The Syncretist International » czech republic

Kutná Hora Day Trip (Pt. 4 – Dinner)

stellar magnet — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 20:20:47 +0000

At last, we got some dinner. We went to this hotel called U Hrnčiře that has a restaurant serving meat dishes and a large variety of vegetarian dishes. I read about it on WikiTravel, and I’m glad I had my meal here! I got some amazing soy goulash and potato pancakes. Both were quite spicy and very fresh looking and tasting. Petr ordered some pork but he ordered speaking (poor) czech and I don’t think the waiter understood. Actually when Petr ordered I could sense the waiter didn’t think he ordered an entree, and I told Petr but he said that no he got it. I got my food and then like 20 minutes pass and his pork hasn’t come yet, but he got his salad. I tell Petr to ask the waiter what’s up — but he’s being stubborn and not listening to me! Finally the waiter comes back again and he asks and yeah, there was never any pork ordered. So we waited another 20 minutes and it finally came. As soon as he finished we rushed out, hoping we’d catch a cab somewhere in this dead town that would take us to the train station to catch the next train (if we walked, we would have missed it). Luckily we found one!

Kutná Hora Day Trip (Pt. 3 – The City)

stellar magnet — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 20:10:55 +0000

From the cathedral we walked a few kilometers to the center of town in search of food. The cute pinkish buildings complimented the sky quite well. There weren’t many (any?) people around at all.

(Church of St. Barbara is to the right)

Kutná Hora Day Trip (Pt. 2 – Cathedral)

stellar magnet — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 20:05:39 +0000

After the bone church I visited the Cathedral of Our Lady at Sedlec. Petr passed. Whenever I bought my ticket for the bone church I bought one that got admission to both places since it seemed cheap. It was okay I guess — I’m not much of a person for visiting cathedrals unless they are really extravagant. The Church of St. Barbara on the other end of town seemed much nicer from the outside and I would have rather visited that one than this, but it was getting late (like closing time) and at this point I didn’t even know where the other church was.

Kutná Hora Day Trip (Pt. 1 – Bone Church)

stellar magnet — Wed, 08 Apr 2009 20:00:23 +0000

Took the train from Prague to Kutná Hora, with Petr. It was a short ride (about an hour). A very small town, not many people around at all. The main reason for coming to Kutná Hora was to visit the bone church or Sedlic Ossuary. Right after getting off the train we walked there (it’s pretty close to the train station). The chandelier was my favorite, can’t say I will ever see something like that again in my life.

Bach and Dvořák @ Dvořák Hall

stellar magnet — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 20:50:24 +0000

I heard some Bach and Dvořák performed at the Rudolfinum’s Dvořák Hall. It was delightful. The hall was quite exquisite as well. This is my first classical music sort of concert. Funny how lots of people totally dress up really fancy like — I was wearing jeans and a hoodie. My roommate treated me as a thanks for computer help throughout the week. I have to admit that near the end of the performance I was kind of falling asleep … what can you do! But there were some moments that had my full attention as well. Long day… Oh yeah, they do encores at these types of concerts as well, in case you were wonderin’.

J. S. BACH: Brandenburg Concerto No. 6 in B flat major BWV 1051
J. S. BACH: Concerto in D major for three violins and orchestra BWV 1064
A. DVOŘÁK: Silent Woods for cello and orchestra op. 68
A. DVOŘÁK: String Quintet in G major op. 77 (arrangement)

Czech Chamber Orchestra
violin Jana Vlachová, Dana Vlachová, Maria Ericsson Vlach
cello Mikael Ericsson
rehearsed by Jana Vlachová

Praguing Along The Water

stellar magnet — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 20:49:29 +0000

Various shots of Prague with the Vltava river.

Letna Park

stellar magnet — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 20:47:12 +0000

Letna Park is marvelous. It’s high up and overlooks the city center. Most of the people hang out at the beer garden…. what else, what else… it’s just chill and kind of the daily place to hang out.

April 7th in Prague

stellar magnet — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 20:39:42 +0000

Wandered around Old Town, satiated my hunger with another plate of bulgar risotto from Lehká Hlava, enjoyed the sunshine in Letna Park, attended an art opening, walked along the water (kinda) and then winded down the evening with a classical music concert and some pasta (both treated to me by my roommate as a thanks for helping him with computer problems). A good day, I’d say!

Blind Eye on Sunday

stellar magnet — Mon, 06 Apr 2009 23:51:45 +0000

Sooo I showed up to Blind Eye around 9:30pm on Sunday night and the bartender didn’t know anything about a DJ coming, but I explained to him my deal. Later on the owner was there for a second so it was all good. I managed to get three couchsurfers + three of their friends to come, so that’s six people that I brought– I feel good about that! Otherwise I guess at the best point of the night there were like 15-20 people in the bar. I got a maximum of 4 people dancing. Requests that I fulfilled: Blue Öyster Cult, The Clash, The Sex Pistols, Queen, Nirvana, and Led Zeppelin. Unfulfilled requests: System of a Down (never!), The Doors, Cream. The crowd generally had good taste. This girl gave me a shot of something that tasted like Goldschlagger. When I played the Ramones this guy came up to me and pointed to his Ramones shirt and was happy. I had a lot of fun and DJing made me happy. No pictures though…. just picture a mostly empty bar and me behind a DJ booth playing songs off my laptop and a cute bartender dude. Oh yeah at one point in the night these two cops came in and showed us all this picture of a man, apparently a murderer. They were looking for him. None of us had spotted this murderer. I have never witnessed police searching the streets for a murderer and showing a picture until now.

Persian Picnic in Prague

stellar magnet — Sun, 05 Apr 2009 23:19:42 +0000

So over the past couple of weeks I had been messaging this couchsurfer Djali, who is 1/4 Persian and 3/4 Czech, about getting together and cooking some Persian food. Since the weather started to get nice we decided on a picnic. So we had the picnic on Saturday! It was a success. I cooked the Persian things (Kookoo Sabzi and Adas Polo) and Djali made some meat. We had the picnic on this hill in Djali’s neighborhood. There were many bottles of wine, including a bottle from Russian River that our friend David brought! See video of David below, talking about how to bring cool wine to a picnic. He’s French. Our picnic was quite international: we had a person from Portugal, Germany, Russia, France, Czech Republic and three Americans (one of unknown origins, one of Greek nationality and one of Iranian nationality – me). After the picnic we crammed six people into an elevator to Djali’s apt. and we got stuck. Paul, the artist, and Petr, this couchsurfer from Moscow, figured out a way to get us out though… after being in there for like 5-10 minutes. Good job guys!