Home, away from home.

I'm back in Amsterdam. Monday morning I left Prague with tears in my eyes. It was weird to be back in Holland: the houses seemed small, the roads narrow, and all of a sudden I was able to overhear every conversation people were having...I still have to get used to hearing, and speaking, Dutch all the time.
The last week in Prague was nice and a bit awkward. My friend Bianka visited me, and we took it easy besides some sight seeing. I went into the St. Vitus kathedral at the castle again, and again I was taken away by the beauty of it. The last days I tried to suck in as much of the glory of Prague as possible, knowing I would have to get used to missing the beautiful sights, the parks, the architecture. Sunday I had a 'goodbye lunch' with my friends and my roommate Zuzana, and I wandered around in the streets, feeling sad. It's nice to be home; to sleep in my own bed, have my records and books and friends around me again. But I've fallen in love with Prague, and it's hard to let go.
I've decided to keep this blog, so I will have to think of a new title. As soon as I have my good mood back, I will start writing again.

'Braindrain'.

A 2000 Kč (around 75 Euro) reward for the return of this dwarf parrot.

This week I've been thinking of something to post; something intelligent, witty or exciting. But with no result so far. My brain hasn't been working properly the past few weeks.

My Prague days are almost over. Monday the 30th of July I'll be flying back to Amsterdam, at the inhuman time of 6:40. My friend Bianka will visit me the last 5 days and fly back with me, so that's nice. I have a hard time believing I've been here for two months already, and at the same time it feels like two years. I've been so absorbed in this town; its city life, its culture, its inhabitants. As the first few weeks were more of a 'warming up'; time needed to get rooted, the past month or so has been filled with 'stuff'; new friends, new places, trips in and around town, a lot of researching, writing and photographing, moving, seeing friends and my parents. I'm satisfied, but not done yet...and I'll probably never be.
Although my manuscript now mostly consist of ideas, bits and pieces, a scrapbook that just gets bigger and bigger and a Moleskine with only a few blank pages left, I look forward to finishing the project in the remaining two months. I've read almost every guide on Prague there is to find, and often thought "I can do this, and probably even better." I'm confident I can do it, and that feels really good.
Since it's been over 30 degrees for the past week, I have no other option than to go with the flow and take it easy. The coming two weeks I will work as much as I can, and spend the rest of my time enjoying my friends and my city. I hope I will be able to squeeze out a few more intelligent, witty or exciting posts before I leave, but if not; forgive me.

Finally, I promised my parents to give them a little more honour on this blog; I think they were a bit dissapointed by the sparing post about their visit, haha. Since no thousand words could properly praise these wonderful human beings, I'll just leave you with a picture of the happy couple, taken after their extensive visit of the castle of Prague:

Nashledanou.

Strike a pose.

For the fifth year in a row, the Sculpture Grande exhibition has hit the centre of Prague, featuring sculptures of 'established' artists as well as up and coming artists. The sculptures are scattered around the centre of Prague until the 30th of September.

Julian Opie, 'Imagine you are driving a blue Honda'


Jan Kadlec, 'Pig'

Cross Bones Style.

I'm suffering from a little writer's block, or maybe it's more a blogger's block. I'm not sure.
Last week was spent with my parents, whom I tried to show as much of the city as possible, as well as some things outside of Prague. We visited Karlštejn, a small town south of Prague, where King Charles IV (then ruler of the entire Roman empire) had a castle built in 1348 to save his crown jewels (how decadent). We did a tour of the castle, which was in some ways quite impressive. The town itself isn't very interesting though, and so horrible touristic it makes you wanna kill everyone that's in your way. The next day we went to Kutná Hora, a town east of Prague, which has a beautiful old centre that is under the protection of UNESCO. We visited the St. Barbara Cathedral, which had some 15th century frescoe's that amazed me, and the Ossuary. The Ossuary is a small chapel in Selec, a suburb of Kutná Hora, that contains the remains of the 40.000 people who were buried in its cemetery. Since 40.000 dead people produce quite a lot of bones, in 1511 a monk started to decorate the chapel with the skulls and bones of the deceased, and nowadays the small chapel is completely filled with it. The ceiling has a huge chandelier containing every bone that can be found in the human body, and the corners house four big 'altars' of bones. While we were there, a group of Japanese metalheads were taking pictures of each other while doing the 'horns up'. I wonder how many album covers worldwide contain cheesy pictures taken at Kutná Hora.....

The Ossuary also has its own website.

A new room, with a view.

This nice view belongs to the window of my new room. The past week proved to be the most hectic since my stay in Prague, starting with the arrival of Ernesto, my best friend.
Ernesto arrived last Friday around noon, and after meeting up with him, I decided to take him to my house to show him my room and have a sandwich before hitting town. Little did I know that my flatmate/'landlord' A., who had already told me I wasn't allowed to have friends sleeping over (which I found already pretty ridiculous), did not want me to have anyone over, anytime! So, Friday night I received an angry text message from him, resulting in me rushing home to discuss the situation. To make a long story short: I was not allowed to have people over without calling him first, to ask for permission. This was, to him, only natural, since it was his house, his rules and I had to obey (!) him. When I pointed out to him, so angry I had trouble keeping my voice down, that it was just insane to ask this of me, that I was allowed to have friends over since I was paying him quite a fair amount of rent for a not so big room, and that I didn't want to be treated like a child, he concluded that I did not respect him. Also, I was acting hysterical and childish. So there you go.
The weekend with Ernesto was great. We walked around a lot, had dinner, spent lots of time with my new (American) friends and before we knew it, it was Sunday night again and Ernesto had to catch a 6:40 plane back to Amsterdam. Six hours later, I went to Žižkov to look for a new room, and loved it immediately. It's two blocks down from the TV Tower, in a beautiful, but slightly deteriorated, old building. The room is huge, the ceiling doesn't seem to end and my new flatmate is the cutest Czech girl I've met so far. Monday night I packed all my stuff, cleaned the house, told A. the good news and moved out. Here's to new beginnings.

Tuesday afternoon, my parents arrived in Prague. I was very happy to see them, since it had been five months since I'd last seen them, and the past days I have showed them my city. Because it truely feels like my city now. I've been here for more than six weeks, and I'm home. I can't believe I have to go back in less than a month, and to be honest, I don't want to.