Bohemian Evening

When I first decided to go on this trip to Europe, I figured the Czech Republic would be sort of an afterthought. However, my time in Prague turned out to be my absolutely favorite part of the trip!

What I love about Prague is that of the three major cities we visited, Prague was definitely the more “Old World” and least modernized. I also realized later that we were in the very heart of Bohemia. Why didn’t I think of this at the time?! That’s why Prague is so awesome!

On the day we arrived in Prague, we immediately had to get ready for the band’s concert at the Church of St. Simon and Judah. Us choir folk had the blessed chance to roam around the town square, scour for something to eat, and take pictures of everything we saw.

After roaming around a few blocks, we stumbled upon the town square, where there seemed to be some sort of festival going on.

I was starved, so after scoping out my options (and gosh, do I love European street food options. No deep fried Twinkies-on-a-stick here!), I decided on jacket potatoes, which really just looked like an awesome hash!

Oooh so good. I know there’s ham and potatoes in this. Mariah told me there was sauerkraut in it, but I don’t know. I didn’t care. I didn’t ask questions, I just ATE!

Somebody (I think Kris) ended up buying a trdelnik. I have no idea how to pronounce that, but it’s this Slavic pastry that’s cooked over coals and dusted with big sugar chunks. I think it tastes somewhere between a cinnamon roll and a soft pretzel, and it was AWESOME. I’ll show more pictures of it later when I go over the next day, since you know we went back for more…

It wasn’t long before we needed to be back at the church for the band concert.

Oh yeah, people! Jake, Mariah, and David.

Oh. My. Gosh.

Our first evening in Prague felt rather otherworldly. It may have been in part to our tour of Terezin earlier in the day paired with a mentally exhausting several hours of bus travel that day. But it was a truly unforgettable experience standing in the middle of the city square the day before the tourists really came out, eating street food with friends, listening to local musicians playing with all the passion they could muster, surrounded by brooding, breathing Gothic cathedrals. The stones really did feel alive around us. We went back to our hotel with our first impression of the city: depressingly beautiful. At least, it that was the impression we got that evening. We did modify that interpretation a bit the next day, but that’s another post.