In Prague

[osprey_archer]

I have met my father in Prague! Mostly we have been eating and wandering, because my third favorite occupation in foreign climes, bookstore-haunting, will avail me little here. I can't even pretend to read Czech.

The eating has been going very well, however! We are staying in a little hotel with a restaurant downstairs, and yesterday we had duck for dinner - perfectly cooked ducked, with crispy yet succulent skin, accompanied by dumplings and laid gently on a golden bed of sauerkraut. The sauerkraut looked so luscious that I actually tried it, despite my habitual suspicion of all things cabbage, and lo! it was delicious. It was glorious. It oozed a golden sauerkraut juice which was a good as any gravy.

In fact, I was so extraordinarily taken with last night's sauerkraut that I had a hotdog with sauerkraut for lunch, and came to the same conclusion that not all sauerkrauts are created equal, and indeed that most of them are not lovingly warmed to a golden brown hue that suggests faint caramelization. But I was very hungry from getting lost in Prague, so I ate the whole thing despite the inferior sauerkraut.

Getting lost in Prague! Otherwise known as the way that I get around Prague, because even when we combined our bumps of direction, my dad and I never managed to get where we intended to go without getting two or three other places first. But the whole city is so lovely, it doesn't really matter: all the buildings are beautiful and bedecked in sculpture, and whenever you turn around there's a spire that appears to be just around the curve of the street.

It is not, of course, just around the curve of the street. When you try to track the spire down, it will disappear, and be replaced by an onion dome and a marionette store, and you will forget you meant to find the spire at all, because there's so much else to see.

(I do hope, though, that I will get my bearings enough to find my way to the Mucha museum while I'm here.)

I am particularly taken with the marionettes, and am firmly restraining myself from buying one. They're charming in shops because they exist there in marionette troupes, but if you take them out of that social environment - well, marionettes are not meant to live alone. when they have no other marionettes to play with they are apt to get up to mischief, and I just don't have enough time to keep one entertained.

Comments

[goldjadeocean.livejournal.com]

Uuuugh. You're in Prague, and my favourite TV people are shooting in Budapest, and I'm still in North America. I WANNA GO TOO.

Re:

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

Who's shooting what in Budapest?

Re:

[goldjadeocean.livejournal.com]

Mark Ellis and Stephanie Morganstern, who created Flashpoint (the cop show about the SWAT team that tries not to shoot people) are now in Hungary filming outdoor scenes for Camp X, which follows a team of WWII Allied spies trained out of a secret base in Ontario.

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

That sounds rather glorious.

[asakiyume.livejournal.com]

I have met my father in Prague!

This should be a voiceover for a film of the 1940s, probably starring Ingrid Bergman. Probably though we'll have to excise the exclamation point--which I wouldn't want you to do from *your* account.

he sauerkraut looked so luscious that I actually tried it, despite my habitual suspicion of all things cabbage --"habitual suspicion of all things cabbage made me laugh :D

my dad and I never managed to get where we intended to go without getting two or three other places first.

This sounds really *wonderful*--and the city, just beautiful.

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

I actually managed to get somewhere that I meant to go today! With only one detour! Which happened because I was so surprised by the fact that I seemed to be making progress that I decided I must have gotten turned around somewhere, and should therefore check the street signs. But no, I really was in the right place. So curious.

[isiscolo.livejournal.com]

Your spire-following comments make me think of Jan Morris' Last Letters from Hav, which I enjoyed a lot - it's a novel in the form of a travelog about a fictional place.

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

That sounds very interesting! Perhaps I'll look it up when I get home.

[khiemtran.livejournal.com]

Prague was made for getting lost! (I think that's even true literally - at least the story goes that all the big streets that look like they're heading towards the town square end up bending away to confuse invaders and give the local dignitaries more time to escape...)

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

That wouldn't surprise me at all. I can just imagine confused invaders marching through the town, looking at each other and saying "Didn't we see this spire before?" And meanwhile the local dignitaries sneak away down the river.

[carmarthen.livejournal.com]

Omg so close you could almost visit me. :P

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

Almost! Not quite, unfortunately. It's six hours by train at least.

[carmarthen.livejournal.com]

Sadfaaaace. How long will you be there?

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

We're leaving tomorrow. :( It's too bad we didn't plan this earlier.

[carmarthen.livejournal.com]

Well, I have been either traveling or apartment-hunting, so I think it was not to be. But yay Prague! Is it as great as it looks in photos?

[osprey-archer.livejournal.com]

Yes! It's a beautiful city - not just the main tourist sites, but the whole thing. All splendid buildings and sudden bursts of statuary, everywhere you look.