Praha

Well, Prague will unfortunately be the place were I lost my beloved Guinness hat. The hat I bought 13 years earier at the Guinness brewery when I was freezing my ass off in Dublin. Oh well.

Prague is a city with great architecture and has been the darling of the expat set for several years now. Having given in to any invading powers, the city is very well preserved and being a behind the iron curtain it was historically very cheap. Unfortunately this is really no longer the case. Now, not to brag here, but I was lucky enough to be here not long after the fall of the iron curtain in '92 as part of a school trip. The city was just coming into it's own, with no international chains and it was still cheap. And I mean cheap. Pints of beer for 15 cents, and as 10th graders we were just in heaven. The price, beauty and creative energy is what attracted an ecclectic set of expats, but unfortunately in our opinion it has 'jumped the shark' (look it up if you don't know what I'm talking about).

It is still a great city with lots of beauty and lots to see and do, and it is still a bit cheaper than other European capitals, but it is a bit sketchy and lacks the effortless charm of other cities of similar stature. It is also very, very heavily touristed. I am talking Rome levels here, even in the winter time, elbow room only in the main square. Lots of Russians and other Eastern Europeans, as well as the usual contingent of Americans and Western Europeans rob it of it's charm a bit.

Their is an ancient castle with loads of history on a prominent position above the city and the Charles bridge and the surrounding areas are beautiful and worth seeing, but we just didn't gel with this place. We ate the national dish of pork, dumplings and saurkraut which is nothing to write home about. Not speaking even a lick of Czech was a bit inconvenient too. After coming from Italy where we can stumble through a sentence and Spain where it is even a bit easier and even Germany where I know 'Thank You' and my numbers we can't utter a word in Czech. Now several people speak English, but we went into a busy deli and had to just grunt and point which was very disspiriting as well frustrating for the person who helped us.