Hlavní nádraží Part Two

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.

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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.