Snow falling on Prague...
Last night I bravely boarded a Eurolines bus at midnight (from Arnhem, Holland), set to arrive in Prague, Czech Republic at noon today...12 hours on a bus, was I insane?Apparently not, as I immediately bonded with a Czech girl my age (Eva) who happens to be getting her phD in Wageningen, where I've been staying with my aunt. To be honest, I don't even remember the particulars of what we chatted about; I got the feeling it didn't really matter WHAT we talked about, just that we were there to distract each other from the potentially boring ride!
We were fortunate to be able to sleep for about 7 hours each. We awoke to the pleasant sight of rolling hills (HILLS! I had almost forgotten what they looked like!) and snow falling lightly on the evergreen trees...as we rolled by the Prague castle and I got a glimpse of the winding river and bridges cutting through the center of town, I started understanding why Prague has grown in the past decade to rival cities like Paris in terms of architectural and cultural beauty!
However, the beauty of Prague seems to be much more understated than that of Amsterdam, Brussels, or Dublin...I can't put my finger on it, but despite being a fairly significant tourist destination, it feels less "in your face" than previous cities where Iv'e visited. Tomorrow I hope to give myself a crash course in cultural and art history (sorry, Mr. Wall and Mrs. Newman!) so I can put a name to the myriad architectural styles I spot on a given street and the cultural observations I make...on the surface, it's it's definitely different to be out of western europe (although Czech is becoming more western - they joined the EU last May). I hear much less English on the public transportation and the people seem to carry themselves in a more guarded way...I'm looking forward to more time for deeper observations over the next 3 days! For now, it's time to catch up on some shut-eye... | posted by Cheryl, 11/19/2005 01:43:00 PM
0 Comments:
Add a comment