Closely Observed Train Stations

Final Call

2010-10-15T06:06:00.000-07:00

I'm going to use the train pun one last time. Yep, it's over. This project is finished. Thanks to everyone who stopped by to read but as Ferris says,

Or you can check out my new blog.

Hope to hear from you.
Ryan

Roztyly

2010-09-02T07:24:00.000-07:00

Hard to believe but after almost two years, it's over. My adventures around Prague's metro stations has come to an end. I reflected on this more last week and don't wish to rehash the recent past, especially when this stop proves to be one of the most interesting I've visited.

I know Roztyly quite well. Until early this year I took the bus home from here. Then during the heavy snows I decided to change to the train. I figured it would take about the same time and trains are better - more comfortable, better views, more opportunities to drift off into dream worlds. I think if we were to strip down to the undercarriage of fantasy it would be steam powered.

Today was the first time I'd been here in a while. In all the time I had been coming here, I never once ventured to the woods behind the station. There was no better time than today. I figured the walk would take me to a lodge which I've often seen at the top of a small hill. In fact, the woods turn out to be quite large with a few kilometres of trails running through them.

According to a sign there were muflons present. I have seen muflons in the wild before. A few of you may already know my oft-repeated anecdote about the time G. and I were collecting mushrooms when we heard a thumping coming toward us. G. moved behind a tree whereas I just froze. From the undergrowth three animals burst forth. At first I thought they were dogs until I saw that they had horns. This didn't allay my fears. In fact, they appeared to be coming straight for me. Suddenly, about ten meters away, they stopped, did an about face, and disappeared as quickly as they had come.

Today there were no such encounters. There were people picking mushrooms and I even stopped to have a look seeing as I had a bag with me. No, I'm not such a compulsive mycologist that I always carry one with me. My book was wrapped in it to stop the corners becoming tattered. The forest was picked clean. Even inedible ones had been turned over.

This forest is certainly a place I would like to return to. It is perfect for an afternoon stroll, especially now that autumn is just starting and the whole place smelled damp and rich. Autumn has settled on us early and, like so many, I love this season. It's not just the colours changing - something else novel to an antipodean - or even the free fungi in the forests. It is that the world has retreated and doesn't bully us like summer.

I turned randomly trying to cover as much ground as I could without getting lost. It wouldn't be possible. The traffic was an unbroken grind in the distance. All those car and trucks stewed together and poured somewhere out of sight. The mind had to work harder to escape. I'm not ashamed to say that I spend the greater part of my time doing just that.

Through the branches I saw the smooth green top of an algae covered bond. It was a good a place as any stop. The footpath continued on, but I take a seat and watch the ducks sift through the algae, eating trails through the sludge. Couldn't they just get more ducks to clean up the rest of the lake?

Ahoj,
Prague 2008 - 2010

Skalka

2010-08-27T01:07:00.000-07:00

It's humid. The clouds are under my shirt. I'm dressed for two months from now on account of giving a talk at a conference. Usually, I deride the ubiquity of supermarkets but today I go inside to get an ice cream. I opt for one of those high end brands with the embarrassing soft porn advertising.

While queuing a young kid of eight or nine, goes to grab my ice cream. His brother apologizes and explains that his brother is 'pitomý' stupid. I tell him 'v pohodě' - which roughly means 'It's cool', though it isn't. V pohodě has become my stock reply to a number of situations like people stepping on my feet, knocking me with elbows or being late with my order.

It has just occurred to me that, at least symbolically, nine is something of a nothing age. When assuming the age of someone, I would base it on not only physical development but beahviour. I can't think of anything which is typically nine. Eight year olds (at least when I was eight) were just that more socially aware than younger kids. Ten ears old are starting to show signs of teenager hood. Nines are in a DMZ of maturity, but I digress.

Outside, I eat the ice cream far less glamourously than in the commercials, hunched over to stop the chocolate falling onto my shirt. I think there is a Ben Elton routine about this. Anyway, slightly hunched and munching on my ice cream I start to look around the block. There's a library here but no obvious entrance. A security guard who has become curious about my toing and froing and is studying me from the window. I'm all prepared to tell him about what I'm doing. I'm even considering producing my journalist card for an added layer of teflon legitimacy. Perhaps, it's too humid for him to bother because he disappears.

Coming to Skalka is something of a full circle for the blog. I first conceived of the idea when I used to teach here. Train stations are often inspiring. I've written a lot of poems and stories while sitting waiting for trains. Occasionally, missing them as a result. It was after one lesson I thought that visiting the stations would be a novel way to see Prague, and now that I've visited all but one of the stations I realize how much more of this city is left.

In the last year, my freelancing for one website has let me see more of the city, and though it was time consuming, the opportunity to have a good look beyond the obvious places was one of the rewards. As much as there is to still explore, the blog and my writing assignments have shown me much more of Prague than I thought I knew when I first arrived. In fact, when I first arrived I was a little disappointed. The reality didn't live up to the romance. My affection for Prague has grown as I've seen more of her grubby side. I prefer her as this confusing, at times dilapidated, at times meretricious, tightly wound burg rather than just a fairy tale backdrop. I love her for her musty second hand book stores with volumes I'll never read, her smoky old men pubs, her forgotten alleys, remnants of communism and for the fact that I don't live here and will always have her for a visit.

The blog hasn't made me an expert on the city. If anything it has made me see how transitory place is. You can stay, but the city keeps moving. It is the elephant and we're the blind.

Promise

2010-08-20T01:39:00.001-07:00

I know it's been a wile, and I;m note sure how many of you are still bothering to read this. Anyway, I'm back. Expect the final two posts over the next fortnight. Thanks to those who have stuck along this far. I've never been one to keep faith in much. My bookshelf is testament to that.

Lužiny

2010-08-20T00:36:00.000-07:00

I was here about five months ago, maybe six. In fact, this station derailed the whole project for a while. I couldn't get inspired. It was another crumbling shopping centre, more kiosks selling the same fast food drowned in oil. I sat at yet another pizzeria, ordered a coffee only so I had somewhere to sit and looked over the road to where I had been over a year ago when I came to Hůrka. The puzzle was locking in place, but I still felt as though I was forcing the piece.

I told myself I'd comeback when I was more in the mood. Then I had other things to write. 'Real' things, things that seemed much more professional than this blog. I had lost faith, interest, inspiration and it seemed better to leave, but at the back of my mind I couldn't. I knew I had to finish it off. There was no climax. Only closure. Even if the blog hadn't gone the way I wanted, I felt that I couldn't start anything else until this is done. This is the beginning of a start as much as an end.

The shops are still here, the same grease sodden food, the same sense of transience and torpor. The one difference is that the outskirts of Prague no longer recall the burbs of home. Perhaps, the comparison has been blunted by overuse. More so, these places have a distinct quiddity, which is in as much the architecture as the feeling. If you could erect a shrug it would look like this.

Yet there are things I didn't notice the first time - the statue of three birds, herons I think, with curving bodies and arrow heads, locked in a tumbling dance, twirling unnoticed above the people. Apples are growing along the footpaths. Back in April they had not yet fruited. Now there are several pink and green ones within reach. I grab the closest and take a bite. It's sour and hard, so I add it to the others which have been pilfered or simply fallen.

I also find splat berries. I don't know the real name and I'm not going to Google the info and pretend I do. The berries are white and about the size of a marble. I call the splat berries because people like to place them on the sidewalk and stomp on them to hear the satisfying pop as the berry bursts. Some people have done this and I do the same. It was a simple pleasure G. introduced me to when we started seeing one another.

There is also a second hand bookshop. I noticed it the first time I but didn't venture in. This time I feel more compelled to exhaust the station of its possibilities. From the faded popular hardcovers in the window I don't feel much confidence. It will probably be like the apple.

The inside is promising. Books are piled from the ground to waist height. More are stuffed into the bookshelves, sometimes two rows thick. The best find is a cabinet filled with these exquisitely small poetry volumes. Among them I found two collections from Nezval, one was a series of pastorals called Z domoviny (From the homeland). The other was a collections of shorter whimsical pieces featuring the suites Básně na pohlednice (Poems for postcards) and ABECEDA (ABCD) The latter were published much earlier during his more 'surreal' period. The former were more overtly socialist, which was not so uncommon amongst writers in the early days of the regime. Kundera wrote some utter bilge in praise of communism before he became well known for his 'scandalous' novels.

When I go to pay I have to find a break in the books behind which the seller has barricaded himself. He is a young anxious man, worn thin by his nerves. It is hard to follow if he is speaking to himself or me.

This trip to the bookstore has renewed my confidence in this blog and what this city has to offer. I had become too complacent. I had made the mistake of thinking that something was simply what it is and no tried to look closer. I had failed to live in the moment, which this blog is somewhat about. As far living in the moment, Nezval was able to put it more succinctly.

Každodenní básně
Gramofon pod okny hraje
toto jsou básně na pohlednice
zahřejí tě jak šálek čáje
když ti je smutno u srdce

Everyday Poems
The gramophone plays under the window
these are the poems for postcards
they warm you like a cup of tea
when you have sorrow in your heart

Letňany

2010-04-02T10:10:00.000-07:00

[N.B. This was written on 23rd March but I didn't have time to post until now.]

As a break with standard practice, I'm going to start as we pass through Střížkov, which is two stops before Letňany. The newness of this station along with the next two makes me feel like I'm leaving the real world and entering a life-size model. It makes it hard to separate the stations from each other.

We pass through Prosek and two kids across the aisle from me are reciting a rhyme used to help children learn how to pronounce ř. The rhyme goes like this:

Tři sta třicet tři
stříbrných stříkaček
Stříká přes
Tři sta třicet tři
Stříbrných střech

And in English:

Three hundred and thirty three
Silver fire hoses
Spray across
Three hundred and thirty three
Silver roofs.

Amusing how a phonological constraint will produce. Equally amusing is that the kids reciting it are a little too old. Nostalgia isn't dead. They stop reciting the poem for the fourth time to comment on passengers they are sure are members of the mafia because of their appearance. Prejudice is alive and well too.

At Letňany only a bus stop can be reached without crossing a road. I know I've broken this self-imposed rule before but as with that nursery rhyme the challenge to creativity is what you can do within constraints. Besides, it's just a factory outlet.

Behind the bus station is a flat open field. I wonder if it is an air strip. This thought gets me wondering whether the name Letňany derives from this since 'let' means flight in Czech. When G. calls a few minutes later I ask her. She says she doesn't know. Winter is putting up a final bitter fight, so I tell G. I'll meet her at her grandmother's which is not far away in Kobylisy.

On the train back there are some kids playing a game, a different group of kids than before. The object of the game is to run as far as they can from the train then turn and try to make it back to the train before it leaves. I watch them noisily disrupt the crowds of commuters at every stop. When I get to Kobylisy, one of them clears a bench and just manages to squeeze between the doors before the train takes off.

Hloubětín

2010-03-09T10:23:00.000-08:00

Though I've been curious about this station since I first saw it many years ago, I never succumbed enough to check it out over the years. The name has been the main reason. The names of most other stations are self-evident. This one is more impenetrable.

When I leave the station, I feel the icy wind on my face. A few days ago I was fooled into thinking spring would soon be here. The air was warm and fuzzy. A few buds had sprouted on the trees. I was feeling energetic. Now the air is steely.

The Czechs call this type of cold "kosa", which means scythe. Today, it's obvious to see why. The wind is slicing me to the bone. It's also going to trim today's post. I'm not sure how long I can stand to be outside.

On the first block I follow a street called Pod Turnovskou tratí. It's one of the features of Prague toponyms that they reflect some of the geographical or historical features of the area. Of course, the city is not short of streets named in honour of historical figures and famous places - or streets renamed when certain historical figures were no longer in vogue. In other instances, the street names simply describe the street. In this instance the street is under Turnovský's tracks.

Across from me is a basketball court with two large gates, one at each goal end. The gates resemble bared teeth for a post-apocalyptic play set. Moreover, they are completely useless, as the surrounding fence is quite low and would be easily crossed by your typical basketball player.

Through the second exit of the station I find the local branch of the municipal library. It seems a good way to avoid the scythe so I mount the caged stairwell. The library is in a seventies style cement shopping center with an optometrist and a supermarket. Kids' drawing are stuck to the window. Books are displayed invitingly. It's shut. The scythe's got me.

Muzeum Part 2

2010-03-03T21:44:00.000-08:00

Now that the National Museum comprises of two buildings I thought it would be better to devote a second post and day to the new section which is housed in the former Federal Assembly. I also relished the chance to explore this building, which sits grim and remote at the top of Wenceslas Square.

When I first arrived in the Czech Republic the building was surrounded by concrete barriers and guarded by police because it was the headquarter of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. Now, the headquarters have moved and the building has been acquired by the National Museum. There is a perverse symmetry because during the 1968 invasion, the Warsaw Pact troops allegedly thought the older National Museum was a radio station and fired on it. The bullet marks are still visible in the columns. Fittingly, the current exhibition, Za Svobodu, is on the struggle against the communist regime.

The exhibition is a survey of both repression and resistance from 1948 to 1989. The exhibition attempts to show life at different levels with examples of propaganda, dissident literature and even a replica of a typical living room in a panelák flat. This is one of those situations where I could reel off all the information I've gleaned form books, articles and conversations, yet it doesn't change the fact that I don't feel this exhibition as Czech people do. For me, these things are examples. For them, they are memories.

However, the disconnection perhaps invites other 'readings' about the place. The main one is how unreal some of this feels. I'm referring especially to the riot cop gear, which appears more like a the accessory to some ill-conceived live-sized action figure still in its blister pack of a display case. Compounding this feeling is the replica of the Berlin Wall toward the end of this exhibition, complete with a copy of the original graffiti. I wonder how many other examples of graffiti have been copied as though they were the work of an old master? Actually, given that it's been a few decades since Basquiat decorated New York with his work, there have probably been a few. There's probably also a forged Banksy around - probably done by Banksy himself.

Perhaps the most interesting aspect of the exhibition were the connections made with the the charter movement in the Baltic states and those here. I was surprised to read that one Latvian student Eliyahu Rips, attempted to set himself alight in protest against the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968. This was only one example of other forms of protest to come from this region. It's a history I've heard little about since living here. Again, a visit to a museum resulted in me learning something.

Muzeum Part 1

2010-03-01T09:36:00.000-08:00

Even if you've never been to Prague, you can probably guess that there is a museum located at this train station, the National Museum in fact, so I thought I would slip out of my tourist role and into that of a my tour guide.

The National Museum tends to get a bad rap as nothing more than a stuffy old building filled with bones and moth eaten stuffed animals. This description is partly true but it's also part of its appeal. Whereas many other museums try to go for interactivity, this museum recalls a time when knowledge was treated with some solemnity and a dash of amateurism. I realise there is little we can learn from an animal by skinning, mounting and placing it by another creature who's suffered the same fate, and I know that many collections are really glorified booty, but I enjoy the quiet, and these simple exhibitions can allow the mind to wander.

This was not exactly what I experienced at The Story of Planet Earth. (I've taken the liberty of removing the redundant article.) This current exhibition takes its cues from those more modern exhibitions with films and exhibits to make you better imagine an earthquake. As the name suggests, the exhibition tells the story of Earth from formation then splits into various sub-plots - geological, evolutionary and environmental. The perpetual ten year old in me, who was being glowered at by the perpetual fifty six year old in me (the perpetual eight nine year old had dozed off in the lobby) loved the dinosaur display best of all. Actually the regular thirty four year old enjoyed the dinosaurs and fossils too. One of my dream jobs would be a curator. I guess I can add it to the list.

Actually, I enjoyed the exhibition a lot more than I've led you to believe. I guess that fifty six year old has taken over. Even the hordes of kids didn't bother me. It was heartening to see them interested in something other than computer games. One little girl thought the dinosaur skeleton on display was for a dragon. Another kid was imploring his father to look at everything around him - I guess appealing to families isn't always so bad.

A lot of the fossils were from what is today the Czech Republic, thus creating a telescopic view of the regions history, at least in my imagination. Some surprising fossils included the head of an early species of shark.

Perhaps the most shocking display was of three photos of the Trift Glacier in Switzerland, showing its retreat. No less disturbing was this series of images showing the rate of deforestation in Borneo.

I forget that trips to the museum are also meant to be educational.

Pankrác

2010-01-20T21:57:00.000-08:00

I've got a letter to post. It's been sitting in my bag since before Christmas and it really should've been sent already. One of my colleagues said the nearest post office is near Pankrác and since I haven't done Pankrác I thought how convenient. Except I don't know where the post office is.

When I exit the station I head to a map by a bus stop. Unfortunately, the scale is too small to show specific buildings. I figure I could ask someone, but finding the post office gives me a good reason to explore, so I head off around the large shopping centre above the train station.

It's very new, dropped from the sky new, even the cobblestones of the footpath seem to shine. Attached to it are large colourful names like badges, already to be taken down when fashions and economic situations change. Quite a lot of English is spoken around here. Three Americans discuss pot as I walk past and then I see the post office. If only I had gone clock-wise.

The post office is off the block with the train station but I'm going to bend the rules since I don't think I've written about visiting a post office. I mentioned the GPO once before but I haven't written about using the post here.

When I enter I take a number and join the large but evenly distributed crowd who are also clutching their numbers and staring at the number display as though it will provide succour. One of the numbers is 666. I mention this not because I'm religious or into apocalyptic revelations. It's just a funny co-incidence because I was reading about the number last night. The reason I was reading about the number was because I was doing some research on phobias and was drawn to the spikiness of the word hexakosioihexekontahexaphobia, the fear of the number 666. Apparently, Nancy Reagan suffered from it. If I were the superstitious type, or Greg Araki, I might place more significance in this. My letter is posted without any fuss. Not that I expect any.

Leaving the post office I decide to continue stretching the rules and head to a block further on. I think a shopping centre is beyond my powers of imagination or observation to make it interesting. I do have one fond memory connected with the place. Last year, I took part in a photo story for the magazine I work for. By photo story, I mean one that resembles a comic but with still shots for the panels. I was one of the characters. Strange that they never asked me to do another.

The other reason is that I've spied a tower across the street and would like to investigate it close-up. Also across the street I see the older apartment blocks before the shopping centre crash-landed. They're painted birthday cake pastels apart from the side wall where a giant knife has sliced through to the brown grey underneath. Maybe, the impact of the shopping centre destroyed part of the building.

Getting to the tower is not as easy as I first thought. It seems to be behind a large DIY centre. I figure all I need to do is walk through the car park and I'm there. When I get the end, there's a barrier and only when I lean over do I see the side of the tower.

So I had the other way around. It's a long way round. Fortunately, the tower is just tall enough for me to keep it in sight. When I get around I see my final approach to the tower is blocked by a scrap yard, which is private property, and there are too many people around to simply walk in. I have to make with a photo taken by standing up on a cement wall.

Stylistic Decision

2010-01-05T08:41:00.000-08:00

This was written before Christmas but I decided to keep it in the present so as not to break the style of the blog so far. Probably my first real stylistic decision about what I'm doing. The reason for the delay is that I was quite ill from the day after I wrote the original notes. No doubt it was a result of standing around in the snow. By the time I recovered it was Christmas and then and then. Please read on.

Luka

2010-01-05T08:25:00.000-08:00

This station sounds like a good name for a dog not that I know any dogs here with the name. I think I've mentioned before that Czechs tend to give their dogs English names, so I won't pry open that old chestnut again.

Speaking of chestnuts, there don't seem to be any stall selling them here. Though this station is surrounded by shops, there are no Christmas markets. This means no bloody images of carp, no sweet trdelník (Did I mention that this cylindrical sugar coated pastry comes from the word trdlo - which means, among other words, bumpkin?), no tacky gifts for me to riff on about and no chestnuts. I guess I've exhausted my more Christmas friendly stations.

I'm not really in the mood to explore yet another supermarket. My sense of wonder can only go so far. Instead I try to see how far I can go along the block. Above the sky is cataract and the ground talcum white. The block doesn't stretch so far, so instead I try to work out which direction Stodůlky would be by following the ventilation towers. Unfortunately, I'm not exactly which direction it is. I see a church which for a moment I think is one I saw from Hůrka, but church designs tend to follow a common design, so it I can't be sure. My feet have become so cold that they feel wet and I have a Christmas party to be at. The last for the year.

Hlavní nádraží Part Two

2009-12-08T09:41:00.000-08:00

It's impossible to write about hlavní nádraží, or hlavák as the Praguers call it, without mentioning the people. The station is a confluence of visitors and locals, the transient and regulars, though who is who is usually a matter of perspective.

I take a bench to the right of the central stairs. Opposite there used to be a newsagent. Now, there's a burger-store and its smell fills the upper hall. The first thing I notice about the people is how straight they walk, regardless of speed. As I tend to meander, often stopping to check out some incidental object or event, I am surprised that most people keep to a straight mental track. Even the woman in the painfully fashionable boots, her feet forced almost vertically straight, doesn't teeter.

This direct movement is all I can see that people share. Otherwise it is a mix of age, social background and I can only assume nations. And it is this blend that makes the place seem ordinary and is it this ordinariness that leads so many friends and acquaintances to be disappointed with Prague, that the city is too far from their lustrous, or dark, presumptions. As I remember one friend opined "Prague is just another international city." An understandable lament when you're passing through. But I'm happy to forsake some "authenticity" if it means meeting different people or finding decent wine, food and other comforts.

Beside me two teenagers chat. The guy is angle toward the girl. The girl is facing forwards but regarding him askance. He's offering her some cola and she's adamant that she doesn't want any. Health food advocates would cheer. Most of the conversation is a verbal tennis match of direct questions and answers, returned short and sharp. It reminds me of a conversation class, and I think they're both going to play the distance. I don't have the patience.

******************************************************

I head to another knew addition, another Potrefená husa. I take a table by the door and watch the action. It seemed to be a poorer choice. The people maintain their determined private routes, but there's little else. A bad afternoon. I've seen so much here before. People shooting up. Punks wiling away the hours. Working women soliciting customers. People dressed for medieval battles.

A man comes into the pub. He hasn't entirely lost the face he had as a boy. His eyes seem mildly bemused as though this his first day out alone in the big smoke. Along with this there is the caution people have before experience clocks up. He catches me studying him and gives a perplexed, though not threatening, look, I guess the journal I'm writing in isn't so alarming, if only a little odd.

An older woman enters not long after. She smiles at me when I notice her. It's the first time this has happened while doing this blog. The usual reactions a more like the man's. I hear her order Modrý portugal, a variety of grape and the name of the wine made from it. Of course, she's getting the wine. G. and I had a fantastic bottle of St Martin's Modrý portugal last week. I think I'll end with this little coincidence.

Hlavní Nádraží Part 1

2009-12-07T12:06:00.000-08:00

There might be more of me than usual in this post. I'm looking at the station through the grainy visors of the sleep deprived. But that's another story.

Aficionados of main train station's past may be disappointed by what they find. The herna bar on the top concourse - gone, the old scummy toilets - gone, the Fornetti shop - gone, the right side of the building - gone. Actually, they've been gone for a while but it's taken me this long to get to he station, which is currently being refurbished.

One thing about construction is that it brings out people's creative side. I'll miss these pics when the panels are removed. I wonder who will get them.

One benefit of these changes is the bookstore. This is the first time I've been inside. Usually, I'm in a rush to get my train or I want to avoid an impulse buy. Today, it's research.

The first book to grab my attention is a book of Nohavica's songs translated into English. I'm a little skeptical about this. I'm not so well versed in Czech that I would say the translation would lose some of the meaning. However, I am disappointed by the loss of mystery. I felt that the magic of his lyrics was something granted to those who took time to learn the language. I can see that I might be guilty of the more Bohemian-than-thou attitude a friend of mine accused other expats of demonstrating. At the same time, it would be a pity for Nohavica to become slotted into mass convenience, which is the fast track to mass indifference.

Beside that book is something by Jiří Gruša's Instructions to Czechia. His The Questionnaire is one of my favourite Czech novels. I was drawn to how rooted it seemed despite the imaginative flights. Again, this is an outsider's opinion and one no doubt formed from reading it here and so knowing the places before reading about them. His Instructions looks amusing and is something to add to my list of books I will try to read in Czech.

One book which everyone knows is Švejk. though I've read it a few times, I stop to flick through the large hard-cover edition. This one is illustrated by Petr Urban. Though Lada may have given us the definitive Švejk, there's something about Urban's scrappy rendtion, which seems more fitting, less an icon and more human. On the back of the book is an illustration of the two Švejks meeting. It seems a perfect image of the old and new Czech I think as I go to get my train home.

Jinonice

2009-11-20T00:01:00.000-08:00

The name of the station reminds me of jitrnice, which I'm quite partial, providing it's prepared well and there's more offal than bread. This is not the only station which reminds me of food. The marbled columns of Můstek reminds me of the marbled appearance of tlačenka. As I once said, food always finds its way into the blog, though I'm not hungry now.

The area around Jinonice is covered in leafless trees, low bushes with gaudy berries and billboard towers. It's urban but totally removed from Prague. I feel as though I've strayed into some dead end around some tightly curled bend. Not that this is at the end of train line. It just doesn't feel part of the city. Háje or Černý most seem to be more apart of Prague though they lie on the outskirts.

Perhaps it's all the traffic which seems unnatural to me. Maybe, it's the building material merchants. One of them is a betonárna. "Beton" is the Czech for concrete and "árna" is added when place is associated with the product. So, a betonárna is a concrete plant, just as a cukrárna is a sweetshop (cukr is the Czech for sugar) and čekárna a waiting room (čekat is the Czech for wait).

As I approach the betonárna I catch a leaf. I suppose anyone my age from the Northern Hemisphere would find this embarrassing yet autumn and its colours remain an annual delight. Catching falling leaves is something I've only recently mastered.

Richard Lopez said in his blog I write like a tourist. At first I was a little dismayed at the comparison. I always hoped a tourist was what I wasn't. I've learnt the language, the culture, the history, keep abreast of current events here. But I suppose in some ways, these small ways, he's right. I am a tourist in that I'll never fully be of this place while this place continues to delight, amuse, confound and frustrate.

At the moment though, there is a feeling of deja vu. I'm sure I've never been here, so it can't be presque vu. Funnily, proof is all that distinguishes a sense of being somewhere you haven't visited from not quite remembering some place you have, except the only proof I have is memory. I guess I can ask G. when I get home.

What finally confirms that it's deja vu is the housing estate ahead. It consists of many square apartment blocks with balconies like soap dishes. I'm sure I would've ranted about something as ugly as that before. My last clue that I've not been here is that I see a bus driver lavatory. Though I doubt I would've noticed it if I hadn't read about it in Andrew's blog "Seldom Asked Questions."

A Quick Note

2009-11-17T00:56:00.000-08:00

The following post was from a week ago. I know. I've sunk back into my bad ways.

Českomoravská ==> Vysočanská

2009-11-17T00:08:00.000-08:00

I'm struggling to find anything interesting at Českomoravská. The exit is linked to a single block. There is a Dům Šance at the back. In the distance I can see a panelák with silhouettes of animals painted on it. Sorry to digress, but has panelák entered the English language? Wikipedia seems to think so. That would then bring the total up to between two and three depending on who you ask. As you all know, robot derives from the Czech word 'robota' for forced labour. Some suggest that pistol derives from the Czech píšťala, which means whistle. The spelling on the etymological dictionary appears to be wrong.

Anyway, back to Českomoravská. The area is dominated by the squat metallic Sazka arena. Fifties style UFO, giant Frisbee, overturned dog-bowl could all be used to describe, but none of these comparisons would capture its ominous presence, inhuman and sterile amid the flats. I went to a jazz festival there many years ago. Apart from this guy and a Hungarian pianist, whose name escapes me, it was singularly one of the worst musical experiences I've been to. The venue had a lot to do with it. And Van Morrison. Though it's against the rules, I'm going to head to the next station.

Unfortunately, a large shopping centre stands above Vysočanská. At least it's warm inside. I circle around to warm up and, vainly, search for something interesting. The best thing I spot are a group of kids racing in the opposite direction of a pedestrian conveyor belt. A girl with bright leggings wins.

Outside, there's a park with a grammar school opposite. The park is littered with leaves. Whereas last year, the leaves were a bright carpet, today they take the term litter quite literally. Hundreds of discarded brown paper bags come to mind. Admittedly, it is later in the year than when I was at JZP.

Vysočanská is the adjective of Vysočina, the name of the area, which also means highlands. The shopping centre has commandeered the top. The area gets more interesting when I head down. I watch a fishmonger try to catch a pike in his net. Despite the small size of the aquarium, he's having difficulty. The sleek fish glides away from the net. It takes him five attempts before it's caught for the two women waiting patiently.

Nearby is a second-hand shop. I think of my good friend, the writer and second-hand shop connoisseur Vanessa Berry . I think Vanessa may be disappointed by this store. It is not the trove of discarded objects awaiting her imagination to vivify. It's like a clothes store, the items perfectly arranged only faded and musty. It's tempting to imagine that the folds of these clothes contain more than the lining. Were these clothes abandoned by families who had fled in 1968? I suppose that's the typical outsider's perspective - to constantly romanticize this place and keep it always just beyond the finger tips.

Flora

2009-10-29T10:25:00.000-07:00

I'm in the mood for a walk through a cemetery, and it's not the time of year. It's the easy quiet and solitude I'm after or at least what I imagine I'll find here. The outside still creeps in over the crumbling walls. There are children here too with their little scooter bikes and some people appear to use it as a short-cut from the tram stop.

Why I'm in this mood I cant' say exactly. I've just felt a sudden need for the sort of sobriety found here. Those that know me can make a pun on that as they wish. Maybe, all I needed was somewhere to let the well-spring of random thoughts surge and flow out. Lately, whatever I've written has been purpose driven. Being in an old cemetery is a pleasure for its aimlessness - and there are fewer people here than in a park.

Czech graveyards bear the marks of the country's changed history. Angels weighed down with cement wings and forlorn Christs with moss coloured robes populate the front section. Further in I find a gravestone in Russian and another in German. Unfortunately, I can't get to visit the Jewish section. A road blocks my access as it when I was in Želivského.

The newer stones are as austere as the older ones are extravagant. Slabs of black marble with only names and dates. A few of them have photos or engravings of the deceased. These engravings are eerie. Grey and translucent, it was as if the family wanted to be haunted. And the images immortalize more than the memory. Double chins, eighties perms, caterpillar mustaches commemorate the dead. But to be loved is to be imperfect. Only idols are flawless.

The blank slabs are an invitation to my imagination. What would I want as my epitaph? To be honest, I'm too distracted by the names to think of anything remotely witty or appropriate. Czech surnames are far more descriptive and imaginative than English ones. Among the gravestones I find a Mr Blackbird (Kos), a Mr Hedgehog (Ježek) a family of hooks (Hák), someone who is black (Černý)and another who is quiet (Tichý). The most interesting was the man whose name means "was having breakfast" (Snídal).

The use of the masculine past tense as a surname is not uncommon. Bohumil Hrabal's surname means "raked" or "was raking" depending on context. Perhaps, his ancestor was a gardener, though I'm not sure why eating breakfast warrants a family name.

As I leave, I notice someone taking photos. On the exterior of the cemetery wall was some stencil art, which I'd like to share with you:

Náměstí Republiky

2009-10-28T13:20:00.000-07:00

I need Lt. Hůrka's help with this one. I can't do it alone. So, I'm slipping into my Hůrka suit. Flaky skinned, droopy eyed Bolík Hůrka is on the case, though I'm not sure what the case is. Maybe he'll be able to work it out from the clues he's gathered:

* Photos of tea collectors happily toiling. Pictures by Liptons. Tea leaves are waxier than expected.
* 'Blesk' on the side of a van. Blesk, which means both flash and lightning is the name of his friend's dog. It is one of the few Czech dog names he knows. It's also the name of a tabloid.
* A stray feather. No idea which bird. He once had a feather in his favourite hat but he lost it on the way home.
* Ties in the window look as though they're waiting to be examined by doctors (Ahhhh)
* A leaflet asks "Why are ginger-haired people disappearing?"
* The German for Italian shoes is "Itaienische Schuhe".
* This picture reminds him of his daughter's boyfriend. That's if he existed and actually had a daughter.

* He hears someone whistle. This is the first time in a while.
* A mother calls her child "Little Bug". He called his daughter this too. Still does from time to time.
* He sees the statue of Žižka. He's never been down this block before.
* He's never noticed the tops of those building before either.
* Another man is whistling.
* There's a stain on the wall of the escalator tunnel exactly the same shape and same position as in Narodní třída, except this one is black.
* This statue again.
He doesn't know what it means.
* The leaves still look waxy.
* He lied about the stain.

Kobylisy

2009-10-09T14:22:00.000-07:00

I met G. on the platform. We were going to walk her Grandmother's dog together. This is not a typical weekly ritual. Not for me anyway. I'm here because I've got some time to kill and Babi's place is near the metro station, so it seemed a fitting moment to reboot the blog.

The dog himself is the reason this won't become a habit. Of the various annoying traits a dog can possess: disobedience, a grating incessant bark, nauseating body odour, food thievery, invasive muzzle and over friendly tongue - this dog possesses all of them to their utmost. His name is Čert, which means devil. Needless to say, I've never met a more aptly named pet. He's also one of the few dogs here with a Czech name. Most seem to have English names. And he's only a dog in as much as anything vocal, hairy and four-legged is a dog. He looks, and certainly smells, like a used sheepskin car-seat cover.

G. told me that she walked Čert only in as much as she walked WITH Čert. He was very much in charge and dragged her and later me around a few blocks. This is when I discovered Čert's other annoying habit. He marks his territory constantly. On one occasion, he did it with as close to wryness as a dog can manage. A guy called Lerry left his tag on a gate. The tail of the 'y' was topped with an arrow. Čert left his mark exactly where Lerry directed him.

Later, Čert seemed merely senile. When G. finally coaxed Čert to turn around and head home, he sniffed a mark he just made the very instant before and sprayed a bush he'd marked not a minute earlier. I think the poor guy can no longer remember his signature.

If Čert is deserving of any credit it is that he's not aggressive. When other dogs rush to the fence and bark is one of the few times Čert doesn't make a sound. His lack of confrontationalism means you are saved the effort of dragging him away. But, it has come at the expense of his bravery. When he hears another dog, he drags whoever's attached to him along the path until he's at a safe distance.

Incidentally, Čert took us in a counter-clockwise direction. If he had hands, his right would be the dominant one.

Comparisons

2009-09-01T13:20:00.000-07:00

I would say that my tardiness is inspired by the MO of the blog. But, the Prague Metro is actually efficient. Perhaps, I need some benevolent dictator or worse to get my act together. Suffice to say, there'll be no post this week.

Service Problems

2009-08-22T02:15:00.000-07:00

Once again things have got away from me this week. In my defence I had two interesting writing assignments, so little time for the blog. Everything will be back on track...yes, yes, pun intended.

Háje

2009-08-07T23:11:00.000-07:00

The stations are so much more ornate than the ones at home. Great coffee cream marble interspersed with the same anodized panels found along the green line. And they are such crowded hubs of activity, not merely waiting places. As soon as I leave the escalator I see the familiar bakeries, newsagents and other stores. People are shopping or just milling about. They're not scattering themselves home.

From a courtyard I see beyond the city's limits. The change from urban to rural is sudden. The paneláks create a neat wall keeping the city in. It's not the fraying patchwork of suburbs still forming. Just grey then greens.

I can smell the vegetation - the late summer ripening and rot, the same crisper smell I've mentioned before. Blackthorns have all but fallen from their trees. Most are fermenting on the ground, adding a yeasty sweetness to the other odours. Further on and it's cut grass, also sour from the heat and humidity. It's not the tropical humidity I experienced recently, but it's oppressive in its own way, in its unexpectedness.

I would've loved this place as a kid. There are so man bridges and overpasses for the mind to convert into ships, so many tall blocks to imagine as castles. It feels like a little city hear, like Budějovická, but without the guy with the pig.

A couple of junkies pass by, eye lids dropped for the day, or not yet open, their voices in low gear.

Two Roma are digging up the road. One operates the jackhammer, the other shovels away the rubble. Between breaks I hear the low mournful song of one of the one with the shove. It's seems like such a clichéd 'Eastern European' image - Roma in the streets. I mention it - a part from the fact that I can see it - because one of the most pervasive and pernicious stereotypes of Roma is that they are lazy. Funny thing is, it's always Roma I see doing these thankless jobs.

Beside them sit two well dressed old women. One has coiffured hair a wind tunnel wouldn't move. They sip tea with an old world sophistication that belies the disposable cups they hold, and the hot paved footpath where they sit. The coiffured woman has a frightened bird face, thin cheeks and nose like a pinch of skin. At the moment, she seems unruffled, but she could take flight at any moment.

The reason I'm here is not entirely random. I have to review a film, so for you it might be Saturday but for me it's Wednesday. Wednesdays don't seem that different to Fridays. Maybe there are more people, since they're not all at their cottages.

G. and I have a check whenever we come here, which isn't often. One of us will say, "Jedeme na Háje?" and the other will say, "Ano, a do háje." In translation, "Are we going to Háje?" / "Yes, and to hell." But it probably only works in Czech.

Attention: the train is approaching the station

2009-08-04T12:15:00.000-07:00

I will start posting again as of Friday. I'd been away...I should've left a notice I know, but with all the packing...Friday, really, Friday.

Strašnická

2009-06-19T10:16:00.000-07:00

The stations are beginning to look the same. First an ascent up stairs that exist more for advertising than locomotion. There is a newsagent at the top. Maybe a cheese shop, maybe a bakery, today it's a florist and a dried fruit shop.

Outside is a pizza stand, two občerstvenís and a gyros van. Someone is selling punnets of strawberries. They're selling strawberries everywhere at the moment. Pale red with yellow tips, sure signs they've been picked too early and not left to ripen in the sun. But I can't begrudge people the need to make a living.

By the station is a large abandoned building. My first thought is that it's a monastery. The reason for this is that I assume most large abandoned buildings are monasteries. The garden is overrun with wild wheat and amongst them I see two mushrooms. They're early for this time of year. Then again, we have had a lot of rain. They already look a bit old and I'm not that keen on eating fungus that is growing about 20m from a main road.

Along the rear wall someone has spray-painted "Fuck off the government." I find it strange that when the Czech language contains as many profanities as English the person chose English. It's not as though they're writing to English speakers. Cynically, I assume that there political program amounts to appearing cool and it's much cooler to swear in English, or so I've been told.

Beyond the building is a market and this one seems more lively than most. It's mostly fruit and cheap clothing. Some guys are playing cards. Other are drinking. It certainly has colour, but the people are wary that I'm more interested in them than the produce so I continue on.

Outside the front of the building I see it's a school, and it isn't even abandoned. It's just neglected. There are stickers on the windows and inside I can make out furniture.

The underpass leads to a park. As I wander through I pass the same people and I realise that with my dishevelled hair and unshaven face I might look a little dodgy. It's one of the problems with observation. You yourself become visible.

Because of this feeling I hurry through. That and I want to avoid the humidity. On the way back to the station I notice a bumblebee working away in a flower. As fey as it sounds, it puts me in a good mood. I just like these insects. I watch it for a few minutes and then head back thinking what junk food I will purchase. I'm not in the mood for it but I haven't had lunch.

Suddenly, I recall the fruit stands and change direction for the market. The fruit seems ridiculously overpriced. My knowing this is either a sign of my domesticity or the length of time I've been here. Or both. But wait? I have an apple in my bag. I soft-ball sized red apple from a farmer whose produce we trust. I work it free from my bag and start to eat it on my to the station. By the time the train arrives, I've eaten it down to the stalk.

Zličín

2009-06-19T09:49:00.000-07:00

I feel I've been here before but I don't remember why. It couldn't be the shopping centre. I wouldn't come all this way, not when the identical stores are more conveniently located. It couldn't have been for the atmosphere. It's not even charmingly decrepit. People stand stiffly while trying to smoke casually. Everyone's reading everyone else. Then there's a sudden burst of moment. This time two guys hurry to the train platform. And it's back to the awkward stares.

Maybe, G. and I went on a trip somewhere. There is a bus station here. But I honestly can't recall where. I have this impression I've been here but no firm memory. It's not that it seems familiar. Quite the opposite. It seems mostly strange with a nagging sense that I've been here though until I arrived I thought I never had. Is this what they call presque vu?

This nagging feeling is irritating me the more I stand here, so I walk around the block. The first path leads to a traffic jam and the outskirts of a city ossified under billboards and consumerism. I double back and take a path heading through the long grass.

It is the type of grass we were warned away from as kids. "Dugites might be there." Any snake was a dugite. No snakes today. Only snails. Huge snails lugging their limestone like homes across the rain moistened path. Some smaller ones are dining on the unfortunate victim of a careless foot. All around is the pervading smell of an unwashed crisper.

We warned about other dangers in the grass and be so suddenly isolated, I can't help but given into those fears. "It would be my luck," I think but I reach a gate without incident and turn back.

While I approach the station I hear the distinctive rattle of a spray can. As a child I wanted my father to open up a can to show me the ball bearing inside. I asked no matter how many times he explained that the can would explode if he tried. Years later, I found an opened can in the bush. The ball bearing was still there just as I imagined. What else could it be? It was one of those distinctly disappointing moments.

The juvenile graffiti artists lower their voices and crouch behind the railing. Do they really think I care? Then I remember a game we played as kids. We would stand at the end of the drive way and wait for cars. At the last moment, we would duck for cover. The cars went on oblivious and our hearts pounded and our bodies wriggled with pleasure. Subterfuge of any kind is tantalising.

I head back to the platform disappointed I can't get more from this place. Partly, I feel ashamed, as though I'm letting the station down by not finding something more. Of course, this is a home to someone. Someone else had their first smoke or drink or god knows what here. The graffiti artists will perhaps think back to this place as one of their first hits. To me though, it's just a suburb that smells like day old salad.

And I still don't know why I came here the first time.

Vyšehrad

2009-06-08T08:59:00.000-07:00

I had my notes already to transcribe as I usually do, but I decided to scrap them and go with what I remember.

At first, I thought this was going to be easy. I was sure there was nothing to this station, so I was just going to describe the Tom Waits concert I went to last year in the Congress Centre, where the seat were designed so that none obscured the ones behind. All had a view of the podium and the speaker could see all. Perfect for a performance.

There were actually a lot of places to walk - but it didn't take me anywhere. I could see the little garden hidden by train line, the twin spires of St. Peter and Paul and the defensive wall from where the mysterious house with the radars is visible as well as the whole historical collage of Prague. But I couldn't get close to it without breaking the rules.

I was at least able to cross the Nusle bridge, which has a Golden Gate reputation amongst Praguers as a bridge of last resort. From there I could see the hidden garden in more detail. Further on, a much larger park I never knew about was visible. Traffic sped like a motorised wall. I imagined what it would be like if they shut it off, if someone staged a reclaim the streets type action. IT would be one hell of a party. The most daring I know of were some Greenpeace activists abseiled from the bridge. They most have been quite fit to get over the 2m high fence with its arched top.

Incidentally, the Czech for banner is 'transparent'. Make of that what you will.

Můstek

2009-06-01T08:02:00.000-07:00

I'm in the Chinese restaurant in the arcade beside the Palác Knih book store. I have a novel open as I wait for my lunch. Someone has written "Don't read this if you are already feeling depressed!". I wonder how grim the story can be. Not gr4im enough to hold my attention. I put it back in my bag and watch the people passing through the arcade.

Chinese restaurants remind me of home. They are a quintessential component of the suburbs. Sweet and sour pork, fried rice, chicken and black bean - these are the true staples of home. Not meat pies. Not vegemite. The mock lanterns, faux-jade and water paint images of our view of China transport me home more than those kangaroo road signs. Incidentally, there is something of a crave for them here. I've seen a few suctioned to the rear windows of cars. The nearest kangaroo locked up in Prague zoo. I guess what we associate ourselves with has little to do with where we are.

My duck arrives. It's not a prohibitively expensive type of poultry here, so I can enjoy it more often. However, the sauce is a little salty, something my beer on exacerbates. Thankfully there's plenty of rice to cut the flavour. I plonk each thin slice into my mouth and survey the restaurant before going back to looking outside.

A group of twenty somethings have gathered at the theatre opposite. Two women engage in one of the most elaborate social kisses I've seen. The keep about 50 cm from each other and crane in gingerly, as though the other is smeared in something noxious. They pucker their lips into a broad duck's bill and then as quickly as possible dispense with the perfunctory greeting. Is this something they have to practice? Do they occasionally judge and head butt their friends? Being half Italian I'm used to the full lipped variety of kiss. Even form uncles which would be planted wet, bristled and slightly sour smelling on the cheek.

With the greetings over, they stand around like a group of strangers. Their occasional glances suggest they're waiting for someone. The waitress eyes me warily as she takes my empty beer glass. Writing has a way of making people feel uneasy. I guess they're worried I'm writing about them and in this case I am, but maybe I wouldn't have even said anything if it wasn't for the look. I leave some of my duck and about half the rice pay up and go. It was too much, which is a lot given my appetite.

I follow the arcade which I've been through many times before. There's the back entrance to Palác Knih, the glass booths with new pieces of art or photos, the lingerie store where the scantiest under wear is paired with the most structurally elaborate boots, the stair well which I've never been down, the guitar store where I always think of buying something, the cafe which could rent itself out as a smoke machine and the exchange bureau.

Most times I turn right and head to Hlavní Nádraží. Today, I swing left to do the block tour. There's a slight drizzle but I can't be bothered getting my umbrella out. It's only when I see that I'm passing the main head quarters for the Communist Party that I realise I've never been down here before. I had assumed it was some other street. A little further on and I'm behind the GPO. A single postal van glides through the back. It symbolises just how laid back the city is. I'm sure if I were behind the Sydney GPO, I'd have to be dodging traffic. I'm glad I'm here.

My shoelace has come undone, so I stop in the vestibule of the GPO to do it up. I was here with a friend a few months ago. She wanted to take a picture of the ceiling. A guard moved faster than his age suggested and wagged a finger at her. For the same reason, I haven't supplied one this time. But I never do.

I head down into the concourse of the station. It's like another mall down here. There's a supermarket, several newsagents, whose main purpose is to sell cheap DVDs, a small bistro, a bakery, health food store -which sells good juice and a pharmacy. Oh and one of the ubiquitous herna bars. Practically everything you need is here. If it weren't for the lack of accommodation you wouldn't have to go aboveground. Well, you wouldn't in my post-apocalyptic subterranean fantasies.

On the next block is a French deli I've been meaning to check out. I'm heading to Mladá Boleslav to visit V. and I want to take something. There isn't all that much which is French about the produce. It seems like any other deli I've been to here. But while I'm here I decide to explore the arcade a little more. Some wiry punks are playing with their dog in the centre. The arcade ends at a dilapidated and empty bar. I spin around. A hooded punk is roughing the jowls of the dog. The dogs tail is an ecstatic metronome ready to fly off at any moment.

The drizzle has become a deluge. I cower with other people for a moment under the awning of a hotel. I understand what the French mean when they say, "Il pleut des cordes." I wait for the strands of water to break up into more more manageable droplets.

My trousers are still soaked through though. I decide to cut through the shopping centre, Černá Růže. I had wanted to avoid this place because I have visited some many other shopping centres around the train station. At least there's an Arabic food store. I pick up some hummus and baba ghanoush. The shop keeper is chatty, so I here Czech with an Arabic accent. It must be just as novel to hear the language with an Australian one.

The rain has cleared almost as quickly as it started. A man raps to himself as I head out onto the mall. I have two options. I can check out this section of the station or head back up and complete the top. I decide on the latter. I wind through another arcade, through the Františkánská zahrada, which would usually be full of people slurping ice creams, but is now just another way from one soggy point to another.

I could still go to the bottom part of the station where the small bridge that gives Můstek its name is allegedly found. Instead, I head down Jungmannova. There's a deli there that specialises in game. At least I can get something for V. there. It does, however, require me to break the rules of the blog as I have to cross the street.

[Narrative interruption]

I'm back on the block with my pheasant pate, mouflon sausage and rabbit ham. V. should be satisfied with some of that. I follow Jungmannova back around to Wencelas Square. On the other side is Lucerna. Another place I know well. Since I'm here I think I may visit one of my favourite bars and get a coffee. Then I notice a sign for a store called Myšák. G. has mentioned this many times. She used to visit it with her grandmother. She has been talking about the place a lot since she heard they were reopening. I have to go and sample something.

One of the things I like about the Czech Republic is the simple yet broad range of the ice creams. You won't find chunky monkey for example, but you can get pear ice cream, which is what I order along with a scoop of peach and one of lime. The place is very first republic, flock wallpaper, curlicue wooden light fittings and waiting staff in white and black. The pear ice cream actually feels like pear, but I prefer the lime which is nice and sour. The peach is a little over powered by the other two.

Three scoops was a mistake. I feel a little bloated and would like to sit and rest, but I haven't the time. I have a bus to catch and I still have seen everything that is around the station. I do Lucerna quickly, heading back and forth across familiar stores. The upside down sculpture of Wencelas is there - check, the wine store - check, the tacky gift shop - check, the great little book store and cafe - check, the Belgian chocolatier - check.

I'm not as close to the bottom section as I had intended. I should've started at the top and worked my way down. I hurry through the crowds until I get to the bottom. I do another familiar block, where caters almost only for tourists. I cut through whta I assume is a supermarket but which turns out to be an old market place. The word tržnice is still visible above the automatic doors. So are some of the old fittings, though most are obscured by the insulation panelling. It is such a pity to waste this space on a generic food store. I know a market is just another place to buy food, but if we have to have capitalism I'd rather the bustle of a grower's market, the tactility of the produce, the noise and smells. However, given it's location, any market would become kitsch.

There's a book store around the corner I used to pass quite often but haven't been to in years. I used to stare into its curved windows and wonder if I would ever be able to understand anything inside.

At the next block, I'm even further into nostalgia. This is the very first pub where I came when I arrived. The bar tender spoke no English - one of the few in Prague -, so I at least could practice my phrasebook Czech. I had venison for the first time too. I met an English guy there one night. He spent most of the time complaining about Czech dumplings.

The final block connects to Národní třída. I could've done the two as one, but it seemed too much at the time. You know this area already, and I'm out of time and so head to the metro. I haven't found the bridge.

Vltavská

2009-05-24T02:21:00.000-07:00

The last time I was here, it was late and the air was spent of its evening energy. The people's faces were sunken and drained. Now, the air has the static charge and heaviness of a coming storm, but everyone is too much of a hurry to be allowed a moments languor.

The station leads out to an cement island of občerstenvenís. All around people are sitting on the low walls, smoking and drinking. Their ages and states of inebriation vary. They are about the only humanity among the circling access roads. Everyone else clears out as soon as they arrive. It doesn't feel that I'm close to the city centre. All cities have places like this, at once near but forgotten. There's the former East Perth or Alexandria in Sydney.

Up from here there is a knoll where people take their dogs. A gutted fridge lies on its side. A few people glance at me as I wander back and forth. All my notes are mental ones at the moment.

From here, I can see the top of cathedral. The buildings are a mix of communist era tiled offices and turn of the century apartments. Unfortunately, there's no way of having a closer look without crossing a road. I return to the platform to meet G. We're seeing a film tonight at a cinema called Bio Oko - so the station was selected for that reason.

While I'm waiting I run into a colleague from the university. In his inimitable style he rattles off some details about a training session we're attending together and then says good-bye before I can respond. I wonder if I can survive a weekend with this guy.

G. arrives a little late and she's had a bad day at work. She fills me in as we cross the cement island to the tram stop. I glance back to make sure I haven't missed anything but in this moment I've gone back to being an ordinary commuter.

Invalidovna

2009-05-13T11:05:00.000-07:00

There are some worn and peeling benches just outside. The perfect place to have my lunch. And having lunch is a good cover to do some people watching. On the bench just over from me is an old guy with pants secured far above his waste and a bright red trolley. Two metal-heads stand at my right with jackets draped imperially over one shoulder. It's a fairly humble duchy they lord over. Crooked cement slabs, a bistro, the old man and a mother trying to coax an ice-cream into her child's mouth but succeeding only in smearing on the child's face.

I wonder where the word bistro comes from. It looks Italian, but it could be a French word that has been rendered 'phonetic'. There's a hairdresser's beside this bistro, which makes it less appealing. Food and coiffure don't mix.

I get half way through the cous-cous I brought then put it away and go and do my thing. Perhaps, it's the recent illness but I don't feel inspired and Invalidovna is not a place to lack inspiration. I weave through the panelaks. They remind me of Mladá Boleslav, especially why I was happy to leave. A boy dodges the explosions which arise from his mind and exit through his mouth. And then it's quiet.

All that intrigues me here is the seemingly empty panelak in the centre of the block. Someone was living in the very bottom corner. There's a bed, a portable electric hotplate, magazines, centre-folds on the walls, table and chairs. This abandoned life is on show like any shop display in the wall length windows. I try the main door but it's locked. I don't think I have the courage to go further even if it had been open.

Slackness

2009-05-06T12:29:00.000-07:00

Sorry about recent slackness. I've had deadlines, general fatigue and now the flu.

Dejvická

2009-05-06T11:53:00.000-07:00

The station is familiar but not commonplace. The walls, the stall , the bookshop are just fleeting images as I rush to take get to the airport bus. It was the first airport I saw when I arrived, the one I see when I see people off and so it will be the last one I see if I ever leave the city for good. Today, though, Dejvická is tulips.

They are searing a scarlet and yellow ring in the centre of the traffic island. Beside me, they are imperial purple licks of paint without a royal portrait. It is the simplicity of form which attracts me to these flowers. I am not ordinarily a flower person. I don't know species, not particular breeds. The tulip has a special place. The simple cup perched on a the single slender stem is nature's most perfect moment. Though, I know, tulips have been selectively bred to look this way.

It's quiet, but not the suburban quiet of Nové Butovice. It's the quiet of city abandoned by the warm spring weather or people stifled by the heat. A girl is meditating in the park. Some guys are sharing a beer at the benches. I wander to the end. There are a row of alders and the leaves of one them are covered in crimson nodules. I wonder if this a disease or mutation. If it is, it's funny that nature would be so complementary, the crimson of the nodules is the perfect opposite of the leaves deep green. [I later find out they are in fact the larvae of some insect.]

The station is also has good examples of Czech styrofoam art. There is a perfectly sculpted TV with a tractor set inside. The piece is in almost perfect condition though it has been here for years. It must be the only TV to go unnoticed in the world. Some of the other pieces are damaged since I was here last.

I return to the platform where a new line of tourists has formed to replace the old. I'm the only person waiting on the other side. G. is expected soon. Then we're off to meet another friend and go for a walk in Divoká Šarka.

Střížkov

2009-04-10T08:37:00.000-07:00

Too clean, too new to be real...I feel reduced in size, like I'm pulling into a display model...outside and I'm back to reality...panelaks, pebbles and pigeons...the occasional blackbird...trees and shrubs decked out in spring...branches heavy with bright green buds...bushes sprayed yellow or purple...bumblebees make haphazard paths to each...groups of children well and then burst with laughter, screams, chatter...cracks arc through the side walk, traces of a dinosaur that didn't realise it was extinct...but really from countless lighter steps - and the weeds, weeds which remind me of home and weeds which I always confuse with strawberries, though they're not...a long boulevard, good in theory but the uniformity of the buildings is oppressive...a blackbird slaps a worm against the sand...it's two-thirty in the afternoon...this bird obviously never heard the old adage...it's like a suburban kingdom in here, walled in by the flats...the kids hold court...a bumblebee hovers around a motorbike...can insects be boors too?...at the edge of the block I can see Prosek, where I was in autumn, watching the trees turn the colour of the sunset...now I'm here among the green...I've been walking along a giant jigsaw puzzle piece, which I've been looking for for some time.

Depo Hostivař

2009-04-03T08:39:00.000-07:00

A month has gone missing. Last week was grey and sodden. Today the sun has burned its way through the last remnants of winter. It feels like we're in the last weeks of spring. The air is warm and dusty. You feel it on the roof of your mouth. I think I've forgotten what warmth was.

Just outside the station are a group of well dressed attractive young women. Before any of them approach me, I catch a whiff of their perfume and automatically deduce what they are: perfume sales reps. One approaches me as I stuff a newspaper and magazine in my bag. I tell her I'm not interested and after a pause add "in anything". I know she's only doing her job, but I can't abide these pushy sales people. I especially can't abide how they wait at the exit of the station like brightly coloured fragrant herons ready to stab some frog just trying to make his way home - or write about Prague Metro Stations.

I follow the path around the bus depot. It passes outside a building with OZM. I try to guess what it could mean. The best I can come up with is obecné zemědělské ministrsvto, which would mean general agricultural ministry, except the Czechs probably wouldn't call it that. (It actually stands for Opravárenská základna metra - Metro Repair Workshop. ED.) (Wait. I don't have an editor. Ed is that you? RYAN) Apart from a canteen there doesn't seem to be much else of interest and it looks like I'll have to go back past the ladies with their perfume.

Except that I was too rash. On the other side of the bus depot is another footpath and it leads on down a road. I stop to survey the train tracks - the "Driver 8" video clip and boxcar fantasies playing in my mind. Those who know me well would say I would never have done that. I would have been too scared. And it's perhaps time to accept they're right.

From here it's just the disappointment of a long straight road. Not far away, I see a building where I used to teach. That must mean the Skalka metro stop is not faraway. Up ahead is road, so I'm sure I will not reach it. I will just follow this block around. Except the road does lead in the direction of Skalka. Two stations again? It seems a bit much. In the distance I see another cross road. I follow it to the end. If it's a cul de sac, I can continue and mazbe zig-zag my way to the station. It ends in a car park, so though I decide to continue on to Skalka, what I see there will have to wait for some other time.

However, I find this remarkable building there tucked away behind renovated factories and warehouses. I just wonder if the slanted floor ever becomes tiresome.

Sorry about the mullets.

Nové Butovice --> Hůrka

2009-03-28T08:54:00.000-07:00

I always get a kick out of seeing the restricted sections of the train stations. They make me think of what is behind the scenes on film set. It fits nicely into a fear I had as a kid that life was just a TV program. The fear lasted until I was about five and school brought a new batch of worries – I also realized this was one of those things you didn't admit to. Colored perforated metal fins run along the station's ceiling, which is made from metal tiles. It accentuates the imaginary nature of the place . It's as though it will all be pulled apart and packed away in a box at any moment.

People are queuing outside the station. I don't think I can stay too long before I attract attention. I circle round once. In the distance a barren fields walls in the area. I grab a pear from the fruit stand and head to the other side of the station. I assume there will not be much to see today.

The path leads to a square from which ventilation pipes poke. On them are graffitied the names 'killer', 'bloods' and 'many'. I assume the guy meant 'money'. (It's a common spelling mistake, which I know from teaching.) Unless the person responsible thinks of himself as some type of collective. There is a crown above the name, so perhaps he refers to himself in the royal we.

The quiet is unsettling. It gives you an impression of a ghost town. A few families pass by, but there are moments when the only sounds I hear are my footsteps and the murmuring of my trouser legs as they rub against each other. It doesn't seem possible. I can see cars and people in the distance. Behind the square is a construction site. But, the noise remains distant, as though muffled by the silence. I guess I shouldn't be surprised. It is 2:30pm in the afternoon.

I continue along the path. It leads to the next train station. Around me are The buildings are different styles of buildings, some old and cake shop beiges, browns and creams, some tall and licorice all-sort pastels, thers modern highest quality German steel grey. Across from here is a panelak, which looks like a faded and dirty work by Mondrian. I pass some high glass arches and through them see the train station Hůrka. Nové Butovice is still visible in the distance.

The name Hůrka, reminds me of a police officer, Sergent Hůrka. He would be overweight with floury white skin, and folds under his large long-suffering eyes. His rank doesn't mean much. He's happy not to have the responsibility or the compromise.

From Hůrka, the train tunnel appears out from the ground. A great metallic worm making a dash from one side to the other, but caught and pinned on the cement pylons. If I follow the worm I will be able get to the next station Lužiny.

The worm passes over a park with small lake. It's noisier here. Mostly kids' and dogs' names and the occasional siren. A Great Dane passes me. Its shoulder come up to my up waist. It ambles passed with the clumsy gait of all large dogs. Its head seems too large for it to control. The other dogs keep away.

The park becomes an open field on the other side of the worm. A dirt track has been worn through the grass. An old man and his grand daughter don't stick to it. This is the first time I've seen this here. People are usually careful not to walk on the grass. I can still hear sirens and a child releasing a gurgling cry. I kestrel screeches and I see it alight with tentative claws on a winter stripped branch. It expertly sheaths its wings while it surveys its hunting grounds from the perch.

Sgt. Hůrka wonders how the girl went missing. Not that there is anything to work out. He knows what happened. It's just he likes to punish himself by going over it.

The girl was bundled into a car. The people had grown used to ignoring screams – that was other people's business. Or it scattered them like pigeons. Someone claims they saw two Roma guys nearby. They could've been Roma the witness said after the second questioning. Everyone at the station knows they didn't do it. The description given were too generic. As soon as Hůrka heard them he imagined a sketch on the front of a newspaper. Plus the times didn't match. The witness said he saw them speaking to the girl at two when she was still at school. Funny the little details people don't think to check when making something up. A younger cop said that they should pin it on them any way. The station chief rubbed his lined head and said that they didn't even have the funds to scapegoat people. So, they would keep asking people questions, while the girl was already over two borders and somewhere where cops came even cheaper, along with guns and cameras and whatever else you needed.

After the first few days, when despite the training and experiences, cases like this still found the soft places under the armour, Hůrka after his second beer, and too tired to deny the truth, said that what they should do is get a list of every film studio, every film distributor and basically shut them down until they got some names. Hůrka was moved to another case the next day. He had only said this to one of the younger officers.

It didn't even happen in this park. But it was similar. Coming here won't bring him any closer to the answers. It just reminds Hůrka that he is no stronger than any other person. He looks up when the sirens whines past and like everyone else he wonders what could've happened.

I return to the worm and follow it up the embankment. The ground is soft and almost sucks the shoes from my feet. There's a cement path at the top which leads to the courtyard of a grey panelak. All around are old faded signs. I find it comforting, somehow more comforting because it's real. Up from the panelak I see the entrance to Lužiny. Unfortunately a road blocks my path. The entrance is only 150m away.

I return along the worm. When I reach the lake again I realise that I'm going around the lake clock-wise. I went around the lake clockwise earlier too. Two kids run past. One stops suddenly and calls out to the other that she's feeling sick. I assume she's got a stitch because she starts to wretch. Stitches are something I associate with childhood too.

Lt. Hůrka goes around in an anticlockwise direction. He's right-handed and he's never thought about which direction he heads. Right now he's thinking about his own daughter, and as soon as he thinks of her he thinks of all the things he disapproves of, her boyfriend, her studies, her music.

I cross the square down from Hůrka train station to another square. It is connected to the first square by a bridge and there is a small doorway at the entrance. I assume that the square had once been a church and this was from the original structure – or they wanted to suggest the original structure. It's like walking through an unfinished sketch. In the centre is a gazebo which resembles a basilica. Inside are painted ceramic reliefs. The images are all non-religious. A fox, a lamb, a crown, a tulip.

I cross the bridge back to the original square, where there is sea blue building which suitably resembles a submarine tower. There's a bell and intersecting pipes at the top. Only when I read the sign that I realise it's a church, Kostel sv. Prokopa. The intersecting pipes are a cross. Perhaps, the resemblance to a submarine was intentional as though they felt religion was a resurfacing.

Before heading up to Hůrka train station, I scan the are one last time. Lt. Hůrka is heading home to one of those perfect identical squares. He's opening a beer and waiting for his wife to come home so they can watch Star Dance.

Guy with the Pig Returns

2009-03-25T15:11:00.000-07:00

I was pleased to see the guy with the pig outside my office today in Budějovická. The pig isn't some domesticated variety but a tame wild boar, though smaller. The pig was relieving itself in among the hedges by the road side, so I didn't take a picture.

Budějovická

2009-03-19T10:52:00.000-07:00

I have the song "Living End" by the Jesus and Mary Chain in my head as I circle the hospital. At some point, it becomes their song from the Crow soundtrack, and I step in a puddle of icy water. Surprisingly, it snowed this morning. Most of it has melted by now. My shoes are water-proof, but they are low-cut, so while the water doesn't soak into the leather, it does dribble inside.

I return to the front of the hospital where I hope to see the guy with the pig. I saw him a few months ago on my way from work - I work near the station. A colleague said that there were quite a few clips of the guy with the pig on You Tube. He's not here today, though.

The guy with the pig is as you've guessed a guy who owns a pig, which he's known to walk in the vicinity of Budějovická. The one time I saw him, he seemed to be having some difficulty controlling the creature. To get it to go in the direction he wanted - or rather just to prevent it from going where he didn't want it to - he would stand, legs tight together, to block the pig's path. The pig would then scamper in another direction and he would run to ensure it didn't continue to far in the wrong way or worse, run out onto the street.

He's not going to appear any time soon, so I head underground. As I do, the guy who sells honey everyday at the top of escalator, says something to me which I don't catch. He seems to be speaking to me. It could be that he recognises me since I'm here twice a week.

To me, Budějovická feels like a city in a city - a collection of glass steel hives, with tunnels connecting them, and the almost endless flow of people. The main square is a depression, which only adds to the insularity. I often wonder if this was intentional or if they couldn't be bothered filling in the hole.

I'm looking down into it but then notice a phone shop and since I need to get a new one, I head inside. There a young people outside dressed as doctors handing out flyers. I tell them I'm going inside anyway. A woman inside, also in doctor get-up, offers me a gift. It's a badge advertising some service of theirs. How generous of them!

Though I know nothing about phones, I stoop over each one, deep in thought. This is to prevent any unwanted attention from the woman in the medical coat. When I get to the end of the line of products, I take a brochure, and also make a play of studying it. No one bothers me. They must be the most apathetic bunch of sales assistants I've encountered. Thank goodness!

I continue to study the brochure over lunch, which is filling but not great. The main reason I'm taking this seriously is that I'm considering getting the Internet with my phone. It will be quite useful for work. My current habit of buying second hand phones maybe a false economy.

Once I've finished lunch I go back to see if I can see the guy with the pig. He still hasn't made an appearance. Only the spring sky from yesterday has returned. I enjoy it for a moment then head off to get a coffee.

Křižíkova

2009-03-18T12:18:00.000-07:00

This doesn't feel like Prague. Maybe it's the display of bongs in the shop window as I step out onto the small square. This feeling stays with me as I walk away. It could be the preponderance of Italian themed establishments. But none of it looks like Italy. Not even a little Italy.

A few doors down from these renovated places is an empty shell of a place. The floor boards have been ripped up to reveal the capacious cellar and pitch black tunnels underneath. Wouldn't that just be the perfect place to explore? But there are bars on the windows and no way in, so I peer inside one last time and continue.

It could be the light that lends the place this different character. I started this blog in autumn, so the days were shortening. My most recent trips have been mostly in darkness. Today, the remnants of a clear spring day linger above, suffusing the streets with crisp light. Friends have said to me that Prague makes more sense in the winter - and I certainly have that association. I guess we're all guilty of that Europe = cold generalisation. Then again I prefer Sydney in the winter too. I feel more secure under clouds.

At the corner of the first block there is quite a large cathedral. The entrance reminds me a little of Notre Dame with the three smooth arches and statues lining the top. Or is my memory playing tricks on me. I don't stay to ponder this for too long. I guy gives me a look as if to say, 'tourist'. I don't know the implications. It's enough to make me move on.

Around the corner there is a second hand store. In fact there are a few on this block. All most all second hand stores in the Czech Republic display the union jack, and most claim to stock English fashion. I was confused by this as first as I wasn't sure there existed any major English fashion labels. A student explained it to me that these stores buy the second hand clothes in Britain then sell them on here. So in fact it is second hand British clothing. Don't ask me what Czechs do with their old clothes? Stockpile them in their cottages perhaps.

There is also a second hand book store. It's in a courtyard in fact that's its name Antikvariát ve dvoře = Second hand book store in the Court Yard. It's near closing here. I go over to a stature of man on a bed, on which books are piled and take a picture.

I wonder if it's the boulevards which make this place feel so different. Prague isn't short of wide streets, but I do have a strong association with claustrophobia - yes, yes, too much Kafka. There's something about the place.

As is often the case when I do this, I buy something to eat. It's not that I'm a glutton, not much, it's just that the time coincides with dinner. I need a snack and so go to the bakery back at the station. One thing I've noticed is that most metro stops here have one.

I order two doughnuts but stop as I catch myself about to say "Dvakrát koblihy" (twice doughnuts) when the correct way should be "Dvakrát koblihu" (twice doughnut. I manage "dvakrát", stammer and the woman adds "kobliha" then stops speaking to me entirely. She doesn't even tell me the price. When I say goodbye she carries on speaking with the next customer. This is even rude by Prague standards.

It is around the second block that I realise I'm going in a clock-wise direction. There was no reason for this. There was no obstruction which forced me to do so. At the exit I could go either way. I mentally retrace my steps back to the metro and realise that I headed to my right. I only realise this because though I'm following the block I suddenly feel lost. For some reason, I'm sure I should cross the road, but apart from the rule that says I shouldn't, there's no logical need. As certain as I am that I must cross I continue. Once again retracing the journey in my head.

And I still can't work out why this place feels so different. Back at the square I spend sometime looking at the small goods shop. Partly it's from my love of salami. Partly,it's because the rows of salamis and the racks of wine are close to how I imagined Prague to be when in fact the small goods stores can sometimes appear quite surgical. Perhaps that's the source of the feeling - finding a place that has conformed more closely to my former expectations.

I'm startled away from the window by something large and black moving beside me. It's a man carrying a double bass on his back in a black case. He's dressed in black. He stopped for a moment to speak to someone but now waddles off like some great beetle.

Karlovo Náměstí

2009-03-09T12:01:00.000-07:00

I was here on Friday by chance. Though I had decided not to do a post, I realised that I didn't have a ticket and got off here to get one. Since I was there, I considered having a walk around, but I was still suffering from the aforementioned commitments and decided to go straight home.

So I'm back. It might not be the best way to randomly chose a station - but the whole system has been random thus far, changing with each post. The first block I headed to was the one I was looking forward to the least. [It was only after that I realised I left the station in a counter-clockwise direction but continued in clockwise fashion once aboveground.] On the block is yet another shopping centre. All it offers is a little warmth. The arcade a couple of doors down is more my style: rounded shop windows, small tiles on the floor, a cukrána, sock shops and florists, among others - none of which are usurped by the architecture or lighting. I'd like to return.

On the other side of passage is a bakery crammed with food and people. I grab a couple of koblihas, Czech doughnuts, and head back outside. A rude blast of cold air bellows up the street. As soon as it's made its entrance, the sleet follows. Today, I cam prepared. We had sleet this morning, so I made sure to pack my umbrella.

You know what I miss most about home? The rain. It's not what people associate with Australia, least of all Perth. The picture postcard sunshine - the bone drying reality of the heat - but when it rains, it's rarely in half-measures. It isn't the spit of a disapproving crowd, which covers me now. It isn't sky sweat. It falls in ribbons; coils in pools; beats windows and roofs. That's if it rains.

The wind has all its teeth bared but I don§t mind and stop at the corner to look at the golden orbs atop the tower of the New Town Townhouse. They shine defiantly against the grey. People are running = partly for safety, but from the smiles on their faces, I'd also say to remember a younger time.

Icy flecks cling to my jacket like overlooked dandruff. I can't tell if that is a mother and daughter coming toward me - or two sisters. The younger of the two grips the older ones hand so trustingly. I come to the end of the path and turn around.

The rain and sleet clear when I get to the other side. I carry the umbrella like some drowned raven, which I feel compelled to bury. (I didn't drown it.) There is one thing I know here. It's the great mud grey tree near the centre, split in two to reveal its blackened middle. The tree is a historical landmark, literally a memorial tree (památný strom). I like that a tree can be part of the cultural landscape as much as the natural. Individual trees are at times mentioned on maps. They are monuments along with the chapels and castle ruins. Maybe, it goes against nature that we preserve those things.

I call G. to find out the significance of the tree. It's been a while since she's made an appearance in the blog. Not that she minds. I can't reach her. We've been playing phone tag all day. I flip my phone closed and continue to wonder what the significance of the tree is. Perhaps someone was crowned there - or killed. I head to other side of the square to see the orbs one more time.

While passing back through the station, I remember the layout above to determine which exit I need. It's then that I become aware of the road above. It seems to me that the plastic ceiling strips are all that support traffic. I wonder if they will hold and hurry out.

I've never been to the second side of the square before, so I've never appreciated its size. It's still hard to imagine that this is the biggest square in the Czech Republic. It's twice the size of Wencelas Square. Wencelas is noticeably longer, 172m longer in fact. But Karlovo Náměstí is over twice as wide, 130m versus 60m. The roads have diminished its scale. There are more dogs over here.

While walking around [Yes, in a counter-clockwise direction] I find some graffiti on a bench. When I get around to translating it it seems to be about a woman (in Czech it's possible to tell from the inflection of the past tense) who has had a shoe stolen. I won't bother transcribing it. Instead I head back to the arcade and to the cukrárna for a Turkish coffee. When I sit down, I madly search my bag for my pen. I think it's fallen through the hole in my bag until I realise it is wedged at the bottom of my pocket. Now I can start writing.

Apologies for the Inconvenience

2009-03-07T02:20:00.001-08:00

Due to commitments professional and social, I won't be doing a regular post today. Please, try again Monday evening(GMT).

If you're a newcomer, feel free to check out the older posts. The invitation for others to submit their experiences of Prague metro stops still stands. Send anecdotes, stories, photos, sketches and or poems to closely_observed@hotmail.com. I'll put up what I like.

In the meantime, please enjoy this new project I'm doing with my good friends Tim and Vanessa.

Smíchovské nádraží

2009-02-28T02:58:00.000-08:00

It starts to rain as soon as I get to the station - a light spring rain. This feeling is emphasized by the unseasonal warmth and the urban humidity. I don't have as much time today because I'm going to the cinema. It's a pity because Smíchovské nádraží proves to have a lot more to explore than I first thought.

My first mission is to find an ATM. I figure that way I won't have to leave so early. Though the concourse is filled with shops, there isn't a dispenser, so I give up and decide to follow the sign to the second hand bookstore. I can't say that my Czech is so good that I can freely browse, but I might find something to add to the 'I will read this when my Czech is better pile'. It's already getting a little large.

The store is crammed into a space usually reserved for občerstvenís. It's not so much a shop as a great disorderly stack of books, which the shop owner has borrowed into, making just enough space for his desk and one customer at a time. There is a copy of de Sade in Czech and just above it a Rod Stewart album. The rest are unfamiliar English authors in translation and some textbooks. I continue around the building. I consider taking the bridge but decide to go to the park.

This area is probably what some people think of when they want the 'authentic' experience of Prague, dilapidated turn-of-the-century blocks, lines of pubs, few tourists. Only one building has been renovated and it is literally tarted up with hot pink window frames and a blushing rouge paint job. A man passes me speaking into his mobile phone. He gesticulates as though his interlocutor were there in front of him. If I continue down this foot path I will get to Anděl and I would like to see more of the station.

As I pass again through the park, I notice some people speaking behind me. It's a group of four guys in hip-hop gear. I quicken my pace a bit. I'm not proud of this, nor am I proud to admit it. I don't want to give further credence to the already pervasive mistrust out there. But it is how I react, and this reaction leads me away from the bridge I wanted to cross and back to the station. I had a knife pulled on me on a bridge in East Perth. That memory is all that's going through my mind. My steps flash underneath me. I don't slow down until I'm back at the station and I see that the guys had stopped long ago to chat.

From this side I can go down to the metro platform. Around the corner, I find an ATM hidden behind a station controller's office. At least now I can see more of the station. I even have time to go and check out the platforms - but first I'm going to head back to the bridge. I can't exactly admit to the guys that I thought they were going to rob me, but at least I don't have to behave like a total fool.

The bridge leads to a sparsely developed part of Prague. There are blocks and flats, but behind them the land is bunched up into smooth hills. On top of one is a house a friend once pointed out when we were on the other side of the river, looking down from Vyšehrad. He said that no one knows what the house is for, but when a student of his tried to walk up the hill he was turned away. It is possible to make out radar dishes at the front - though that could just mean the occupants have good TV reception and don't welcome trespassers. I could walk to Anděl from here too, but there's something I want to see.

I've taken trains from here a few times. Almost as soon as you leave the station you see two sculptures of cars, which look as though they have been molded from resin and then pinned with giant stakes to the factory wall and left to dry, so that their bodies are now stretched. Unfortunately, through all the overhead wires the two forms only resemble red blobs among the grey brown walls. And I've got to go if I'm going to make my movie.

Náměstí Míru

2009-02-18T22:39:00.000-08:00

An early post and I'm not exactly at the station either: I'm in a café across from the square. I'm not going to be here on Friday and since I had to pick up a book and meet some friends in the area, I thought I'd do my post.

In case you're wondering, the book is a collection of Isaac Asimov short stories. Lately, I've found myself returning to the interests of my youth: sci-fi, comics, the Cure. I guess it has something to do with being over thirty. I'm meant to be going to a cocktail bar with my friends. I haven't had a cocktail in about six years.

Outside the café is a wonderful winter urban scene. People shuffle in their coats, or run for the trams. A guy is getting a hot dog (párek v rohlíku) from the občerstvení. The statue of the small girl reaching for a dove glistens softly. It looks as if she was suddenly frozen while playing. Above, the cathedral sits pompously. There's a crust of fresh snow protecting the ground.

Because the days are now longer, the scene is suffused with a blue grey light. Perhaps this is what lends the view its levity. I'm ashamed to say that I've never adapted to the shorter winter days. I understand the physiological explanation. But when I was young I loved the night. I always felt more active, more alive. Insomnia was just another word for a reversed sleeping pattern. Here, I've found I actually crave sunlight. I know, physiology you say again.

I'm only a block away from I.P. Pavlova, named after Ivan Petrovich Pavlov, he of the famous dogs. Náměstí Míru, meaning Peace Square, has the same inner city atmosphere, but the distinctions I mentioned in my last post are born out here. It's as if the classes have followed the metro line as it borrows underneath. Beyond the square, a variety of rather swish looking restaurants glow invitingly. That, of course, is a superficial impression. The food could be rubbish.

Jesus, I just had a shock. A man leant his skis against the window. The skis are in a bright yellow carry case with a draw string opening. It is a little too long for the skis. I thought someone was dragging an amputated arm across the window, the yellow sleeve dangling loose.

Not only was I wrong about the arm. I'm wrong about the owner of the skis. It's in fact a young girl. I can now see as she boards a tram.

I.P. Pavlova

2009-02-14T01:43:00.000-08:00

This is even more random than usual. I had meant to go to Nové Butovice, but since I don't have enough time before work, I'm getting out here. Yeah, this is another morning post and I.P. Pavlova is the closest station to where I realise how much time I've got to write it.

I wasn't sure about doing this place. I didn't think I'd be able to do justice to its vibe and bustle. Like Anděl, it has a down town feel. At the same time, it looks a bit more upmarket. The buildings are more gentrified, the people have that young professional sense of purpose; there's a hip record store around the corner and a place called "u Džoudého" literally "at Jodie's" where people can seek succour in a variety of brass trinkets, incense sticks and meditation CDs. Anděl might have the Smíchov shopping centre. But off the main drag, its working class blocks back.

No wonder an American friend of mine chooses to live near Ípák (Ee-park), as Praguers call this station. It suits his night-owl life style. There's a late night café around the corner, and if he needs to take his dog for a walk, he's not short of sights and scenes in the wee hours. This morning it's no less sedate, maybe just a bit more commonplace.

This is probably a good as time as any to mention my observation about class and the Czech metro, something else I've been postponing. [*********WARNING GENERALISATION ALERT*********] It struck me from the moment I arrived in the Czech Republic, and while there are exceptions, the three lines A, B and C seem to service the suburbs of the upper class, working class and middle class respectively. This is no surprise as social classes do tend to congregate in certain suburbs. With a freer property market, it's expected the wealthy will choose the leafy picturesque historical centre while the incomes of the working people are going to limit them to the rent controlled panleláks on the periphery. The train stations don't impose this divide. What's noticeable is the way the metro stations and the trains reflect this, especially strange since most of the stations were built under communism, when the country was meant to be 'classless'.

As I've mentioned in a previous post, that the A line stations are the most aesthetically pleasing with their oft-photographed dimpled anodized panels. I've never seen anyone take a photo the stations on line B. Moreover, until recently, line B has always had the older trains, Line A the newer ones and Line C a mixture, though with more newer ones. Line C also has the greatest number of shopping centres which is something I associate more with middle-class and suburban living, though I assume their presence is more due to the wealth in their surroundings than some town planners scheme to segregate the city.

There are exceptions to the class character. The opulent cathedral of spending at Náměstí Míru, which is found on line B, seems to be aimed at the wealthy. Florenc on line B and C is not far from the working class area of Žižkov. Skalka on line A is indistinguishable from other suburbs. Despite these examples, the stations do generally have these characteristics, something I reflect on as I turn the corner, the domes of the National Museum poking over the top. A block away was the scene of the Prague Uprising. I hope to get there one of these weeks.

Derailment

2009-02-07T04:24:00.001-08:00

Just a couple of things. Firstly, I was wrong about the factory in my Kolbenova post. What I thought was factory is in fact a flea market. Prague's biggest no less. I wish it had been open when I arrived.

Regarding the delay of posts, I think this will be a permanent. Though I visit the stations on Friday, other commitments mean that I don't have time until Saturday. If you are a regular reader, check Saturdays.

Hradčanská

2009-02-07T03:36:00.000-08:00

Just above the station, stuck to the charmless faux-marble façade of the office block, are four Styrofoam sculptures. Here as in other parts of Prague, the local municipality has left them. Maybe they like them as much as I do.

The stateliness of the area strikes you immediately. The Spanish embassy is across the road. There's a Japanese Restaurant up ahead. The homes have angled balconies and reliefs of cherubs and grapes. People are walking dogs. Whether large or small they convey the leisurely lives of their owners - these are people who have time to indulge such demanding pets. Unless of course, all these people are professional dog-walkers.

The houses are a mix of the renovated and run-down. On one ground floor is a vast open plan architectural office filled with people whose laid-back poses are belied by their wide-eyed expressions. It's Friday afternoon after all. A couple of doors up there's a winter garden crammed with old broken furniture. The window frames are split and peeling. I wish I could live there.

On a street lamp is a poster for a Roma music night. It's in English which is not entirely surprising. It is not only because of the pervasiveness of the language. The evening is probably aimed more at the tourists. Czechs are quite well-known for their prejudice against Roma people.

As I get to the end of the block, a couple of police officers arrive to speak with a man, who until this point has been chatting to a barman from the corner pub. The matter is probably trivial but that they arrived in a large police van seems excessive. Unfortunately, the menu on the pub is too far away for me to eavesdrop so I keep heading round the block and wonder what it was about.

Surprisingly,I find a traditional Chinese medicine store. Not that I've been looking, but they are so common back home, it is only seeing this that made me realise how uncommon they are here. The sign is in Czech, so it's not for the expats. This shouldn't be so surprising. I would say that Czech people have the same fascination and misconception of Asian cultures as most Europeans.

At the very end of the block is a typical, though thankfully not traditional,Czech pub. They have Lobkowicz on tap a beer I've wanted to try since I taught someone whose claim to fame was that he once worked for the house of Lobkowicz when they returned to the Czech Republic.

I've lived here for a while and I've visited many pubs and consumed enough beer to drown any number of large mammals, but I've never attempted a review of a beer. So if you will please indulge me just this once...

"The Lobkowicz lager, 11 degrees, has a malty taste with a slight honey finish. It's not as crisp as a Pilsener Urquell nor as sweet and effervescent as a Budvar. (I mean the Czech Budvar.) However, the sugar content is enough that it leaves a sour after-taste which detracts from the initial pleasure. I don't think I'll be going out of my way to have one again."

...I know what you're thinking. I should just stick to drinking the stuff.

Národní Třída

2009-01-31T02:56:00.000-08:00

This station is deep. One of the deepest in the Prague Metro System. During the Prague floods of 2002, it was submerged. But I never have that sense of going underwater when entering. Just a sense of vertigo on the long steep escalators when I leave.

When I first came to this station a little over five years ago, the few Russian words I learnt in history came in useful. I remembered the 'narodniks' were the populists in the nineteenth century Russia. Seeing as there was also a 'narodní divadlo', it was easy to surmise that the word meant 'national'. It was my second day on the mean streets of Prague and I was already learning.

It would be wrong to assume that cognates can always help. This confusion was exploited in the movie Kolja, by Jan Svěrák. In the film, the boy, Kolja, points to the Soviet flag and says 'Ours is red.' The Russian for 'red' sounds exactly like the Czech for 'beautiful'. Zdeněk Svěrák's character assumes Kolja is commenting on the aesthetics of the two flags and promptly chastises him, telling him that the Soviet flag is red like a pair of underpants.

I buy a blueberry pancake and and Turkish coffee. While I'm eating at the counter beside the stall, the woman who served me continues to chat with the store owner from the adjacent stall. They speak in Russian. Their half-intelligible words remove me from this place, and I can delight in the incomprehensibility and just enjoy the sounds.

In the summer there are fruit and veg stalls here, at least as far as I remember. The wasps buzz from the split weeping fruit and dive-bomb any unguarded drinks. Today, it's just the buzz of the commuters and shoppers. There is a shopping centre here too. They have display for Valentine's Day with love hearts that read 'Miluji tě'. I'm not going in. I think I've covered that topic enough.

A man joins me at the counter. He has a lunch time beer. He notices me writing and so turns away. He finishes his beer in a second mouthful and he walks off. There's a couple at the end of the counter chatting and smoking strong foul smelling cigarettes. The man tells someone on his mobile telephone that they are at Naměstí Míru. The woman he's with corrects him and says that they are at 'Národní třída'.

A family arrive at the pancake stand. The two women stop chatting. The second goes back to her stall. The little girl wants a strawberry pancake. The lanky teenage son wants a cola. The cold has made my Turkish coffee drinkable.

It's not the Turkish coffee I know from home. It's not prepared in a small pot held gingerly over a flame. It's ground coffee, over which boiling water has been poured. It's better than instant. The trick is to wait until the mound of granules on the top has settled. But you always get a few grains in your mouth.

Kolbenova

2009-01-23T10:12:00.000-08:00

Sometimes this place gets to me - the unfriendly commuters crammed around me, the faux-American teens squawking and chirping, the indifference, the insularity, the parochialism, the fact that this is just like anywhere else. Perhaps it's the cold I've had since Opatov. All week I've waited for this moment to climb into my looking glass which protects as much as it reveals. But Kolbenova was, perhaps, not the best place to take it.

The platform is decked out in blue acrylic panels favoured by a second rate installation artist. The upper concourse would be his/her aluminium period. The front completes the conceptual art motif. The name KOLBENOVA is stencilled on the glass like a text based art piece where some word has outgrown its referent and means only itself. KOLBENOVA - I imagine some solitary misunderstood woman. A woman who struggled and the more she struggled the more she resented until she just turned away from the world and denied it her gifts.

But the station doesn't offer as much as the name. Across the road is a factory rimmed by a covered walkway which connects to an overpass leading to the factory's extension behind the station. But I can't go inside. The only place I can go is a supermarket.

I feel in need of some spontaneity. A concert maybe, or an exhibition so something. But the most daring act I'm capable of today is to splurge on some anchovies, duck-liver pate and sun-dried tomatoes to go with the wine I plan to drink while listening to Mingus.

Sometimes Prague can surprise me. Sometimes it can have me in awe. Then there are days like today when it just crowds around me.

Ládví

2009-01-16T14:57:00.000-08:00

The air is damp and heavy. All around it smells like yeast and the snow looks like mashed potato left to congeal overnight. At least it's warm enough for me to walk around.

First of all, I'm going to return my library book. On the way, I pass a poster for Karel Plíhal. I need to look into getting tickets.

The library is shut when I arrive. I've only got myself to blame. If I hadn't gone to the wrong platform at Staroměstská I wouldn't have headed in the wrong direction. I would've just made it. I guess even experience with the metro system doesn't prevent these bouts of confusion.

I'm a little disappointed because I wanted to write about the Ďáblice branch. I was there before Christmas and it reminded me of the suburban libraries from home. New thin legged shelves housing an eclectic mix of classics, airport fodder and rarities. I'm not even able to negotiate with the librarian to let me return the book. I'll have to come back next week.

So instead of the library, there are shops. Lots of shops, bakeries, newsagents, a clothes shop, supermarket and the Czech equivalent of a two-dollar store. There's also a cinema and the ubiquitous herna bars. I opt for the two-dollar store. Except here, they are 39Kč stores, which is a bit more than two US dollars and about $3.50 AUD, though the latter rate may change by the end of the week.

I set myself a task. I'm going to buy the coolest and simultaneously most useless item I can find for 39Kč. When I go in, I observe the custom of always taking a basket and start down the aisles. I'm not the only man here. However, I am the only man under sixty.

The first aisle is stocked with rag-in-waiting brightly coloured clothing, so I don't linger long. Fluorescent undies are useless, but not all that cool. The next aisle shows some potential. There are penguin shaped picture hooks, balls of yarn and novelty safety scissors to name a few. I inspecta packet of scissors in my hand then put it back. A shop keeper eyes me suspiciously.

The back of the store is full of knick knacks and toys. There are some serious contenders here. Sad-eyed statues of dogs, each with a concave back. I can't work out what's meant to fit there. Below them, I find tiny wooden houses with a nylon loop at the top. Christmas decorations? Bird feeders? They have a wind-up dinosaur and I do like toy dinosaurs. But it seems to soon to put it in the basket.

The third aisle is footwear. And not all of it is 39Kč. Not even the slippers. I need new house slippers (We follow the Czech custom of removing shoes at home.), but I did say it should be useless. And they are 59Kč. Stuff it. I've been meaning to buy them for a while and I'll probably forget. In they go.

There's nothing else here, so I head to the last section, which at first is just rows of shampoos and cleaning products. I'm mistaken, there are small Chinese dragon statues, and salt and pepper shakers, oil pots and then I see it. And as soon as I see it, I know it has to be mine. This is to be my purchase.

It's obviously cool and undeniably useless. A soft boiled egg requires three minutes to cook properly. This timer only goes up to a minute. What's more, the egg design is in keeping with my chicken shaped egg cup I got in Leipzig.

As I pay I succumb to my second non-39Kč purchase. They have hip flasks for half the price I've seen elsewhere. And these ones aren't emblazoned with the logo of some distillery, so I grab one too. Quite a successful trip all round.

Opatov

2009-01-09T08:05:00.000-08:00

Even more of the landscape has been rubbed out by the snow. The fields on both sides of the station are plain white sheets, except for the cigarette butts and other city detritus.

One of the things I love about snow is - when there's enough of it - that the built environment becomes blurred. The edges between the natural and artificial are not so distinct. Cars can't just glide over the top. Bins and benches become tiered mounds. Stairs meld into the slopes. Everything is subsumed in landscape.

The other thing I enjoy, and the two kids out on the field are getting into this already, is that the world becomes a vast playground. Slopes are for tobogganing. Snowball fights can break out anywhere. You can sculpt or just throw yourself down and make a snow angel.

The field is fringed by feathery frosty trees or branches of bony white ice or what can only be described as chandeliers for an apocalyptic ball. Only the cars mark where the field ends. A woman asks if this is where she can catch a bus from. I tell her she has to go to the flyover. She remains convinced that I don't know.

I shouldn't be out here. I'm on to my third cold for the winter. I have a little heartburn from all the juice and anti-flu pills I've been knocking back. At least, I don't feel sleepy. But I could do with somewhere warm and so head back to the restaurant between the platform and the flyover. It's all windows, so it will be a good place to people-watch.

It's the usual mix of students, office workers, retirees and people ready for the weekend. The restaurant itself is quiet. I slurp down my salty gulášová and try to casually take notes . A large skin-head type glances over at me a few times. When he's done he places his dishes on the trolley provided and leaves.

On the other side of the restaurant is a large fibreglass croissant which looks more like some giant jaundiced insect larva. I decide to get a small donut to go with my coffee instead. Apart from the sickly grub, there are posters advertising the different foods here.

Perhaps, I'm missing something but most of them seem either quite prosaic, e.g the ad for a hot dog reads 'Vezmi si něco na cestu...'(Take something for the trip...). Otherwise, they are a little didactic like this one for salad: Každá spálená energie se musí dobít (All spent energy must be replenished.) The only attempt at a pun is ...oslaď si život (...sweeten up your life) which advertises a cinnamon swirl.

This quite dry approach I find surprising as the Czech slogan for their EU presidency is "Evropě to osládíme" which literally means "We will sweeten Europe." Innocent enough, but the actual meaning is more like "We will give Europe a taste of its own medicine" or "Europe will get its just desserts". Witty but it doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

Normal Services...

2009-01-05T12:23:00.000-08:00

will resume on Friday 9th of January. In the meantime, please enjoy this fine musical selection.

Public Service Announcement

2008-12-24T01:45:00.000-08:00

First of all I would like to thank the following people for linking or plugging me on their blogs and web pages:

Tim at swim/swam
Vanessa, queen of Vanessa Berry World
Jason and Chelsey at Our Prague Blog
Dan from the eponymous Dan Music
All the people behind Prague City Beat
and last of all, The Dashing Fellows for inviting me on board.

And an absolute final thanks to anyone who has offered encouragement and advice. You've made this project feel less lonely.

But most of all, you've allowed this prima donna live out his award acceptance fantasy. Thank you.

P.S. Please stay behind the white safety line.

Anděl

2008-12-21T00:48:00.000-08:00

I have a strong connection between this place and Christmas ever since I saw the film “Anděl Exit”. In one of the opening scenes (if memory serves me correct), people are lining up to buy carp – the traditional Czech Christmas food. The carp vendors are gutting, skinning and beheading the fish on the street, discarding the still gasping heads in the gutter for a few dogs to tear at.

The reality, at least today, is less grotesquely fanciful. The carp vendors keep a respectful distance from the Christmas market set up on the block, and any fish remains seem to be neatly disposed of. The carp dwell at the bottom of the storage pools. A former student told me carp instinctively remain low in the winter, because this is the warmest place in a pond. But, I can't help but imagine they know their fate and so try to keep out of reach. One carp is even trying to wedge its way through the other fish, its head stuck between the other bodies, tail thrashing but unable to drive itself deeper.

For those who've never tried carp. It's not nearly as disgusting as you might imagine. Admittedly, the dark meat should be avoided, but the white meat is tasty. Some people complain that it is too fishy, but as I'm a lover of fish and seafood, I like the taste. The only problem are the many bones, which means a meal of carp is one of the few occasions when sticking your fingers in your mouth is acceptable.

Most people coat the carp in breadcrumbs and fry it but there are other ways. An even better way is to bake the fish with vegetables. A spicier recipe is a traditional Hungarian soup, which I tried to make once, but which I don't think I got quite right. And just today I learnt from a student a new recipe. It's from the region known as Chodsko. There, they eat black carp, which is carp prepared in plums. I'm curious to try it.

It's probably easy to disparage the markets, a seasonal knee-jerk reaction along with the other emotions, good and bad, people burden themselves with. There is also the sense that among my circle – or the people identify with, the educated, literate, well-traveled, Christmas with its once a year goodwill is an easy target. Perhaps the real challenge is to find something of value.

But some things are just inherently tacky. It's not the commercialism. This is a market after all. It's the junk that people seem to think they can pass off just because they are selling it from a quaint wooden stall. There are clunky cheap toy trucks, lots of kitschy ceramic and woolen hats only tourists and little kids wear. I consider buying some mulled wine, but I had a couple of glasses of decent wine earlier and I don't want to spoil it.

Anděl is Prague's real downtown for me. It is brimming with the bustle of everyday life. The shops are narrow and compact. Not everything has been given over to expensive cafés and restaurants. The people aren't just passing through. Many colleagues, students and friends have grown up around here. It's a place that has retained the cacophony of diversity. Quite often I come here if I have some free time.

It's one of the few places in Prague I know well. The school, where I first started teaching, has its head office here, so I've seen the changes over the five years. The butcher shop where I first stammered my way through Czech is gone. The restaurants seem to change every couple of months, getting progressively brighter, newer, as though the whole place is slowly being polished.

Around the corner, I find a second hand bookstore I've never seen before. The interior is a strange contrast of shiny new shelves and old books. The owner is a fussy old man, who answers everyone's questions with careful deliberation.

There are sections dedicated to the more well known Czech orders. A whole shelf of Hašek, another of Čapek. I scan the titles and serendipitously find a copy of Apocryphal Tales in Czech. I was given a copy in English this morning as a gift. Now I can compare the two versions. The fussy store owner is trying to convince the man in front to take a plastic sleeve for his purchase. When it comes to me, I tell him just the book and hand him the eighty crowns. He comments that I have the exact change.

I return to the market but find busy pace too much now and so head for the train. As I step on the escalator I have a strange sense that I'm leaving this place forever, though I know I'm not.

Kačerov

2008-12-13T02:05:00.000-08:00

The man in front of me is tentatively testing the escalator, so I cut in front of him. He's either drunk or very scared. Once I'm on my way up, I feel something press on my backpack. It's the man. I'm still not sure if it's alcohol or fear.

The distance up is one of the shortest I know in the Prague Metro System. The station hardly qualifies as underground when compared to the deep lairs of the other stations.

At street level, the patches of snow are still surprisingly clean and white, like parts of the scenery have been rubbed out. On the footpath, it's already a mud slushy. I've traipsed through this cold muck so many times, but snow remains pure and driven in my mind.

I remember that one of my students told me that Menzel's version of Closely Observed Trains was released yesterday. There's a newsagent, which doesn't have the movie but does have a copy of the Piano, which would be good for class.

Beside it, there is a small grocery store. Just inside the door, I join the short stationary queue. People are waiting for shopping baskets. This is a curious habit of some Czechs, at least those outside of the centre of Prague; they insist on having trolleys or baskets, even for the smallest purchase. The cashiers can be a little irate if you don't have one. A fact backed up by G.

One reason for this is that the efficiency of service relies on there being some type of grocery receptacle. But I stubbornly refuse to take one just for a single item. Whatever that will be today. However, I do wait in line, at least until a man arrives after me and pushes his way through. The man in front decides this is also acceptable. I follow the path cleared by them.

The goods on offer are not particularly noteworthy. There are baked goods, which by now are probably a little stale. There's a small goods counter where a crowd of older women vie for service. The rest of the store is like a small sample of any larger supermarket. I decide to get a yoghurt drink. They have a sour cherries and vanilla flavour and since living here I've developed a fondness for sour cherries, especially in strudel form. The best, incidentally, comes from Hungary.

I put the drink in my coat pocket and head to the nearest panelak. I was under the misapprehension that there would be little to explore here today. So far I'm getting a whole block. I pass a group of young men smoking. One of them is telling the others of a foreigner who abused him in English.

Language seems to fill the same safe social field that weather does for us. One buses and trains, you will often hear people discussing what language they or their family and friends are studying. It's never points of grammar, just their personal experience of using another tongue.

By the panelak, I see a pair of shoes. If I had a camera I would take a photo. I have a small collection of discarded shoe photos. I'm not a fan. But shoes left in public always make me curious. Though their reason for being there is no doubt banal, I often imagine something more dramatic. Perhaps a fugitive had to change his shoes. Maybe someone threw them out along with all the trappings of their former life. This all stems from a diet too rich in thrillers.

On the way back, I remember the drink in my pocket. It's not bad. The taste is more generic cherry than the tartness of sour cherries. The guys are still standing there smoking. Further on at the bus stand, someone has thrown a cigarette into the bin and it's gently puffing. The stand fills with the smell of burning paper.

There's an underpass to the pass stand on the other side. I can't imagine there will be much on that side apart from the bus stand. The underpass is decorated with a rainbow of goggly-eyed, large mouthed or smiling, sweet or scary, fish. I can see what they were attempting, but it doesn't make the underpass feel any less dingy. The fish only highlight the graffiti.

When I emerge, I see a small kiosk and decide to try my luck. They do have the film. They also have a copy of Memento. It's only after buying it that I see it's not the one that plays the story in chronological order. It probably makes me a philistine to want to do this, but I'm curious. But I've finally got Menzel, so one task for today is fulfilled.

I head to the small place under the freeway, which as far the path will go, and head in the other direction. At first, it seems disappointingly short. Then I notice a staircase, which leads down to the train line. This is one of the points where the trains can surface from the metro. In the distance, I can see what I think are the maintenance yards. Now, I know where the trains go when we're told to alight from the trains at Kačerov. I can tick another box today.

The path leads further along. The scene becomes even more wintry. The snow is a lot thicker, but it's not cold enough for it to remain fluffy. In stead, it is draped over the branches like a sodden blanket. I can hear blackbirds shuffling underneath. These birds remain here through the year, sticking it out under the snow piled bushes, unlike the swallows and house martins. Above, there is an apple tree with a few bauble bright fruits that have survived the birds, bugs and occasional frost.

I stay for a while looking down and listening for the trains. I'm hoping for one to pop up from the tunnel. But none do.

Stodůlky

2008-12-06T03:58:00.000-08:00

I'm a little apprehensive about coming here. Outlying suburbs make me nervous, having grown up in one. But the suburb also makes me feel a little optimistic. It's St Nicholas tonight and since this is a residential area, I should catch some of the local festivities.

When I arrive, I find a flat broad shopping centre crowned with corrugated iron. The brightest thing all around is the supermarket. Stacks of rosy meat glisten in the butcher's window. There's a herna bar at each end. Neither look enticing. There's litter and graffiti. It sort of reminds me of places near where I grew up, more than any other locality in Prague, though I don't feel any more comfortable.

People have already started to gather at the busted benches. It makes it feel a lot later than it really is. Perhaps, they've been here since the end of work and the night suddenly crept up on them. The only remarkable thing is that I'm travelling in a clockwise direction. Not that I have much choice. Had a followed my natural inclination I would've simply passed more benches.

I find an underpass but by now all my bravery has leaked out of me. I decide to cross the station to other side where, dimly lit half built apartment blocks glow like like cold giant lanterns. The project is called the British Quarter. It isn't for Prague's expats. The name is on Czech which means that the being 'British' is a selling point.

In fact one of the shops on the other side advertised that it had children's goods from England and I've often seen shops advertising that they have furniture or clothes from there. Not so long ago, the Union Jack was something of a fashion item. Maybe, it's the colonial and republican in me, but I find this a little strange, especially the perception of the Union Jack as trendy. For me, soccer louts and skin heads adorn themselves with crosses of St. Andrew, St. George and St. Patrick. Funnily enough, the northern suburbs of Perth are something of a British enclave, so this development only reinforces the similarities between my old stomping grounds and here.

The mounds of dirt and canon sized pipes also take me back to my childhood, the imagined part, when unguarded building material became a castle, a ship, a space ship or an enemy base we had to infiltrate. In the dark, they look like a horror film set. I continue briskly on. Some of the people coming the other way, give me strange looks. When I get to the end of the path I see why. There's no entrance to the station and they weren't commuters but people walking at the site. My hyperactive imagination is having field day here, and every thing it's coming up with is bloody and gruesome, so I head back to the shopping centre.

A hiking path leads from here to Řeporyje and then on to Černošice. G. and I almost hiked to Řeporyje. We were walking through a very nice valley on the outskirts of Prague and this town was where we should've taken a train from. Fortunately, we managed to catch a train from a much closer station. I had no idea the valley was in this part of the city. I have no idea where Černošice is or what I would find there.

Some teenagers in devil horns have gathered on the benches. A St. Nicolas comes out of one of the paneláks. As I pass the teenagers, one of them ask if I'm meant to be a spy on account of my long winter coat and cap. I don't answer. What am I meant to say? 'Nejsem špion'?

Privately I'm a little flattered. Of all my insecure male fantasy occupations, spy was the top. I think I destroyed a small rain forest doing the various activities from the Spy Craft book. And at least people are now interacting.

Želivského

2008-11-28T11:00:00.000-08:00

The panels covering the walls and ceiling are anodised but not dimpled like the ones in the other stations along the green line. I'm pretty sure Skalka has dimpled panels too. I guess I'll find out whenever I go there.

I wonder if they ran out of the panels during the construction, or simply decided to vary the design as they did along the other lines. I also wonder who Želivský was that he deserved a train station named after him. It might sound sexist that I assume it was a man – but the name gives it away.

Ahead of me is the slowest escalator I've ever seen. Naturally, I go for a ride, regardless of where it will take me. As soon as I step on it, it speeds up, and I'm just as quickly disappointed. A slow escalator ride seemed novel. Now, as usual, I'm being rushed to the top.

It deposits me in front of the Hotel Dorint, whose fluid designs intrigue me. After a while I grow wary of them. I feel that rippling curves and bubbled windows were a very deliberate attempt to stand out against the squarer flats and factory surrounding it. Such contrived oddness leaves little beyond an initial sense of curiosity – a conclusion I come to as I circle the building.

Behind the hotel and across the street is a building with a jumble of triangular windows scattered across the wall. The top is lashed with the type of twisted cable once popular with interior designers who wanted to make a space appear decrepit. Ahead of me is a restaurant called 'HUI BIN GE'. Remove one of the spaces, and the name would be more apt.

As I return to where I started I notice the weak November sunlight winking in the Hebrew written on the gate of the Jewish cemetery. On the bars are three signs in Czech, German and English. All I can make out from here is POZOR, ACHTUNG and WARNING. I assume they are security notices. There are no station exits on the same block, and perhaps me going inside just to look around would not be appropriate. Instead, I head to the občerstvení(*) to buy some grog.

When I first arrived in the Czech Republic, I was a little perplexed as to what grog was. Back home, grog is slang for booze, so I was under the impression they sold some kind of generic alcoholic beverage. [Try GROG! We don't know what it contains and after one mouthful, you won't care.] As most of the world knows, it's rum in hot water. This is just one of the many deficiencies of coming from a warm country.

At the občerstvení, someone is drinking a beer called 'Beer'. I suppose the word sounds glamorous in the same way that non-English words sound to us. Unless some company tried to dominate the market here by using the generic name. Quite a pointless strategy in such a proud beer drinking nation.

I order my grog and while the kettle is boiling I peruse the interior. The owner is dressed in shorts and a t-shirt. I'm a little surprised as I'm bound up in a scarf, coat and have my hat pulled down tight over my head. The two small deep fryers probably keep the place warm. The stench of refried oil suggests they're used a lot. The woman behind me in the queue orders a straight rum. While the owner pours, she asks about his wife. I can't quite make out his mumbled reply. Before he responds to her next comment, he places the plastic cup, filled to the lip, in front of me and asks if I want sugar and lemon. Of course I do. I'm not drinking this for the taste. Once the sugar is mixed in, I walk away with the drink rather than listen to the rest of the story.

In the station passage way, leading to the other side, I stop in front of a mosaic of a knight. On closer inspection, I see the chalice I deduce it must be a Hussite soldier. Maybe this is Želivský. Or maybe Želivský was a communist. The station was built during this time. Though the name doesn't sound familiar and anything unfamiliar I usually date to before the twentieth century. I move when I become aware that I must look like a tourist – a very touristy concern, I'm sure.

At the top of the second exit is the factory. I glance to my left down its long wall but decide to go around the corner. It's only when I've gone round that I realise that again I've gone in an anti-clockwise direction. (I didn't when I went around the hotel – something I only realise now.) The factory is typical of the sort gutted to make open plan flats for professionals. This factory has actually been converted into their offices. There's no sign of its original purpose.

Behind the block, I see a woman restraining a muzzled Alsatian outside a vet's and calmly telling him, “Yes, there are other little dogs inside.” I think he / she is aware, hence his / her desire to get in. Just past her, there's a pub that ambitiously refers to itself as a restaurant. I say ambitious, because I doubt there will be much fine dining or service to be had at the base of a panelák. But after reaching the end of the block, I find there's nowhere else to sit.

I find a table at the back in the non-smoking section and decide to employ the same method the Ethiopian cooks used to keep warm in I Served the King of England and order a beer. It's got to be more as effective as the grog, which only made me feel, I'm ashamed to say, a bit pissy. Perhaps my brain was already numb, and the rum made it more so.

I consider getting some pickled cheese so as to continue my other project of sampling this dish in as many pubs and restaurants as possible, but decide on the utopenec – a pickled sausage. The name literally means 'drowned one', which also gives it a morbid appeal. The sausage comes with bread and when I'm done I sop up the vinegar with a slice.

A very pale man and woman sit opposite me. They look at each other a little puzzled when I take out my journal and start to write. However, I'm about as much a curiosity as the Hotel Dorint, and they soon return to their meals. The young man slices his chicken with the tentativeness of a science student. What will I find? – he wonders. How will I be graded?

Two woman enter the non-smoking section and after ordering, light up. It is perhaps hypocritical of a non-smoker to complain, but since stopping I notice the smell. And knowing I will smell like this on the bus ride home bothers me. Not that I say anything, nor cough theatrically, nor tap the non-smoking sign. I might be a hypocrite, but I haven't become completely self-righteous. Instead I order another sausage and continue with my notes. The women also glance over at me. 'Another foreign writer' they probably think – a very foreign thing to assume.

I finish the second sausage and the vinegar and as I'm doing so, Nohavica's song “Zítra Ráno v Pět” is playing on the radio. It would be the perfect moment to leave, but I have to wait to pay. When I do, the waitress doesn't look pleased that I want to use a meal ticket. The song has already ended and now a listener is calling in.
I give myself a self-conscious sniff outside. I hope people won't notice too much. The woman with the Alsatian has gone. In her place stands a much older woman who stares blankly at the paving as I go by.

(*) Občerstvení, meaning refreshment stand, is another word I always use even when speaking English. There's nothing particularly evocative about the word itself. Rather, the refreshment stands here are so typical for the country, and so uniform - same menu of sausage, chips, dubious hamburger and fried cheese in a bun and usually run by someone whose flabby build and bad skin hints at a weakness for their own wares, that the Czech word is more appropriate. Perhaps my next blog will be on the občerstvenís of Prague.

Pražského povstání

2008-11-21T09:13:00.001-08:00

The station is named after the Prague Uprising of 5th May 1945, a couple of days before the end of the war in Europe. As the actual drama unfolded elsewhere, I will save the details for another post.

Pražského povstání is probably well-known to expats who've been here a while for another reason. This stop is near the Supreme Court of Prague. Around the corner is where they issue the police records (rejstřík trestů), a term I came very familiar with over the years. This document is necessary for anyone who wants a long-term visa or business license.

Before they made obtaining the record easier, it was necessary to wait about two or three hours at the offices. They had a ticket dispenser, from which you took a number, checked how many people there were until it was your turn and, if you were me, went off and hoped you returned in time. The first time I went the dispenser was broken and a long queue stretched past the court almost to the park. It was chilly but not unbearable. The worst aspect was the slow crawl toward the offices. By the time I got to see a clerk, the whole process took all of two minutes and she handed me a slip of paper a little bigger than a postcard. I didn't even have the right documents. My birth certificate should've been translated into Czech, but the clerk extended me some administrative largesse on this occasion.

I thought that I would return there – a little stroll down memory lane, but memory lane has been closed off. Or I was wrong. There's no way to get to the court without crossing the main road, so I head around the block.

As it happens I turn left and, at least in this instant, bear out the observation I read recently that right-handed people will move in room (or any space) in a counter-clockwise direction. We right-handed types apparently draw circles that way too. (Theodore H. Blau, The torque test: A measurement of cerebral dominance. 1974, American Psychological Association ). I wonder if there has been any survey of voting patterns and handedness.

Around the corner, it's immediately quiet. There were a lot of people filing out of the station but they seem to have been immediately absorbed by the blocks of flats. At the base of a few are shops. If the businesses at Nádraží Holešovice provided a meretricious covering, the ones here seem bolted in place – a sign, shelves, tables and you have an enterprise. It feels more real, perhaps it's the sense of people struggling. But it's all real even the Babushka dolls they peddle in the souvenir stores. Though a Russian tradition, are part of Prague street life. One of the stores is a second electronic goods store. I see a lot of these outside the historic centre, almost as much as I see souvenir stalls inside.

The footpath leads through the centre of the block. This is the only way I can go to avoid crossing the road. I pass under a tall ribbed steel and glass tower. It's the Ministry of the Interior. Some clerks are smoking by the door. The illusion of importance the building projects is about as convincing as the illusion of openness created by the modern office block across the road.

And that's it for the station. No footpaths promising me some hidden part of Prague. But I'm not ready to go home. I buy two mandarins and head around the block again. Ever since childhood, more than the taste, it is the ease with which I can peal mandarins that has enticed me. It's as if the fruit is eager to disrobe and get on with the act of eating. Both are sweet and disappear in a couple of mouthfuls, leaving me holding the rind, moist with juice as a cold wind starts blowing.

Only on the way back do I find a bin. Even without the juice on my hands, the wind has an edge. I'd like to look around this part of town a little more, which means I'll have to leave the block. At the cross walk, my phone rings. It's someone from my bank. In an atypical sing-song voice, the woman asks if I'm interested in a loan. Without getting into my finances, I tell her I don't need one. She rings off win an equally melodic good-bye and I cross the street to find somewhere warm.

Rajská Zahrada => Černý Most

2008-11-14T11:45:00.000-08:00

It’s no Garden of Eden, and there are no tomatoes – at least not as far as I can see. The station is nautically themed: a blue and white colour scheme, portholes, a ventilation shaft built to resemble the bridge on a ship and rust.

All around beyond the licorice assortment styled paneláks, the vegetation is a dry autumnal brown. The colour reminds me of summers back home.

A couple of years back I wrote a poem based on the station’s ambiguous name. It was influenced by the poetry of Karel Plíhal. Plíhal’s poems are concise and often based around witty homophonic pairings. My attempt doesn’t exactly employ this technique, but I took inspiration from his approach. Here it is, my first poem in Czech:

Rajská zahrada
Byl jsem na Rajské zahradě.
Eva nedala Adamovi rajče.

In English it doesn’t work so well:

The Garden of Eden
I was in the Garden of Eden.
Eve didn’t give Adam a tomato.

The ambiguity arises from the fact that the word ‘rajský’ can be the adjective for both ‘paradise / Eden’ or ‘tomato’. ‘Rajksá zahrada’ is ‘Garden of Eden’ and ‘rajská polevka’ is ‘tomato soup’. Another amusingly ambiguous adjective is ‘masový’. It can mean ‘meat’ as in ‘masová koule’ (meat ball) or ‘mass’ as in ‘masový vrah‘ (mass murderer).

I circle the tiny block where the station is locate. I had a sleepless night last night. Maybe this is influencing my perceptions but I find little of interest. There is nowhere to sit and few people to watch. The train tunnel snakes from the station. On the top is a footpath. I decide to follow it to Černý Most to at least keep awake.

The path takes me high above the traffic. It is wide and devoid of people. I wish I had a skateboard. I wish I knew how to ride one. About halfway along and I am almost level with the large shop signs. I found them unsettling when travelling this way at night – great luminous words suspended in the dark. It was as if the bus had entered some flat textual world.

I know Černý Most as well as Florenc. It was the other station I came to on my weekly trips from Mladá Boleslav. I reach the station only passing two young women and their children and two police officers telling some teenage girls to get down from the railing.

The station has remained faithfully lodged in my memory. There is no unsettling sense of the familiar and the new that I have experienced when returning home. I wonder if I’ll see anyone I know. Unlikely. All the teachers I worked with are gone and the students would be leaving for the weekend - so set are the routines of people there.

Despite these comments, I’m looking forward to going back to Mladá Boleslav tonight. Partly it’s to catch up with an old friend. Also I’m curious to see how a place I called home for four years may have changed.

Many fond moments happened there: nights at the film club when the the gawky bespectacled president would give lenghty introductory speeches about the movies, sometimes on any topic he pleased; the camaraderie of playing badminton; the post-hike beers; dinners and music nights.

From the footbridge I can see the sun melting away through the haze. It resembles a vast peach – something Dahl would conjure up – and it’s making the smog blush.

Malostranská

2008-11-09T10:30:00.001-08:00

There's a small bronze plaque beneath a statue showing the water level of the 2002 floods. The level is just above the escalator, so every time I come here I imagine sinking beneath the murky swollen waters of the Vltava. Perhaps this fantasy is to compensate for the fact I never experienced the floods first hand.

Something else I almost always do when I'm here is check the exchange rates that flash above the exchange office at the station. I do it so automatically that I'm no longer sure why. I don't need to change any money. Perhaps, the only way to deal with this info-pollution it is to mindlessly absorb it like other toxins.

I did these things on Friday but this Friday wasn't an ordinary day. I was there to meet a friend I hadn't seen for thirteen years. As I sank in the imaginary waters, possible conversation were racing up in the dark currents. There was a slight knot in my stomach. We had been writing messages for the past few weeks and both of us had been cheerfully forthcoming. Still in the flesh it could be different. I stepped on to the platform and wondered where I would stand.

The disembarking crowds meant standing by the entrance / exit was impossible. I decided on the far end of the platform where no-one goes and where I invited quick stares from the passengers. The imaginary waters parted and were replaced by phantasmal security guards asking why I was there. The answer was as innocuous in truth as in fantasy. I was waiting for someone. I started watching the real people.

The station was strangely deserted. I'm so accustomed to being here in the tightly packed crowd which clogs at the escalator's base and being squeezed into the long human sausage on our way out that I felt like I was somewhere else, an alien place of older fantasies, reinforced by the dimpled metal, a simple fantasy, the hangar of some great space bound city sized craft. I think this nonsense is to deeply ingrained.

In this atypical serenity, the escalators ran as though projected on a screen, soundless and flat. The people who come off them have yet to become real. Back there they were silent and two-dimensional like the escalators. With the first scuff of their shoes, they become solid and real. Many disappeared as quickly as they arrived. Some stared in confusion at the sign with the stations deciding which platform to take.

The system here is quite simple. There is a sign with all the stations for that line. At whatever station you're at, there will be two arrows, one pointing left the other right. The arrows indicate the stations the train will travel to from the platform in the same direction. While I stood there, about five different groups of people became quite confused and continued to study the sign in bewilderment as to what they were meant to do.

One group of four actually conferred by the metro map, as though knowing the plan of the city would make the correct platform to choose more obvious. In the end one of the women pointed to one of the platforms and impatiently directed her friends to it. I figured this was something that got the best of most tourists until a Czech family had similar problems.

My phone beeped. I got a message from her. She was on the bus from the airport. Thirteen years. Maybe we had exhausted our topics over the Internet. Perhaps I had changed too much. I was ashamed about the weight I had put on. She'd notice. Would she comment?

Every train I watched expectantly, long before it was possible for her to be on board any of them. I wondered what she would think of my life here? Would she and G. get a long? Though no conceivable reason existed, people sometimes simply didn't click. The awkward crunch of incompatibility has often echoed when my different social circles have intersected.

But I was excited. Thirteen years. This would be the only friend from school to have visit me here. The first to meet my wife. The first to see my flat. The first to get a glimpse of my new life here. It wasn't all dread.

Vanessa saw me before I saw her. “Ryan,” she called as she came through the arches from the platform. Before the arrival I wondered how we would greet. I've become quite reserved in recent years. I offer a hand rather than a cheek. What would be appropriate in this time? She already had her hands out wide. I was glad. I was glad that the decision had been made. More I was glad for the embrace of an old friend.

“You haven't changed a bit,” she said. I thanked her but wondered if it could be true. I told her she was looking well and she did. She sounded more Australian than I remembered – but all my Australian friends do. There was a few moments as we inarticulately rubbed and half-hugged, perhaps checking the other was there.

“So why did you come here?” she asked.

For a split second I thought she meant the train station. I quickly realized she meant the country.

“Do you remember when Michael came back from Germany?” I said.

She looked at me a little confused.

“And he had all those photos of Prague. When I saw them I knew I had to come here.”

There were other reasons. I was curious to see the city of Kafka, Hašek and Kundera. I wanted to see the place where Prague Spring played and where Ginsberg was named “Král Majáles” . I had at some point years ago developed a crush on a girl who lived here but who I no longer see. But all of this is too much information for one escalator ride. Vanessa at least knows Michael and that was the starting point.

We were briefly deciding what to do. Vanessa had been here ten years ago. I could see how eager she was to explore and to retrace former journeys. I still a little confused about the afternoon's agenda. It is always the same when I have a guest. Do they want to see the touristy things? Do they just want to get a drink? Do they want some experience, which no one else has had and which they can stick up on FaceBook

I suggested taking her to the Waldstein Gardens. From there I could show her where I work. The gardens were closed, so we had to take the long way around the block. The topics fired back and forth and changed when a name, place or some event reminded us of one of the thousand questions we had for each other. I couldn't recall if this was how it had always been. Vanessa was someone it was always easy and enjoyable to talk to. She had a term for that, D and M, a deep and meaningful. Sessions like that would go into the night, though I doubt I was as open as I was now. It had to be the frisson of years. We discussed where we had traveled. I was impressed how much she had done. Much more of Europe than I had. The Middle East as well. I asked about her son. She is the first friend from school to become a mother, a parent. I told her this and she laughed. It is funny, funny that something so natural is now considered an amusing accident, or something out of character.

At the time I didn't mention that was how I saw it. In the days after I would see how unfair this was. I only recalled that like everyone at the time she wasn't that keen on kids. People change, but I seemed not to have. Physically or personally. For so long, I imagined I had abandoned my old self somewhere else. There had been so many experiences and revelations which had lead up to this person now – this person who moved here. I am just what people see.

We reach the end of the block, and though we went on, I will stop here.

Line Work

2008-11-07T23:05:00.000-08:00

This week's post will be up on Sunday.

Sorry for any inconvenience.

Radlická

2008-10-31T10:54:00.001-07:00

People file out brisk but orderly from the train station and head straight to the office building across the square. It's as if the revolving door is an extractor fan, gently sucking all the people to their desks. The whole building resembles a machine, not something sooty, Victorian and cruel, rather a stylish over-blown polished gadget with silver grills, wood paneling and gleaming balustrades for handles. It looks so fresh and ultramodern that despite its size it would be discarded within a year.

The commuters don't suit their stride. They're not worker ants encased in black suits. One of them has a suede cowboy hat and matching vest; others are in puffy bundas in preparation for the weekend or just because its cold and these jackets are comfortable; some are dressed for Friday night drinks. A couple of them have suitcases on wheels. One guy strays from the line as he reads a book. Only a skater rolls against the flow. He merely adds a long invisible score beneath their movement.

Yes, it's morning. A deviation from one of the rules, but an excusable and even inevitable one. The days are getting shorter and the thought of being alone at an unfmailiar metro station in the dark is not appealing. Plus a different time will bring a change of focus, though at the moment it seems are more interesting in the evening when there is that great collective release.

Anything of interest has given the station a wide berth. I can understand why. In the five years I've lived here, I have never been to Radlická. If it weren't for the blog, I imagine many more years would pass before I would visit. Apart from the office block and a small gilt statue, which I assume isn't real gold, there's not much.

Across from the office block is a passage way. On its walls tags and graffiti compete for space. Through the intersecting curves is the ubiquitous 'Fuck Off'. How much longer before it loses all meaning? In the future it will be an everyday expression. We'll send it to each other on greeting cards. Why not? It's on t-shirts. I just hope we will be able to emote future swear words so well.

Some bold soul has also professed his love for a girl called Šarka (Miliju tě, Šarko). I wonder if Šarka will be able to find this declaration of love among the tangle of characters.

I went through the passage earlier. It seemed the least popular route and remembering my Frost I decided to go that way before heading back to write. At Radlická neither path was worth taking. Beyond the passage is another modern building with fixed shutters, which are no doubt fixed at the optimal angle to reduce the sun's rays in summer, but which deny the tenants the opportunity to throw them open. It is a rigid shell, something to occupy not live in.

Around the corner from this building, I found a dead cat. Its fur was matted with melted frost. I am perhaps too inquisitive by nature and stopped to have a look. On hikes, I often stop to point out some carcass to G., who is far down the path, determined not looking back. The cat has no visible signs of injury. This was when I felt horrified. It couldn't have been a car. The only question was who? It was that feeling that I had when I came to sit here and start today's record.

This is the furthest I've been in the direction of Zličín along the yellow line, which I should refer to as Line B, but never do and so confuse most people when I discuss the metro with them. Everyone knows it by the letters. I can only remember the colours.

I wonder if being here only highlights the artifice of this blog. Other people write about the things they really experience. I place myself in an unnatural situation. Most Fridays before this I would be at home or today, I would have slept in – or read, rather than leave the house to come here. I'm not a part of this. I'm watching from a distance, a distance I don't know yet how to bridge.

I want to achieve this end without stepping out of the conditions I've set myself. To bastardize a saying, it is the frame that makes the picture and frames tend to be precisely measured and suited to some purpose. My frames are the stations, for the moment any way. They liberate me because they bring me to places I wouldn't ordinarily come to. The dilemma is if I should be part of the drama I see unfold and certainly in a way that doesn't involve some act of bad faith – no interviews, no spectacle.

A group of pre-school aged children pass holding hands and wearing bright pastel winter jackets. They also go via the passage way. I wonder how their teacher will explain the cat to them.

Line Work

2008-10-27T10:17:00.000-07:00

There are now links in the posts to topics or people mentioned, which I felt required an explanation far better than I could manage.

Thanks to Sam at Prague.tv for showing me how.

See. I've become quite adept at it now.

Until Friday...

Chodov

2008-10-24T12:40:00.001-07:00

An immense cement and stone shopping centre. A facade of glass looking onto the car park. Bright lines and brighter shop signs inside. A great slab of prosperity and consumerism on the outskirts of Prague. It's so big it straddles a motorway. A perspex covered walkway joins the two halves. The train station which leads to it couldn't be more different. Light brown half-cylinder tiles decorate the walls. Rows of broken rain pipes come to mind.

My plan was to sit inside at a bar called Potrefená Husa and watch people come in. A snap portrait of each. I didn't consider this place because I'm endorsing the establishment. It's a characterless chain pub and it serves one of my least favourite beers. However, it's the very first place you can sit as you enter, which would mean that I don't have to go further inside. We all know what shopping centres are about.

Another reason I was going to sit there was because of the name. A few months ago a student asked me to help with the translation. The name literally means 'struck goose'. Suffice to say this meant nothing to me. He went on to explain that the term was used when someone creates alarm over nothing. “Henny Penny,” I suggested. They are both poultry after all.

Two days later G. came to me with the same request. Astounded at the coincidence and pleased that I was informed I told her I knew what it meant. She said I was completely wrong. The name came from the saying 'Potrefená husa se ovzala.” meaning “The struck goose cried out.”. It is used when a topic comes up and someone present starts to defend him/herself. For example, imagine you're talking about the environment and apropos of nothing one of your friends starts to tell everyone how much they recycle and how they don't use private transport. He or she might be accused of being a 'potrefená husa'. The best I could come up with was 'one doth protest too much,' though I realise this is more limited in use.

I'm probably a potrefená husa for explaining why I'm not at this pub.

Instead I'm by a run-down fast food stand which is part of an older shopping centre. It's the ugly cousin of the Chodov centre, Růže – Rose. Faded obviously.

Across from the bench I'm sitting at is a footbridge. Initially I thought it promised more than an afternoon at a shopping centre. I took the underground tunnels eagerly hoping to find a park, tracks and maybe deserted alleys. Before I reached it I saw a bronze coloured statue of an archetypal worker. Crimson run from his eyes. At first I thought he was weeping rust but then saw it the dry streams coming from the helmet. Someone had chosen the wrong colour to vandalise this guy. It made hims seem more heroic. They were not tears but sweat.

On the bridge three young guys were leaning over the barrier and pointing at the outbound traffic. One of them excitedly called his friends over to the side where the incoming traffic was. Here they go I thought. They're going to spit. Very clever guys. Then I saw one of them remove a camera and felt a little ashamed for making another snap judgment. They were only doing their own bit of recording.

The bridge lead to the top of a cul-de-sac. I couldn't go any further. There wasn't even a path leading along the banks of the main road. As I headed back the one who called to his friends spat on to a bus. A friend had the camera ready to capture his feat.

The bench is also opposite a bus stop. The people are mostly heading inside. It would be unfair to say they are pouring inside. Despite the cold air, they are taking their time. Once the bus pulls away, the stand is deserted. It stays this way for a few minutes. People start to queue one by one. It's a few more minutes before one of the guys frustratingly shouts in the direction of a non-existent bus. He sees me writing and falls silent. I may as well be standing here with a camera.

A woman comes with a pizza box jutting square and straight from her side. I can smell the contents.

This is soon covered by the cigarette smoke of a second woman. She's just far enough away so the smell is more alluring than repulsive. Five years ago, I would've been sitting here either patting myself down to find my lighter or brushing the ash from my shirt-front.

The smoking woman notice me writing too. She's smirking and looking askance. Je divnej, she's thinking.

Behind me at the tables near the food stand, tables I was too slow to get, old blokes are unwinding with small plastic cups of spirits. 'Blokes' is too Australian, but they resemble the 'blokes' I knew as a child, friends of my fathers I regarded with equal repulsion and admiration. It also depended on distance.

I suppose at this moment I've joined them. Like me they're recording the last moments of this day, imagining some other life, seeing lost opportunities in every fresh face to come down the path.

Jiřího z Poděbrad

2008-10-18T04:16:00.000-07:00

I take the exit past reliefs of the Bohemian coat of arms and what appears to be Prague castle. It's hard to tell because each piece is rendered in a lazy municipal council version of cubism, which means the reliefs merely look half-finished. There's a park at the top of the stairs. I was about to write another park in reference to last week's entry, but it sounded as though I was fed up with green spaces when in fact I'm delighted to be here.

A deluge of leaves lie on the ground. A stream of them runs down the stairs into the station. I am reminded of the book World with us, which imagines how many of our largest structures would collapse through the action of the smallest agents: seeds, sands, droplets of water, guano and leaves. I fantasize the Prague metro filling with rotten leaves creating a great vein of black humus coursing under the city, crawling with worms, beetles and moles.

Today the leaves are yellow and green. Some fresh ones have followed the autumn fashion and also dropped to the ground. Though I've lived here for five years I can't resist the urge to kick a few into the air. If someone were with me, he or she would get a handful of leaves thrown at him/her. I leaf fight would ensue. But it's just me so I kick some more leaves across the path. The air has a burnishing chill. My cheeks must be red and glowing. It's probably the healthiest I've looked for a while.

Candy apple cheeks as an old friend described them – a friend I'm not in contact with any more. It would be strange, artificial even, to use his or her name. It would imply a connection which dissolved a long time ago. Who'd think such a pleasant image could make me so maudlin?

The park is mostly empty. A woman is smoking on a bench. A young guy cuts over the grass while carrying shopping bags. At the end of the park, roses are unexpectedly blooming. They are intense points of red in this green and yellow. The few that have opened fully look burnt around the edges. On my way back there's a guy with torn jeans, carrying brass guttering. Something about his tough appearance makes me think that there's a sinister motive behind those long pieces of metal, which glisten like ruddy blades in the late afternoon sun, which seem sharp enough to slice off fingers with a single blow. The poor guy is probably just renovating his flat. I'm ashamed to be so easily threatened by a stranger.

I'm in a morbid mood today and I'm ruining this park, so I go to find a coffee.

On the next block, there's a cukrárna. I decide to explore the area a little more. I find some shops, a trendy restaurant. The facades across the street are more interesting. Not as tarted up as in other places. My steps are so slow and small, I become aware of walking in a way I'm usually not. Walking that feels part of the footpath and not just getting from one point to another. Up there live the other 'mes'. The glamourous urbane tangents of possible lives. Those high ceilings and wooden floorboards would make everything come together. Well, that was what I used to think I needed. I turn the corner and say farewell to these lives not lived. My pace quickens. I really want that coffee.

Something I've never understood is why do so many Czech cukrárnas resemble bathrooms: tiles, mirrors, plastic plants and pastels. It gives the entirely wrong impression of the cakes and coffee. I would prefer something antique, but that's no surpise. Apart from an espresso I order a piece sacher, piled high with cream. I take a bite of the cake swallow it down with the coffee and take out my journal.

The crowd are a mix of people. Two university students, an old man and his middle-aged daughter, two council workers, an old woman on my right and a man on my left, who looks like he has been hiking. As much as I dislike the décor, I love the atmosphere. It's sedate and civilised. No music for my thoughts to battle with, no hyperdextrous brewster, no stylish floor staff. An old-world reserves pervades the place despite the newer trappings. The people are engaged in the quiet conversations and the simple indulgence of a cake and coffee. Kaffeeklatsch, I think the Germans call it. But I think there's a more negative connotation, implying gossip or at least idle chatter. However I like the precision of the word, and the alliteration sounds like indistinguishible background chatter. I don't know if there's a Czech equivalent.

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Jiřiho z Poděbrad. When I first arrived, most of my English speaking colleagues refered to this place as the unpronounceable station. I mangled its name pretty badly myself at first. I think I have a better grasp of the sounds now. Or that's what I tell myself.

Most of my friends who have come to visit me have come to Jiřiho z Poděbrad. One reason is that a favourite pub of mine is here. It's unpretentious and relaxed, if smoky. In fact I'm going there later tonight hence the reason I'm writing about this station. I know. I'm cheating again.

When my father first came here I took him to that pub. It was a sweltering August day. We were sitting at the outside benches having a beer. Behind us some old guy was muttering in what sounded like English. I think he was parroting us. I went to a newsagent to get some water for the bus ride home. When I returned dad had befriended this old guy. In conversation with Dad he was lot more lucid. Dad even gave him a cigarette.

The other reason I often come here is that it's the location of one of my favourite buildings: the Church of the Greatest Heart of the Lord (Nejsvětějšího Srdce Páně). It was known by most of my early colleagues as the cubist church, though the inspiration was apparently early Christain architecture. This term was used instead of the train station. “Let's meet at the station by the cubist church,” we would say. Despite knowing this is incorrect, I continue to use this term as it was how we knew it.

The most striking feature is of course the clock. It has two faces both made of glass and at the right time of year, and the right point of the day, the sun can be seen through it. I'm here too late today and have to be content with its more ordinary splendour.

In all this time, I've never been inside. All day I wondered if I would go in. I couldn't come here to write about this church and not venture inside. At the front of the church I have second thoughts. I'm not religious but these people have a right to worship in private. As I'm reconsidering an old woman is holding the door open for me. Since there is no facial expression to convey “I'm just here observing stuff for my blog, and since I'm not a Christian I'm not sure if I really should go in,” - I go in.

The ceiling is incredible. Imagine a series of squares, about a metre and half by a metre and a half, with gradually smaller square inside, so that each portion resembles an impression left by a miniature Mayan pyramid. At the front are proud brass looking Christ figures, not as delicate or sickly, nor eternally benign, as the stautes I remember from childhood. There is a stern nobility in the face worthy of worship. From the ceiling hang 34 metallic spheres. Just below the ceiling are stained glass mirrors each with a representation of a heart along with fish and crosses.

It's been five years since I was in a church that is still being used. The last time was at Christmas in Scotland. It's been about seventeen years since I've been in one as a member of the faithful. I can't justify going and sitting a pew, so for once loitering back with the small tourist group is the better option.

People are going to confessional. It's been a long time since I did that too. In one of the four ornate booths, I see a young boy reading from a note book. There's no screen to provide him with any privacy. I wonder how can a young boy fill a note book with his sins. When I went to confession I would just repeat my two standard misdemeanours, “I took biscuits when I shouldn't and I was mean to my sister.” I've made up for it since then.

The boy's younger sister is also taking advantage of the lack of screen and is going into say hello before her mum whisks her away. She doesn't return to see her brother. She's found something better, the entrance to the priest's side. Her mother just manages to grab her before she disappears all the way in. The mother tries to occupy her with the statue of Christ after the crucifixion, when he's slumped in Mary's arms. An image I know better than those aristocratic versions at the front. The little girl is determined to see what's inside this booth.

Her behaviour makes me think how unnatural religion is. All the girl's most human features – her curiousity, her delight in life, her playfulness are inappropriate here.When she's old enough she'll be filling in an exercise book with her wrong doings and no longer smiling so freely.

Suddenly a voice comes through those spheres. I can only make out the word 'otce', which is the fourth case of 'otec', the Czech for father. I assume at first that they are announcing the arrival of the priest. The church has changed a lot in two decades.

Then I realize the woman is reciting the Lord's Prayer followed by the Hail Mary. The people in the pews recite the prayer back in barely audible voices. It's as private as they can be in a crowd. I stay to listen to the woman's voice. I like the sound of Czech, when it is annuciated as softly as this. It's a language which can carry a lot of tenderness and sincerity, though I'm only enjoying the soothing burr of her voice and ignoring the message.

The pleasure doesn't last long. I suddenly become uncomfortable with this whole scene of a prayer broadcast over speakers and the people repeating it back. Even after I stopped believing I would often defend people's religion for the comfort it brought them. The church was guilty of enumerable crimes, but faith at least provided succour even inspiration. At this I only see the drone mentality it engenders. I think of how I used to take part in this. I have to go.

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The closest Czech translation I could find for Kaffeeklatsch was 'klevety', but the use seems to be closer to the English word gossip.

Prosek

2008-10-10T12:58:00.000-07:00

After half a bottle of decent Argentinian wine and a glass of just palatable modrý portugal, I'm in Prosek. Until now I've only known it from the metro map. I shouldn't be here though. I intended to start this blog a year ago, when there were only 52 stations, one for each week, and so give the blog a temporal as well as spacial completeness. Procrastination interceded, so now there are three new stations. Prosek is one of them.

The train glides to a stop. I think it's the bold primary coloured freshness that has made me choose that word. I doubt the trains operate any differently here as any other station, though it is easy to imagine that, like the rare occasions when I enter an upmarket bar, this machine is affecting some grace.

Before I look around I head to the newsagent to buy a copy of Reflex and some gum. I noticed on the ride here, that the latest Hana and Hana is in English. For the uninitiated Hana and Hana are two ever youthful high school students who ruminate on the world from an apparently Czech, teenage, female perspective. Sometimes they come across as Socratic fools, expressing great wisdom in their senseless remarks. Sometimes it's just deliciously cruel. I'm curious to see how it works in English. The gum is for my post-wine breath.

The afternoon's drinking has also made finding a loo a necessity. I flick through the magazine to find the comic while heading toward the WC sign. The comic seems to work. Some of the language seems a little unnatural, but the final comment raises a smile. At times I like a cheap laugh. And I see I've over shot the bathroom entrance.

From this little stop I head to the nearest exit. It opens out into what seems to be a business park. Around the corner I see it is called Prosek Point. I assume they mean point as in 'position' and not 'promontory'. Around me there are only paneláks. Some of the longest I've ever seen. They stretch about 100m and in a line appear to be sawing up through the ground. The three buildings in the park resemble, if you'll excuse the analogy, those big vehicles the jawas drive in “Star Wars”. Only these buildings have many more windows.

Beside the second exit is a poster of Octobriana, a Soviet comic book heroine, drawn by the Czech Bohumil Konečný. There's an exhibition of his work at the moment. I only know this because I read an article somewhere about Soviet comics a few months back. This entry does have a sort of geek feel...comics, jawas. That was all part of my history as much as an earnest pursuit of expression.

Above ground there's a shopping centre. I walk past it and head a little further on to a park. A huge park. It stretches for a couple of city blocks. This was not what I imagined when G. closed her eyes, spun around and pointed to Prosek on the metro map. The business park was more what I expected. Instead there 's this expanse of autumn colours, kids running and cycling, smaller ones waddling beside prams. Some older boys are trying to rap in one of the parks many nooks. There's a park with a flying fox (zip-line for Americans, aerial runway for the British). I'm going to try that if no-one's around later. Two younger children are damming an artificial stream with small stones. They seriously give each other instructions about where to place the rocks. The artificial stream leads to an artificial pond. There are benches around. I join a young couple laughing and wrestling and a policewoman stealing wistful glances at them.

Magpies skip around us under the trees. They're smaller than the Australian ones, and not at all vicious. Their tails stick out rigid and elegant like a clasped fan. For a long time I had no idea they were the namesake of our hairstealing, eye-gouging counterparts. I knew them only as straka, and the foreign word suited what I took to be a completely foreign bird.

The police officer gets up. There mustn't be much for her to do here. Ward stray children and dogs away from the water? Or perhaps this serenity is just an outsider's illusion. I'm going to enjoy it for today though. It's not just Friday and the wine. It feels like a while since it's just been me in a park with my thoughts, not matter how inaccurate. The young couple move off too. Perhaps they've had enough of me writing all of this down.

A trio of teens soon replace them. Two of them are clearly a couple, and unlike the first two, they seem more accustomed to each other. Arms just hang over shoulders. They're including their friend in the conversation. They're also sharing a joint. They must've waited for the police officer to leave, though it would be nice to think that she displayed some largesse and left to let them have this time. A little gift she could enjoy vicariously. But it's just too much to believe.

Mid-conversation they start saying, “I'm a stupid blond girl.” It's clearly directed toward the girl. For all the textbooks, course and efforts of their teachers, it dismaying to think that is the sentence they use. They repeat it so uniformly it sounds as if they're imitating it from a movie or TV show, which is even more dismaying. The language will one day be rendered down into these thick rubbery chunks, harmlessly hurled about a park for a laugh but meaning nothing.

The three of them get bored with this and go back to talking. Their natural conversation is much quieter than those practiced lines. Eventually they finish the joint and go, glancing at me as they do. I suppose this is one of the perils of doing this so publicly. People start to become a little suspicious. I could do this more surreptitiously and try to mentally capture everything, but I enjoy writing in the open like this. It frees me up. I'm likely to invent less – a little less. And since this is a blog, it only makes sense to take the exhibitionism a little further.

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There are dog prints at the bottom of the artificial pond. The leaves are the colour of the evening's sunset. In the air is the chill I love. I can smell dirt. The playground is still full. The flying fox will have to wait for some other time.

The last block from the train station appears massive. Behind the blocks of flats, there is a long wall running unbroken over the small hill. There should be enough to make this a double entry. But the access roads to the flats run across the path and after last week's minor infraction I feel compelled to adhere to my rules a little more today. I could wander along some of the footpaths among the blocks, but they seem modern and uninspiring.

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Being so far from the centre, there are hardly any people on the train. An empty carriage is a rare pleasure and the ideal place to finish these last few lines. It will only be like this for the next two stops.

Line Work

2008-10-05T03:10:00.000-07:00

It is now possible to leave anonymous comments on the blog.

Palmovka

2008-10-03T12:37:00.000-07:00

This morning G. said, “Why don't you go to Palmovka?”. It's not exactly random, but it isn't part of my route, so this seemed like sufficient reason. As with many of the stations on the yellow line, Palmovka is characterless. Instead of the daydream inducing paneling there is acrylic and brick. Next week, I'll pull a name out of hat.

Out of the train I can go left or right. I go left. The upper concourse, like many stations, is crammed with small shops. One difference is the coat of arms for Líbeň affixed to one of the walls. I seem to recall that Líbeň was an independent town before it was absorbed into Prague. I could later check this out and incorporate the facts into the post. Right now I'm not sure.

Of the four exits I take the closest. Aboveground is what could've once been a town. The terraces seem to be arranged around a former square. I follow the block behind this exit. At the very first corner a small sculpture sits on the awning. It resembles a word, but none I recognise. By chance I have the camera and go to take picture. Then I change my mind. A camera will establish a different, though not worse, relationship, a more detailed but compartmentalised one. I want to wander around here and absorb the broad and imprecise feel of the place.

Time has gone to work on the buildings, cracking bricks, ripping off plaster, punching out a few windows. Developers are starting to cash in on its efforts. Not as much as elsewhere thankfully. The area is as close to what I imagine Prague would be like all those years ago when I decided to come here.

The path around this block leads back to the supposed square. Prague metro is quite new and cars were not as numerous as they are now. This place could easily have been a place of business where farmers brought goods. Maybe people worked in what looks like the remains of a brewery. That wouldn't have employed too many. Maybe time had been more merciless with some of the other buildings.

I return to the station to go to the next block. A wall runs across the concourse, so I will have to return to the platform to get to the other side. The wall looks new. What made them decide to suddenly cut the two halves off from each other?

The next exit takes me to a bus station. It's a scene anyone at a bus station anywhere knows well - people queuing, a few guys sharing a drink. That's not a bad idea. Summer is pretty much a memory. Those benches aren't going to be so welcoming for the next few months.

Back to the concourse and another exit. I leave and immediately approach a bright red mural. It's a man breathing fire. In the long serrated flame are words. All I can make out is Laďa. That might not be right. I follow the black wrought characters, trying to make out more of them. On an adjacent wall I see 'B. Hrabal' carefully painted and above his name an excerpt. Above on the same wall as the mural is this:

Bohumil Hrabal, *28.3.1914 + 3.2.1997

one of the greatest Czech authors of the 20th century, lived in the years 1950-1973 in the street Na Hrázi in the house no. 326/24, which stood in this place. He considered his stay in this house to be the happiest time of his life. Here he wrote Diving for Pearls, Pábitele, Tales of Those about to Die, today now classic works. Closely Observed Trains and Dancing Lessons for Seniors and Advanced were composed here too. Even later he returned to this neighbourhood in his memoirs and set the plots of his books Tender Barbarian and A Home Wedding. Thanks to the translation of Hrabal's works into dozens of foreign languages this little street, which he called timeless Na Hrázi, has become renowned through the whole world.

Further down is mural with pastel images of the former inhabitants, Hrabal, books, shelves, cats, a frothy capped mug of beer, a giant typewriter. This must be where he lived with Boudník. Tender Barbarian was his memoir about the artist and Boudník died sometime around the time he was here. I could check all this, make it look like I know, but this blog isn't about that.

G. must've known though. No wonder she sent me. Hrabal and Boudník are two people we admire. The blog's name is a pun on one of Hrabal's books. Gifts don't come much better than this – a memory ready formed for me to collect.

So where are his old haunts? Where did he watch the poet philosopher Egon Bondy wring beer from his beard? In which of these pubs if any did he hear Boudník speak at length on sex and art? I don't know. I will know. But not now.

I get out the camera. I want some pictures for me. I want to show G. later. In my enthusiasm I realise I have stepped I am no longer on the footpath. A few more steps and I am on another block. Why not? It's a rule I'm imposing and it's only one more block. But where does it stop? Next week the entry could be anywhere.

But the camera's out. I head back to the first corner and take a picture of the sculpture.

Other Journeys: Vanessa Berry, Wolf Prefa

2008-10-02T13:26:00.000-07:00

Staroměstká

2008-09-26T11:40:00.000-07:00

Randomness is proving harder to achieve than I had assumed. My third entry, and again my routine has brought me somewhere I have to be rather than anywhere. I worry my life is too fixed, too well-formed. It's got its immutable shape. If it were furniture, it would be one of those trunks that my mother and aunties kept at the base of their beds, rectangular, hard to move and crammed with naphthalene scented junk. I'm back at Malá Strana, teaching, so I came to the library at Staroměstká metro station to return some books and do this.

I was dreading writing about this place. The greats have covered every corner. Guidebooks have ripped out, reconstituted and rendered it down to bite-sized pieces. There's nothing I can tell you that you don't already know. The clock is probably doing its hourly little jig. The tourists have flocked with penguin necks, ready to catch it. The klobása guys are there and the saxophonist with the cowboy hat. They all have been every other time I've walked through the square. [If you were there on the 26th September 2008 and witnessed something different. Feel free to leave a message. All contributions welcome.]

I don't know any of this for certain because the little 'rules' I agreed to don't allow me to actually venture to the station's namesake. I can only venture to blocks directly connected to the metro stations exits. I cannot cross any roads. This seemed the most effective way to delimit this project, to create an arbitrary and creative constraint. Since I broke the 'posting every Friday rule' last entry, and I am breaking the 'writing in the afternoon' rule right now, I have to observe at least one.

G. thought I should do this only in the platforms. It would certainly make the title more accurate. Staroměstká is would be a good platform to describe. The tunnels are covered in anodized panels, each with a convex or concave spherical cap, as are all stations along the green line. I was rapt in these stations when I first saw them. Confined and clean, they were tunnels to a futuristic subterranean world. The wall paper on this blog is meant to evoke these panels.

Yet, this condition would have been too constraining in the long run. The blog would have been a constant description about the commuters surging on and off the trains. Plus I doubt the guards would tolerate someone standing there for a couple of hours taking notes. The cafe around the corner from a second exit suits me better.

Sitting at a cafe is about all I can handle right now. I'm glad my student postponed her lesson. There was a party last night. I lost count of the drinks. We missed our train, got in at 1:30 and were up at six. I feel like a sponge left in dishwater. It's a feeling I know well in varying degrees. Sometimes I quite like it. Nothing can touch you. Perhaps it helps me to absorb more. It certainly makes me less self-conscious about gazing into windows.

The block at the south eastern exit was my starting point. It comprises of art nouveau apartments attached to what I think is a neo-renaissance building. I'm basing this uneducated guess on the square windows. On the river side of this building is a piece of graffiti that has been there for as long as I remember. It reads 'Pochybujte si, chcete-li, o osobě, která Vás miluje. Nepochybujte avšak o lásce samé'. [Doubt, if you want, the person who loves you. However, don't doubt love itself.] I remember this message not for its homespun sentiment but because it helped me remember the Czech word for doubt. Whenever I passed the graffiti, I would revise it.

Around the corner there are a few pubs and a second hand bookstore, which is closed today, but which I recall had reproduction of the futurist poster Franz Ferdinand used on their second album. Up from here is an antique store. In its window are the pale porcelain figurines I loathe. Always have done.

My nonna liked them. She was one of the most important people to me in my life, so it isn't some negative association. It's the actual and assumed delicateness. The figures can't seem to escape the fragility of the material. They are cold mockeries of people, all the rouged cheeks and soft brown painted hair only emphasises this.

A little up from them, there is a bright orange mule about twenty centimetres long. It's one of the few modern pieces here. Another is a glass fly playing a trumpet. But I want the mule. It has its head down and hunches raised as if about to bray. I won't get it though. It would only lose the wonder it has on the other side of the window. At home it would become lost under papers. It would become another thing. Here, it stands out against the reclining ladies, tricorned gentlemen and musical insects.

Nor do I want to go inside. If I do, I will come out with a handful of porcelain shards worth a few hundred maybe thousand crowns. I also find these shops so cluttered. Things which have no other use other than collection. It's not that I'm not materialistic. I certainly have enough junk. I even brought some over with me, but lately I think I have to deal with the internal clutter.

If I opened up the chest, what would I leave behind? What would I display? Is there anything that I want other people to have? There's something novel – maybe a novel – a shop selling memories and experiences. When we're gone, all that we've done is put on a shelf, perhaps in orderly sets, perhaps higgledee-piggledee, where there is a space. People would come and take what they needed. Maybe an experience that was no longer produced, or a memory that was a collector's item.

I doubt there was anything that there would be anything from the Old Town Square that would be put on the shelf. Maybe into a one dollar box at the door. The memories here aren't so unique. They're cheap knock-offs that everyone is taking home. And there are enough real knock-offs around here to not need mental ones.

Can you own a memory? Travelling seems to be built on that assumption, experiencing something unique, special, yours. And if you own it, would you really want to sell it? Memories are gifts if anything, but like all gifts, they are ones given as cautiously as they are received.

Across from the cafe, the Greek music is blaring. It is the most authentic thing about this area now. Greek music, from a pizzeria, serving original Czech Pilsner. The autumn cold, held in the shade of the awnings, has worked its way into my shoes. I'm going the library on this same block.

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The café at the Municipal Library of Prague is probably my favourite cafe in all of Prague. It's quiet and the food and service is unpretentious. Old ladies gather here for a midday glass of wine or a cup of coffee and a chat. Students work. The tourists who come here seem to adjust to the general quiet. The only noise is from the teachers who use the cafe for private lessons.

The best babovka is served here. I should use bundt cake an English word, appropriated from the German, but I've always known it as babovka. It's like the word bunda. The first time I owned a real winter coat was here, so the Czech word, bunda, sounds right even when I'm speaking English. It's a puffy comforting word. Jacket reminds me of a tearing sound.

The pancakes with tvaroh, another word I don't feel right using the English equivalent, are quite tasty too. The coffee is not so good. Today though I order vývar (We even have to plunder French to get the word bouillon.) with big liver dumplings – a personal favourite, and chicken curry. In case of the latter no language has an apt term for the tasteless watery dish I'm served.

The library is one of my favourite buildings in Prague, so the trip is not entirely in vain. It is an example of socialist architecture I like. It is composed of great cement blocks with large doors, square windows and a row of statues representing various socialist archetypes. The latter I'm not so keen on.

It was my habit last academic year to come here on Tuesdays, to borrow some new books, return the old, read and maybe write. Last night's excess is making me feel increasingly edgy and the best thing for it will be to sit in the sun. There's nowhere here today. On my way back to the station I stop at another of my favourite places, another small second hand bookstore. They're selling illustrated field guides for plants and animals in Europe for only 20Kč. They're in English. So I grab one. It's about time I learnt the English names for the mushrooms. I also buy a cinnamon swirl from the bakery next door. This was usually the first part of my Tuesday ritual. I'd scoff one in the short walk to the library. If I was lucky they would be fresh from the oven and you could feel the butter in the pastry. It's not the case today. And I have plenty of time to eat it. It's Friday after all.

Nádraží Holešovice

2008-09-23T11:10:00.000-07:00

Nádraží Holešovice comprises of uniform rectangular slabs, each about 80cm x 150 cm. The regularity is unsettling. Nature couldn't produced something like this. It doesn't even feel right for people. It's more like a vast play set.

Some of my friends like this unpretentious unadorned style. My tastes are more 'decadent'. Maybe it's all this concrete which turns me off. On a day when the sky looks freshly poured and about to set, the occasional spire or arch provides relief.

This station would have provided a ready-made symbol the Czech Republic's transition from communism to capitalism, a meretricious veneer of commerce over a drab building. Yet already this mix feels outdated. A better symbol of Prague would be the gentrified buildings, gutted to make way for trendy boutiques or cafés. Nádraží Holešovice represents what has been left behind. Perhaps it will be modernised like the main train station. Perhaps the building will be preserved in the amber of nostalgia.

A parrot mobile dangles from the rafters of the beer garden outside. The only greenery are the weeds sprouting from the cracks and the parrot's wings. They sort of look like broad wilted leaves. This wooden bird describes a stupefied arc and while doing so surveys each of us at one of the six large tables.

Perhaps I should've called this Closely Observed Bars. I had wanted to sit in the main foyer and watch the stream of people. However, all the seats were occupied, mostly by students. From the snippets of conversation, I assume most of them are German. Probably off home after a school excursion here. Instead of the human pageantry I've got this parrot, five quiet men staring blankly into space. In the next room there's a trannie and her trick.

Though I'm in the bar, a patina covers it. It's as if I'm looking at it at it through a smudged pane. The grandeur that was intended, the raucous last drinks and couples luxuriously sipping wine on the ample velvet seats, only becomes apparent with some imagination. The immediate impression is a place of loss, where people come with a few private thoughts.

Holešovice wasn't chosen randomly. G. and I heading to Berlin for the weekend. Our train leaves in thirty minutes, hence the brief entry. (I only got to enter it after we returned.) I haven't been to that city in five years. After my first visit I raved about the place. I fell in love with its vastness, its teeming possibilities, an abandon I haven't even experienced in London. I hope after all this time the magic is still there.

Florenc

2008-09-12T10:36:00.000-07:00

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.