Every place we went for Christmas was breathtakingly beautiful. Everything we saw was stunning. But when I caught my first glimpse of Tyn Cathedral, I gasped out loud. “I think that’s the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen!” I said, sipping a hot gluhwein as a live orchestra performed “Somewhere In My Memory” nearby. “This is everything I wanted for Christmas. This year or any year!”
“Better keep saving your money, then,” the boyfriend informed me.
Magic
With its winding cobbled streets that my GPS could not navigate, hidden, twisty passages waiting around every corner, and awe-inspiring architecture and history, I couldn’t stop thinking the word “magical”. If any place in the world has magic, it is surely Prague.
Memories
I had the good fortune of accompanying my aunt Barbie on a trip to Europe when I was 12, and Prague was one of our destinations. It’s been a long time now since I was 12, and a lot of my memories have become hazy or disappeared altogether. But while standing in front of the Astronomical Clock, I had a sudden flashback of having stood in that exact spot 22 years before, and exactly where all of my companions had stood in relation to me. Like I said–magic.
I had sauerkraut once, 22 years ago, when a McDonald’s in Prague surprised me with it on my Big Mac. Since then, I have remembered it as the most disgusting thing I had ever eaten and always vowed I would never get it anywhere near my tongue again! Well, while in Prague this time around, sauerkraut appeared on a plate on my table, and…I ate it. And it was not terrible! It was almost good! I mean, it’s just pickled cabbage, right? I don’t know why I considered that the nemesis of my taste buds for all those years, but that night our long-standing enmity came at last to an end. Funny how it both started and ended in Prague.
Welcome To Prague
When we first arrived in the city, we were picked up by a large, bearded taxi driver whose face and accent at once reminded me of Rade Serbedzija in The Saint, and I was a bit intimidated. We rode in silence all the way to our destination. Once there, I needed to communicate that our hotel was paying our fare and that I would be right back after grabbing some cash. I took a deep breath, swallowed, and said in the words I’d been practicing, “Uh…prosim…Anglictina?”
At once, the man who had so completely intimidated me before burst into the biggest smile. His cheeks turned into red roses like many vintage illustrations of Santa Claus and I swear he was blushing. “A bit,” he said.
I smiled widely and explained the situation, then dashed into the hotel, still nervous enough that I completely forgot to ask how much the fare was. This found me having to rush back out, back in, and back out again before all was said and done. But we got there in the end.
City of a Thousand Spires
For those of us on the search for beauty everywhere we go, Prague is a dream come true. Because it escaped heavy damage during World War II, it retains many monuments to the Gothic, Renaissance, and Baroque era. I was breathless with wonder.
The Christmas Markets
Of course, the main reason we were on this trip was for the Christmas markets. So please enjoy these Christmas-themed pictures of the city.
Some Thoughts on Language
I had so many languages floating around in my head during this trip, what with the three different countries we visited, that my brain was doing somersaults trying to keep it all straight. (It was exactly the way my brain feels when I’m trying too hard to do math; the difference is, I can usually figure out languages.) One morning in Prague, I greeted someone in Czech and then thanked them in Spanish. Because apparently when overworked, my brain defaults to the first second language I received a moderate education in, rather than the one I need to use in the moment. It’s like my brain says, “What? You’re trying to use a language other than your own? That MUST be Spanish! Never mind that German in the corner!”
Though I did rather well with French while in Strasbourg.
Fun story: As a kid, I always knew I wanted to live in Europe someday. So when the option to take either French or Spanish in high school came around, I wanted to learn French, believing it would come in handy more often in my adult life. But my parents told me no, I had to learn Spanish instead, knowing I would never make it to Europe. (Though they let my sister take French a few years later.) So out of rebellion that year, I got myself a really basic beginner’s French book and worked really hard to learn everything in it on my own. Because that’s what stubbornness and rebellion will do for you–you CAN do the things when someone tells you you can’t!
Of course, it’s been a long time since then and most of my French and Spanish (and Latin, which I took for fun later) are gone. Interestingly, although I had the brief but formal education in Spanish, it is the French alphabet that I was so determined to learn which I still remember. But I always pay close attention to correlations between words of various languages to see how they relate and what the origins might be.
Americans Abroad
A buddy of ours is living in Italy for a few years, so it was fun getting to meet up with him for a bit while overseas! He had a great time making fun of us during our photo shoot, which had us all cracking up.
We unintentionally committed a major faux pas on our final night in Prague. It was late, we were hungry, and we wanted to sit down somewhere warm and and dry to try everything we could that we couldn’t get back home. Each of us ended up ordering one of these.
I don’t know why we all thought it would be just tiny tastings of all the different things on this plate. But we ended up with three whopping plates of delicious food that none of us could come close to finishing. The three of us could easily have split one, even as hungry as we were. We had to ask for boxes to go. And we watched, cringing, as the angry waiter was intercepted on his way to the kitchen by a manager, whose snide smile indicated we had just fulfilled some awful stereotype of Americans for him. Oops. All I can say in our defense is that we didn’t mean to!
We departed early in the morning on a quiet Christmas Day.
Photography
Several of the pictures in this post were taken by Constantine at Alibric Photography. If you have an Instagram, you can follow him here. Thanks again, Constantine!
Have you visited Prague? I would love to hear about your trip!
