first weekend
First, a hats off to Casey, Mike, and JC, all of whom have either commented on flickr photos or blog posts. You guys are siick. JC - your advice is great, keep it comin! (see story below)
Nothing particularly interesting yesterday. Orientation in the morning, more touring in the afternoon (after a typical Czech lunch of fried cheese sandwiches. Literally a block of fried cheese on bread, with a piece of lettuce and some tartar sauce. Sooo tasty). Our Czech buddies today (we combined with another group) were fantastic (and gorgeous). After our trip to a big mall in Smichov (kind a suburb, but really close still), we had a big dinner for everyone in the program. It was nice to see everyone all together for the first time - we're a huge group!
My efforts to make sure to socialize were successful yesterday, and last night I headed back into the city at about 9 to meet with some folks and head to some pubs. I asked Tomaš what the best route would be to get to the dorms (where I was meeting people) and back after midnight (when the trams change numbers and routes, remember), and this led to a 30 minute conversation and map-searching extravaganza with me, Tomaš, and Zuzana. I know I've said it before, my I am truly lucky to be staying here, with people who care so much about making sure I'm comfortable with everything I do.
Yes, I had that long rant the other day about cultural poaching etc etc, and last night I was proud to be a part of a small group of us who, while we weren't going to hit the pubs Czech-style necessarily, were definitely not looking to go crazy. We walked...and walked...and walked...and finally settled on a pub on the other side of the river that wasn't the cheapest (40Kc [$2] for .5L of beer? Unheard of!).
The real story is in coming home, which I did successfully, but not without the standard drama. I needed the same tram as my friends in the dorms (thank goodness), and so rode with them half way, and then was on my own. I knew the stop I needed to get off at, but couldn't really hear/understand which stop we were at. So, when I thought it was time, I left the tram, looked around, realized I was in the wrong place, looked at the tram leaving, realized another didn't come for 30 minutes, and promptly panicked for a moment. Then I walked. And walked. And walked. 2.5km. All the way home. (I had gotten off early. Common problem, I hear).
The good part of this story - I got home, huffing and puffing from climbing the other half of Baneofmyexistence Hill, at about 2:15am, went to bed by 3, and woke up at 11:30am. Yay, I'm adjusted to the time zone! This morning, I went with Tomas and Zuzan for a sort of tour of the far suburbs of Prague (they often go with a sort of club of people, complete with a tour guide, to explore their own city). It was a nice walk, but they said it wasn't nearly as interesting as others have been.
Tomorrow, I think I'll start to plan more seriously some of my weekend trips - look up prices and stuff. That's before the Bears game of course, which lots of us are going to find a bar to congregate in to watch.
