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.

Lužiny

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

Křižíkova

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.

Smíchovské nádraží

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.

Anděl

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.