Florenc

Florenc is pungent, pungent with details: basement shops, hidden courtyards, people arriving from all over Europe, as well as quite literally with smells: new asphalt, stale rubbish, klobásas sizzling in day old fat, wafts of cheap cigarette smoke and the smell of a city baking in its residual heat.

My family don't believe me about summers in Prague, or the Czech Republic for that matter. To them, Europe is cold.  The name itself is covered in snotty icicles.  They cling determinedly to this misconception despite visiting the country.  As much as I relish any fact which contradicts my parents, this heat is becoming wearisome after four months.  To paraphrase Saul Bellow, it feels as if this city too has broken free of its terrestrial moorings and flatted to warmer latitudes.  Humidity and bitumen brew here into a heavy air.

This stop seemed the most logical place to start a weekly record of the Czech capital from its metro stations.  A block away and you could imagine that you're anywhere.  Graffiti colours the crumbling grey walls; bill posters advertise American and British bands; workers rip up the road; cars groan until they have their chance to pounce into another queue.  Added to this is the constant flow of tourists coming from the bus station and metro.  Behind their wheelie bags follow, jogging over the stones.  Others stand at corners turning maps over until they've made sense of the knot of Prague streets and then, jittery bag in-tow,  they barge through the crowd.

Yet this an undeniably Czech place.  Herna bars promise riches on most streets.  Wine stores sell wine straight from the barrel into PET bottles.  Locals - punks, homeless, commuters - sit and chat on the small square, or quietly read.  The pub I'm in is like any pub outside the tourist zone,  English and Czech pop in the background and a single weary barman serving everyone.  Nothing in English except an old Coke sign.  In this tourist hub, the Czech language is proudly visible on shops and pub windows.  It's completely unlike the dead historical centre, which doesn't feel like anywhere.

To go to those places often overlooked was one of the motivations to write this blog.  Florenc isn't exactly out of the way by my afternoon there uncovered an organic food store, a gaming store and this quiet pub.  There was also a personal reason for coming here.  Florenc was my main contact point with the city for the four years I lived in Mladá Boleslav.  Whether I was making a trip to the city itself or embarking on a further journey, I usually had to pass through Florenc bus station.

Though I use the Florenc metro stop everyday, I haven't been to the bus station for over a year.  The statue of Jan Žižka is now only visible from the furthest traffic island still accessible from the metro station.  I'm sure he used to stand unobstructed in full military glory.  The small markets are gone.  Where they had been, the ground is now dug up.  This seems to be a frequent sight in Prague.  The station remains charmingly insalubrious.  People are still hanging out around it, minding their business.  If they could be bothered, they'd probably wish I would do the same.

Apart from all the embarking and disembarking I did, there are a few moments linked to Florenc which really stand out. The earliest and surprisingly still memorable concerned a trip to Český Krumlov. It was when I was still in the thrall of cheap beer and limited responsibility. I arrived at Florenc, a four hour bus trip ahead of me, with only a couple of hours sleep and a nights worth of beer in my system. It did a lot to foster a particular reputation with my colleagues.

A fonder memory was when G. and I went on our first international trip. It was to Munich, which is five hours away across the border. It had been cold back then, the sort of cold that confirmed my parents' dread. We arrived at a still darkened bus station on the outskirts of the German city. There were no coffee machines and we had to wait another hour for the bus to the centre. Even then the cafés didn't open for another hour or two. But G. and I strengthen our relationship through a mutual love of wandering through galleries, shared caffeine cravings and the ability to laugh at our misfortune.

Just outside the pub there is a supermarket, something else I never noticed before. I'm going to buy some water for the journey home, so this afternoons exploration hasn't been entirely uneventful.