Adventures with Angela

After leaving the beautiful country of Norway it was time to head for some familiar territory in the Czech Republic, namely Prague. Christine and I visited Prague at the beginning of April and now a month and a half later, the experience there was as unique as the first. The reason I went back to Prague was to meet a friend of mine from back home in Winnipeg, Angela. She was in Europe to attend a conference in Berlin with her PhD research and we decided before I left that we would do a bit of travelling together before she went back home. We chose Prague because I knew that the two days Christine and I would spend there would probably not be enough, and I also didn't want to be the reason Angela didn't get to see that gorgeous city, so we decided to meet there. I arrived a few days before Angela got there so I had a lot of time to reaquaint myself with the city and just enjoy the atmosphere of the place. What a feeling it was to just walk the medieval streets of Prague every day on my way to relax in the park and see all these amazing sights along the way, what a great place it would be live! I spent a lot of time exploring the corners of Prague I hadn't discovered with Christine and also just relaxing in the 'Kampo' along the Vlatava river, reading or just writing about my trip in my journal. It was a lot of fun to just pretend I was local for a few days. Someone actually started talking to me in Czech at the grocery store one day which was kind of cool, maybe I actually did look like a local?! Anyway the weather was unbelievably warm the entire time I was there which was a quite a change from the first time I had been through there. Apparently it was quite unusual for Prague to be so warm this time of year, but I guess the warm temps they had all through winter are just carrying on into the summertime as well. What a difference from the cool spring temperatures of Norway though!

Having been gone about 3 1\2 months now I also decided that it was time for a little TLC and treated my tired feet to a pedicure. I figured since I'd be wearing my sandals everyday now with the summer like weather it was the perfect time for one. I just randomly found a place in my travels one day, walked in there and got the best pedicure I've ever had! I actually learned a lot about the Czech people from the girl giving me the pedicure. She had lived in London for 3 years so she spoke english really well and was able to answer all my curiousities about her country. It was a good time for me and my feet!

So after three days of experiencing Prague on my own, I was able to experience it again from someone else's perspective when Angela arrived on Friday night. I picked her up from the train station, brought her to the hostel, and herded her straight back out into the city to do something Christine and I had missed when we had first been there: a ghost tour of Prague. They do all kinds of walking tours through the city, but the one I wanted to do most was this haunted tour that takes you to all the places in Prague where unusual or frightening things have occurred. It wasn't actually that scary, but the stories our tour guide Jan told us were quite interesting and really added to the mystery that is Prague. The most famous one is about this creature called 'Golum' (no not the one from Lord of the Rings!). He was made of earth by a Jewish Rabbi living in the Jewish quarter of town who also brought him to life and used him to protect the Jewish people in Prague. Everyday the Rabbi brought him to life and gave him specific duties to perform and at the end of the day also removed the lifeforce from him to give him rest. One day, the rabbi forgot to remove the lifeforce from him at the end of the day and because at this time Golum had no specific duties, he did not have an outlet for the energy within him and so just went crazy and went on a rampage and began to destroy everthing in his path. I'm not sure what supposedly happened to this creature, but he's a legend in Prague! The tour also gave us a chance to see Prague at night, a time of day that I hadn't spent too much time out in the city yet, but now after having seen it at night, think it looks even more beautiful.

The next couple of days I brought Angela to all the major sights in the city and had a chance to see what she thought of the place. Of course she loved it, it's hard not to like a place with so much history and preserved medieval character. Her first thoughts as we walked the streets of Prague were that they looked like they were straight out of a movie. It's no wonder she thought that, they do film a lot of them there because the streetscapes are just so ideal. We climbed the 287 spiral steps at the St. Vitus' Cathedral tower for an amazing view over the city, we walked Charles Bridge at night to watch a beautiful lightening storm in the distance behind Prague Castle, we had dinner in a cafe in the Old Town Square and even went to hear the orchestral opera 'Carmina Burana' at the Art Nouveau Municipal House on Sunday evening. I think our experience there was as ideal as the place itself. I'm so happy I got another chance to be in Prague because at this point I don't think I could ever get bored of it.

After some good times in Prague, we flew to Milan, Italy for a little shopping. I actually didn't do too much shopping given the limited space in my backpack, but Angela had a heyday there! I think it helped for her that she was actually being paid to be in Europe, given that she was presenting research at a conference, so she had a great time spending that money while I was pretty much just there to offer an opinion! We also used Milan as a jumping off point to visit her cousin Charlene that is working at a private American school in Lugano, Switzerland with her husband Keith. We arrived there early in the morning and Charlene and Keith showed us around their school and also the area of Lugano. What a gorgeous place, how lucky they both are to be able to live and work there! The view of the Lugano lake surrounded by mountains from their apartment window was superb! The school they work for is also a pretty high end place given that a lot of wealthy people from around the world send their kids there to be educated. We were there on prom night and I think a lot of the dresses we saw walking around there that evening cost more than any salary I've ever made or ever will!! Keith and Charlene also took us to the top of one of the mountains surrounding Lugano for some coffee and a panoramic view at a cafe up there and also took us out for some authentic italian food for dinner that night. It was so great! What was also really cool was that I in effect was also visitng a cousin because Keith and I played the Mennonite `Who Are You Related to Game' and discovered that we are third cousins! Pretty cool. Anyway, I had a fantastic time in Switzerland.

After our whirlwind visit in Lugano, Angela and I took the train up to Zürich yesterday and flew to Düsseldorf where we parted ways. Angela to visit relatives in Münster and me back to Heike's place in Hagedorn. After five weeks of travelling on my own I am now quite content to just relax in Hagedorn until it's time to meet with Christine in Munich on the 16th of June and head out to Croatia for the last leg of our trip. Can't wait!