Returned on Wednesday from a 9 day trip to Prague. I’m still jet-lagged and reeling, but this was the first time I’d ever visited the Czech Republic and there was a lot to like about it. It is, however, exceedingly nice to be back in my own comfortable home in the United States with our gloriously large, hot showers and sleeping in my non-hotel bed with soft, fresh sheets.
I do have to admit, though, that the flight from Dallas to London (which then jaunts on to Prague after a 6 hour layover) is brutally long and feels like it will never end as it saps all the moisture out of your body, cramps all your muscles and leeches away your will to live — and that’s even before you hit British Airways’ notorious Terminal Five!
I didn’t take many photos as I don’t consider myself much of a photographer, finding it more annoying than inspiring to be standing in the middle of a crowded sidewalk taking aim at some view or building or whatever ephemeral flotsam is supposed to catch my eye and “inspire” me, but nonetheless, I soldiered on and pointed my little portable Cannon Elf at a couple of things I thought might make for arresting imagery or successful memory joggers:
This particular photo was snapped through a window opening in one of the old iron doors set into the stone wall that encircles the cemetery. I like how the clean lines of the cross-type bars contrast with the jumble of out-of-focus headstones in the background — it also implies some type of Christian-Judaic connection, even if it’s not intentional. I do have some additional photos from inside the cemetery, but to me, this is the most successful of the photos, as it was Saturday (the sabbath) when I took it (hence being on the outside looking in, as the cemetery was closed to the public), so there was no one there to clutter the scenery. When we returned on a Tuesday, the place was jam-packed with tourists, which made for a very unpleasant and decidedly “tourist-trap” experience, especially with all the merchant carts set up just outside the synagogue hawking what seemed like acres of cheap crap.
Shop Window on Parizska Street:
Parizska Street is the main shopping drag in the Old Town Quarter, cutting almost directly through the middle of Josefov, the Jewish section of the quarter and the neighborhood in which our hotel, Hotel Josef, was also located. I took the photo not because I thought the decorative glass objects were all that stunning, but because this particular store, with its antique-type vases and Old Europe attitude, stood in such stark contrast to the recent influx of global luxury brand boutiques surrounding it — Dior, Valentino, Dunhill, Hermes, Moschino, Sonia Rykiel, etc. Construction workers were just in the beginning phases of installing new Etro and Sergio Rossi shops nearby. If you look closely, you can see the reflection in the window glass of the Louis Vuitton shop across the street.
Jan Hus Monument in the Old Town Square:
Old Town Square was just a few minutes’ walk from our hotel, so I meandered past the massive Hus Monument on a daily basis (if not intra-multi-daily — is that a word?). Jan Hus was a Czech theologian and early social activist who criticized the Catholic Church’s use of funds from the (often poor) Czech people to further their wars around the world. He was tried for heresy and burned at the stake (no good deed goes unpunished, yada yada yada). He is now considered a martyr and national hero, with a national holiday to his name and a gigantic monument plopped smack in the center of Old Town Square. The monument is so large and distinctive that to my foreign eyes it soon came to represent Prague itself, its alluring mix of history, culture and beauty liberally sprinkled with the grime of industrialization.
More later . . .
