How Prague Stole Mardi Gras

For all my talk and planning for Prague's version of Mardi Gras -- the Carnevale -- suffice it to say it did not happen.

At least, for us. Here's the story from my failed attempt at Mardi Gras in Prague:

It started two weeks ago, my first weekend after classes began. I went sightseeing around Prague with three other students and we came across this huge festival in a park near the Charles Bridge. There was music and people in costumes dancing and lots of food booths. It was a great time but none of us knew what the occasion was. Later, we saw a banner that deemed it Prague's Bohemian Carnevale -- two weeks of balls and events that led up to Fat Tuesday. 

I checked out their Web site, got super excited and forwarded it to my fellow students, saying basically -- "We are doing this Tuesday, don't make plans." In the calendar of events, it showed a parade starting around 5 p.m. Tuesday with celebrations in the same park continuing until 9 p.m., when fireworks would begin. It would be a way to celebrate Mardi Gras without Louisiana.

Unfortunately, the classes we taught Tuesday ended at 6:30 p.m., then we had about a half-hour of feedback with our teachers to go over what went well and what didn't work. I figured, if anything, we'd have time to catch the tail-end of the celebration before fireworks. AT LEAST, there would be fireworks!

So we leave school and walk toward the park, crossing the Charles Bridge. You can see the park from the bridge. It was completely dark and empty. No signs of music or food, or even trash on the ground from a previous good time. So I said, "Well, there are a lot of parties and balls going on, maybe everyone's there and then they'll come out for fireworks." Everyone takes this as a good enough reason. I applaud myself for quick thinking. We head to a pub for food and drinks to kill the two hours until fireworks. 

A few minutes before 9, we walk back onto Charles Bridge, thinking it will be the perfect place to see the fireworks over the river. At any given time, there are a lot of people walking on the bridge. It's kind of the main attraction. This makes it hard to gage if people are here for the fireworks or just because they are tourists and are all, hey, let's look at these statues ... at night!

9:30, 9:45, 10 p.m. Nada. About the most exciting thing we witness is the alarming amount of seagulls and swans chillin' in the water right below the bridge. We all imagine that if fireworks were to happen just across the way, it might become a veritable shitstorm all over the bridge.

But, alas, no fireworks. I start apologizing to my friends, saying, "I'm almost positive it said 9 p.m. on the Web site!" 

Then, oh ... then! The heavens opened and an angel materialized on the cold, Bohemian wind in the form of Tara Reid. ... OK, it wasn't Tara Reid, but close your eyes and the girl had the same voice. I mean, she could do the voiceover work for "Taradise" if they ever decide to release the series on DVD.

And in her raspy, I haven't slept in days but have had a lot of vodka voice, she sang a song to my ears. "Fireworks?" she asked.

"Wait, you're here for fireworks, too?" I exclaimed.

"Yeah, there's supposed to be fireworks," she slurred.

Beautiful. It turns out Ms. Reid is part of a group of American students studying abroad in Prague. The rest of them walked up and we all made introductions and pondered if this Carnevale was all a scheme to punk American tourists.

Then someone said, "Hey, there's a pub over here with a guy from Texas playing acoustic guitar!" So we all went and drank and tried to forget. It wasn't half-bad for a Tuesday night, I must say.

The next day, of course, I check the Web site again and find that, even though the calendar of events was the same as I remembered it, they did post an update on the homepage saying the times had changed. The fireworks were at 6 p.m. Too bad I was still in class.

And that is how Prague stole Mardi Gras. No hearts growing five sizes bigger, no gifts of beads, doubloons and boob-baring, no one joining hands around a float at the Rex parade singing "Fah who for-aze / Dah who dor-aze" while shots ring out in the distance. 

Bummer.

Bratislava in a day

So, we spent Saturday night and all day Sunday in Bratislava. Even though it's not as interesting of a city as Vienna (only 40 kilometers away), we had the most fun there. Something about being in a foreign city you know nothing about with a local makes it ten times better. Lenka and her boyfriend Matej brought us all over the city, to some great bars Saturday night and really made the weekend a blast. I'd go back tomorrow, if I could.

Snowy Vienna

Vienna was gorgeous and cold and snowy Friday and Saturday. Last time I was there, it was cold, but not a winter wonderland like you see in the above pictures. I determined I need to find some good, cheap winter shoes with rubber soles and not made of canvas like my Converse sneakers. I brought some better shoes, but they all have harder soles, which is fine for going out to a nice place or on a job interview, but sucks in general on cobblestone. Thankfully, I doubled up on socks, so my feet didn't get wet.

We had some of the best food we've had so far in Vienna and that was a big plus. Lots of tasty schnitzel to counter all the bread and cheese and cheese and bread.

From there, we took a 1-hour bus trip to Bratislava (more snow, but also more Communist-era architecture). Those pictures up next. Be thankful I even post these on here, it takes for freakin' ever!

(Oh, by the way -- tomorrow ... Prague Carnevale ... parade ... fireworks on the river ... hurray!)

Cheese, bread, beer, repeat

That's what I've been living on nearly every weekday since the course started. You can get a couple of rolls or croissants and a hunk of cheese for about 40 koruna at TESCO, which is less than $2. That's my lunch and we often hit the pub on the way home from school. Then I get back to the flat and eat my leftover cheese and bread from lunch. Of course, I do have some yoghurt or oatmeal or a banana in the morning. (My oatmeal this morning was kind of watery, though, and it pretty much ruined my whole day.)

I'm wondering how I'm surviving on this diet. Although, I did buy some vitamins a week ago and have been taking those. So maybe I'm OK. We'll see. This weekend we are going to Vienna and Bratislava (staying with Lenka, the only European person in the course, in the place she rents in Bratislava). I hope to try out something other than cheese and bread in Austria and Slovakia.

Teaching went really, really well today. I was the most comfortable I've been in front of the class, and it was nearly an hour lesson. They all seemed interested in Mardi Gras and they were asking me questions afterward.

What's strange is on Thursday night, everyone goes to the pub next door to the school. And that's everyone -- students and teachers. So, basically, I left class and then continued to talk in English with the students from my course in the pub over beers. All that was left was a white board and the overhead. But it was fun to talk with them outside the classroom.

Well, tomorrow is a half-day of class and then hopping a train to Vienna. I think we're all bringing our weekend bags to school in the morning. I wonder if they have cheese and bread on the train?

Mardi Gras in Praha

So, I'm a little bummed about missing Mardi Gras back home. But I was surprised to find out Prague has it's own version, Carnevale. It culminates on Fat Tuesday with a parade of masked and costumed people walking over to Kampa Park, an island in the Vltava River just across the bridge from Old Town. And then, FIREWORKS!

I am very happy about this. We'll miss some of the parade because of teaching practice, but I think we'll make it in time for the fireworks.

Tomorrow (Thursday), I teach my third lesson. I think it's about 50 minutes this time and, while the others were nearly straight from the book, I get to make this one up on my own. Guess what I'm doing?

The difference between Carnevale and Mardi Gras. 

I think I'm even going to let them listen to some Mardi Gras music: The Dirty Dozen Brass Band's "Mardi Gras in New Orleans" in particular. This will require me to lug my laptop to school, but I think it's worth it.

Thursday is my last day teaching intermediate students. Next week, we swap with the other group in the class and teach beginners. Just as an FYI (because some have asked), they are all adults, some college students, but mostly adults. At the end of the course, we have the option of taking a day-long course on teaching children, but I think I'm enjoying adults enough to stick with it.

From the rooftops

Saturday, we went up to the top of the clock tower in Old Town Square to get a view of the city. Here are some shots I took. Notice the crowd in the second shot, there was a wedding in Old Town Hall and the bride and groom left in a classic car timed with the Astronomical Clock's hourly show. So there was a wedding party mixed with tourists below.

The view from here

The top is a shot of my bedroom. Notice I used the spare bed to pile up stuff. I also have a table and an armoire in the room. The rest is most of what I can see from my windows/balcony. Notice the weird little kid-with-a-top-hat statue built into the side of the building across from me. It's apparently a very recent building. And by recent, I mean 1894. So says the big plaque above the door.

Heading into the third day of school and it's snowing outside. But it hasn't started sticking yet.

The ethernet happened

So the ethernet is fixed. Rejoice. Now I get to catch up on all these e-mails. Today, I got to teach an 8-minute lesson to my fellow students about anything I wanted. I taught them how to design the front page of a newspaper. Yes, predictable, but it was easy. One of my fellow students taught us how to do Beyonce's "Single Ladies" dance. That was interesting. 

We also started our first of four hours learning another language. We're learning Gaelic from a teacher here who is Irish and named Sinead. Yep. We met her last night at the pub with the school staff and she used all the information she learned against us in the classroom. My name in Gaelic is "Beartla" and it is nowhere near what you think it sounds like. It's so nerve-wracking to be on the other side of the equation. Part of you is trying to study how the language works and the other is trying to study the teacher's method. But I guess that's the point.

Tomorrow, we meet the students we'll be teaching on Thursday and, similarly, we have to learn a bit about them and try to remember their names.

Dobre den

Hello, from Praha! My apologies for the delay in writing this. The ethernet connection in our flat isn't working (they promise to fix it soon) and the wireless connection is hit or miss. 

Flights went well, mostly. The audio on my TV did not work, so I had to make up words to "Rachel Getting Married" and "Burn After Reading." I got into Prague around 11 a.m., checked out my hotel and then spent the day walking around the Old Town. Saturday, I moved down the block to the flat that will be my home for the next month.

I am writing this from my room on the third floor of a building down a narrow, cobblestone street just a few blocks from Staromestske namesti (Old Town Square). You can see one of the churches on the square in the second picture. The first is Charles Bridge with the Royal Palace and St. Vitus Cathedral up on the hill behind it.

The weather is cold, somewhere in the 30s but I haven't kept track. All I know is I've been living in my double-breasted coat, scarf, hat and gloves every day. 

I'm staying in the flat with three other guys. One's from England/South Africa, another's from "The O.C." (by that, I mean, the show :) ) and the other is from Houston. No lie. Houston. He even went to UNO for two semesters. Weird.

Besides us, there are three girls in the course. They are from New York, San Diego and Slovakia. So we're seven total, which is nice. Everyone's really cool and most are around my age. We get along well and have spent nearly every night together walking from pub to pub drinking the really good, really cheap Czech beer. You pay the equivalent of about a buck-fifty for a huge pint. For realz.

We had our first day of school today, and it seemed to fly by. That is also nice. Afterward, the teachers and staff took us to a cool, local pub and paid for all our beers. I think I've been drinking more beer than water, here. It is cheaper, though ...

On Thursday, I'll be teaching for 25 minutes in front of a class of mostly Czech students. Jeez, we jumped into this! Pray for me that it goes well!

My room has a quasi-balcony. By that, I mean I have these huge double doors that open and then there's a railing behind it. I can open it up and look out to the street below. Across from me are some old, old apartments with ornate designs and even a statue. Hard to explain, but I'll post some more pictures next time.

Now, I have to do some homework and go to bed. It's 1:13 a.m. right now.

Na shledanou (good-bye)!

That's the sound of my forehead hitting the table

Lists are not something I normally do. But I did for this trip. I talked about it a lot. A to-do list of 25 important things. It was with me all the time. I marked off each item as soon as I did it.

I'm normally a procrastinator, but I decided -- as I'm putting so much money and time and life-changingness into this move to Europe -- I need to plan ahead. The list helped. And I'm down to just a few minor items.

But then, life happened. And now, two days before I leave, I suddenly feel like I am waaaayyyy behind.

Last week, my bank sent me a notice that because of some general and vague fraudulent activity (probably the work of Somali pirates), everyone in the world ever who has a debit card is getting a new one. I should receive mine in 7 to 14 business days. The old one will cease to be Feb. 12. Snag No. 1.

I quickly called my bank to see if they could expedite the process of sending me the new debit card because of my circumstances of probably not being in the country if it arrives within 14 days. They offered a helpful "No."

Debit cards are the only way I've been able to get cash quickly in a foreign country. Tagen reminded me of this earlier today as she told me over the phone, "Remember? We tried to use our credit cards at the ATM machines (in Turkey and Greece) and they asked for PIN numbers." I have no idea what my PIN number is for me credit card. I've never needed it, which is why I relied on my debit card. I leave in TWO days!

So then, I thought, well maybe I can use my VISA card. I called VISA this afternoon and said, "Hey, no idea what my PIN number is. Can you send it to me?"
"Sure!"
"Hurray!"
"You should received it in 7 to 14 business days."
(Snag No. 2)
"Uh, can you e-mail it to me?"
"No."
"Can you whisper it softly into the phone in your nighttime voice?"
"No."

Then, later this afternoon, feeling forsaken and moving on to other matters of dire concern, I was searching through my Filing Cabinet O' Important Things whilst looking for my previous auto insurance policy ... Oh, cuz lol!!! Sidenote and Snag No. 3: My auto insurance company sent me a letter TODAY and they were all "Yeah, you is dropped as of March 19" and I was all "Whaaaaa?" and they were all "Oh, oops, lol forgotz to tell you in the last TWO YEARS that since you moved back to Louisiana, our auto insurance company don't do no policies in Louisiana, even tho weez a NATIONWIDE company and have been happily accepting your payments since then. Thanks for those, btw."

Moving to another state seemed so simple four years ago.

Yeah, well while searching for the auto insurance policy so I could quickly ninja a new policy to take over as soon as the old one drops like a bad rap album, I found something that may or may not be my PIN number for my credit card, as it was clearly not the PIN to my current debit card. Still with me?

So I called VISA again, and was all "Can I toss out four numbers at you right now and you can tell me if I'm right?"
"No. I know nothing of PIN numbers and such. Only our computers and your soul and Jesus know your PIN number."
"Dang. OK, well how can I find out if this is the right PIN number?"
"You can ... try to use it."
"Sounds simple enough ... but lo, I called a little while ago and asked for them to send me my PIN number. Aren't they sending me a new one?"
"Did you ask for a new one?"
"I ... I ... have no idea."
"Well, if you try to use your card at an ATM and it works, that means they've sent you a copy of the original. If it doesn't work, that means they've sent you an entirely new PIN number ..."
"Or that the PIN number I have has nothing to do with anything anywhere ever."
"This is true ... but you'll get a new one in 7 to 14 business days."

So I drove down to the ATM at my bank, tried out the PIN, it did not work. If that's because it's been changed or is just completely wrong, only Jesus and my soul and a massive computer somewhere know.

Le sigh. Apparently, my big to-do list was a little too soft on the to-dos. I probably should have planned this better and stocked up on a whole slew of workable credit cards before this trip. Most of it's my fault for not having recognized the potential problems earlier. But the debit card debacle, though, that's all on the Somali pirates. Bitches.

I'm praying that my new debit card comes to my door within the next two days, otherwise, my parents will have to ship it to me. Either way, I may be resorting to travelers cheques, which are, well, the checks of modern day checking.

This has been my first official freakout in regards to moving to Europe. Let us relish in the moment.