Day Ten: I Would Walk 500 Miles

Is it really worth it anymore to complain that food got stolen?  No?  You’ve started taking it for granted?  So have I.  (In case you were wondering, it was my yogurt.)

Today we dedicated to Petrín Hill and the buildings we only wanted to see, so we steeled ourselves to walk clear across the city to the bottom of Petrín Hill, and we traipsed merrily along for about six blocks until Verity realized she had left her phone on her bed in the hostel: big no-no, especially when yogurt and pears weren’t even safe (and I’m putting away the bitter now).  She retraced her steps, promising to meet me at the funicular stop using public transportation so that we would theoretically arrive in the same place at the same time.

I took my time just in case.  Using the route we had mapped out the night before, I ended up revisiting Powder Gate and Wenceslas Square before passing by the National Theater, where of course it started to rain before I could really begin my photo op.  The National Theater suffers from the same illness as the rest of Prague: inordinately dirty-looking stone with nearly blinding ornamentation.  But all the same, squat and domed and overlooking the river like it does, the National Theater belongs where it is; it looks like it’s been there since the 18^th century and has watched the landscape around it change without changing itself — apart from a good dome buffing every now and then.  All the same, I hurried across the bridge towards the foot of Petrín Hill.

Yup, raining. Theeeere's a raindrop.

The rain let up by the time I hit the park at the bottom of the hill, and on instinct, I began searching for stairs to avoid having to pay for a ride to the top (and to preemptively counteract any future heavy meals), but what I found was infinitely more interesting.  Giant concrete stairs emerged from the gravel path, and six of hammered metal sculptures adorned them: the figure of a naked, downtrodden, abused man copied six times and more and more eroded, rusted away the further up he climbed.  His wounds gape open, framing the naked forest behind him.

A memorial to the victims of communism.  And if I hadn’t looked up at the right moment, I would have walked right by it, the rusting man melting into the hibernating tree trunks around him.

Memorial to the Victims of Communism

In any case, I found Verity, who had taken nearly every form of public transit available to get there, and we took the funicular up to the top where, of course, it began to rain again.  Hard.  We wanted to ramble around on the top of the hill — explore the ramparts and gardens, look out over the city leisurely — but the rain coupled with the higher elevation wind made being outside rather uncomfortable, so we followed the (minimal) tourist crowd towards the observatory.

Remember how I compared Charles Bridge to the Eiffel Tower?  Well, I’m going to do it again with the observatory, and this time, with an even more obvious reason: it was modeled after the top two decks of that infamous French monument.

It's the Eiffel Tower! Oh wait, wrong country...

Really, that’s all that needs to be said about how it looks.

We debated whether or not to go up to the top — you have to pay, of course — but as rain still threatened to persist, and there weren’t any other attractions around, we decided why not.  Verity, who was nursing an ailing toe, opted for the elevator while I got my workout in with the stairs.

Just like the real Eiffel Tower, the Petrín Hill observatory features two observation decks on two different levels, and I stopped at each to wander around and take pictures.  On the first level, which was practically deserted, you can exit the interior, and walk around a narrow outdoor veranda, and despite the persistent drizzle, I took advantage.  The second level was both more crowded and enclosed, though you could open large, chest-high-on-me windows in order to lean out safely and take pictures.

View from the stairs on the way to the second level.

Oh, the view was superb.  If only, it hadn’t been cloudy!  I had to use the super vivid option on my camera nearly the whole time, or else all of my pictures would have looked washed out and dreary and generally Central European.  As the highest point in Prague and immediate environs, the observatory towers above everything, and you can see for miles: a good thing over the downtown area, a meh thing for over the more residential side on which the observatory is situated.  Red roofs mill about, clustering along the banks of the Vltava, the pattern only broken by the oxidized copper ornamentation of churches and government buildings.

View of Castle Hill, the other hill in town. Also, yay super vivid!

Verity and I found each other, and we walked back down together, using the correct staircase and loudly cursing those who clearly couldn’t read the universal language of pictures and tried going up the ‘down’ staircase.  We opted to hoof it down the hill as well, and as we did, our watches struck twelve noon, and so did every church in the city, their bells clanging at different but someone melodious tempos.  We stopped along the path to relish the unexpected surround sound, thinking it would last maybe a total of five minutes.

On the way down from the hilltop.

Fifteen minutes after noon, we started to get a little impatient.

When the bells finally stopped ringing, we continued our way downhill and searched for lunch, eventually ending up at one of the worst choices ever: some medieval-themed restaurant that we chose because, despite its proximity to Wenceslas Square, it seemed cheap.  For a good reason.  By medieval-themed, they apparently meant suits of armor in random places (and positions) and coats of arms on the walls as decoration.  That’s it.  It was in a basement, it was cold, and it was just this side of hellish (only barely) because of the absolutely atrocious 90’s music they pumped in right over our heads instead of heat.  It was one of those situations where you have to laugh to keep from crying, though I think at one point, I was crying because I was laughing so hard; we were both so incredibly bitter about the whole situation.  However, I got a plate of delicious roasted vegetables out of the deal, so maybe that canceled out the basement aspect of the restaurant.

We filled the rest of our day with more walking and more picture-snapping of places we didn’t necessarily want to visit but still required a glance, the first being the Fred and Ginger dancing building.  A glance a picture, and you’ll know one of the architects: Frank Gehry.

The best things happen when you're dancing.

Built after World War Two, the buildings are apartments and a restaurant, and you can’t go in them unless you can prove you have business there, so most people just mill about on the street corner and take pictures of the buildings leaning into one another.  Officially named Nationale-Nederlanden, it’s supposed to mimic two people dancing, hence the unofficial nickname of the Fred and Ginger building, after Fred Astaire and Ginger Rogers.  I don’t quite see how the building to the right could be seen as dancing, so I’m more apt to agree with the people who call them the drunken buildings.

From there, we continued back along the river, past Charles Bridge, and snapped a couple pictures of the Rudolfinium, home of the Czech Philharmonic and a contemporary art gallery.

That dude at the bottom was approaching, and I sprinted.

I successfully avoided the guys out front trying to sell tickets, but Verity got snagged, so while I was waiting for her to extract herself, I actually read one of the posters for tonight’s concert: a sampling of well-known classical music featuring Dvořák, Brahms, Mozart, Beethoven, and the kicker, a selection from Bizet’s Carmen.  Sold!  I prevaricated, probably bugging the hell out of Verity, but I eventually dragged my ass inside the building and bought a ticket.  Why not?  Seeing a chamber group made up of members from the Czech Philharmonic playing some of the most well-known pieces for €20?  Yes please!

That, however, meant that we had a time limit on things, as I had to be back at the Rudolfinium in two and a half hours, and I may or may not have to pick up an on-the-go sausage after the concert for dinner, depending on how long it lasted.  So since we were in the area, we took a spin around the Jewish Quarter, where the Jews of Prague had to live by law until Josef II of the Austrian Empire lifted the restrictions.  We quickly glanced at the Old-New Synagogue built in 1270 (so named because at one point it was new, and then other synagogues were built, and therefore it wasn’t new anymore), the most expensive shopping street in Prague with stores like Gucci, Tag Heuer, and others I feel poor just thinking about, and the Spanish Synagogue.  We had allotted time to go into the Spanish Synagogue, but when we noticed that yet again we would have to pay to go into a house of worship, we nixed the idea in favor of looking at the posters of the interior and taking a picture of the Kafka statue out front instead.  It looked pretty.  I wish it hadn’t cost money.

Jewish Town Hall.

Spanish Synagogue.

Kafka statue!

In order to pass even more time, we meandered back to Old Town Square to have a hot drink in one of the cafés in front of the astronomical clock and watch it go off while cozying up to a heat lamp.  For the first time in what seemed like forever, I order a hot apple cider, the one without the alcohol, and Verity ordered a hot wine, and we sipped away until first the clock went off and then I had to leave for my concert.

Cider!

In accordance with my prediction, the concert was both fabulous and short: only an hour.  It was in a smaller hall than their full orchestra concert hall, and that suited me just fine, though I would have enjoyed at least glimpsing another grand concert hall (I saw the Staatsopera in Vienna, and I wanted to compare them).

This was *not* my staircase.

I thought the music was spectacular, especially the extracts from Carmen which is my favorite ever of all time EVER, though the guy next to me looked like he couldn’t possibly care less about being there and like he had been dragged there by his ear even though I don’t think he came with anyone.

When I got out, I texted Verity that I was on my way back, and we ate and crashed again. Verity was trying to make plans for the following day, and I was lamenting the lack of Nutella in Central Europe.  Verity looked at me.  “You know Nutella exists in Prague, right?”

“Yeah, but it’s not the same,” I whined, petulant and melodramatic but halfway joking.  “I want French Nutella.  It doesn’t taste the same.”

Two Argentinian boys spoke up from the other half of the room.  “Would you like our Nutella?  We have some.”

I paused.  Really?  I had let one of the Argentinian guys use my conditioner that morning, but he didn’t really have to pay me back, and with Nutella at that.  “Really?  Are you sure?”

“Yes, we don’t need it.”

I may or may not have snatched up the bottle and happily dug in, remembering at the last moment to use pretzels instead of my finger.  Glancing at the bottle, I giggled: it was in Hebrew!  Where did this bottle come from?!  Sometimes, I really do enjoy hostels.  However, it only struck me after they left for a night out that they may have only meant to lend me the bottle of Nutella, so I left it next to one of their suitcases on the off-chance that they wanted it back and were leaving in the morning.  If they didn’t, they would leave it in the room’s unusable kitchen as community property.  A large portion of me hoped it would be there after they left.