And Outside The Rain Fell...

25.10
Prague was different.
Different in what we did. In what we saw. In the way we saw it.

Just different.

So, we started off the day, rather night, in a totally absurd fashion. 4a.m. The conductor comes knocking. Prague time!
Voice in my head-
"Wait. Prague. Already? 4a.m.". No way in hell!
"Yeah boy, now get your a** out of my train (sorry parents)".
"Oh. Well, I might as well do that"

4a.m. in a cold city. No way. Opposite station. Some train leaving in 4 minutes. To some random place called Desin. Like the hell I care. Arrival at destination? Sometime 6.
Good enough.

Catch entire compartments for ourselves. There were few others to complain on this train. In fact, none at all. Woo-hoo. Just the 7 on a train, to a random place, in a random country.

Anything for dear sleep. Almost.

I don't even remember getting down at Desin. Or whatever that place was. A few minutes later, we were catching a train back to Prague. Right opposite again. Reaches at 8. Woo-hoo. Time to brush my teeth and go back to sleep.

Alright. We like making the most of our Eurail passes. Including travelling trains just to catch sleep. Like i said, anything for precious sleep.

Prague again, this time at a more sane 8-ish. And then we did the usual. You know, walking the walk (a few kilometres around the city square), talking the talk (food, supermarkets, food, India, sweets, dosas and Paris), doing the stuff every other backpacker does.

Or did we?

Take a wild guess.

You're right, we did.

Actually, nah, we didn't!

Currency conversions. Pizzas for breakfast. And off we were to town square.

Voice in my head
"But hey Gustav, you haven't described the city yet"

"Like whatever, take that you (shows an absurdly explicit sign) European conscience"

Oh, well, so the city.

Astonishing. Beautiful. Amazing buildings everywhere. If there's one city you'd want to visit in Europe, you cannot possibly miss Prague.

Okay. History time.

So, this like city. In this little country. How the hell did it possibly not get flattened out during the War? Like every other major city in the Europe we'd seen? To an extent, by letting the Nazi Germany occupy Czech during the war. And then, at the end, letting them out peacefully. See, no bloodshed. No rampage. No pyromania leaving the city burning. Of course, the Russians were waiting outside for the retreating Nazis, but the city was safe.

What that left was a beautifully intact city, with a splendid town square, replete with its own elaborate Astronomical clock, huge Goth church and a more modern Protestant church. Again, everything beautifully intact. I do not want to talk too much about the city, it really is amongst the most beautiful cities I've seen here, and must be experienced first hand. We took one of Sandeman's Free Walking Tour of the city, and by the end, richer with a lot more history and the most laughs so far, we were extremely happy, content.
Our guide, Isaac, was flamboyant, knowledgeable, an amazing story teller, and a killer wit. And a Jew. Who could ridicule and laugh at almost everything. Including his beloved Prague. Never did we enjoy touring a city so much, thanks to him. It really couldn't get better.

Only it got better.

Way better.

As in, way, way better.

A restaurant. An early Dinner.

One of the best so far.

A vegetarian restaurant. Gets better. Hold your breath.

An Indian Vegetarian Restaurant! Yeah baby!

Gets even better. An Indian Vegetarian Restaurant that charges by the weight.

Inexpensive, and downright delicious pulavs, rice, dals, rajma, salads, curds, pickle. The meal was absolutely yummy.

It really couldn't get better.

But it had to.

The kind hostess offered us free lassi since she was closing and we were the last customers.
The food really was as good as any in India. And we had the widest smiles yet on our trip.

We rounded off the day with a lazy walk across the castle and St. Charles Bridge.

I had to come back to this city. Period. Soon.
I wanted to see it all over again, and see the parts we had skipped.

One helluva day. This day. Today. Douche Bag.