Nuremberg, part I - the Old Town

As I mentioned, I got up at the crack of dawn (like I always do) for that infernal morning bus. I headed to the hostel lobby, chatted a bit with the reception bloke when checking out, and went to the pool area to buy a sandwich and a whiskey cappuccino from their vending machines.

Whiskey cappuccino, oh my lord. This is one of the best things ever invented. I'd actually been ordering it from day one at the hostel since their coffee machine was relatively cheap and the coffee was surprisingly decent. Also, the name "whiskey cappuccino" is just so provocative and before you know it, you're on your second cup. Anyway, this whiskey cappuccino was MAGNIFICENT. If I ever go back to Prague, I'll stay at this hostel again, just for the coffee.

3 empty cups of whiskey cappuccino, some korunas and a tram ticket.

I found that I had enough change on me for 3 cups so I sat there and sipped away. I miss that morning, I really do. Other early travellers were up and about, looking just as bleary-eyed and dishevelled as I felt. I took out my itinerary and went over it again, then put it away and sat there and thought about nothing in particular while I munched and sipped away. Tomorrow I have to confront my demons, a prospect which I both relish and fear. I've been running for a year now. I don't know what it'll be like. There is the probability of my chickening out. But then again, it'll always be there so might as well grit my teeth and go with it.

Prague at 6am, sun's just rising. Waiting for the tram, waiting for the dawn.

One last glimpse of the hlavni nadrazi.

5 minutes later, I still can't sleep. Still obsessing/worrying/going spare. Is there any way to turn the clock back? What would have happened if x and y had occurred instead of z?

I had a weirdly vivid dream last night. I dreamt that someone had broken into my locker - the sort that you have in hostels - and stolen some of my stuff. The padlock I'd used, which they'd broken into, was the blue one I'd brought to Europe. Anyway, my stuff got pilfered and so did this girl's, a girl I'd gone to middle school with, whom I didn't like very much back in the day, but we're not even on each other's facebook. To be honest I never even knew her that well. Back in middle school I disliked her because her hair was perpetually dandruffy and me and my friends all thought that was disgusting. She also had this lost puppy aura about her, and was forever hanging on to people who were too polite to tell her to get lost. Anyway, my stuff that got pinched was pretty much irrelevant stuff - eye masks and such - even in the dream, I had trouble remembering what I'd left in the locker - and I went to the police station to report what had happened. The officer was a retired member from the national guard who was stationed at my high school, 5 years ago now. And, what the hell. I can't believe it's been that long. So much has happened since then.

Anyhow, the police officer took my details and told me that they'd probably never be able to find the culprit but they'd try anyway. That was when I woke up, and reached for the alarm clock, and read the time on the luminous dials: 4am sharp. And I couldn't go back to sleep again, so here I am, typing away. What's my subconscious trying to tell me, I wonder. A phobia of people taking away my belongings, or in a broader sense, my losing things and never getting them back. This is probably because I've been watching the Phantom of the Opera's 25 anniversary special edition and Erik was one psychotic possessive-manipulating bloke if there ever was one.

Or maybe there's nothing at at all to see and tell and Freud's Die Traumdeutung is just a load of crock. Dreams are meaningless. (Do you honestly believe that, though?)

In any case, this post is supposed to be about the past and not the present so I'll get back to that. I hopped on the plushy De Bahn bus to Nuremberg.

Holy lmao the weather I got in Nuremberg was awful. It was freezing and pouring with rain, and the accommodation was German and expensive, although one good thing about it was that it was right next to the HBF so I didn't have to walk far when I got there. It was also surprisingly fancy - one of those hotels-turned-hostels, where the rooms are actually hotel rooms with four extra bunks thrown in. I managed to bag one of the proper beds, the original hotel bed, and it was BLISS. The ensuite bathroom and toilet were so extravagant that I almost cried. Spent far too much time in my cosy hotel-hostel room since the weather outside was simply abysmal. What else? Oh yes, the room was oddly empty: it was a six-bed "dorm" but the only guests were myself, a Korean boy who could barely speak English and a stinky Spaniard who smelt like he hadn't showered for at least half a year and didn't speak much English either. Didn't really want to talk to them, and in any case probably couldn't have even if I wanted to. The Korean boy's locker got stuck at one point though and he asked me for a penknife to pry it open with by drawing a surprisingly good picture, and I lent him my sewing kit. He was very skinny, painfully polite, and docile, which probably aren't very flattering adjectives for a young man.

I finished all the sightseeing spots that day, got caught in a whopping thunderstorm that soaked me to the skin and froze me to the marrow, treated myself to a Chinese restaurant for dinner that wasn't as good as I'd expected (although the owner was pretty nice), and then went back to the hostel and spent a heavenly half hour in the shower. Honestly, after being obliged to wander around in the pouring rain at about 5 degrees celsius for two hours, a piping hot shower in a spotless bathroom with shampoo and shower gel is astounding and otherworldly.

This is the Old Town, which was actually my last stop, but I don't think I want to write about the Rallying Grounds or the Nurembeg Trialhouse just yet so I'll start with something frivolous. Although the weather, urgh. Nothing to be frivolous about there. Nuremberg was one of those gorgeous Christmas towns you read about in your novels when you were little. Certainly, it reminded me very much of Philip Pullman's children's novel Clockwork. The clockwork tower with its figurines, its thatched-styled cottages, crisscrossing woodwork and barrels of mead are the stuff of fairytales. And, of course, Pullman turned those figurines into killer figurines.

Your standard cathedral. It started pouring like nobody's business when I arrived here.

The clock tower. Apparently there's a figurine show like the Orloj in Prague but of course I missed that one as well. I wanted to appreciate it more but being completely soaked/freezing wasn't really helping matters.

The Christmas market, and stuff of children's dreams!

Another chapel, this time right off the market square, but again I couldn't find it in me to appreciate it due to the dismal weather.

Walked to the metro and went back to the hostel, and these are just pictures I took while walking there - in the pouring rain, I might add.

The metro station for the Old Town

Czech Republic, part VI - Prague (iv)

St. Vitus' Cathedral

Location: Pražský hrad.

There was a HUGE cathedral within the castle ground - St. Vitus' Cathedral, or Katedrála svatého Víta/Václava a Vojtěcha. Definitely up there in the top five. It was built in the mid 14th century, and contains the tombs of numerous Bohemian kings and Holy Roman emperors. One of those works of architecture that make you draw up short and goggle in wonder. Its sheer size alone is good for at least 10 minutes of gawking. Admission to the cathedral was free but I had to queue for a good fifteen minutes to get in.

When you emerge from the cathedral to the other side, there's a very beautiful bohemian mini-square.

Was feeling VERY peckish by then so decided to splurge a bit - although it's that part of the world, thus the definition of a Czech splurge is quite different to a British splurge. I have never ever splurged in England before. I'd have to go hungry for a month if I wanted to splurge in London. That's not a joke. Whereas here, in Prague Castle, I can walk into a four star restaurant with a panoramic view of the entire city and order a three-course meal for less than 15 euros.

Czech goulash - yes, I think we've established that Hungarian goulash is still the best.

I hogged a four-person table all to myself, but the restaurant was doing a roaring business (I think it was actually a hotel restaurant, whoops) so it was only a matter of time before someone asked to share the table with me, especially considering the fact that my table was arguably the best one, with the best view. An elderly American couple with their Czech guide came and asked very graciously if they could sit with me. We ended up having a very nice conversation, and the couple insisted on paying for my lunch, despite my protests. I'd like to do that too when I'm their age - go gallivanting around the world, meet serendipitous strangers and talk with them and buy them dinner, and then go back to my fancy five star hotel and do it again the next day.

The view from the restaurant.

A manhole lid in the Hrad.

One last glimpse of the square.

And here I am waiting for the tram back to the hostel.

Spent the rest of the afternoon/night chatting with the newcomers in my room, a girl from Colorado named Amy, an Australian girl named Carly, and a typically handsome German bloke from Hanover named Klaus. Carly had been in Europe for three months already and was here for the party scene, but she had somehow managed to get some sort of infection that had resulted in a rather nasty growth on her thigh. She'd been due to leave Prague that day but the growth was bothering her so much that she had been obliged to go to the hospital, where the doctors told her they had to perform surgery on her immediately or the gangrene would spread to the whole leg. Amy had never been out of Colorado for her entire life, since she had dedicated her life to staying at home caring for her mother. She'd been saving up for a new car, but one day decided that you only live once, and resolved to use her car savings for a trip to Europe. Klaus was in Prague simply because it was nine hours from Hanover by bus and he wanted a weekend alone. The three of us were all pretty jealous of him.

Anyway, it was rather nice that evening. Klaus didn't really have much to say to Carly and Amy, although he and I talked quite a lot. He eventually sloped off at around 10pm and didn't get back till rather late. When I got up at 4am, I was mildly surprised when he stuck his head out from his bunk and whispered, "You're up early."

"Got a bus to catch," I said. "You didn't just get back, did you?"

"Been back for about an hour," he said with a slow smile that lighted up his entire face, and momentarily drew my attention for a bit longer than it should have.

"Yeah, well," I gestured to my belongings. "Better get cracking then. It was nice meeting you."

When I'd gotten myself all sorted out and was about to leave, he whispered again, "Bye. It was nice talking to you. Take care."

This conversation kind of sums up about 70 percent of the friendships you make on the road - you meet someone, have loads to say to them and them to you, but then there's that mutual, unspoken agreement not to leave any contacts, that goodbye is goodbye and you'll never see each other again and even if you do, odds are you've already forgotten what they look like anyway. It's a pity, I suppose, but we all have to say goodbye at one point or another.

Czech Republic, part V - Prague (iii)

My second to last entry on Prague - I've sorted out all my photos here and then I can move on. Prague was one of my favourite cities but I feel like I've been writing about it forever.

I have been up to my neck prepping for the future, writing emails, thinking up various ways to be subserviently obliging without seeming obsequious, and maintaining my sanity. Fortunately in this world most people seem to look upon fawning rather more favourably than I had presupposed. Everyone likes people fawning over them. Well, most.

My last day in Prague. Visited the Castle district, Prague Castle, or Pražský hrad. Took the tram from my hostel, which was about a 20 minute journey, walked up the VERY steep slope which took about 10 minutes though it certainly felt longer, and hey presto we're on top of the hill, a la Jack Dawson - "I'm the king of the world!"

The VERY steep pathway up to the castle.

The whole place was teeming with tourists, no surprise there. Especially elderly Chinese and Japanese tourists who just kept snapping away. There was a very nice panorama of the city to be had from the hill, but for some reason it just doesn't look that marvellous in pictures. Nonetheless, I think I took about 50 pictures of the skyline. To be fair, so did all the other visitors. That's another thing; it seems like everyone left their manners at home, the amount of pushing, jostling and shoving that went on for "best photo spot."

Decided to leave the madness, and proceeded into the castle grounds. The poor castle guard looked really hot in that garb. I was wearing a blouse and even then found the weather ridiculously stuffy. I can't even begin to imagine how stifling their uniform must have been.

The palace gardens, as such. This part of the castle grounds are free, but there are other sections where you have to pay for admission. I walked around the free parts since those were quite big enough for me.

The castle square.

I was lucky enough to be there JUST in time for their changing guard ceremony. It's almost exactly like the one in Buckingham Palace, except that these Czech soldiers are a lot more disciplined..well they were a former Socialist state after all.

I was originally squashed in the second row, but an elderly Czech couple in the front row motioned at me to come squeeze in front of them, which I appreciated very much. Me, the diminutive Asian. Every time I'm in one of these crowds I feel like a hobbit.

Back to the main square.

More to come soon, when I manage to snap out of brown nose mode again.