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Sup TL-netizens,
my girlfriend and me are planing on a little citytrip and decided to go to Prague. Many friends who have been there told me it`s a great city, with a cool atmosphere. So the target was found pretty easy. Fast decisionmaking? check.
What followed was some extra research over the interwebs. The driving distance from Hamburg (Germany) is about 650 kilometers and it should take us about 6-7 hours to get there by overlord transport car. Close enough.
The next questions that came into our heads were a little trickier: Where to stay? What is a must-see? What restaurants/bars/lounges should we check out? Is there a special event during our stay? (22.-26. July)
That moment I remembered: "dude, you`re a nerd and TL is an amazing hub for people from all over the world. Why not ask for infos over there?" And here we go.
Can any of you recommend a cool hotel, pension or appartment in the city, which isn`t too far away from where the "life" happens. (prizes per night shouldn`t be much higher than 60 euro for 2 persons) And what should we definitively check out?
peace
zul
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prague...lemme quickly check where I stayed.
I stayed in the Mosaic Hostel, fucking well nice place but may be a bit on the expensive side (we got 10%because of the st christophers inns) thing.
Hostelbookers.com will be your best bet, and you can find private rooms on there but all prices are per person per night
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I'm about 95% sure there was a blog from someone wanting to visit Prague in the last two weeks, might want to check for that.
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Am I the only one to to think, "Playguuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu"?
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On July 20 2012 21:26 Azera wrote: Am I the only one to to think, "Playguuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu"?
Yeah that's the joke.
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On July 20 2012 21:26 Azera wrote: Am I the only one to to think, "Playguuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuu"?
That's exactly the reason I opened this blog. What a disappointment
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I shall try my best to assist you with helpful information, but after one year of being domiciled there, I cannot share the easy enthusiasm of an ingénue.
About accomodation: The only room I had ever taken had been at Sir Toby's on the northern sectors of the city. The atmosphere is agreeably Bohemian, its use being almost exclusively reserved to globetrotters and the like. The staff is helpful and will relate better advice than I on particulars. For around €15 you can obtain a bed in a shared room of six or eight.
The most accessible sections of the city have been largely abandoned by its indigeous inhabitants to foreign romp and riot, this includes most of Prague 1, in the centre of the city, stretching from Charles Bridge in the west, through Vaclav Namesti, and onto the Namesti Republiky area, where the great shopping venues are. The region about Vaclav Namesti is crowded by petty merchants and conmen, selling such trashy trinkets as will support the nadirs of a base existence. After about nine in the evening, squadrons of negroes will accumulate around the square's corners, invariably offering business propositions exceeding legality. This being the avenue of dissolution and vice, that when night's shadow falls, she lures countless visitors to her dens of infamy where money and conscience alike are engulfed under the corrupting whispers of moral freedom.
During the day, restaurants charge premiums for their accessible situation, and often cost twice the fare of the suburbs. In addition, hosts in the centre are wont to surcharge an additional "service fee" upon the final tab, in what they presume to be fair sport matching the guest's understanding against the host's deception. Pay the amount listed on the menu and not a single crown more in these establishments.
When going into the outer regions, prices plummet as the facade is stripped away from the Art Noveau exteriors to reveal a tastelessly functionalist city so close to the character of its inhabitants. The studied grins of the touristic centre evaporate here to reveal a more natural city than may be supposed. As you ride the metro, watch the expressionless face of that tall blonde girl whose beauty just two minutes ago might have captivated your heart. Neither lethargic nor stoic, betraying nothing, looking at nothing. This, a model citizen of that most intelligent, most industrious, and least sentimental of the slavic races! More akin to a German in phrenology and posture than to the idiosyncratic but always colourful faces of her distant Polish or Russian cousins. Should you surmount your courage to strike up a conversation with this creature, you will find your virtue ill-rewarded by anything resembling easy manners.
Prague is a traffic congested city. Rumours have it that someone in town owns a bicycle, but religion, much less superstition, is in short supply in this city. The metro will be your best means of travel. Taking the metro, be certain to verify your pass atop the metro before descent, for the system has been deliberately designed to confuse, and one suspects that public transport is not so much subsidised by tickets as by fines.
Beyond a meaningless existence commuting from one trinket shop to the next, one overpriced restaurant after another, the tourist may rest in those other traps erected to his guilded existence which take the name of "culture." For instance, visit the National Opera at the head of Vaclav Namesti. The performances are nightly, the repetoir exactly what you would expect for sale to a touristic mass who wish to confirm their recent elevation to worldliness by going to the opera for the first time in their lives. (Nothing of course, against Madame Butterfly, which I take no shame in calling a masterpiece.) The tickets sell for a range from ten to a hundred Euros, but judging by their production values, the theatre must recoup their expenses if on any night they sell a single ticket.
Don't forget other such amusements in the funhouse that is Prague by going to the museum of Communism, or maybe, if you are travelling solo, to the oddity that is the sex museum. If you are looking for the Czech equivalent of those great national monuments in Berlin or Budapest, which give a tour of national history, that building that looks like a rectangular rock to the side of the opera is it. If you are in want of ideas for your next outing, there is no vacillation that the ubiquitous advertising of Prague will not cure.
If looking to dip your toe in some Czech literature in your hours of repose, any bookstore (knihovna) in the centre will have a selection of translated Czech literature (at absurb prices, of course) for your consumption. Actually, unless you can read Czech, you may be under the impression that the Czechs have two authors: Jiroslav Hasek and Milan Kundera. There is of course Kafka, but any German knows that Kafka had little to do with the Czech tongue.
About the Czech tongue, you might as well be confined to the centre of Prague if you do not speak it. A terrible fate, I know, but one adapted to necessity. The only thing unhappier than the foreigner's five-day confinement in the heartland of kitsch is my private tragedy, for they are always telling me how much they enjoyed it!
P.s. Do not order the following food in the Czech Republic: Fried pork ribs. Let my waistline attest against its innocence.
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MoltkeWarding, I love your writing style. You made Prague seem like an interesting city.
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thanks moltkewarding for your very detailed report.
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T_T misread and was expecting plaguuuu stuff
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On July 21 2012 00:33 Incze wrote: MoltkeWarding, I love your writing style. You made Prague seem like an interesting city.
lol, he made Prague sound horrible.
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MoltkeWarding's post is very good oO, but I did not know there was a Czech writer beside Kafka, Hasek, and Kundera. You learn something new everyday :p Enjoy your trip OP, if you can after that...
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im in prague right now ask questions if you'd like
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MOLTKE YOU'RE BACK?
Someone spotlight this asap. That's definitely big news. =S
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Holy shit Moltke made a post.
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