Prague

For some reason I am still awake – not a jet lag thing, as the time zone is the same as SA. It is still light outside and it is 8.40 pm! Guess we must be quite far north. The flight was tedious but no more so than usual. We had a stunning view of the Alps, specifically Mont Blanc, and Lake Geneva as we flew over Italy and Switzerland at 37 000 feet. It was relatively clear from the Mediterranean (which was where I opened the window shade) until the northern border of Switzerland but thereafter Europe disappeared entirely under its usual thick grey blanket. In Amsterdam it was 13 degrees Celsius and rainy. Immigration was cursory and pleasant for once. I sometimes think one of my late Dad’s greatest gifts to his offspring was the right to a British passport.

So here I am in Prague. It is cold and windy and I cannot understand a word of what people say or what I see written on notices and signs. But the people seem very pleasant, many of them speak English when they realise you aren’t from around here (which doesn’t take long) and the place really is beautiful. I’ve heard it said that many people who visit a foreign town or country for a week feel they can write a book about it, those who visit for a month can only manage a chapter, those who stay for a year can’t put out more than a page and those who stick it out longer than that don’t feel qualified to write anything. So having spent 6 hours in Czechoslovakia, I am about to commit my impressions to paper and shall probably make some sweeping and unjustified generalizations. I shall probably also get some of my facts wrong.

I am staying at a reasonably modern hotel in an old part of the city – not a bad compromise. I chose it because it is very close to the conference centre where the meetings are being held over the next 2 days. On my booking slip there were some complicated instructions on how to get from the airport to the hotel – take the 119 bus, then the one train, get off then take the other train, get off at this station and walk up the hill or something like that. When I confirmed my booking I was assured it was safe. I am afraid that at the last moment I chickened out and took a taxi, which actually cost less than in Cape Town (28 euro) and the distance seemed longer. The cab driver seemed grateful for the 2 euro tip (I gave him 30 euros and told him to keep the change), which I found quite humbling.

Despite the country being in the EC it still has its own currency, the Czech krone. The exchange rate seems to be about 25 krone to the euro or 2 krone to the rand. Prices are not too bad, certainly not compared to Western Europe. I paid about R60 for two large baguettes and a large bottle of diet coke. Not sure I would have paid much less at Woolies or Pick ‘n Pay. And that was at a 24/7 convenience store next to the local petrol filling station.

There seems to be a rather jarring contrast between the beautiful, very old and the rather ugly, relatively new. For example, a few hundred metres from here there is a deep valley through which an old railway runs, flanked by the most stunning multi-storey red roofed houses, and above them parkland with some stunning trees, all in spring green now. Clearly the city fathers (or mothers) needed a means of getting across the valley without negotiating its windy streets so they just built a huge concrete bridge which actually goes over the houses. Bizarre. Practical but bizarre. What would Prince Charles have said! (and would anyone have cared?)

Another example: I visited (but couldn’t get inside) the ca. 1350 Karlov Church and (Augustinian) Monastery. Just outside the perimeter fence of the garden is a very large, ugly and heavily graffiti’d concrete statue which might once have been in the centre of a pool. A notice near the entrance says “Welcome to Karlov in the grounds of the Czech Police Museum”. The original church (the Church of Our Lady and St Charles the Great) was consecrated in 1377 and was associated with Charles IV, of whom there is a statue in the quadrangle, dating back to 1837. The octagonal vault of the church has a diameter of 23m and a height of 18m. The organ was built by Bedrich of Telc and dates back to 1733. The monastery underwent “Baroque reconstruction” in the 1600’s. There are cellars under the building in which the conans kept their wines. Emperor Joseph II broke up the Augustinian order in 1785 and the monastery became a “hospital for incurables”. During the Great War it was a home for recovering soldiers. What an amazing place! What an interesting history!! The Czech Ministry of the Interior took it over in 1960, “reconstructed” it yet again, made it into the State District Archive and later a museum, finally the Czech Police Museum. What an ignominious fate for such an imposing building. What on earth were they thinking?

On my way back to the hotel I made a detour to another church whose imposing twin spires I had noticed from across the valley. It lies within a walled area ? fort which I think is called the Vyšehrad. On the map it looks like the church is that of St Peter and St Paul. All I could find was a notice which said Basilica Minor, which I thought odd for such a large church. It was unfortunately shut, but I walked through the adjoining graveyard – mostly early 19th and 18th Century graves but some earlier. Very well kept. All the gold lettering on the headstones seems to have been touched up recently. Must go back when the church is open.

I have registered for the conference and collected my bag. The sessions don’t look like showstoppers but I hope I pick up some information which might be useful. Life is tough – forced to spend 3 days in one of the world’s most beautiful and most interesting cities and I don’t even have to present anything – just sit and listen.

Anyway, here are some photographs to give a flavour of the place. Clearly I must do some reading up and hopefully some more sight-seeing.