Chapter 3: things to do around Prague

I've gotten somewhat settled into my routine. I wake up sometime around 8:30 or 9:00, get dressed, spend 20 minutes eating our little breakfast (it takes effort to spread butter and jam!), get my things together and catch the metro or a tram. Then I spend time in studio, often it gets swallowed into the whirlpool of things to do on my laptop, (including updating this!), and things to do to prepare for classes. I'll attend the class or two I have that day, spend some more time on my computer. 3 days of the week I eat in studio from groceries purchased earlier in the week (i.e. - one small PB&J, one small turkey or ham sandwich, a few chips or a cereal bar, water or juice) the other 2 days we'll go out to lunch with people. We'll stay in studio after classes until sometime around dinnertime, (by the way, do you say dinner or supper? I say both, but apparently one is more particularly southern than the other) when people will wander out to find a restaurant, sometimes all together, usually in smaller groups. Sometimes we'll come back to studio afterwards, sometimes not. Sometimes people go out for drinks, particularly later in the week (and I may join if it's not really late and there's not other things to do, and get a fanta and feel somewhat like radar, but man, fantas are good here). And then shower and reading or homework and bed and we start over.

This is not hard-set by any means, but a pretty average day. But today, after listening to people talk about not wanting to waste our time here, and taking advantage of the fact that we're in PRAGUE! I've started thinking about what I want to see of Prague, and considering my time here is limited, where and what and how I'll see and do and be. So I've started working on a list. I started out with the must-see parks on this website's list (our site, Letna park is not on their list by the way... don't worry, it will be, you just wait for this library to get built and see what happens around it and it's going to be right up there after Prague Castle, the Charles Bridge, and Old Town Square). There's a botanical gardens, a franciscan rose garden, and a more natural preserve thingy on the western side of Prague. I continued reading on this touristy site about top places to see, going through some of the churches, and one of them really excited me. At St. Nicholas Cathedral, right on Old Town Square about 3 minutes from our studio, they have concerts every night beginning March 31. It costs about 12.50 for a student ticket bought ahead of time, and what really excites me, being still somewhat of a classical music nerd, is the schedule around Easter, the week that it starts. On Maundy Thursday, it says: a capella choir, Ave verum: O. di Lasso, G.P. Palestrina. On Good Friday it says: chamber orchestra, J. Haydn: 7 Last Words of Our Saviour on the Cross. On Easter Sunday, there will be a choir singing J. Haydn: St. Nicholas Mass (which is of course appropriate being in St. Nicholas Cathedral). And on Easter Monday there will be a vocalist,, a trumpeter, and an organist playing works by Mozart and Handel. (You can learn more about it on the website: http://www.psalterium.cz/en/start_en.php). Did I mention the organ is the one Mozart played when he lived in Prague? So anyway, that kind of excited me, I know it's not going to be the absolute best performance anywhere, I mean, it'll be $12, but it's still pretty cool. I think. If you have any thoughts on which of those concerts I should choose to attend, feel free to put in your two cents. I've only 40 days to decide!

My goal now, is if there's some free time between classes, is to try to wander someplace new at least once during the week and more during the weekend. We'll see how it goes. But the anticipation is half of the excitement of going a new place, and by simply wandering and getting lost I'd never learn or find even half of the cool places that I would like to. Well, I'm off to dinner. It's that end of the routine. I'll be back on tomorrow morning, 9:30ish Prague time. Hope everyone's having a good Mardi Gras!