A couple of weeks ago David from Malta was at a conference in London and with phones running out of credit and communication through his wife back home we managed to meet up in central London one evening. David is a thoughtful guy – as you can tell from his blog – and I always enjoy talking to him about politics, life and anything in between.
The week after we had another blogger passing through. This time it was Karen from Wisconsin. She had to leave Prague prematurely due to visa issues but was heading back to try again. On the way back to Prague she was making her way through Europe and London was the first stop. We had some entertaining days with Karen who was excited to be here. Here she is at Covent Garden with a Jack Sparrow look-a-like (and smell-a-like).
This weekend we again should thank a blogger for the entertainment. At the Blogger Meetup in February there had been a competition for rugby tickets and although we didn’t win (Ann got really close). However Peter – one of the winners – wasn’t going to use his tickets and gave them to Ann. I was soo excited about the chance to see a rugby game and had been looking forward to it for weeks. But yesterday as we were starting to get ready to get out the door we couldn’t find the tickets… We looked everywhere and got the room cleared out but the tickets didn’t appear.
I grumped about the lost tickets for a couple of hours but luckily enough we had an alternative event to go to. Instead we went to The Barbican for a show called the The Manganiyar Seduction where a group of 43 folk musicians from Muslim region of India was sitting in boxes as they played. A very impressive show as you can see in the clip below – but still a poor replacement for a rugby match.
Anyways big thanks to Peter Marshall for the rugby tickets, that was a nice gesture. He blogs about photography at Re:Photo and writes about the many protests and walks he photographs in My London Diary. Peter has been walking around London taking pictures since the 70s and has some really interesting stories and observations.
A blog post from me has been long overdue, I know. It’s been a month and a half so I’ll give you a quick rundown of the highlights. (For more reliable updates check my twitter or Ann’s blog)
In London
5th of November the Brits celebrate the Guy Fawkes failed attempt to blow up Parliament. We went to the local Roundwood Park to see a the fireworks. Before the show we grabbed some hotdogs and looked at all the kids fighting with light swords.
Trips to Denmark
In November I went on a round trip in Denmark partly for business but also to see friends and family. In Copenhagen I stayed with Mikkel who loves to cook (and I love to eat his food).
In Aalborg I visited Peter, Maria and little Oscar and met Martin for a beer or two at my favorite classy and trashy bars.
In Odder I had a playdate with my nephew and ended up at my parents place for a couple of days.
This Denmark trip ended with a big Christmas celebration in the barn of my aunt Solveig where the three cousins were celebrating Christmas big style. Always a big, fun party and this year cousin Rasmus was home on leave from his soldier duties in Afghanistan. Here are the three brothers Rasmus, Mogens and Christian.
Three weeks later I was back in Denmark again – this time with Ann. Since Ann and I are spending Christmas in Malta we went to exchange gifts and celebrate a mini-Christmas with my family with a nice dinner, gifts unwrapping, Lego building with Magnus and cookie making with my dad.
After the family stuff we went for a trip to Ã…rhus to see Christian, his wife and 6 month old son. Before that we went to The Old Town an open air museum where they have old buildings from all over Denmark that has been disassembled in their original spot and rebuilt in the museum.
Visits in London
Ann’s mum and sister came to visit us in London at the end of November. With them we went to see the musical Blood Brother with Melanie C. One of the other days we walked along Regent’s Canal to Camden Market.
A friend from high school Jan and his girlfriend Kristi came to London this weekend and I had a great time playing guide/discovering London with them as we walked through town on a nice winter Sunday.
With Jan and Kristi we made it to an evensong at Westminister Abbey. For the first Sunday of Advent, Ann and I had gone to St. Paul Cathedral (pictured above).
Getting out of London
We went to Canterbury in Kent for a Sunday to meet a friend of Ann. The weather was not the best but we got to see the medieval town and huge cathedral where the Archbishop of Canterbury resides.
That was it for the highlights. As mentioned Malta is coming up for Christmas and I’m really looking forward to that 🙂 Hopefully I’ll get around to writing another update or two before – if not – Merry Christmas!
There were two bands playing that night, the first one with was a guy playing different a instrument for almost every song with his band. This was a bit more traditional I guess and then there were Jamie and his friends playing a bit more upbeat with a drummer and guitar. I really enjoyed the music, it reminded me of my days back in high school when the folk festival was in town there.
I shot a video of the first song they played; Exotic Snowball. The sound in the video is not good so if you want to hear what it really sounds like go to their myspace profile and hear the song there.
The title refers to the activities in my last weekend 🙂 Don’t say I’m not trying to diversifying. But more on that later, first let me catch up.
Since I got back from Denmark I’ve been quite busy with work but have also had time for some other activities.
First Mikkel, one of my thesis buddies from Aalborg, came to visit. It was a long time since I had had time to catch up with Mikkel so it was great to have him in Prague. Mikkel is an avid cook and took over the kitchen a number of times to great delight for me and some friends.
While Mikkel was here I finally got around to go on a city tour of Prague with Helge who I have know for most of my time here. I should have done it a long time ago because the tour covers a lot of Prague history and the central areas and buildings. I’d recommend it for any Dane going to Prague and for English speaking people they do private tours.
After Mikkel left I took it easy for a weekend and only got out to go to Bohemian Jazz Festival on Old Town Square. To my surprise the first band playing was Magnus fra Gaarden, a danish band dressed in cow and 80s costumes playing jazz mixed with electric guitar. Interesting combination. The next act, Josefine Lindstrand was also really cool.
on to the last weekend which started out Friday night at a friends place. He had just gotten back from a visit to his native Hungary and had brought some homemade wine and grappa, which kept us entertained for the night.
Saturday I went to another friends place were we had a sushi party spending all night rolling and eating sushi till we were rolling ourselves.
Sunday I tried to combat the overeating from the night before by watching other people sweet it out as they were engaged in real combat.
An hours drive south of Prague a 9th century festival called Rogar – Blood of the North was taking place. They had set up camp and was living in tents making food over open fire and creating weapons and jewelery in the styles and methods of the era.
The highlight of the festival was the battle. Around 40 guys were suited out in body armor, helmets and weaponry and went at it in full force for about an hour. They fought until everyone was “killed”, then got up again and started over. (here’s a short video)
After the battling we went on a hike by the nearby Slapy Reservoir. The picture at the top of this post is Leigh holding up some of the mushrooms we found. Simona is Czech and she knew what was edible and here is some of the stuff we found.
I have never seen mushrooms as big as a plate before and I would have never dared to touch them if it hadn’t been for Simona. It seems to be a national sport in Czech Republic to go mushroom hunting. Yesterday Simona cooked they ones we found and I must say it was very delicious and I see why its fun collecting mushrooms.
That was sort of a brief overview of what I’ve been up to.
I haven’t mentioned it on my blog before but I will be leaving Prague in mid-September to move to London. And last week Ann and I signed the contract for a place near Willesden Green where we are going to live 😀 So with less than two months to go I will enjoy Prague and surroundings as much as I can.
Last weekend started off great with a dinner Friday night at one of my favourite eating places when we lived in Prague 6. Tandoor is a small restaurant at the bottom of a small alley almost hidden if you don’t know of it’s existence. The interior is quite modest but the food is great and reasonably priced. There were seven of us there and some could not get it hot enough.Â
At the next table over I heard the people speaking Danish and I’m always a bit giddy when I hear Danish in Prague. It’s not that often I get to talk Danish and it’s nice and homey to hear it. This time I got the idea that one of them was a blogger I had read before so I went over and said Hi and it turned out that it actually was Nicolai from auramin.com. He’s been in Prague for almost two years but it’s only been about 4 month’s since I discovered his blog. He always has some great pictures of the food he makes or eats and it was cool to meet him.
After the meal Kathleen, Carljan and I decided to take a night walk across town through some of the prettiest parts of town in the cover of darkness with many of the streets abandoned of people. I forgot to take any pictures tho.
Saturday I spent with Hermann geeking around trying to rescue the lost blog posts. More about that in a later post but things look bright.Â
Sunday I was up early and then I went with a bunch of friends to the hills in Herlikovice . I haven’t really taken full advantage of having mountains 120 km from Prague but at least I got my second time in snow this weekend. Many of the others were on snowboard so I decided to give it a try and I really liked it.
I got some hard falls and sometimes the board was running way faster than I wanted it to, but controlling it wasn’t that different from skiing so I made some good progress. I never figured out how to make a a turn with the board facing downhill tho.
On the way home we stopped in a small village with a quaint square for a well deserved dinner 🙂
Last weekend I decided to shoot some video while helping my friends Michael and Sarah move to Freiberg in Germany. This is that weekend condensed into 6 minutes;
Daniel was one of my house mates from Joint House in Ann Arbor. We had not really been in touch since I left Michigan but last week he contacted me through Facebook and said that he would come to Prague.
It s been a while since friends has stopped by Prague *hint*hint* so it was a great surprise to hear Daniel was coming. I had a great time hanging out with him for a couple of days talking about old days of Joint House and the cool parties we had as well as what we had been up to the last couple of years. I realized that Daniel and another house mate of ours live in Berlin now, so I should try and see if I can make a proper trip up there.
Daniel did 4 days of Prague right after my head, plenty of culture and plenty of beer. We started out Sunday night at Akropolis with reggae. Monday he did the the city center with Old Town Square and Charles Bridge etc. At night he went with another friend to see some underground stuff at the skate ramp on one of the islands and ended up clubbing at Roxy. Tuesday he did the Museum of Modern Art and the Prague Castle. In the evening I went with him to Laterna Magika (Magic Latern) to see a play and later on we continued to a basement bar with dressed up people in Malostranska for the rest of the night. Wednesday he saw Museum of Communism and the beautiful cubist museum. At night he rocked to two live bands at the very unique and wicked Cross Club with another friend. Thursday we went for breakfast together before he headed back home.
If I were here for a few days I d do something like that
One thing I hadn t done before and hadn t thought of before Daniel mentioned it was to check out some Black Light Theatre. Czech Republic and Prague became famous for their pantomimes using mixed media in the sixties. They even built a special stage for these plays at the national theatre in this building called Laterna Magika that looks like it s wrapped in bubble-wrap.
The show we went to see was Wonderful Circus which turned out to be hilarious, partly intentional, partly because the show is some 30 years old. I can t really explain it but this is the start of the show;
Two clowns are hatched out of two eggs washed ashore by the waves. Before they know where they are, they are confronted by the Tempter, the symbol of the snares and deceptions of life, and by Venus, the vision of mysterious beauty, which leads them to set out on a pilgrimage.
The show uses pantomime and black light theater on a background of three projection screens. Parts of the storyline is going on in the film clips projected and parts on the stage. The characters would jump from one media to another in a quite imaginary manner.
I think the price is a bit steep at 730czk for regular tickets but I must say it was good entertainment. Here are the two clowns trying to catch the fleeing Venus:
Two weeks ago I was also in the theatre to see an English play. I didn t get around to blog about it but Karen did.
To hint some more at those people that could be tempted by a trip to Prague I might add that Daniel found a hotel room for 15eur(!) per night on HRS.de. It was quite basic but it was 5 min from my place, clean and included breakfast. For a better alternative try and get in touch with Laus for some Prague Apartments.
December and January was quite busy month with birthdays and house parties in Prague so instead of doing that for my birthday I decided to organize a trip out of town for my Prague friends. With the help of Helge and Pavel I found a small pension in Spinderuv Mlyn, the most popular destination for skiing and snowboarding in Czech Republic. We ended up being 14 people (from 10 countries). Here is part of the first group who took the bus ready to leave Prague.
The first day the weather was not the best but it snowed as well so we had pretty good slopes to work with.
About half the group went skiing and all of those had done it before. The other half went snowboarding with most of them being first-timers. This of course made the snowboarders drop on a regular basis for the enjoyment of the rest of us. Heres Grace after a less than graceful fall.
On the cool-scale Bjorn the German took the price skiing in his lederhosen with a regular coat. He was laid back as he went down the mountain and never hit the deck.
The nightlife in Spinderuv Mlyn turned out to be a lot of fun as well where we danced till we were completely done.
I dont really know what Mickey Mouse and Krteek was doing at the club but at that point we thought it was fun.
Here is a picture as we were ready to leave on Sunday with everybodys limps still intact, happy but bruised.
At the end of December Kathleen invited a bunch of Prague friends over for a Christmas party with food, gifts and ugly hats. That kicked off my Christmas spirit and we had a great evening with lots of laughter and good times. Here is Antone, Sascha and Julie with big smiles:
The day after there was a flash mob event on Old Town Square in the center of Prague. The idea was that everybody should show up with a pillow hidden. At exactly 18.55 someone would whistle and a pillow fight should start.
I was at the square a few minutes before it started standing next to some tourists that didnt know what was about to happen. And then the pillow fight started. Several hundred people brought out their pillow and started whacking each other. Soon the air was full of white feathers and it looked as if it had started to snow with the fluffiest snow. Below is a video I shot 30 seconds after the started.
December flew by and I went home to my parents in Toftlund. Ann flew to Denmark and spent almost two weeks with me over Christmas and New Years. Needless to say I enjoyed it immensely to share our Danish traditions with her.
Christmas in Denmark is celebrated on Christmas Eve with a nice dinner, rice pudding game for dessert, dancing around the Christmas tree and opening gifts. This year we were my parents, my sister Majbrit, her boyfriend Mogens, my nephew Magnus, Ann and me.
On Christmas Day we didnt have any plans but to work some of all the good food off we took a trip to The Dear Park by Haderslev. Afterwards we went to meet my grand parents in Styding and some of the family that lived close by. Here is Ann and I in front of the view over the lake.
A few days later we had a dinner with my high school class mates. Every year we try to gather the class and this year we were 8 (with Ann).
For New Years we made a little trip where we first went a day to Aalborg where I used to study. We stayed over night with Peter my old neighbor and his family and had a great time with them. It was a year since I visited them last so I hadnt met the cute Oscar before.
The next day we went for brunch with Tomas, a buddy from university and then met some of the girls I worked with in ESN for a coffee.
Then we headed back south and ended in Skjoldelev where we celebrated New Years with my good friend Christian and his wife Louise. The live by the village square so we could see all the fireworks just outside. A really cozy night.
My parents gave me an early birthday gift and threw a party for me inviting the extended family. So January the 3rd we had the house full of people many of them I hadnt seen in a long time so it was really nice to see them before I took off again.
On the last day we had coffee with the neighbors and then it started to snow. We took a walk in the first snow of this trip and went to feed the ducks in a nearby pond. It was hilarious to see ducks try to walk on the ice
The next day Ann went back to London and I went back to Prague.
This was probably the best Christmas Ive had as an adult thanks to all the friends and family and, of course, Ann.
