though not really FUNNY, george and my first day or so of travel, all i could do was laugh really. cause it was just BAD. allow me to expound...
meet up with george, no problems there. actually went FAR easier than i would have imagined, meeting up like that, halfway around the globe for him, many countries away for me.. thats just ASKING for something to go wrong. but with the exception of george being like 20 minutes late, it went like clockwork.
from there, frankfurt was not too bad, though there really wasn't that much to do in the city. but it was nice to relax and just wonder, george had a couple of espressos, so his jet lag wasn't really an issue. we did however, end up WAITING for quite some time, as our train didn't leave till midnight. welcome to backpacking across europe: sitting in train stations.
and sitting on crappy trains. we were unable to reserve a sleeper train, or even a couchette, so we were forced to sit in a regular old compartment, for the 9 hour overnight train ride. (it didn't help that it was SATURDAY, AND, the ROLLING STONES were playing prague the next night.. so the train was PACKED) now, i had done this 2 out of the last 4 nights, sleeping in chairs on the train, but it was not quite what george had expected. six people, crammed into the six chairs of this little train compartment. "sleeping" upright. it really wasn't sleeping, cause well, imagine the most discomfort ever, and multiply that by a billion, and thats this train seat. AND, the guy sitting next to me is WASTED, and manages to spill an entire beer all over the compartment, so at least it smells horrible too. i managed to laugh about the whole thing with these 2 german girls who were in there with us, but really, the whole thing just sucked. 3 times in the night, we were "awoken" from our not-so-deep sleeps, by screaming, gun-yielding, czech and german officials about tickets and passports and what not. yeah. FUN.
prague, however, is worth the trouble. the city is BEAUTIFUL. words cannot describe. and believe me, i've had my share of people saying good things about prague. it seems everyone i meet has been, and there's nairy a bad thing spoken. only good. and now, having been, i can see why. granted, there's more PEOPLE here than i would have though (tourists), but as a whole its lovely. after arriving yesterday, we checked into the hotel, and walked around town, visiting the castle and other czech goodies.
after sleeping from 6pm last night till 8 this morning (yes, both of us.. aparently we were TIRED), we headed out for another day of wondering in this great city. the jewish quarter was worth it for the cememtary, jam packed with some 12,000 tombstones. a sight to be seen. and lunch at some authentic czech cafeteria-style place, where they spoke NO english, so we pointed, and before i could even BLINK, i had a plate full of czech slop. which was suprisingly tasty and filling, but the whole experience was rather strange.
and tomorrow we're off to cesky krumlov, in the southern part of the country. it should be interesting. prague is beautiful, and part of its splendor, is that they speak english. cause the czech language? yeah, NO CLUE. more than any language i've seen, its just a mish-mash of letters. consonants mainly. and who knows what we'll find in small-town czech republic. i suppose we'll find out..