First Day in Prague

I arrived at the airport in Prague at 2pm yesterday. I had been worried about my checked bags arriving, and waited at the carousel nervously as many people claimed their bags. Eventually, there mine were, and what a relief it was. Customs was no problem. Nobody even asked me any questions or looked at any of my things except for my passport. As soon as I walked out of the baggage claim area, I spotted the booth for the cab company I was directed to go to. They had a sign up at the booth with my name on it. It couldn't have been easier. I took cash from the ATM to pay for my apartment and hopped in the cab. The driver took me to the Hotel Pivovar. This hotel is in the same building as the school where I'll be studying for the next month. In the lobby I met one of the students at the school and she gave me an orientation packet and rode with me in another cab to my apartment (or villa, really...it's a big house full of mostly students). The villa is very close to the school, a five or ten minute walk. It's very nice, I was surprised by how much room we have and very happy to learn that we have wireless internet.

Most of the students in my course (there are 19) had been corresponding for the last couple of weeks, so we had already planned on meeting for dinner at 6. Before dinner I set up my computer and got online and ended up having my first Skype conversation with my friend Jesse who lives in Stockholm, Sweden. Later I called John who didn't answer and my mom who did and was very excited to hear from me. Skype is great. I used it to call my mom's cell phone and talked to her for over 20 minutes which cost about 40 cents. I can definitely afford that.

I met one of my flatmates, Sasha, almost as soon as I got to the villa and another, Marissa, before we left for dinner. We joined a couple of the other girls who live in the villa and headed down to the Hotel Pivovar to meet the other students who were coming to eat with us. We went to a pizza place nearby and ate dinner and chatted. Everyone from the program that I've met so far has been been very friendly and fun. Some of us are American and some of us are English. There will also be an Australian and a native Czech joining us. After dinner I was extremely tired after traveling for so long with little sleep, so after dinner I came back and put my things away and after talking to mom on Skype I went to sleep.

Marissa's picture of the group at dinner

This morning I slept in a little, then got up and started the day with some Sun Salutations and a cup of tea. I got dressed and headed out to explore. First I wandered around aimlessly at a mall right by our metro stop. I was looking for the grocery store but I couldn't seem to find it. Then I ran into Marissa and Mary Beth from my program and we rode the subway to the city center together. They were going shopping since they had already been exploring the day before. I got off before them and came out of the subway and into the center of the old part of the city. First I went into a big mall right next to the subway and grabbed some food from a grocery for lunch. I ate lunch in a beautiful square. The buildings here are gorgeous, and the streets are narrow and winding with so much to explore.

While I was finishing my lunch, the bells at the church next to me started ringing, and trumpets were playing. I heard people cheering and people from all around started running over to the other side of the church. I thought maybe it was like the Rathaus-Glockenspiel in Munich or something. I followed the crowd over to the other side and looked around. The church has a beautiful clock, and there were men playing trumpets up in the tower high above. It took me a minute to realize what the commotion was: someone had just gotten married. I walked right next to the car that carried the couple. The bride looked beautiful.

I spent the day wandering through the streets. I crossed the Charles Bridge. I had coffee at a little cafe and read some of my book, which currently is The Unbearable Lightness of Being.  It's actually a coincidence that I ended up choosing a Czech author to start reading before my trip. I was looking through Jared's books and nothing was jumping out at me until I came across that book. I had always wanted to read it because I've heard it's a good book, but I've never read any Milan Kundera and didn't even remember that he was Czech until I had chosen it and laid down in bed to look through it. I love coincidences like that. It makes me feel like everything is in line.

In my wanderings I came across the MuMo which is a modern art museum and walked through their exhibition there. They currently have a show of Pavla Aubrechtova and Vladimir Gebauer, who are a married pair of Czech artists that came of age during the mid-70's when freedom of speech was very limited here. I really enjoyed the show. I can't wait to visit more of Prague's museums.

Later in the evening before I got on the subway to head back to the villa I stopped at the grocery store. I am happy that food is very inexpensive here. I was worried that produce would be more expensive, but I think it is about the same or less expensive and everything else is definitely less expensive. I got a lot of food and the bill was under $25. I think at home for the same items it would have been about $40-$45. When I got back to my apartment, I cooked up some pasta with fresh spinach, fresh tomatoes, olive oil and parmesan cheese. I made extra to take for lunch for the next couple of days. I'm planning on trying to cook for myself as much as possible, and I wanted to get off to a good start. It's been an awesome first day. Tomorrow we have the orientation for our program in the afternoon, and I might see about going to another museum beforehand. I've also got to do some research about the music scene here. But now to bed...

Cooking my first meal in the new digs