I didn't write for an entire day for good reason! I just wasn't around. I walked until my feet gave out and spent the better part of yesterday in Wenceslas Square in Prague's new town. Oddly enough, my surname, Fencl, is an abbreviation for Wenceslas. Fencl Square? Anyway, my goal was to go to the museum of Communism, which was incredible. After that, I went into the Czech National Museum before heading back to recharge my batteries at the hostel, where I randomly met two new friends---Alix and Hanna. But first, a bit of back story:
After writing the previous entry, I get into the shower, which is one of those bizarre showers with no mounted head, but rather the hose-like nozzle that detaches. It was more like hosing down than showering. Not a fan. So I get dressed, walk into my room and Alix is there. She is a student from Minnesota by-way-of North Dakota. She and her friend Hanna are studying abroad in Ireland and are on spring break. She is really into music and we had a lot to discuss. We sat like little kids on our bunk beds talking across the room and trying not to freak out too much about how cool it was that we met and were swapping stories about seeing Explosions in the Sky live. I am so envious that she got to see Phil Elverum! Yes, THE Elverum of Microphones/ Mount Eerie fame. She also does music of her own. (Ed.--Excellent tunes! check them out here)
That night, (this is still the 26th) we decided to go to a pub down the street from our hostel, which is completely shitty, but that is beside the point! We cannot sleep in our own dorm room because of the three middle aged men who snore so loudly that they collectively sound like Darth Vader with walking Pneumonia. Basically, it got so bad at night that sleep was just not worth it.
Alix is such a cool person. She studies Environmental Science at school and also wants to work for NGOs in D.C. (Ed.---I hope to move to D.C. by the end of the summer). We discuss a musical collaboration, which we hope to get underway when she returns to the States. I mean, when two people share the same musical loves and become such fast friends like us, it is a no brainier!
Then out of nowhere, these two guys appeared. Both were kind of creepy, and they started talking to us. Their English was kind of broken, and they made Alix uncomfortable by playing with her hair. The one is relatively normal in appearance, but the other resembles a sort of Che Guevara poseur in that he sported a tan leather beret and a red leather military jacket. He was very pseudo-guerrilla. He kept saying, "I am psychic! I AM psychic!" So far gone...
I tried to distract them by asking where they were from. In their slurry, drunken haze, they said that they were from Zurich but were originally from Tel Aviv. When I expressed an interest saying that I wanted to visit the beaches of Tel Aviv, they made plenty of recommendations and gave me their business card for a vegetarian restaurant that they own in Zurich. All the while, Alix and I kept making eye contact to figure out how we would make our get away. We eventually said that we had to get some air, but would be back. We ended up going back to the hostel and talked more music. I think that I actually slept that night because I was so tired. I couldn't even move my feet.
The next morning, I woke up a bit later and talked to Alix and Hanna. Then I was off to the Communist Museum to see Uncle Karl and Vlad L. Like most places in Prague, it was quite difficult to find. I actually ducked into a McDonalds to see if it would be any better with fresher grass-fed beef, but it wasn't. Same old shit. I hate McDonalds. I hate what it has done to the global economy and I eat it once a year usually. They should put surgeon general warnings on Big Macs or "Royale" burgers (quarter pounder) like they do on cartons of cigarettes.
Apparently, the museum was on the other side of the McDonalds, so I was in luck. I loved this museum. it was a cluster of rarities, commonplace items, and all things bizarre during the nearly 70-year existence of the Czechoslovak SSR (CSSR). Murals of worker hero worship, Lenin, and Marx were plenty. I especially loved the film screening where they showed the Velvet Uprising of 1989. It was intense to think that 30 minutes prior, I was in Wenceslas Square where it all happened and even stranger yet that the revolution occurred within my lifetime. After, I visited the National Museum and it was not as cool as I thought it was going to be.
After writing the previous entry, I get into the shower, which is one of those bizarre showers with no mounted head, but rather the hose-like nozzle that detaches. It was more like hosing down than showering. Not a fan. So I get dressed, walk into my room and Alix is there. She is a student from Minnesota by-way-of North Dakota. She and her friend Hanna are studying abroad in Ireland and are on spring break. She is really into music and we had a lot to discuss. We sat like little kids on our bunk beds talking across the room and trying not to freak out too much about how cool it was that we met and were swapping stories about seeing Explosions in the Sky live. I am so envious that she got to see Phil Elverum! Yes, THE Elverum of Microphones/ Mount Eerie fame. She also does music of her own. (Ed.--Excellent tunes! check them out here)
That night, (this is still the 26th) we decided to go to a pub down the street from our hostel, which is completely shitty, but that is beside the point! We cannot sleep in our own dorm room because of the three middle aged men who snore so loudly that they collectively sound like Darth Vader with walking Pneumonia. Basically, it got so bad at night that sleep was just not worth it.
Alix is such a cool person. She studies Environmental Science at school and also wants to work for NGOs in D.C. (Ed.---I hope to move to D.C. by the end of the summer). We discuss a musical collaboration, which we hope to get underway when she returns to the States. I mean, when two people share the same musical loves and become such fast friends like us, it is a no brainier!
Then out of nowhere, these two guys appeared. Both were kind of creepy, and they started talking to us. Their English was kind of broken, and they made Alix uncomfortable by playing with her hair. The one is relatively normal in appearance, but the other resembles a sort of Che Guevara poseur in that he sported a tan leather beret and a red leather military jacket. He was very pseudo-guerrilla. He kept saying, "I am psychic! I AM psychic!" So far gone...
I tried to distract them by asking where they were from. In their slurry, drunken haze, they said that they were from Zurich but were originally from Tel Aviv. When I expressed an interest saying that I wanted to visit the beaches of Tel Aviv, they made plenty of recommendations and gave me their business card for a vegetarian restaurant that they own in Zurich. All the while, Alix and I kept making eye contact to figure out how we would make our get away. We eventually said that we had to get some air, but would be back. We ended up going back to the hostel and talked more music. I think that I actually slept that night because I was so tired. I couldn't even move my feet.
The next morning, I woke up a bit later and talked to Alix and Hanna. Then I was off to the Communist Museum to see Uncle Karl and Vlad L. Like most places in Prague, it was quite difficult to find. I actually ducked into a McDonalds to see if it would be any better with fresher grass-fed beef, but it wasn't. Same old shit. I hate McDonalds. I hate what it has done to the global economy and I eat it once a year usually. They should put surgeon general warnings on Big Macs or "Royale" burgers (quarter pounder) like they do on cartons of cigarettes.
Apparently, the museum was on the other side of the McDonalds, so I was in luck. I loved this museum. it was a cluster of rarities, commonplace items, and all things bizarre during the nearly 70-year existence of the Czechoslovak SSR (CSSR). Murals of worker hero worship, Lenin, and Marx were plenty. I especially loved the film screening where they showed the Velvet Uprising of 1989. It was intense to think that 30 minutes prior, I was in Wenceslas Square where it all happened and even stranger yet that the revolution occurred within my lifetime. After, I visited the National Museum and it was not as cool as I thought it was going to be.
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