Skalka

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.

Můstek

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.

Hradčanská

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.

Želivského

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.

Chodov

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.

Nádraží Holešovice

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

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.