raise your hands

raise your hands if you took a boat to work this week.

nobody?

well, guess who did. twice.

for the last two months the tram lines near our house had been undergoing major construction so we had to take a bus a for those few stops to get into the city. for the most part this wasn't a problem except during rush hour when what usually took 2 minutes took 15, which was increadibly frustrating.

this morning i noticed that the trams were running again so i got on the tram and thought 'yippie, i can ride all the way into town again'. though wouldn't you know there was an announcement saying that due to further construction up ahead we would have to get of and take the 'X21' which i assumed was a bus.

when i got off the tram i couldn't figure out why there was no bus and why everybody was crossing the road and walking down to the river. but then i saw the boat! i wasn't the only one who was surprised; everybody was laughing and smiling and taking pictures. apparently the tunel through which the tram passes (which is under the vysehrad cliff) hadn't been closed off for 20 years. so this was a very special boat trip indeed.

in all my time in prague i never even thought of taking a boat ride or anything because it just seemed to touresty. but i actually really enjoyed it. prague is a great city because it very hilly so it can be looked at from all kinds of different angles. the view from the boat was new to me though. i finally saw the cliff at vysehrad from the bottom (see april's post 'in my lovely city' for a view from the top).

i also got a good (though foggy) look at the cubist buildings!

so the boat trip, same as the bus did, can also make 15 minutes out of what are usually just 2. but any lost time is made up by the fact that you are travelling in style. you just can't complain about that.

pins and noodles

i have decided to keep a list of amusing things that sue has either said or done. i will up date this list anytime something new happens so please come back and see how she is getting along.

( i have to say that a list concerning my actions would be quite extensive as well, however keeping such a list is not up to me.)

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6. S:"I have pins and noodles in my butt." (of course she meant 'pins and needles'. but she caught her mistake right away!)

5. S:"Oh, great. Wallbrains!" (she couldn't think of the word 'wallnut' but remembered me saying that they look like brains.

4. S: I'm ugly.

C: What? No you're not.

S:Yes, I'm ugly with you. ( I agree with you. the old L/R conflict)

3. this morning morning i saw her take out a roll of baking paper so i though she was going to bake some cookies or something. instead she wrapped her sandwiches in it. apparently she saw the picture of bread on the roll and assumed that it was wrapping bread.

2. for my last birthday sue took me out to a really nice colombian restaurant. she also gave me a nice leather wallet, the nicest i have ever had. she also gave me a czech birthday card. i looked at it a long time but couldnt find the word for birthday which i was quite sure i know. later when i had it translated it turned out that the card actually said "Congratulations on your Wedding. May you be happy with each other forever..."

1. this next one is little more subtle. it probably depends on your silverware drawer, but i'd say that most people, when they organize their silverware into one of these plastic trays, do something like this:

forks, knives and big spoons at the top in the middle (in some particular order) and the little spoons at the bottom. well, one month ago she decided to clean the tray because it was dirty. however, when she returned everything to the tray it looked like this:

chopsticks at the bottom! (the blurriness is due to the camera wobbling, not anything that sue did). i though that was so great; she subconsciously gave preference to the chopsticks.

now a couple of days ago i found this:

i'd be interested in knowing what you make of it. was it subconscious behavior on part of our other flatmates or is it some kind of backlash? a struggle to reclaim what once was?

more soon.

white wall of laser

as you might remember i am very lucky when it comes to finding coins. though there was another dry spell which lasted about two months i have started finding coins again. mostly 50 heller coins (worth half a koruna - something like 2 cent). sadly, these coins have gone out of circulation! so now i'm stuck with about 30 or so coins which i can't use. i think the banks won't even accept them anymore. but then again i haven't tried returning them.



there was a funny moment yesterday. i was changing trains at florenc metro station when i found a 50 heller coin in the middle of the busy crowd. i stopped to pick it up aggravating the people behind me who had to swerve to avoid hitting me. i held the coin up to look at it (and here you can imagine a scene from a film where the camera first focuses on the close object and then on the background) and then became aware of a young woman sitting in a wheelchair, wrapped in a blanket with a little dog on her lap, holding out a squished coca cola cup for coins. i probably hesitated longer than i should have, focusing on the coin again and then back on the lady. then i raised my eyebrows as if to say 'do you want this?' and she gave me this pitiful look. then i raised my eyebrows again as if to say ' you do know that these are 50 hellers, don't you? these have gone out of circulation...'. but she insisted so i put the coin in her cup.



now of course i feel like a creep so if i see her at the same place next week i will go and find a place where i can buy some dog food.



one curious development is that i have also started finding coins in my dreams. last night i found a 50 heller coin as well as a 20 heller coin (those went out of circulation even longer ago although i have actually found one in real life on vaclavske namesti). last week i had a dream where i was trying to escape from this massive building before the security system would switch on sending a wall of white laser sweeping through the whole building destroying anything in its way. naturally, just as i was nearing the exit which was at the top of a steep slope i spotted a coin on the ground. when i ran to get it the white laser wall appeared and started coming quickly towards me. i was faced with a dilemma: grab the coin or get killed by the white laser wall? i decided to grab the coin. but then i started slipping because the ground was like polished stone and i couldn't get enough grip to get moving up the slope again so i had to run to the bottom of the slope and start running from there. anyway to make a long story even longer...i got to the exit just as the laser passed behind me. that's when i woke up panting thinking ' ahhh, i didn't get the coin!'



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this connection i have to coins has a long history which i had forgotten about until i rediscovered this photograph:

i must have been two or three here. as you can see i am counting COINS! on the plastic cup there is a sticker which reads DM (the old german currency). oh nostalgia...