On Mother Praha

And from Berlin, I headed to Prague. (I'm starting to keep score of how many times I can change cities without a hiccup, and how many times something goes wrong. So far it's five to three. Could be worse, right?)

So I settled into Prague for 6 days... which is a long time in the scheme of my trip, especially since I didn't really know anything ABOUT the place other than the vague feeling that I would like it, and a few friends telling me how beautiful it was. So armed with that vague idea, a really HORRIBLE grasp of the Czech language (and I thought GERMAN was hard!), and a couple thousand Kronas (man I really love really high currencies... I feel like such a high-roller every time I buy a candybar.) I headed to the Czech Republic.

It's kind of weird to say that it wasn't what I was expecting since I just got through saying that I didn't really have any expectations... but well, it really wasn't what I was expecting.

The city was really lovely, in a completely dainty, boroque, frilly sort of way, with buildings which looked like piles of marble whipped cream. But the people of this frilly, almost fussy city felt completely out of whack with it. This people reminded me of the ships you see in harbors at the end of summer... worn and sundrenched from the storms they have weathered, but still treading water with grace and pride. The two didn't match. I could love them both, seperately, but I had a really hard time putting the two together.

Another city which I can't claim as my own, but I truly loved observing. Lately I've felt less like a traveller than a peeping tom, eavesdropping on bits of languages I don't understand and peering in on cultures which are equally foreign to me. I haven't felt lately that tug of recognition, that silent and knowing realization that I've just stumbled into a place which has had a peice of my heart all along, and I just didn't know it yet. But I feel like instead I've been learning how to genuinely respect and love such different ways of seeing the world, in a way I don't think I ever have before. Which is kind of just as cool, I think.

On misconceptions

Ok, I've got to be honest with you...

Of all of the places I'm wandering around this summer, the only one I honestly just wasn't too excited about was Berlin. Truth be told, the only reason I went at all was because there is a Guggenheim museum there, and I made that silly goal when I was 13, and so off to Berlin I went.

For the record, I have several absolutely lovely German friends, who I think are pretty much the most awesome thing since apple strudel... but to be completely honest, as a whole it has always been the one culture I just could never identify with, never find any sort of connection to, and I just flat out didn't get it. Once while I was still living in DC I had a long conversations with two Germans about the main differences they saw as they were living in the US. The thing they kept saying over and over again was that it was so weird to them that people would smile... on the street... to people they didn't know... for no reason... just to be nice. The whole concept that if you were seated next to someone on the train you might attempt to start up friendly conversation, just to pass the time, was completely foreign to them. They tried to explain to me that culturally, no matter how warm and friendly you might be personally, outside of your home you just didn't show it. Ever. And I thought, then and there... this is just not the country for me.

So here I was on a train to Berlin, with no real thoughts other than how much I just wasn't gonna like this town. Get in, see the museum, and head out again, was my plan.

And let me be the first to say how completely wrong I was.

Berlin was an absolutely fascinating, hauntingly beautiful, progressive, adventurous, complex, fluid, dramatic, even regal place. And I had no idea. I stayed at a fun little hostel in East Berlin, and some people I met convinced me to go on a free walking tour of Berlin. I thought, why not! It's not like I have any other plans here, other than a museum stop. And oh my, I'm so glad I did. It's hard to put into words in a silly blog post, but as I walked through this town that has seen so many layers of pain and upheavel, quite literally tearing them apart, and then really regally and nobally began to recreate and redefine their capitol... I don't really no how to explain how that effected me, but just to say I have such an overwhelming respect for this culture now.

And I'm really glad to to have been so wrong.

This is the absolutely haunting Jewish memorial stretching smack dab in the middle of East Berlin, just past Checkpoint Charlie, where the death rows had been set up, within eyesight of Hitler's bunker. It's striking and haunting and really undefinably beautiful. I was talking to a German man who said that while they can't be proud of their history, they can at least be proud of how they are choosing to confront and face their history. And I think that is a beautiful thing.

On Amsterdam

And then there was Amsterdam. I'm trying to accept the idea that every place doesn't have to end up being my place... I don't have to fall in love with every place I wander, I don't have to have a deep soul connection with a culture in order to enjoy wandering for a few days. Ok, so I realise this sounds like a pretty basic concept... but everything in me screams to engage wherever I am and whatever I'm doing... has to have some sort of massive, existential, cosmic connection or enormous revelation or incredible experience everywhere I go. When I actually write it down, it sounds like a pretty spoiled way to go about life, honestly.

So I tried to enjoy the Netherlands, and specifically Amsterdam for what it was. A strange and kind of austere contradiction... reserved, dignified, orderly, pristine, polite, and cultured, while at the same time racous, experimentary, blatant, daring, liberal, gregarious.

Not my place, but it was fun to visit for a few days.

On my last full day in the city I wandered around for serveral hours and stumbled onto a lovely little square... and since it was sunday, everyone was out. I ended up chatting with an adorable old Dutch man as we watched a giant game of chess being battled out for over an hour. He was duely impressed with my chess knowledge, and I silently spent the hour thanking Justin over and over again for the hours of forced lessons. Of course... that was until he started blasting things like, "White! What are you thinking?? You have to protect your E5 space, or in 9 moves he's going to sweep in like a demon on F12! It's lost, White! You've ruined it! You'll be gone in 20 moves now!" Thinking that I would understand what the heck he was talking about, and lementing White's horrible impending doom of 20 moves away as well. So maybe I was a teensy bit out of my league... but it was still fun.

I spent most of my time in the Netherlands with some lovely English girls I met on my boat.

And yes... before you ask... I went to the Netherlands and went to a zoo. But while the animals looked pretty much as they do in the states, the signs were in Dutch, so really it was a cultural immersion. And we took lots of goofy pictures, most of which I'll spare you.