But then this girl jumped on him and they made out and dry humped for a few minutes. haha. then the screen started playing 90s metal and rock. Pearl Jam, Metalicca, Rammstein, Beck!!! They played Give it AWAY !!! and i never get a chance to dance to my Peppers anywhere else. This was one of the best nights so far second to the ill train ride to Ostrova where we kept out heads out the window the whole time and drank wine! Im going to the Opera- Carmen tommorow and Vagon is having an RHCP cover band on Wed.! WOOT!

This is currently my screensaver,my images will henceforth be much less pictaresque since I cant stand postcard imagery, stock photos almost, but I had to since im still in awe of my new surroundinds and thankful that im not in NY!

the town of a 100 spires

The praha blog, as I consciously affirm will likely both end and start here, perhaps to some form of resurrection in the near future. My typing must be furtive and cadenced for a roommate sleeps less than 3 feet away from my bed. Praha is amazing cold literary, smoky, cobblestoney, thronged with tourists, checkered in Czechs ,tramvajs , Ahoj! The post communist revolution? Has the culture really changed? How! How not?
Today I got stung by a mysterious creature while attempting to pose for a picture on a giant life size chest set, in the Pilsner Urquell brewery. Middle thumb stung like a mother for a few minutes. Swoll up red, swoll for the whole day, I hope Im not poisoned horribly… I have been reduducing my peronsality? Am I too negative, socially inept, blocked from attaning emotional connections, too dry in humor, sarcastic? I think Im not funny … like lately I feel like my personality has been drained? Did I get a lobotomy when I wasn’t looking at some point during the summer. I used to be quicker on my feet, wittier, refer to knowledge faster in an applicable way. I don’t know…. I ve felt slightly uncomfortable in my own person, perhaps because im in a new place… Its alarming since I have been happy with me, in that department for a while… but I crave some sort of reaccessment and pray to resurface in a flourishing state. Its like this Nietzsche quote.

"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. If you try it, you will be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself." -Friedrich Nietzsche

By the way I spell "Nietzsche" write effortlessly thanks to a paper I wrote for my friend on Nietzsche sophomore year. 15 pages worth required incessant mention of Nietzsche.