whoa some catching up to do!!!!!

It has been a chilly week here in Prague....

But before I get ahead of myself, I have to tell you about Turkey.

After such a long journey, me and Nomad arrived in Istanbul. At 3am. After finding some taxi to take us to our hostel for about 50 euro. We were just relieved to reach our hostel safely. We checked in and snuck into our room that we shared with 5 other people. I lay in my bed, exhausted, drifting off to sleep. Then the call to prayer blasts from every speaker in the Blue Mosque which we are one minute away from. It continues for 15 minutes. Any other time I would have been frustrated and angry, but I wasn't. I was in Turkey. So I listened the whole 15 minutes, smiled to myself and fell asleep.

The next day we received a facebook message from our friend Tav. We worked with Tav last summer in France, and since then, hes been teaching English in Izmit, Turkey. As we are reading his message, guess who comes around the corner? Tav. Just shows up at our hostel and it's a great reunion. We spend the whole day with Tav seeing the Hagia Sofia, the Blue Mosque, lounging in the park, and eating. Randomly, Tav takes us to a Turkish business league basketball game on the Asian side. It's the championship game againt Tupras (oil refinery company) and Opet (oil distribution company). Quite a random thing to do your first day in Turkey, but nonetheless we had fun.

Our hostel, Sydney Istanbul Hostel, located right in Sultanahmet (the old town, nearest all the attractions) was a great hostel. We became rather close with the staff of Mustafa, Rashid, and Iatola. They really went out of their way to give us discounts on food and attractions.

Best discount and my favorite experience? The Turkish Bath (or hamam). Basically you go get naked and sit in a sauna. Then these Turkish women take you and scrub you down and soap you up and wash your hair and wash you off. Then we paid a little extra to get a full body oil massage afterwards! Definitely worth the money! Now you might think this sounds pretty expensive. But for everything, it only cost 30 dollars!

Pretty much everything in Turkey was cheap. Well, relatively cheaper than France or the USA.

What else did we do? Me and heather decided to go on a 2-day tour of Cappadocia in Turkey. The entire city is filled with hills of rock/volcanic ash, that centuries ago, people built homes and monasteries and schools out of. All caves -- some with frescoes and paintings dating back to before Christ, some with human defecation because squatters use them. It was quite fascinating how well the caves had been preserved. On the tour, we also got the chance to see how pottery is made by one of the worlds most famous potters. It was AMAZING how easy it looked and how perfect it was. We also got to see how to make Turkish rugs (for which they are famous). I actually got to tie a couple knots in a rug! Overall the tour was well worth it..... EXCEPT.....

We had to take an overnight bus to and from Cappadocia. That's a 12 hour bus ride. On a public bus. With screaming and puking babies. On the way, we got no sleep. Arrived in Cappadocia at 9am and then had to go on an all-day tour at 9:30am. Super.
The bus back to Istanbul wasn't so bad. No babies this time. Difficult part was that we arrived back to our hostel, but had no bed booked. We were soooo tired. Mustafa helped us out and gave us a couple beds to nap on during the day, and said we could use the showers and internet and such.

Most of the week was spent on top of the rooftop terrace at the hostel. It had an amazing view overlooking the Marmara sea. The hostel sold beer and wine extremely cheaply, so many nights we just sat upstairs, drank and met people. Me and Heather were the social butterflies of the hostel. Wherever we were, others joined. We met some great people from England, America, Ireland, Australia, Mexico, El Salvador.... mostly people like us who just love to travel. We all shared stories of traveling and life for hours on the terrace.

When our time in Istanbul was done, we headed to the airport to catch our 3am flight back to Basel, Switzerland. From there, Nomad grabbed the first train back to work in France. I had 6 hours to kill, so I slept in the airport and hopped on my plane to Prague, Czech Republic.

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Which brings me to the present. The hostel here (Prague Square Hostel) is one of the best hostels I have ever stayed in. It is just absolutely amazing. Free internet, free breakfast, comfortable beds, security lockers, a huge lounge with couches and TONS of movies to chose from, and best of all, it's a one minute walk to both the Old Town Square and St. Winceslaus square. Quite possibly the best location you could ever ask for in Prague. My only complaint? The showers are too small and the streets are too noisy at night. But i have earplugs so I manage.

I had 4 other roommates here. Karina from England. Tanya from Brazil. And 2 guys that I have still never met. We only see each other when we are sleeping. So I dunno where they are from. But I made really good friendships with 3 Irish girls, Sara (Sair-uh), Sara (Sar-uh) and Nikki. Great girls -- we had a ton of fun together. We went on the Pub Crawl together Monday night, along with my other Irish friends Kevin and Neil (who are brothers).

Pub Crawl was soooo fun. For a small price, we got unlimited beer, wine and shots for a Power Hour, and then were taken to a number of different bars and clubs that all had different feels to them. I had my first Absinthe shot. Not a fan. I actually didn't drink much, but it was worth it cause I met so many amazing people from every corner of the world.

The next day, I did a free walking tour of Prague with the Irish brothers. We had a great guide -- it was almost a comedy show with a tour thrown in lol. After 5 hours of walking, I was beat. Came back to the hostel where I met Mark, a Ukranian-American from Florida. Both being lonely travelers, we went to dinner together. I was craving Indian so we wandered the streets to find Indian. Along the way, a couple stopped us. "You speak English? Do you know where there is Indian food????" Why yes we did. We were on our way there now. Such a coincidence to find a couple from D.C. also wandering the streets for Indian food. The Indian food was great..... although EXPENSIVE! I decided it was my one night to splurge on a meal. I've been doing pretty well with money, eating cheaply and not spending much.

After dinner, me Mark and some others stayed up watching movies. Then around 2am, me and Mark were discussing what to do tomorrow. Our first idea was just to ride the Prague metros all over Prague and just get lost. This idea turned into getting a train to Germany. So at 3am we head to the train station to try to catch the 3:40am train to Berlin. Well the tickets were 2000 cz crowns. This is almost $200. So we were out of luck. We returned to the hostel around 4:30am. As I drifted off to sleep, West Side Story occurred outside my window. It was drunk Czechs vs. drunk Americans. Yelling, punching, a Czech got thrown thru a shop window. That was quite a shatter. "Will you shut up?!" was my response as I yelled out my window. For godssake it was 5am and the sun was coming up. Finally it quieted down and I went to sleep.

Yesterday was a worthless day lol. We hung around all day and just watched movies and ate food. Last night went out for pizza with mark and kristin (a new girl from Minneasota who just lived in Turkey). Best pizza ever. Strange thing? Europeans do not cut your pizza for you. You get the whole pie and you have to cut it yourself. With a butter knife. Not very cool. Then we nabbed a couple cheap beers and a bottle of Czech champagne. Then I was off to sleep.

And now its today. I don't really have any plans today. Mark left this morning, Kristin is doing the free tour. I think I might go try to find the school I am attending in September. It's 10 minutes away by metro, so not too bad.

Prague is definitely a magical city. While some travelers are bored here, I find the boredom and slow pace of life an endearing quality. It's also been quite rainy, which is never fun. But, the city is beautiful. As you look down a street, you see almost a kitsche collection of architecture. From gothic to cubist, there are so many varieties of architecture -- no building is the same.

I am also surprised how Americanized Prague is. A man from Philly imports Philadelphia Cream Cheese and has since opened Bohemia Bagel, which has bagels (duh) and other various American foods like omelettes, sloppy joes, and guacamole... and cheesecake (my favorite!).

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Note to Grandma: I found kolaches. They are under a different name (something like Fornettis), but they are kolaches all the same. Made me think of you grandma!!!! =) And it makes me crave kolaches and peanut butter cinnamon rolls!
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Everything in Prague is quite cheap too. A beer should be no more than 30 crowns, which is like $1.50. Most meals are 75 crowns or $5-6. With the exception of my Indian meal. that cost me 800 crowns, or close to $50!!!!!!! ouch! Won't be going there again!

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Many people ask me, "how do you travel alone? aren't you scared?" Never. Thats the beauty of staying in a hostel. I have never eaten a meal alone since I've been here. I've never just walked around town alone. There are always people to do things with. Unless you are incredibly socially awkward, there is no reason to really be alone even when you are traveling alone. I have really enjoyed my time here in Prague. It's definitely been a restful week full of great food and great people and great sleep!!!

I have really fallen in love with Prague. Most people do. Even before I came here, I had never heard a bad thing about Prague. Not a single thing. And I see why. It's beautiful and so much fun. It has a great expatriate community here, so the town is never short on Americans or Brits or Aussies. I cannot wait to return to Prague for a whole month in September!!!!!!

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Well thats all I really have for now. My flight leaves Prague tomorrow afternoon and I fly back to Basel. I will couchsurfing with a girl named Fabienne in Basel for the night. (by the time my flight gets in, i have missed the last train into France). So free place to stay, and then I catch the first train out in the morning to Vannes, France to report to work!

Thanks for reading!
- Amanda