Last week I have been on a short trip to Prague, since it was somehow on the way and additionally Zuzan had been some times at my flat in Helsinki. Actually I picked maybe one of the worst days to pick, nevertheless it was really nice and interesting, although 2,5 days are pretty damn short. But let’s start at the beginning:
After a usual monday at university with about 5 hours of exercise sessions but skipping a lecture, I left around eleven towards the busstop in Heidelberg, it was raining a lot, felt like early autumn in Helsinki. The bus left half past eleven and arrived in Prague a bit before seven.
On the way there was a lot of snow to be seen and also in Prague there was still some new snow from the night. Strange feeling to arrive in a strange town on a bus stop before seven, before sunrise. Zuzan said I should just drop my stuff at her flat, but somehow it felt strange to drop it there at this time of the day, especially since she was at work and I would have to wake some of her flatmates. So I walked towards the city center, westwards, google-earth had prepared me well enough for first orientation.
The normally tourist covered Karls-bridge was still quite empty, the sun was finally up when I arrived there.
I spent some time there watching the people passing by, a lot of workers carrying some drilling machines, some stressed looking fast walking people. and about 3 tourists maybe.
The quarter of town towards the castle near to the old center seemed also still to be asleep.
But some of the bridges were already awake. In Prague there are at least three different types of trams, those old ones seem somehow comfortable, somehow friendly and nice. The newer ones somehow look different, more technically, more neutral. Inside the old ones have been modernized as well, though.
Walked into some little park, passing a monument for the victims of communism. And some trees looked as if it was springtime. In the background Prague’s Eiffel-tower. 1/6 of the size of the original one, but on a hill, thus as high as the french version.
Walking in this park was a bit exhausting because I had all my luggage with me and the paths were all very slippery and frozen over. The view over Prague was very nice, though.
Somewhen before noon zusan returned from work. We met at her flat, felt like the old farmhouse I lived in once upon a time with my family, maybe it was only the temperatures. Quite a lovely flat and also 4 nice people living in it.
Zusan had to leave again to university for an exam (as I said, everything timed really well, more like an ambush from my side) so I had time to explore the town a bit more after having left my stuff in the flat and warmed up by some tea.
In the evening there was a concert by some Rock/Funk/Jazz/whatever band (that’s how a friend of my host described the music), which was great, even though in the end, i.e. before we left when they were still playing, the couldn’t somehow find it. the end. After running though town the whole day and not really having slept well in the bus – that’s maybe only possible for people smaller than 1,60m – I was also quite tired. maybe.
The following day we visited an exibition about czech press photography, interesting and containing some really touching pictures. We also visited the ‘new town’, the other castle, went to take a closer look at the small tower on top of the hill.
When I arrived Zuzan had some sweet bread filled with poppy seeds, which was really nice. When I left she had got another one, which we ate in Berlin distributed over several days, so we had always something to look forward too when going back home to Tonis flat. But as far as I remember Zuzan had also to ‘suffer’ from a lot of cake when she was in Helsinki, like rhubarb-cake 
On Thursday I walked the way from the flat to the train station to see also that part of town. Some builduings were from the Expo ’58, and a nice big park with already partly frozen lakes was on my way and being visited.
The train station from which I was leaving on a 5h trip to Berlin, arriving there somewhen around seven in the evening, reading ‘Pippi Longstocking’ in finnish and Nordermoor (in german) …
More pictures can be found in the gallery.
(Actually I wanted to write this first in finnish and then write a summary in english, but somehow time is at the moment nothing I have lots of.)