It's surprising that I manage to figure this blog out here, since the website is in czech.

Speaking of which, I started my Czech Intensive class last Monday. I thought Spanish was hard...you have no idea. It's hard enough just to read, let alone pronounce the words. Then its all downhill from there. Although I have to say, I think that all laziness put aside, I could learn a good deal of czech while I'm here. Right now though, I really dont have the drive to do that. Besides, even if I could manage to learn a lot, I wouldn't even be able to understand the response. I ordered a hamburger with sauerkraut the other day as a street stand, and I ordered the number 2 (dvě), and realized when the woman responded to me in czech, that was a mistake.

Although my class is 5 hours long starting at 930, after a half hour commute on the trams/metro, and I'm dead tired from the night before, it's not that bad. It's kind of like Spanish, I always liked taking it, and learning it, but I just hated going to class. My professor took us to the Národní Galerie (National Gallery) halfway through class. So it's no MoMA, and definitely not a Met, but it bears a resemblane to the Guggheim, both in shape and size. The different being that yo dont walk upwards in a spiral, the main galleries are outside of the rotunda, and it was kind of dirty, smelled and felt damp. The museum actually had a lot of good art work, except the modern art was a little bizarre and ridiculous at times. The one gallery I wanted to see, an exhibiton of Pablo Picasso's engravings, I forgot to make a round to. I think by the 4th floor, I was "art-ed" out.

That night I went to this club called Cross Club. It's an alternative scene, so there were guys in dreadlocks and girls with pink hair walking around. It's in a sketchy neighborhood, but there are other expats and Americans there as well. The entire club is decorated with old, used, tram parts. The walls, ceiling, stage, bar, handrails, you name it, are all pieces of computers, engines, and other parts.
Leaving is a journey after midnight, since the regular trams stop running, and the metro stops running altogether. Instead, you have to wait in about half-hour intervals or more to get your tram, and then it takes a long route since there are less available. It also picks up a lot of really drunk people going home after a long night, so it's kind of funny being on the late night tram. One way or another, I've bumped into other people from my program somehow going home at 5AM. I've also met other Americans too, like a girl from Brooklyn who is teaching English in Prague. It's kind of relieving sometimes to find other expats, like when I was in Tesco (a large super-store like Walmart), I wasnt sure which label was for what item on a shelf so I tried asking a woman, who was actually from Ontario.

Friday night, I left with some of my suitemates to go to a pub called "The Pub." There are a few in Prague like it, another popular one called The Beer Factory. Basically you sit yourself down (as you do in almost every restaurant I've been in) and there are 4 taps fixed to your table. You fill the beer yourself, and a computer registers how much beer your table has accumulated.

Last night, a few of us wanted to take an adventure and try authentic czech cuisine, so we took the tram in the opposite direction of the Center (what you call the main part of the city), and got off at a random stop. We went into a small restaurant spotted with locals coming home from work. It was interesting trying to speak to people who didn't know a word of English, but we ended up successful, so it was worth it. Plus, when you go closer towards the city, the prices are more expensive and less authentic. Afterwards, I went with two of my friends to check out a band that as playing in a nearby "club." We found the area it was in, it looked like a college campus, but it was apartments. There were two soccer teams playing a match (circa 11PM...) on a court in between the buildings. Under the buildings, there were small dive bars and each were called Bar 1, 2, 3, ect. We went to 007, but the band we went to see had played earlier than we thought so we caught the tail end of the show. oh well. Afterwards, a few of us went to another bar behind the dorm, A Proč Ne, and had some Pilsner there.

So right now I dont have a lot of time to go out that much, since I have to wake up early, I cant really go out late, and everyone kind of dies a little bit after class since it's so long and overdrawn, everyone takes a "siesta." Once I overcome my laziness, I'll update with pictures.