7 REASONS WE ♥ PRAGUE

This summer, around my 21st birthday, we went to visit the nowadays-almost-mythological capital of the Czech Republic, a country no one could barely place in the right continent a few years ago. Nowadays, everyone wants a piece of Prague. So that's what we did. We took a weeklong bite of Prague and this is

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1. It is BE-A-UTIFUL

It's kinda ridiculous how the first item on the list is not about the feelings or experinces, but about the apparence. But you say the outside gives the inside a chance (Swedish google-translated idiom? Á la moi? Peut-être...), and... I think at least I started loving Prague as soon as I saw the beautiful buildings. Yes, I got crazy for buildings. It was like Paris, Rome, Stockholm and Amsterdam had the worlds most epic foursome and ended up pregnant with Prague. The style of the houses were Paris but the colours were Stockholm. The forums were Rome but the canals were Amsterdam.

2. "IT HAPPENS SOMETHING IN EVERY CORNER" 

This is an old and well-told story in my aquanitance, that the well-travelled canadian couple I met in Thailand when I was on the run from my unsympatical friend said these exact words about Prague when I asked them to name their five top destinations around the world.

So we really had to see for our selves if this was true.

Was it?

Well, on our six day trip we stumbled upon two film recordings, countless dressed up people trying to get us to see diffrent shows and street performers almost as soon as you went outside the hotel. Like these:

3. It was modern and classical at the same time

Prague has this crazy house called "Fred and Ginger", "The Dancing House" or "Tančící dům" in Czechish, which is some kind of futuristic house with metal fasade which also serves as a restuarant (since we were stupid enough not to take pictures of this, all I can give you is this source). Just a few hundred meters from it, you can see houses like these:

After a long climbing up a hill, we found "The Golden Lane", a small small street at the top of the hill with tiny tiny houses. People go here, if not just for looking at the cute houses, to see were Kafka lived a part of his days (the blue house to the left in the picture, number 22).

Since we havn't red Kafka, we just came for the houses..

4. Prague has the most amazing art galleries 

...if you love Alphonse Mucha, Salvador Dalí and Andy Warhol, that is.

Which I do.

Maybe too much...

The famous Campbell's, here also as Onion Soup, and Pepper Pot Soup, and Beef Soup, and Green Pea Soup....

I got a little bit hyperactive and overexited, some might say.

Jonathan got bored after a while (I mean seriously, could he not stand two mere hours lookin' at paintings...? Weak creatures, those who have not been enlightened by the religion of Pop!Art...)

This is actually so much Jonathan, I could just show this when somebody asks what my boyfriend is like...
Anyhoo, the pictures are taken at GALLERY OF ART PRAGUE (click the link to learn more), at Staroměstské nám. 603/15, situated just a few 50 meters from the Astronomical Tower - which is basically the first thing you'll go out to see when you have landed. The gallery has a separate floor for each artist, one for Dalí, one for Warhol and one for Czech artist Jan Saudek. Since you could pay for 1,2 or 3 exhibitions, we choose to stay in our safe zone and skip the latter one.

There is also Mucha Museeum which we enjoyed a lot, a bit harder to find though, located at a cross street to the square with first museéum mentioned. The website linked does not do justice to the small but beautiful gallery with Mucha's artwork displayed as big posters, hung chronological. We spent about an hour there and almost as much at the gift store. If you like Art Nouveau, this is your heaven.

Unfortunatly we could not take pictures, and the ones I took secretly somehow disapered. I guess that's karma....

5. EV-ER-Y-THING IS SOO CHEAP 


We live in Sweden, right, so almost anywhere else is cheap for us. But this one is kind of half of Swedish prices, with lunch at restaurants for about 10 $. A pack of fresh strawberries from the market cost about 1 $, whereas is Sweden you might pay about 4 $, even at markets (so what you actually should learn from this: don't buy strawberries in Sweden. Not even in season. Even though they are delicious...).

Guide books warn about prizes getting higher the latest years because the massive expansion of tourism, especially in Staré Mesto, Old Town, but we still got under 10 $ per person per meal at central restaurants most of the time.

P.S! The alcohol is cheaper to....

6. Lennon Wall 

I shut up, for once, and let the pictures speak for themselves:

And just before you arrived at the wall, you walk over a small bridge and on the bridge people put upp locks. 

Ok you all knew I wouldn't shut up SO:

This is Lennon Wall, a wall dedicated to messages about World Peace in true John Lennon-spirit. I think I read somewhere that the wall was just an ordinary wall until someone decided to paint Lennon's face over it, and someone else must have though that was a good idea because people keep on visiting it and write and draw messages about world peace, and I think that is kind of nice. Some proof that the world is still a good place.

I think the wall is so inspiring, both text-vise and visually. It was fun to take pictures of, or stop for a while and just be impressed by. It helped that the guy in the pink shirt only played Lennon-favs.

OR: It's a really good background for your next facebook pic. That's gotta count for something.

7. You kinda HAVE to walk everywhere 

Which is so nice. There's no better way of exploring a new city than to stroll in it. We love walking, and because of that, we walked all the way from our hotel near Stare Mesto to the Golden Lane at the old castle. That could have been... I don't know, two hours of walking? It was really nice weather, we got to see the city from above and just before we entered Golden Lane, we found this treasure:

*Jonathan's mother wondered if it might have something to do with a good-luck ritual of some kind. In that case, the penis wasn't made golden by artist, but rather by all the people touching it. Might be worth looking up. 

Eh.

So...

WELL.

Prague is not famous for its food, rather infamous, and the popularity has increased so much it's literally people EV-ER-Y-WHERE. That is ok though. We like people. We like wierd food. We like cheap alcohol and walking. We like museums with art we actually enjoy watching YES JONATHAN, WE DO!

We fell in love with all of the stuff above but mostly, we fell in love with its energy, its vibe. It's like the city itself says "Yeah, I know I'm good. That doesn't make me cocky, promising stuff I can not live up to or being pretentious."

And for that, we love Prague. 

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Tell us what you think about Prague in the comments!