This email is an attempt to redeem myself for stupid lapses in memory I had when quickly writing the now nearly archaic journal entires about my visit to the Czech Republic. This is more or less for my own sake, as I try to record as accurately as possible what I remember from my travels, but I have broadcast it out there for everyone to read in case it may be of some fleeting interest to one of you.

The first error I would like to cover is an event that took place the day Ben and I were leaving for Cesky Krumlov. If you’ll remember we had missed our first bus by a matter of minutes and were left with several long hours to burn until we could catch the next one. Throughout the day we encountered young Czech women, always in pairs, hawking a thick catalogue. We accepted the first handout offer out of curiosity but after a quick browse through we discovered it was nothing more than an adidas shoe catalog and definitely not worth our precious Prague particulars. After milling through the old town and consuming a wonderful sausage sandwhich we made our way to the town center and encountered a the chaos of a marathon finish line. Dehydrated athletes were pounding through the white ribbon one after the other. We passed through curiously and then decided to find a proper place to have lunch and a few beers before the bus ride. The travel guide gave us a few tips but the first restaurant it led us to had closed down and been abandoned for some time. Who knows why, but thats definitely one of the problem with relying on a travel guide. Places change so fast. And by the time the place makes it into a travel guide and is inundated by toursists (who all found the place in the same way you did) the whole dynamics have changed and its not the same place the tour book writer wrote about anymore. Ah, tourism. Not to be discouraged Ben and I made our way back to a back up in the book. A little further down the street and around the corner we found the place the book mentioned. Upon entering it looked like any other dive bar you might find in America, except the walls were covered in very cartoonish comic strip-style drawings. There was one huge mural covering a wall to the left depicting a gigantic bar room brawl, replete with chairs crashing on heads and blood spewing from the characters faces. The other drawings covering the walls covered a variety of risque subjects. It was pretty awesome. The Bernard beer was just as good as ever and I experienced authentic Gulash for the first time. Afterwards we made our way back to the metro and to the bus station to catch our bus.

The second insignificant tidbit I would like to add is about the day after we returned from Cesky Krumlov. After being turned down at Tulips, where we had usually visited to connect to the internet, Ben and I ventured out to The Bohemian Bagel’s sister site in the town center. The Bohemian Bagel was the breakfast place I ate at on my first day after arriving cold and unexpected on Ben’s front step. Anyway, its sister site was in the center of town and had a blazing fast internet connection. We sipped liters of coffee while checking our email and downloading the newest music I could find. We got half of the new Nada Surf album and just about all of the Bloc Party remixes cd before my computer’s battery died. The internet was super expensive, maybe $6 an hour, but totally worth it at the time.

The third update is by far the most interesting. It involves rock star poses on the Charles Bridge. I don’t remember the exact night it took place or what came before or after, but my picture’s exif files tell me it was on that same day the Bohemian Bagels item above. Which means it was probably after the Bohemian Bagels internet downloading extravaganza. We were walking home through the Czech old town and I couldn’t find a freaking ATM that would accept my card. It kept saying that I had insufficient funds, thought that was totally not the case. After visiting a few different stations that all spit out the same error I ran into a couple of other Americans who were having the same problem. I thought briefly about how this might be some European Union way of punishing Americans for fearless leader’s actions back home but with a few more tries I found a single ATM that would take my card. It was one of those crappy standalone units that you are always really skeptical about using for fear they might eat your card and/or charge you a $50 transaction fee. But it worked and I finally was able to pull a few Czech crown out of my bank account back home. After that excitement we made our way through the winding Prague streets in direction of the Charles Bridge, which Ben lives not to far away from. We ussually would take a different route to avoid the big crowds that gather round the historic site, but I wanted to walk it at night and Ben, like a good sport, agreed to come with me. The setting was absolutely gorgeous and I took far too many photos of the Palace across the river, reflecting off the river in the soft dusk light. Then I put my camera on auto and Ben and I posed for a great many Rock Star photos. We rocked the Charles Bridge hard over and over and over while passers by wondered what the crazy tourists with the camera were making those ridiculous air guitar motions for in front of a camera placed on the ground. I wasn’t really pleased with how any of the photos came out, but you can check for yourself on the website. Just click on “photography” on the left side and browse under Prague photos. I figure one day I will actually make an effort to learn a little more about digital photography and then I can take some real sweet Rock Star pose pictures.

By the way, thanks for rocking with me so hard through this email. Though this information may have just cluttered things up in your mind, they sure did relieve me of the nagging pressure I have had in my head the past few weeks to order my tattered memories about one of the best two months of my life. I still feel a great obligation to finish this Round the World trip journal and believe me, it is coming. Hopefully soon because the longer I wait the more I forget and the harder it will be to write an interesting and cohesive email. Thanks for tagging along. The next entry will pick up where I left: on a bus traveling to the Bratislava airport.

“never mind our plan making, we’ll start living!”

Gabe