The beer is getting better
Sept. 30
Hello, all.
Picking up: last night's local bars were better than all right.
After my experience of walking into the Wellington pub in SoHo and discovering that it was a gay bar, I decided not to wander alone into the Dump Bar. I had no idea what that was about, and I'm a stranger in this country.
I had a few beers that are worth mentioning. Klostermann semi-dark was OK but maybe it was too cold. If I get a chance to have another, I'll let it warm up a few degrees. Strakonicky Dudak is probably a pilsner. Many Czech blond beers are. It was very light.
Svato Vaclavske 21 degree doppelbock is another story. Sweet, strong, it smells almost like flowers. The place where I bought it is called Pivnice U Tomase Stitneho. There were three sketches on the wall. One was Jan Hus, the religious reformer. The others--Jan Zizka and Tomas Stitny—I don't know, but I'm guessing the bar is named for Stitny or for a namesake of his. [Editor’s note: Harry also noticed on a return visit on Sunday night that the establishment is on Stitneho Street.]
I had another Kozel this afternoon, and learned to spell the name. It was better than the first because I was very dry after sweating on the bike all day.
Also had Radlers, a blond beer that tasted like it had spices—maybe cloves and cardamom—in it. Very interesting.
Today I tried to find the New Town hall, where the first Defenestration of Prague took place in the 13th century. I did eventually find it. Not knowing which window, I did a video of the front of the building to get them all.
I notice that some of the windows have grates, perhaps to discourage additional defenestrations.
I found the town hall, but only after a couple of hours of wandering and getting nearly run over a few times on the highway that runs along the Vltava. But getting lost always has its rewards. I stumbled onto the Dancing House, also known as Fred & Ginger. It is an office building on the riverfront that was designed by Frank Gehry in the 80s. The most striking feature is a tower that looks like a swaying figure, possibly a lady dancing in an evening dress. I took a couple of photos, but you can see better on the Internet.
It was on my Prague hit list. So was Saints Cyril and Methodius, an Orthodox church which is about three blocks from the Dancing House.
That was a serious visit. The crypt is a shrine to the members of the Czechoslovak army in exile who parachuted into the country in late 1941 to assassinate Reinhard Heydrich, Hitler's right hand man who was in charge of the Czech territories. They killed him in 1942, but were trapped sometime later in the church crypt by the Nazis. There was a gunfight and rather than be captured, they killed themselves there. There's an exhibit that tells the story, and the crypt door is to be kept closed. No photos in the crypt.
Another reason that I went to New Town is that it holds the second oldest brewery in the Czech Republic. The best beer so far in Prague is Flekovsky lezak, a 13 percent beer brewed by U Fleku, a 500-year-old brewing company that runs a restaurant near New Town Square. U Fleku was written up in a few of the guide books. It is marked on some maps, like the ones that the cops use when they give directions in Old Town Square.
The company sells its beer to other merchants, but the lezak is sold only at the U Fleku restaurant. It is black and looks a bit like Guinness. It's bitter and reminds me of unsweetened chocolate. I had it with roasted pig's knee, a Czech delicacy. The restaurant had an accordion player on duty.
Later I went up to the Charles Bridge, a big-time historic landmark and another tourist magnet, which is now open only to pedestrians. It's clogged with people, not only tourists but people who hawk souvenirs, draw pictures, and play music.
When I was almost across the bridge, I heard someone call "Harry." If you have hearing as bad as mine and as many voices in your head, you know that happens all the time, and nobody's talking to you. But this time I heard it distinctly, a couple of times. And this time someone was talking to me. It was Joanna and her traveling friend Pat. Pat saw a guy wearing a black suit and a pony tail pushing a bike and asked Joanna if that could be me.
I set my hat on the bike seat and the bike on its kickstand while we talked. A lady with an American accent pushed past me to get a photo of the bike wearing the black hat. She may have thought that was one of the most European things she had seen all day. I kept my mouth shut.
The bridge leads to the road that climbs the castle hill. I got up to the castle, partly riding the bike and partly walking it. I didn't go in. In fact, the city is so beautiful, I haven't cared to spend too much time inside anywhere. Even the bars. I usually get one or two and move on.
Another of the tourist marvels here is the great clock on the tower of the Prague municipal building in Old Town Square. It is a major draw. It combines automata with a clockface that tells three kinds of time and tells you what sign of the zodiac the sun is in, or some such astrological information.
It also has figures. When the clock strikes the hour, two windows open near the top of the tower and twelve figures representing the apostles pass in review. A guy with a trumpet appears at the top of the tower and plays a fanfare. He may be a real person. I don't know.
The clock has other figures that appear to be patriarchs and an angel, who, because he has a shield, I suspect is Michael, the belligerent one. There are also figures at the top of the clock face representing the most despised things. From left to right, they are vanity, who holds a mirror; greed, with a money bag; death, who rings a bell, and the Turk. Today's photo is “Harry Meets the Most Despised.”
Had a Pilsner Urquell with dinner and that was superb. [Editor’s note: Harry dragged Joanna around to half a dozen places to read menus before she decided that the first stop, the restaurant in the ancient cellar, near the astrological clock, was the most promising.] So was the polka band doing the Battle Hymn of the Republic in Czech. "Glory, glory hallelujah" stayed in English. [Editor’s note: The rest was in Czech. It could have been a translation of “John Brown’s Body.” For all Harry knows it could about somebody else entirely, like maybe someone thrown out of a window.]
Random observations:
Nobody I have paid so far uses a cash register. Everybody—waiters, cab drivers, bartenders, the bike guy—carries what appears to be a regulation issue wallet with compartments for various denominations of cash.
Nobody in the neighborhood of Hotel Dalimil speaks any English, and so far two of the hotel's concierges have difficulty understanding me. But I am getting along, with many apologies on both sides.
Harry
Far from home
Oct. 2
It occurred to me Saturday morning that Prague is the farthest I’ve ever been away from home. Is that what you call pushing the envelope? [Editor’s note: Harry’s memory or understanding of distance is not accurate. Buenos Aires is farther from his home than Prague is. Prague is the farthest east that Harry had traveled to this point.]
The place has the flavor of Middle Europe, which is appropriate, seeing how this is Bohemia. Careful study of Universal Pictures taught me that you never get more Middle in Europe than Bohemia. Well, maybe Transylvania. But then, I'm not sure where Transylvania is in relation to Prague. But hell, I'm an American and expected to be geographically illiterate.
After two days in the country, I hadn't yet met anyone in a dirndl skirt or lederhosen. No Tyrolean caps, either.
The closest I came to a torch-carrying mob was a bunch of buzzed locals in U Zlate Konvice, the restaurant where I took Joanna to dinner Friday night. They were singing along with the polka band. One guy got up and stood in for the bass player on one number. A companion got up and danced. They were in no shape to go after monsters.
Prague has the Holy Roman Empire flavor that I found in Amsterdam, Frankfurt, Geneva, Zurich. It has cobblestone streets with gutters in the middle in the medieval fashion. Squares are paved with cobblestones in the fan pattern. But here there's a bonus, the sidewalks are mosaics of small cobbles. Even out in the boonies where my hotel is.
Every store in my neighborhood sells booze. One near the hotel is my favorite. It sells ice cream, ladies' underwear, and liquor. Everything you need for a good time, all under one roof.
U Zlate Konvice is right up there with U Fleku. It's really downstairs, in a restored medieval cellar. The staircase is opposite the great clock with the four despised things. Does a location get better than that? That's where the band did the "Battle Hymn of the Republic" in Czech, as a polka. [Editor’s note, just for the trivia of it: This also is the bar in the cellar where Harry had the Cerna Hora Granat on the afternoon of the 29th.]
Joanna had heard about U Fleku. So we went there for lunch. It was my second visit. That house beer is fantastic.
We went back to the Charles Bridge and walked it together. We walked around the far bank, in part of the city called Smaller Town. Among its distinctions is a fountain that may be an allegory of a pissing contest. The figures are stylized, yes, but clearly represent two naked men. Their hips swivel and they have other moving parts. You figure out the rest. (Suspecting no one would believe me, I have video.)
Sometimes I forget where I am. We were in a bakery in Smaller Town and were eating a pastry called trdlo (pronounced somewhat like "tread low) and there was a radio playing in the back. I recognized the song, "Put Your Sweet Lips a Little Closer to the Phone," the old country and western hit from the 50s. OK, now I've seen somebody--two ladies, in fact--in dirndl skirts and Middle European peasant blouses. It's their costume when they work at the bakery. It's in one of the top tourist spots in Prague: at the end of the Charles Bridge, below the castle. It gave me flashbacks to Disney World. Then I realized the cover of the country tune was in Czech.
Bending my mind around all these strange impressions at once is a worthwhile endeavor. I have discovered, for instance, that with enough travel I can keep a moderate buzz going with a minimum of chemical stimulation.
Smaller Town also has the narrowest public thoroughfare I have encountered. It has a light to control the flow of foot traffic. You don't have to believe me. Look at today's photo. I'm not in the picture because there's no room.
The highlight of Saturday was Prague Castle. We got there after dark. You walk past the guards into the courtyard, then through another courtyard, and there's St. Vitus Cathedral. It's standing on its own, a huge full-scale gothic pile surrounded by the rest of the castle. Joanna looked up for a view of the gargoyles.
Then we heard gun fire. We ran toward the sound of the guns—just like Eroll Flynn playing General Custer—and watched fireworks being launched from the next mountain. I think there's an amusement park there.
Saturday night, after I got back to the hotel, I ran across the street to another store, which sells groceries, liquor, beer, and clothes. I bought a bottle of Budweiser. “Budweiser Budvar” in full. It's made in a place called Ceske Budejovice, which becomes Budweis in German. I hope to try it on draft tomorrow to give it a fair chance. Also plan to try Krusovice dark, the beer in the other bottle.
Here's a shot of the place taken from the skylight of my room. It's not great resolution. The windows on the left are groceries. the things that look like elongated wooden giraffes are elongated wooden giraffes, which seem to be very popular here. Next is the liquor window, then trousers and bags. Out of frame is a window with more liquor bottles. The photo caught a sample of mosaic sidewalk in front of the store.
I'm still having trouble with the coins. It's not always easy to see the denomination. When I got back from the store, I realized that the tip I gave a cab driver earlier wasn't 50 crowns (about 3 bucks) but ten crowns, or about 60 cents.
I'm sending this at 9 Sunday morning. When I left her at her hotel last night, Joanna said she would be checking out for Nuremburg at ten.
So I'm on my own and off to embarrass myself some more.
Harry
No comments:
Post a Comment