From Prague to Tbilisi

I know I’ve been a bit silent with my blogs lately, but I’ve got a few good reasons.

A Facetious Guide to Prague

Firstly, I had to focus on writing my latest book, A Facetious Guide to Prague. I wanted to get it done before I left Prague, so I could double up my last party to work alongside a book release. A lot goes into writing a book by yourself, especially when you compound it with the tons of pictures and managing the layout. I was up day and night writing and writing, and up even longer trying to edit everything and put in the pictures, enlisting a team of my close family to help out.

Done in a rush like that, it’s impossible to get the editing done properly. I had to accept a margin of error. When the end product came, I saw that it was a larger than acceptable margin of error, but I had to run with it anyway. I’d sell the books for cost, so it wasn’t like it was a big cost anyway.

stacked up at the book release party

Don’t worry, on my latest editions, I’ve cleaned up all that editing. The pictures and layout look great now on the print edition, and on the Kindle edition, I’ve got it packed full of really useful (links to) maps.

I also learned two things about CreateSpace. When you’re in America, it might be good to go through CreateSpace to get your additional copies for sale. But if you’re in Europe, and if you’re a member of Amazon Prime, then it might just be better to order through Amazon and take advantage of the free shipping. Depending on what you’re planning on reselling it for, you could get a huge cost advantage.

The books looked good. The cover was great, and the pictures all came out well. So we were ready for the party.

It went well, I’d have to say, though also a bit bittersweet.

We held the party at Brix Hostel and Bar in Zizkov. It was a bit of a strategic decision, both since being a hostel bar, it tends to be emptier than regular places and thus more easily fit my guests, but also being a hostel meant that it would have access to a lot of tourists. The idea definitely worked on the tourist part, and I sold most of the books I had ordered in advance. The part that failed was that a lot of the people who I was hoping to come, to see one last time, didn’t.

talking about the book

I used my typical format for a book release. I’d start doing a solo set, then do some reading (though not really this time, as I didn’t want it too over-the-top being a book release, as it was also a going away party and I’m sure the Prague residents couldn’t give a damn about a Prague guide book), then full band with Prague's best Irish band, Cupla Focal, then talk more about the book, then full band, then close. Naturally, I’d break in between the sets and sell and sign books. Ideally if you had a willing volunteer, you’d have someone manning the sales desk, and then you’d just have to sign and not worry about cash, but I’m always short that willing volunteer, so I just do it myself. Not a big deal when dealing with the measly quantities of books that I can ever hope to sell.

Prague's best Irish band, Cupla Focal

But whatever. I enjoy being asked for a book to purchase, then to sign it. It makes me feel like a real writer, and not the hack that I actually am. And even more, it was great playing one last time with my friends. I'll miss those lads!

The Going Away

No more beautiful Prague. It was time to move back to Tbilisi.

a view of Ryke Park and Avlabari

Though I’m American, I have a long history with Tbilisi and Georgia, one that started almost ten years ago with Peace Corps, and then I fell into the trap of loving the country and traveling and having a weird Bohemian lifestyle and not really wanting to go back to the quaint and boring American life (don’t get me wrong, that life isn’t necessarily bad, and the more I suffer 100 degrees without air conditioning I’ve got to wonder about my life choices, but really, it’s not a life for me, at least not yet). I met my wife in a smokey little “art bar” in Tbilisi, where I used to play accordion, and as she’s Georgian as well, we’re kind of eternally connected to the place, for better or worse. I hope for the better, but the city seems to have a giant case of entropy, and no matter what improves, one wonders if it can keep up with the forces of chaos that seem to be tearing the city apart at its seams. A fun place, and definitely an interesting place. It is what it is and here we are.

it's not a bad place to end up

All that moving took some effort though. As we bought the place, it meant that we had to sort out the furniture, the random repairs, the unexpected surprises (no hot water in the kitchen?! And why is the balcony all glassed in? and the last owner made some weird color themes, red walls with red light fixtures, green walls with green light fixture, and so on, weird stuff). We painted the walls, figured out how to paint the walls (plaster isn’t quite as easy to roll as drywall, folks), found that we had to mix the colors and that mixing them again for a new bucket after running out of paint in one room was harder than it seemed. It’s all a bit slapdash, but it looks cool, and definitely better, cleaner, and fresher than before.

The Blog

Finally, I had to wonder what to do with my blog. Did I want to continue it? Was it really serving as a conduit to selling my books? I guess now that I have an actual travel book, and not some psychological horrors like Hunger and How It Ends, then maybe it will generate some leads to that. Or maybe if I unfocus this blog, write again more about personal things and observations (while still having travel), then it will do better. It will certainly be more entertaining to write.

I don’t know. What do you, possibly the only person reading this post, think?

#book #life #Tbilisi #Prague

Synagogues of Prague

Most of the Jewish Quarter was destroyed in the early 20th century to make it posh and Parisian, and in addition a bit more resilient to floods and fires. This is partly why you see the weirdly different ground levels between the synagogues and the other buildings, as the ground was actually raised when they rebuilt the area.

When they tore up the Jewish Quarter, they did so because it was derelict, overcrowded, and a huge firehazard. And before that time, Jews didn't have the freedom to live where they wanted. After the Edict of Tolerance by the Holy Roman Emperor, Joseph II, though, this changed and Jews were free to live outside the ghetto. That meant now the quarter could be restored and renovated.

random street in Josefov, the Jewish Quarter

They left the synagogues which are all still standing, active, and open for tourism. You can't get the feeling of the old, crowded, and poor ghetto that once was, but rather you can buy some super-expensive clothes, as all the top designers, including, ironically, Hugo Boss, have a storefront in this area now. Another weird fact is that the synagogues managed to survive WWII as Hitler had thought the district so nice, that he was going to use it as a huge "Jewish museum", to highlight his version of the history of the soon-to-be-eradicated people.

Here's a list of all the old buildings that still exist though and that you can take a look at. Also click here to see them all pinned on Google Maps.

The Jewish Town Hall

Maiselova 250/18

This was the main meeting point for the Jewish community and was built in 1586 by the mayor Mordechai Maisel, whose projects created a "golden age" of Jewish life in Prague. The building is in the Renaissance style but had a Rococo makeover in the 1700s. It features two clocks: the top one with Roman numerals and the bottom one with Hebrew numerals (that is to say, Hebrew letters). It now serves as the main building of the Jewish Museum in Prague.

the Old-New Synagogue next to the Town Hall

It might seem to blend in with the rest of the buildings nowadays, but back in the day of the ghetto, the town hall really stood out as a masterpiece of architecture. That said, the synagogues were obviously the more important buildings to the community. This one isn't open to look at, but you can see the clock tower.

Old-New Synagogue

www.synagogue.cz

Maiselova 18

t. 224 800 812

The synagogue with the most confusing name is the oldest one that still stands in Europe and has been active for more than 700 years. It was built by the same masons that worked on the St. Agnes Convent and was originally called the Great Shul or the New Shul (Great School or New School), and wasn't called the Old-New Shul until after the construction of later synagogues.

the Old-New Synagogue

There are a ton of legends that surround the Old-New Synagogue. One has it that the synagogue was built from blocks of the Temple of Solomon, brought over by angels who carried it over all the way to Bohemia, by agreement that if the Temple were restored, they'd have to bring back the blocks. Another has it that the remains of the golem are stored in the attic.

Spanish Synagogue

Jewishmuseum.cz

Vězeňská 1

t. 222 749 211

The Spanish Synagogue is the newest of the bunch, but ironically built on the site of the oldest synagogue in Prague, which was called the Old Shul. So perhaps it would be the better bearer of the name of the "old-new", but that's another story. The Old Shul was too small though, so they tore it down in 1867 and built a new one in the Moorish Revival style, hence why it's now called the "Spanish" Synagogue, even though it was first called the Geistgasse-Tempel, or the Temple on Spirit Street. Some people think it belongs to the Sephardic community, because of the Moorish style, but actually belongs to the Reform congregation, the Moorish style chosen just for its coolness and jazz.

Today it contains an exhibition on Jewish history in Czech lands, centered around the Emperor Joseph II, along with plenty of pictures of how the Jewish ghetto looked before it was torn down.

Pinkas Synagogue

Jewishmuseum.cz

Široká 23/3

t. 222 749 211

This is the second oldest synagogue in Prague, and it's pretty small and homely, as are its beginnings. In 1535, Aharon Meshulam Horowitz tore down his house and built a synagogue for his family. Like the other older buildings of this area, it was below (the new) ground level, and was thus flooded often. So in 1860, they raised the floor by 1.5 meters. But then they lowered it in the 1950s to be the original level, which was now lower than the street level, which had been raised in the early part of the century. Nothing is simple here. On the interior of the walls in the synagogue are inscribed the 78,000 Czech and Moravian Jewish victims of the Holocaust.

There is also an exhibition showing pictures drawn by the children of the ghetto in Terezin. In the day, Terezin was used as a propaganda mill for the Nazis. They arranged pictures of Jews doing sports, looking happy, and living comfortably, so that Jews and the rest of the world wouldn't suspect the dark truth of what was really happening. There was some resistance to this though, as one art teacher there, Friedl Dicker-Brandeis, decided to tell his students to paint the truth. Dicker-Brandeis and most of his students would later die in Auschwitz.

Maisel Synagogue

Jewishmuseum.cz

Maiselova 10

t. 222 749 211

The synagogue was built during the golden age of the ghetto in the 16th century. It's called "Maisel", because it was the private synagogue of the mayor, Mordecai Maisel, who had ordered its construction (the same guy who had overseen the building of the Town Hall). The synagogue that's standing now isn't the original one though, as it has burned down several times in its history.

the Maisel Synagogue

The synagogue houses an exhibition about Jews in Bohemia, with computer screens that show maps of different Jewish settlements and famous Jews from the area.

Klausen Synagogue

Jewishmuseum.cz

U starého hřbitova 3a

t. 222 749 211

The largest synagogue in Josefov, the Klausen was built on the remains of an earlier synagogue complex that was destroyed in a fire in 1689. It's right next to the cemetery and offers a score of beautiful architectural motifs, especially Jewish Baroque. The complex that was there before had been built by Mordecai Maisel and included several synagogues and a Talmudic school (they were called the Klausen, hence the German plural).

Klausen Synagogue down the Jewish Souvenir Street

It now contains an exhibition on Jewish Customs and Traditions, teaching about the Tanakh and the Talmud, along with an unfurled Torah scroll and different ornaments used during Jewish services.

The Old Jewish Cemetery

Jewishmuseum.cz

Široká

t. 222 749 211

The Old Jewish Cemetery, a quiet and peaceful place tucked away in the otherwise chaotic and crowded Prague, is one of the oldest Jewish burial grounds in the world and regularly makes the top ten best cemeteries lists on National Geographic and Buzzfeed (what a list). It dates from the 1500s–which is considering the history of the Jewish people in general, not really that old. The area isn't that big, and considering that during the height of the ghetto there were over 18,000 people living in the neighborhood, means that bodies had to be buried on top of each other, some graves going more than 10 bodies deep. There are 12,000 tombstones crammed into the location, and them running out of space there was partly what led the Jewish community to team up with their Christian neighbors in the Old Town and New Town to buy up land over in Vinohrady and carve out space for another graveyard (part of which was later destroyed by the Communists and used for Žižkov Tower).

the crowded and beautiful Jewish cemetary

At the entrance of the cemetery (which is on the far end from the Klausen Synagogue, from the 17. listopadu side), there's the old burial preparation building, which is now a Holocaust memorial.

I've only visited the cemetery so far (though I plan on visiting the other synagogues before leaving Prague) and I must say, though it is a unique and peaceful place, the sanctity of it is somewhat ruined by the combination of the steep price and the clear and un-obscure feeling that you're on a tourist track. There's even a definite path made of stone to guide the tourists through.

On a weird note, one of the neighboring buildings seems to have decided to make a long, Christian stained glass exhibition above the cemetery, as a final sticking it to the Jews from the Christian community.

Jerusalem Synagogue

synagogue.cz

Jeruzalémská 1310/7

t. 224 800 849

There's one more synagogue of note in the city center, though it's not remotely near Josefov. This stunning, Moorish Revival temple is situated on a quiet, out of the way street in New Town right between Henry's Tower and the train station. It's a weird mix of Moorish architecture with art nouveau color and glamour, making for a truly unique structure that jumps out at you in an otherwise gray part of town. It's so Moorish, in fact, when I first saw it I thought it was a mosque. But then upon noting the other details, the Hebrew writing and the Magen David on the window, I realized it was actually a synagogue.

It was originally called the Jubilee Synagogue and was built in 1906 in honor of the 25th anniversary (or silver jubilee) of the rule of Emperor Franz Joseph I (who had made a lot of reforms vastly improving the lives of Jews).

Since Franz Joseph got his butt handed to him on a silver platter in World War I, and the Czech lands gained their independence in the newly formed Czechoslovak Republic, they renamed the synagogue. It was no longer associated with that loser Austrian, but now with the capital of the Jewish homeland.

Many Jews would too soon learn to miss that old man.

This is all taken from my latest book, Facetious Guide to Prague. Read it and learn more about the Jewish history of Prague, along with everyone else's. Check it out here on Amazon.

#history #Prague #touristicsites #synagogues

Hidden Gardens of Prague's Mala Strana

Behind every front cover, there’s an inside, a story to be told, long and wordy and often quite boring. Yawn. Who wants to read books anymore anyway when we’ve got Avengers movies and Game of Thrones? The idea though extends to buildings too, where there’s a front, there’s a back. Depending on the country, the front side is usually the nicely held up representation of what’s inside. People want to say, “Look, whoever lives here lives well, lives nice, lives proper.” So they spend all of their money making up a beautiful façade, but then run out of money for the interior. Maybe they’ll get to it later.

Then again, I’ve been in countries where they don’t give a single haypenny worth’s of care about the façade, and they only care about the interior. Sometimes just the façade of the interior. There are so many metaphors that can fly around this that one should consider a fly swatter. Just watch your heads folks.

entering a "hidden garden"

All that to say, over the weekend there was an interestingly themed “festival” of sorts. Most people know the much more famous sister festival of this one called “Open House Prague”, when all these old Baroque beauties open their doors and let you look up their skirts (indeed, most cities have some sort of variation on the theme). On this not-quite-the-same weekend was Malostransky dvorky, the festival that you shouldn’t confused with Prague Dvorak Festival, which comes from the same roots. That is, Dvorak comes from the word for courtyard. Or porter, actually. A porter was the guy who tends the courtyard and answers the front door and tells the residents if they have a guest. You see, back in the day before the doorbell and cell phone were invented, each apartment complex had their own non-composing dvorak to act as the doorbell. “Hello, I’m here for Svarak,” you might say. Then it was his job to look you over, make sure you were a decent fellow, and then yell up the courtyard, “Svarak!” Then a random neighbor would yell, “Shut up! Everyone wants svarak these days!” True story.

"The svarak comes from up there?!"

So the festival this last weekend saw many buildings in one of the oldest quarters of the city, Mala Strana, open their courtyards to the public. Usually there was some sort of bizarre art display, like one with a bunch of bricks playing sounds from busy places. Another was pretty straight forward, with large paintings for sale.

She's checking on the Internet to see if art makes sense there

art for sale... or not... I don't know...

I went through about half of the courtyards. Some were small and unimpressive, maybe in bad condition even. Others were in a cute rustic condition, where I could imagine happily spending hours drinking coffee and writing, while gazing off into the dark recesses hidden by the thick hanging ivy. The last courtyard I saw was a real masterpiece, one perfect for endless garden parties. The place had their own miniature baroque garden with a fountain, and half a dozen busts and sculptures.

many places featured galleries of sorts

and more galleries

I could imagine a garden party here

fanny packs are in

Vrtba Garden

All of these courtyards really left me for an appetite for more gardens. On my way out, I passed the completely hidden but for a small sign “Vrtbovska zahrada” leading into yet another courtyard. I shrugged and decided to go on in. My day of courtyard wandering had been fully established. But I really wasn’t prepared for what came.

the entry garden house ceiling of Vrtba

cool party house

The entry into the garden was in the courtyard. I went in, and there they were charging 69 crowns, or three dollars. That seemed a lot to me. I mean, that’s like two beers in Prague! So expensive! But really, it’s not that much, so I paid the money and went in. That little pretend baroque courtyard I saw was just a teaser for this. The Vrtbovska zahrada (or Vrtba Garden, in English) was the real deal.

the first terrace

Fantastic gardens were all the rage back in the 1700s, so every nobleman who was anyone had to build a bigger and better one than the next. This gardening boom included the massive gardens just underneath the castle, along with Wallenstein (which I’ll get to next) and Vrtba.

looking down on the first terrace

Vrtba is a Baroque terraced garden built on a closed off area of Petrin Hill, on a spot where you don’t even realize you’re on Petrin Hill. It was created by the Count of Vrtba, Jan Josef, to go along with his newly renovated palace. The palace isn’t accessible today, though the garden was renovated in the 90s and the garden house (along with its large Greek murals) were cleaned up and opened in 1998.

a window from the palace

You enter from the bottom of the four terraces, first to a large courtyard with trimmed hedges and a bird cage. The bird cage is there to give it the real nice touch of creating a constant bird song, as though you’re in the nature or somewhere apart from the city.

one of many statues on the second and third terraces

The second terrace has more hedgework, another little garden house, and a hidden little area with a fountain. The third terrace is mostly open grass with a veranda walk complete with statues that seem to be in some sort of constant despair. Then the final terrace is really just a viewing deck, with a view of the Castle and the rest of Prague. Before I thought the Clementinum was the best viewing place in Prague, but this one might even be better for the crown, mainly just for the pristine surroundings and birdsong.

a couple enjoying the view

a couple not noticing the view

Valdstejnsky Zahrada

Now after this Baroque masterpiece, I wanted to quickly revisit a garden that had long been one of my favorites in Prague to see if it still stood up. I walked out of the Vrtba Garden and to the other side of Mala Strana, where I met my wife and we took a stroll to Wallenstein (pronounced Vallen-schtein and in Czech spelled Valdstejnsky with a very similar pronunciation though somehow dropping a syllable and gaining a d). We entered through the Senate courtyard (the Senate building is the Wallenstein Palace), but you can also gain entry from next to the Malostranske metro exit or there’s another gate along Letenska street.

entering Wallenstein Garden

The Wallenstein Palace originally served as the palace for Albrecht Wenzel Eusebius von Wallenstein, Imperial Count Palatinate Generalissimo of the Holy Roman Empire, who provided the Empire with an army that could field up to about 100,000 men at a given time and probably annoyed very many porters in the day with a name and title like that. He served during the Thirty Years War under the Emperor Ferdinand II, and was responsible for stopping the Swedish Protestant armies by defeating and killing their king, Gustavus Adolphus. But the Emperor began to fear that Wallenstein was getting a little too strong, so he dismissed him. During this time, Albrecht thought about maybe joining the Protestants due to his enormous insult by the Emperor, but was assassinated by the Irish general, Walter Devereux, by the Emperor’s orders/permission, foreseeing how much the general was insulted. Now that's insult to injury, my friends.

Devereux assassinating Wallenstein

The palace was built in 1623 but the resident only got to live there for one year before he got offed in 1634, as he was off campaigning most of that time. Over 20 houses were razed to make room for the palace and its grounds. It stayed in the Wallenstein family until the Communists took over Czechoslovakia, and then like most of the grand palaces from the feudal days, it was nationalized. Some turned into museums, others to book depositories, and like this one, some turned into government offices. Wallenstein Palace is now the home of the Senate of the Czech Republic.

not a bad spot for speeches and press conferences

Albrecht had done a lot of traveling in Italy and fell in love with that country, so wanted as many Italian elements as possible, which included the Baroque palace, its murals and columned veranda, a riding school, a grotto, and a massive Baroque garden. He wanted the castle to be even prettier than the Imperial Castle on the hill overhead, which was, in hindsight, probably a bad decision. Hindsight is of course, 20/20, at least as long as you're alive to use that vision.

plenty of peacocks roaming around

The gardens have dozens of statues, a strange “grotto”, with the concrete designed to look like natural stone and includes dozens of little hidden statues in the little caverns of the stones. Then there’s also a massive pond, a fountain, and inexplicably, a half-dozen peacocks just roaming around. It’s free entry but closed during the winter.

who doesn't love a fake grotto?

Enjoyed reading about Prague? Read some more in my latest book, A Facetious Guide to Prague, available on Amazon.

#malastrana #nature #museums #festivals #parks #Prague