8/30/09

Yesterday we went on our historical tour of Prague. It was amazing. It is so cool to see so many eras of architecture on one street! We started at 1:00 p.m. in St. Wenceslas square, which is a huge plaza with the National museum at the top, or actually the bottom (the south end), and any shop, bar, club or restaurant you would ever need! It's very expensive there though because it is right in the middle of New Town or Nova Mesto. Then we walked north to Old Town (Stare Mesto)and saw all the old buildings. I can't remember when Old Town was built but I did not that New Town was built, according to our guide, just a couple of centuries later. I just love how they count centuries like we count decades. We went to old town square and saw Old Town Hall, a gorgeous, huge Gothic building. On the front of the town hall is an astronomical clock that is very very ornate and STILL working. Again, I do not remember the exact date but you can see it is very old because it depicts the Sun and Moon orbiting around the earth. It rings at every hour and when it does a dppr opens up and the 12 apostles parade out above the clock face. Next to the face a skeleton rings a bell and turns an hour glass to remind us all we are running out of time. Pleasant right? There are also statues of virtues (rhetoric and astrology) and vices (narcissism, miserliness) of the time and of the arc angel and one other one I cant remember. Anyways, it's a huge, ornate, old and very functional clock! On and after the clock smith made the clock, the King in power blinded him so he couldn't make a clock for anyone else or any other country. How nice! I'm just amazed the clock has never stopped working! We also saw the building where the reign of communism was announced (in Old Town square). It is now a communist history museum, which I would really like to see.

The Jewish quarter is just north of the square but we didn't get to see it. I will definitely make my way there soon. I did learn that the Jewish people were ostracized here for quite a while but they always had a very strong community. I was told they were very clever and rich which is why the Czech people didn't like them...jealously. But there was a king, named Josefov (Joseph), who liked the Jews and said to the Jews something along the lines of "you can live wherever you want" but they chose to stay in the community and named it Josefov, after their nice king. There is a really really old cemetery there too, which I cannot wait to see. They buried their dead in layers because for most of Prague's history Jews were only allowed access to one cemetery. They carried on the tradition though even after the nice king Josefov came to power.

So then we walked all the way to Charles Brige and across to the Castle Quarter (Mala Strana), where Prague Castle and our school are located. Charles Bridge was built because the wooden bridges kept getting knocked down by floods. The king at teh time actually hired the best Greek masons to build it for Prague. It is very old but again I can't remember the date...I'll get on that.

Well my fingers are tired, as are my eyes, so I think I'll leave it here. Ill get to more about the castle quarter tommorow. Tomorrow is my first day of school. and I plan on doing more exploring! Miss you all!

Oh and pictures are coming...we still don't have internet in our home but hopefully it will be fixed tomorrow! Goodnight!