Trains are for wusses!

I am throwing down the gauntlet! I will walk everywhere...almost everywhere (if it's nice out).
Yesterday I was on my feet a lot, to the point where my left knee felt swollen and my hips are sore.
First let me just say that I packed rather crappily for this trip. I checked and rechecked the weather and the hottest day was supposed to be when I arrived (81 degrees) followed by 70s and 60s and rain. I brought pants and long sleeve shirts. And while it is not oppressively hot, there are not a lot of jeans-wearers around. More on this later.
Yesterday after the complimentary breakfast, I left about 8:45 and walked to the Charles Bridge. The vendors were just setting up and it was low on tourists, which was nice. I paid to walk up to the tower (was that a tower?) to see the beautiful views of Prague. Oh, and I got a Thai foot massage. They were much less expensive in Thailand.

Now let me just say, I feel pretty adept at navigating cities. Give me a map and I'm generally good-to-go. But my ego is not so big as to not admit that Prague kicked my ass (and will continue to do so for the next 11 days). Holy shit is the road system impossible to negotiate. I tried to find the Kafka Museum for about an hour. I still can't tell you how I found it. I may have passed through a secret portal or something. By the way, Franz had some daddy issues (just saying). This is a letter to his dad. It's not English but I think the general  message it "I can never live up to your expectations so I am doomed to negatively evaluate my own talents despite the fact that I'm about to become one of the most famous writers ever.' 

I was in the area so I went to the Vrtbov Gardens. They were very pretty.

Oh, and I got monumentally lost. I was hungry, really needed to pee and I couldn't tell which way was up. It was about 4pm and the streets were packed with tourist. And there are exasperated tourists all over the place, holding maps and looking perplexed. I finally found my way somehow, and walked back towards my hotel.

On the way to the bridge that morning I had passed a typical pub and I saw they had dumplings with bacon and lard and I said 'I'm going to come back here and wreck myself on lard and beer later.' (There are two types of dumplings- potato and bread- and I really wanted to try both). I went back to that pub but no one helped me and most of the tables were full so I went to another typical pub. I had a dish called strapacky, which is a Czech gnocchi with sauerkraut and sausage. It was pretty tasty. I got a side of bread dumplings. They were pretty much bread. I went to the Globe Bookstore - the largest English bookstore. It looks bigger in the picture- very pretty but not much going on there. After, I went to a supermarket and bought produce to keep in my room. I carry fruit with me, which is helpful because I have essentially been surrounded by tourist eating ice cream out of cinnamon dough tubes. 

Sadly I did not have a rerun of the great night's sleep. This morning, I got woken up at 2am by a telemarketer call and barely got back to sleep. I'm not tired though. I spent part of the morning writing on my map so I knew what places I wanted to go to on there. I ate breakfast and walked to Old Town Square. On the way there I stopped at H&M and bought 3 $10 dresses so I could be dressed for the weather. I felt pretty proud of myself. I found some stores I wanted to check out. I stumbled across the Astronomical clock at 11:45 which means everyone was standing there waiting for it to turn 12:00 to watch it do it's thing. I was trying to find Church of our Lady Before Tyn. I could not find it. I looked for about a 1/2 hour. So I decided to go to a Dali exhibit which was great. I was secretly taking pics of the art just to find out I could buy a book of it for like $4 (this would have cost like $20 in NY or SF). I asked the lady in the museum where the church was and apparently it was in a courtyard. I went there but it was closed until 3pm. So did more window shopping with the intent of returning at 3:00. And then the rain came.  

And it looked like this:

So much for all the walking. I grabbed a taxi as fast as I could, which was not fast. Good thing I bought those dresses! I'm back at the hotel. The sun is out. My jeans are hanging over the kitchen chair and dripping on the floor. I'm going to a vegetarian restaurant for dinner. (Again, sorry about the formatting. I blogged on this sight for over 3 years for the show, you'd think I'd gotten the hang out it by now). 

No one goes to SFO on Saturdays because it's too crowded

Yogi Berra supposedly said that....or something like that. All these years I've been saying that SFO has been a bastion of organization and calm in air travel and all this time I've gotten this impression because I never had the misfortune of flying on a Saturday afternoon. Turns out not that many people CHOOSE to take flights at 11pm. But they all want to fly to Amsterdam at 1:55pm on a Saturday afternoon. Really. Every single person.
The Super Shuttle ride took an hour and a half and I was not the first person picked up. Getting through check in took 45 minutes and that is after following the nice Dutch(?) man's advice to self-check in because that line is 'way faster.' Someone taught this dude that Americans react well to 'way' anything and we all fell for it. Anyway, security was crowded but ok. The one highlight was the cute TSA agent who had me wishing I'd left a few coins in my pockets. It did take me 10 minutes to buy water. People were shopping at the shitty airport store like they thought it was Trader Joes. Even the bathroom was a mess- four stalls and someone cleaning up so every time someone thought they were going to get in, she stepped in front of them to go in a sweep and leave toilet paper. She lived but I don't know how. They had us at one of those downstairs gates that feels little like a hamster tank. I got to hear them page someone whose name I swore was Orlando Vagina. Apparently Orlando needed to check in with airline personnel toot sweet or his luggage was going to be disboarded. Who knew? SFO sucks too.

Otherwise can't complain. The flight was smooth. I tried out my new travel pillow that makes my head look like an uncircumcised penis. you can see it right here. I've tried all sorts of pillows and I've decided that no other item is fraught with such mediocrity as the travel pillow. Really, they all just come in various levels of sucking. (I really wish I remembered how to use this blog better so I didn't have to have all the pics separate from the text. But right now it's before 7am and I don't feel like figuring it all out). Anyway, the picture that looks like a clusterfuck is the security line at SFO. And the pictures that look pretty were taken inside the Amsterdam airport. Oh and I also wanted to show you big chunks of chocolate...just because.

I got to Prague and my airport pick-up did not pick me up so I took a taxi for the same price. I got my little apartment. The staff here are really nice and helpful. The woman behind the desk whipped out a map and started showing me where to find the stores and restaurants nearby. After I got settled here I went to a little store to get some fruit and water for my room. I just discovered the water is fruit flavored. This is what happens when you don't read the language. I had dinner outside at a little place I thought was supposed to be health food. I ordered wine. They brought me the big size (again, language). I came back here. I had brought my manuscript (the one that has been plaguing me for years) with me, because I am in the middle of yet another revision and I figured I could get it typed up on the plane. In my paranoia I was afraid if I lost the hard copy, weeks of work would be lost. But I didn't lose it and the revisions were entered and completed last night at my kitchen table while I was fighting to keep my eyes open. I think I got eight hours of sleep. I took the anti-jetlag herbal supplements I won from the white elephant holiday gift exchange at work and I took melatonin, went to bed when it was still light out and woke up at what I think was a respectable 6am. Here is my bedroom. 

Today I am going to see the bridge, or the castle, or both. I'm going to check out this hotel breakfast in a bit. I hope it doesn't rain but I have an umbrella and that plastic noisy jacket I bought for Thailand but never used. 

So much for carry-ons

Hello beautiful people! It's me again. And this is my luggage. Did you know that my checked bag cannot be more than 50lbs? Am I screwed? Maybe so. I have to utilize my roommate bathroom scale tonight to find out.
So you might notice that the title of my blog is still DeliainThailand and I am in fact not going to Thailand. But I didn't want to make a new blog so I decided this will be the title of my travel blog forever and ever. Tim pointed out to me that if I wanted to rename it, it could be called Prague Blog, which is damn catchy. So every time you look at this, pretend it's called 'Prague Blog.' And then pretend I came up with that myself. I fly out tomorrow afternoon but between my need to hit the gym before hand and Super Shuttle's need to pick my ass up three hours before my flight, I will be left very little time to write.
So this will look the same as last time. I'll chronicle my travel and my witty musing about the meaning of it all. I decided since I write when I travel and this blog contributed to the chapbook length project that came out off the Thailand trip, that I would periodically include excerpts from that manuscript, just for shits and giggles. And this way, even though I am sure I will go on to receive the requisite number of rejection letters from presses that really appreciate me 'allowing them to spend time with my manuscript' but nonetheless can not choose it for their contest/journal/time capsule, I am at least guaranteed to have a few captive readers right here. Yes that is a quote from a rejection email I received this week.
For some reason, the blog is freezing so I will make this short. Thanks for reading.