U Fleku

Today was kind of our left over day in Prague. There was nothing we really "needed" to do, and it's nice to not be rushed in the places we visit. I got up early to desperately attempt to catch up on blogging, and eventually we left to go chip away at our mundane errands.

We went with David to a potato pancake place that Rubin (Leah's roommate) recommended to us. Finding the place was pretty easy, and thank goodness Rubin warned us to split one. These things were HUGE, and smothered with meat, onions, and sauce. Really good, but about 2/3 of the way through my 1/2 of the pancake I was feeling a little nauseous. It was heavy. Oh yeah, and this meal cost $9 total, but we were splitting it, so yeah - woohoo Prague!

Then it was time for another new friend to leave us as David headed to his bus. After that we began our search for our normal souvenirs. I stopped in a store with lots of kitschy tourist plates and asked the lady if she had any traditional ceramic plates. She said no and I asked her if she knew where I could find some. I really didn't know if she would a) understand or b) help me buy something that was not one of her 40 plates I didn't like. BUT SHE DID! And the shop was only a few meters away (yeah I'm getting sucked into the world of meters). Laura spotted the big sign that said "Keramics" and we had found the jack pot. The woman in the store helped me pick out the "most" traditionally Czech colors and pattern (when I told her I'd been all over central Europe, and no offense, it all kind of looked verrrry similar to me). So I found a plate, and on we went. Then we also found the chocolate shop where there are demonstrations, but we thought the demos and tasting were free but they weren't! Bummer. After that I was on a mission to find this church where there is supposedly a thieves' arm that was cut off hanging from the wall. We FINALLY found the freaking place only to find it was totally locked up with no visible way in. I guess it was closed for the day. Lame.

THEN the real adventure starts.

I had in fact called Miguel from Skype, and we had plans to meet up at 5:30 in the Museum Square. Sure enough, he and Toni were right on time. The four of us now seeing each other all in the daylight for the first time clicked just as well as the night before and it was awesome to have some new insta-friends, especially with Jackie and David gone! We headed to U Fleku, a traditional Czech beer hall that was recommended to me by someone back home. Miguel said that was a great idea (he lives in Prague and Toni is visiting him from Australia...they met at a hostel in London - love these stories!).

The beer hall was great, it's almost like a really pretty, much smaller cafeteria just lined with wooden benches and tables. You pick a seat wherever you can find one and sit under pretty chandeliers. They only serve one type of beer, brewed on the premises, and one type of shot, some kind of plum shot which is supposedly the national shot of Czech? Who knows. They also have live accordion and/or tuba music going at any given time. It was a really, really fun place. Online it said they only took cash, and I had exactly 120 crowns left. That's good for 2 or 3 beers, depending on how expensive they are. We told Miguel this and he was appalled that we were only planning on having a couple of beers even though it was literally the last of our cash and it would mean going without food.

Then, this is where the game changed. Miguel asked the waiter if they took card - and they said yes. I grumbled at Miguel because I KNEW that meant game over. We had literally nothing else to do and we were at a super cute beer hall! Miguel insisted we try Czech's national shot and beers kept landing in front of us and it was all downhill from there. We definitely had beer for dinner and completely forgot to eat. We spent hours just sitting around and laughing with these kids, they were so great. I made a few quality one liners and Miguel decided he liked my humor (don't hear that everyday!) Then we resolved that Laura and Toni were the "hot" ones and Miguel and I were the "personality" ones, the "witty" ones. I'm alright with that. I think I'm funny so it's cool when other people do too. It was a ridiculously fun night, and I have no clue what time we left the beer hall. We went to a grocery store to get snacks (which I didn't eat), and stopped by a friend of Miguel's apartment briefly. Then we went back to Miguel's flat and sat around talking and laughing more. At this point, fatigue came out of nowhere and I was simply exhausted. I ended up crashing on Miguel's roommate's bed (who wasn't home) and sleeping solidly through the night.

TO BE CONTINUED....(in the next blog post).


Quotes:
"You can't go to a beer hall and only have two beers!" - Miguel

"Oh yeah, I used you as bait. Sorry." - Miguel, in regards to using me to try to get his friend Hansa from last night to come hang out with us (turns out Hansa apparently had a little crush on me).

Accomplishments:
Experienced the full force of a Czech beer hall with new friends from Mexico and Australia - sigh, traveling...!!

Travel Tip:
Be ready for anything...even beer for dinner - though I don't think I would recommend that, generally speaking...