Last dinner in Prague

I wandered around for a little bit near the square, and found this Art Nouveau hotel with dinner prices that weren't unreasonable. Plus, there were people inside that looked like they were enjoying themselves, and it didn't look like an obvious tourist trap--well, not like the really, really obvious ones in the middle of Praha.

The place was the Kadavra Europa, and it was built in 1889 I think. Like many older buildings, it was a mix of yesteryear charm and strange modern appointments (Coca Cola fridges and things like that). After scanning through the menu, the first thing that popped into my mind is that this is very likely the kind of place Tony Bourdain would call a 'dinosaur'. It wasn't Czech cuisine like I had seen in working class pubs and restaurants, but the type of cuisine I would imagine had been served to Shirley Temple or the Shah of Iran (both of which were listed as having stayed at the hotel).

The food was kind of a literal, mind boggling mix of Czech and French. For instance, to eat you could have a 'Starter' or a 'Steak'. There was actually one pasta dish--lasagna--and the unintentional hilarity of that made me grin quite wide. Major Heading: Pasta! Dishes Listed: There is only One True Pasta, and it's name is Lasagna!

I ended up ordering a 'Chicken Steak with Camembert'. In many restaurants they call almost anything a steak, unlike in the States. They had steak of chicken, steak of salmon, ribeye steak of Argentina (they were very proud that it came from Argentina--this surprised me), steak of lamb, and what looked like steak of misc.

I guess I have been waaay to indoctrinated by modern cookbooks, television shows, and the Internet. When I read Chicken Steak with Camembert, I immediately thought it would be some playful, witty combination of chicken and Camembert--perhaps a Camembert sauce made to look like a loaf of cheese, or thin slices of Cam. over a breast of chicken, I don't know. But the point is I was reading waaay too much into it.

What I got was actually a nicely seasoned and competently cooked chicken breast, sliced to form a pocket in which was inserted a fucking whole thing of Camembert. Now, don't think I'm complaining, it tasted quite good and I yummed it up, but when the waiter set the plate down I think I involuntarily laughed at him.

Yes, I ordered Chicken with Camembert. And I got Chicken with Camembert. No wistfulness, no play on words, no confusion, no sleight of hand--it was exactly what it said it was, rind and all.

And that, I think, was my perfect way to remember the Czech republic. The Czech people are awesome, and like any other big city there are the less reputable sort. However, I think that my experiences with real, honest Czech folks show that while they may not be the most whimsical culture on the planet, they are solid and without pretense. Can't wait to come back (but still Eff Joo Lufthansa!!!)

One funny thing about Czech trains...

...is that they basically let anyone on them without checking their ticket. Not all the time, but most of the time. This is how I accidentally got on a train from Brno to Olomouc in North Moravia with a ticket to go from Brno to Prague. Yeah, this one was totally my fault--my actual train was delayed, I wasn't paying attention, and I climbed on the wrong train at the right terminal. The funny thing was, if I had looked at the status board I would have seen my mistake. The funnier thing is as the train was departing, I *did* see the status board, which elicited a huge, "ooOOHH SHIIIITT!!!" from me.

Luckily, even though they didn't speak a word of English, I 'talked' to two very nice and extremely helpful train conductors who got me back to Brno safe and sound, so I could take the next train. With many of these train tickets you can use them in a 24 hour period, and the train I've now taken four times on this trip runs once an hour, so all was far from lost.

So, to the fine people that run the regional Czech train service, those two fine conductors deserve a big THANK YOU!! for getting me back safely. Now, back to my pivo :D

Dinner in Prague

It really is uncanny how Absinthe in Prague tastes like Nyquil and Bile. Yes, Nyquil and Bile. Wrap your head around that (or not if you have a delicate stomach).

I've had the new legal Absinthe in the states, and it tastes pretty good even straight. They are all very high in alcohol, so all absinthes I've tried are sipping drinks (unless you do the sensible thing and dilute it), but I've found that the absinthe available in the states is a **pale** imitation of that in the Czech republic.

Before I picked up this tiny bottle I had on average a slight more than one Pilsner Urquell an hour for awhile. I weigh (goddamnit) about 250lbs, so a beer an hour really doesn't impair me at all. What can I say, I am not a cheap date. However, after a little more than a quarter of a shot, perhaps a 1/3 of an ounce of this brand of absinthe, I felt funny. One of my colleagues who has had European absinthe before described it as not really swallowing a beverage, but more that the initial burn made it feel it was just absorbed into the mouth. Now, I didn't feel exactly that, but I can certainly understand why someone would describe it that way.

Very sweet, veeeery bitter, and a burn I haven't felt from an alcoholic drink before. That's why I bring up Bile, it felt like stomach acid going down. I had two small sips, and in an unusual move for me, had to throw the bottle in the garbage.

I am sure with the correct glass, perforated spoon, drip, and water, it would be fantastic. However, the stuff I purchased was more akin to softdrink syrup than it was a beverage itself--i.e. it is an ingredient, not drinkable alone.

After that small amount--likely the amount in a a glass of diluted absinthe--I absolutely felt a little dazed and empty headed. This was not the alcohol talking, I know those feelings, this was something else.

All I know is the reasons for banning absinthe originally were propaganda and politics. However, do not take it lightly, as it is **very** strong stuff.

Lunch in Prague

We got ripped off going to the Prague square to get lunch (my fault), but that doesn't detract from how delicious the Old Prague Ham was.

WTFLOL?

Yeah, you figure this one out.

What's that in the middle of the background?

Yeah, it looks exactly like a cooling tower for a Nuclear power plant, but I've confirmed it isn't. And yeah, that is the view out of my hotel window. Yeah, my hotel is NUKLEAR!!11 :D

Eff Joo Lufthansa!!

I'm in Europe right now. I had a hell of a time getting here. I thought the worst was over. I thought getting home should be easy.

Then all the pilots on Lufthansa airlines thought it would be a good idea to strike.

Seriously. Not only that, they are striking over issues that don't actually exist. It's a 'pre-emptive' strike. They aren't mad about things now, they are worried that things won't get better at an appropriate pace.

Basically I can't believe my bad luck traveling this time. Although I'm not superstitious (much), considering that so far 5 out of the 6 major legs of this journey on plane/train have been plagued by serous problems, I am starting to have a pretty fatalistic attitude.

With that being said, I've been able to decompress a bit since I learned about the strike this morning. I changed some of my plans and headed out of Prague quite a bit earlier than I originally anticipated, and made it back to South Moravia around 2pm. I spent a few days in Brno last week, but they were all at my day job--and every night was a night out with coworkers. Now, don't get me wrong, they were great times, but I never really got a pulse on what Brno looked like and how to get around. Today kinda changed that.

After I got in I headed to the hotel to check in by foot instead of taxi. That was the first good decision. Instead of just being whisked around, I got to see and internalize where I was and how to get from A to B. After I dropped off my things, I made it a point to try and get lost (which is something I enjoy doing, as long as I have backup plans if I get *really* lost), and I gotta say Brno in the daylight with a little sunlight is a beautiful place.

Prague is a wonderful town, but it is full to the brim with tourists, whores, hustlers, pimps, scammers, and just plain leeches. Everything is 3x (or more) as expensive as anywhere else in the Czech Republic, and everyone looks at you as a walking $$$ as opposed to a person. There are beautiful things to see and do in Prague, but you constantly have to be aware that your sole purpose being there is to fuel there economy, and everything else is a distant second.

Brno on the other hand is an almost sleepy 400,000 person city. When I was out in the city square it was mostly populated with older couples enjoying a walk, families with lots of (relatively) well behaved children, younger couples who looked like they were actually enjoying themselves, and a very small amount of tourists who were just trying to blend in.

There are some problems though. Most people in the center of Prague have pretty good English skills, but that isn't the case in Brno. Prague has some of the most picturesque scenery and gorgeous architecture I have seen, and Brno is a step lower in quantity and exquisiteness. But Brno is someplace that feels comfortably alien, as opposed to hostilely alien.

All in all, hopefully I can get this flight snafu taken care of in a reasonable manner. I am grateful however that a bad event (canceling the flights, making me super angry, and causing me to leave Prague quite early out of angst and frustration) actually turned into a happy, positive experience. It is that, turning the bad into the good, that is the most rewarding part of traveling.

And of course, photos to come (when I find the cable) :D

I like Czech trains

Even though my travel curse for this trip made our train this evening 40 minutes late, I still really like Czech trains. It turns out the train we were getting on was a Budapest train going to Prague with some stops in between, and one of the stops was apparently for skiing. I guess what impressed me was that even though for the first hour or so leg of the journey the train was pretty packed, people self organized really well, the train conductors/fare collectors almost instantly memorized whether passengers had paid or not, and the whole boarding/dis-boarding was very, very quick.

One thing I didn't like was the actual train station. Basically, unlike an airport where the arrivals/departures are displayed in what feels to me to be an organized fashion, the Czech railways might move gate/departure time info from their boards from one place to another without much apparent logic. There probably is logic, but it certainly isn't intuitive to me. For example, we were monitoring when our train was supposed to arrive, until it disappeared from the list of trains on that schedule board due to it being late. We all figured it would eventually come back with an updated set of info when the railways had it, but that never happened. What actually happened was the train info was moved to another display board (which had this one late train and some others, for reasons unclear), where after twenty minutes one of our colleagues noticed the gate info had been updated.

I am sure there is some rhyme or reason to why the train stations do this, but to an outsider with a) all the relevant numbers and b) the willingness to approach strangers for tips, it was still more challenging than I thought it should have been. Luckily we encountered a nice Englishman from Portsmouth who gave us the sage advice of, "Look over there!", which helped us spot our ride.

So the trains really do rock. Finding the one you are supposed to be on continues to be a challenge, but not one that has messed anything up so far.

When we got off the train in Prague though, we thought it might be a good idea to grab a taxi to the hotel since it was cold and raining. It turns out that even though the Czech republic has passed new laws aimed at combating taxi fraud, it still happens all the time. I knew the hotel was very close to the train station, but since one of our crew was feeling pretty sick (and I didn't have a lot of confidence not getting lost) I thought it would be a good idea to go the half mile in a cab. When we found one that wasn't a completely outrageous, we were already within three blocks of the hotel--basically people walk up to travelers, ask them if they want a taxi, quote a fee that has *absolutely nothing to do with the distance*, then walk them off the train station to a taxi that will likely give them a kickback.

I am not against convenience, and I am also not against people trying to hustle a bit of money, but when you want to charge 20 euro to go to a place and you have to walk 2/3 of the way there to get your taxi, that sirs and madams is a scam :)

But all in all, rail in the Czech Republic is good. It's fast, pretty reliable, comfortable, cheap, and clean. Four people on the way to Brno to Prague (250 kilometers, about 2 1/2 hours) was 790 crowns, which works out to $41 dollars. For four people. And the trains are quiet, have tables, and are generally pleasant. I get to have two more train trips in the coming days, so hopefully they are as positive as the previous.

Second night in Brno

Breakfast was a bit of an eye opener. Never have I been in audience of so many variations of salami, pepperoni, sausage, mortadella, links, and meat stuffed pastry dough. Along with eggs and pork, a huge assortment of adorably sugared pastries, breads, fruit, ham, blue cheese, muenster, swiss, and cereals. It really wasn't the quantity of animal flesh that caught me off guard--see any farmer at our local cafe on a Saturday morning attack his 'side' of bacon--it was the variety. Glorious, beautiful, and terrifying animal flesh in more varieties than I had ever considered for breakfast.

Lunch seemed to be a typical affair--two or three Pilsner Urquell's, and some oddly appropriated cuisine. Several of my team mates ordered 'Chile con Carne' at a local cafe, and what they received was a half rolled up tortilla with kidney beans, a slightly sweet sauce, and ground beef. All of them agreed that it was quite tastey, but unlike any chile con carne they have ever had. As side dishes, it's already a running joke, "American potatoes, french fries, or boiled potatoes?". If one asks if there is a vegetable available as a side, the answer is "American potatoes, french fries, or boiled potatoes?".

For dinner, we went to a 'Texan Steakhouse'. Now, I really don't want to make fun, since ethnic restaurants in the states certainly commit as many faux pas, but I couldn't help but laugh at the text in the menu and the decor.

First off, the chef, "Has had authentic work experience in the state of Texas". The menu for adult dishes was 18 or so pages long, with additional pages for children and beverages (everything is bigger in Texas!). While this was a steakhouse and they had kangaroo and buffalo steaks, the only moo-cow steaks they had were sirloin. No ribeye, no New York strip, no T-Bone (even though they had pictures of all these on their menus, and we even asked the waiter), and virtually every steak was swimming in some kind of cheese sauce.

Second, the decor. Of course this is gonna be kinda wonky, but the mannequin 'cowboy', the plastic cacti on the table, and the Confederate flag was a bit much. It really reminded me of an 'American Pub' me and my wife visited in the UK that was wall to wall Harley memorabilia, along with a six foot tall statue of a bald eagle. I can't tell if it was tacky, out of proportion, or just fecking awesome.

Third, the food. We were with perhaps a dozen other Czech folks, and I don't know why I found this strange, but the most popular appetizer was the beef carpaccio, topped with cheese. I guess the reason I found this a little odd was simply ordering cow before you got more cow seemed a tad, maybe, monotonous? I had a taste and the carpaccio was quite good and don't think I am not dissing the quality here, but the constant meat/cheese/tater trifecta for every meal feels alien.

All in all though the Czech Republic is awesome. It is not however some place that a vegetarian, let alone a vegan could reasonably order food in. Perhaps in Prague, but when you get outside of Prague then you won't be eating at restaurants if you have a vegetarian lifestyle.

Photos from Brno

The hotel we are staying at is like a strange fusion of Ikea and 'neauveau Russian'. Strong masculine lines, with out of place bright colors and plastic furniture. I guess this hotel really kinda feels like a Northwest Hipster--it doesn't really know what to wear, so it wears it all at once. Other than the visual clash it is clean, comfortable, and close.

The thing that strikes me most about Brno is this eclectic mix of countryside that is littered with what looks like dilapidated Communist 'Titan of Industry' buildings, eastern European 'gothic' architecture (not sure if I'm using gothic correctly), and modern high tech glossy enterprise. It doesn't have the architectural charm of Prague, but at least at the city center Prague didn't seem to have the modern businesses that Brno has.


I absolutely adore some of the pubs and restaurants that have beer taps on the tables. The portions are metered, so you only pay for what you pour, and the price (from what I was told, I didn't pay) worked out to be ~$2.00 a pint for some spectacular Pilsners. I mentioned this to a few colleagues (okay, a lot of colleagues) but Czech beers really do taste different here. I am not one that thinks the location matters, except that Pilsner Urquell likely gets the freshest hops and best of the grain--and this makes a difference. Or it could even be more deliberate than that--Coke makes different versions of their soda for different regions, so do large breweries do the same?

This particular treat was a pork knee that looked SO MUCH BIGGER IN REAL LIFE! It also looked very delicious, and was duly consumed by two outstanding citizens. Out of the photograph was the steak tare-tare with raw egg on top, a mountain of schnitzels, and some steaks covered in cheese-sauce-and-butter. There is no such thing as a light meal here :D

I have conflicted opinions right now about this area, probably mostly to do with the angst of the travel I just went to, but even though the people can be a tad gruff on the outset they turn to be funny, friendly, quirky, and most definitely awesome.

Successfully got to London

Now I'm just waiting another five hours for the last flying connection to Prague, where I get to stay the night (hopefully, if *this* leg isn't delayed like all the others). Looking forward to getting out of airports **a lot** :D

Finally got to SFO

After what our pilot described as the worst delay to SFO he has ever experienced, I am here and safe (though I did miss my connecting flight to Frankfurt ). On the plus side I did get to hear a multiple hour diatribe from the woman behind me about how if you are a woman traveling you will inevitably get 1)stalked by gypsy children, 2) attacked in a back alley by 'MEN', 3) kidnapped 4) raped 5) sold to human trafficers by the boyfriend you just met in Italy for precisely $10,000, and 6) murdered.

makes me glad women don't travel<\sarcasm>

I don't mean to be flippant, but living in that much fear must give a person an interesting world view. Human trafficking is a serious problem, and even one person trafficked for any reason is too much, but the fear of it is absolutely no reason not to live your life.

On my way to Prague

Posts for the next few days will likely be completely centered around going to the Czech republic. Hopefully I can find some good cheese :)

I'm currently stuck at the airport waiting for SFO to defogger itself. One neat thing though, I was right behind congressman Peter Defazio(who is as honest a politician as exists). At least they let is off the plane--one passenger was telling a story of being stuck on a Chinese plane for *eight hours* before takeoff. That really puts this delay into perspective.