decorating with bones?

Prague, Czech Republic

Not much to write about really. Prague has been good. It's rained every day since I last wrote, I think. And it's been nice and cool. Some days I've been prepaired. Today I got really wet. The nice thing about the rain is that the streets, especially in the tourist areas become less crowded.

A couple days ago I went to visit the former silver mining town of Kutna Hora. In the 1300s or so, silver was discovered and the resulting city was larger than the london of the time. It was second in importance only to prague. Later, all the silver had been mined and the city shrunk. But not before the miners had paid for an amazing gothic cathedral. Not to be outdone by prague, St. Barabra's cathedral is the biggest or one of the biggest in central europe. I thought the coolest part was the mining guild symbols that were painted on the ceiling.

Kutna Hora is a very picturesque town built around a valley. They also have a nice plague column (giving thanks that the plague of the 1700s was over) and the italian court, a palace that was turned into the mint while Kutna Hora prospered. They day I was there they were having an outdoor concert in the valley, and the group I heard seemed to be an american bluegrass band. It felt out of place.

The main station to Kutna Hora is actually located in Sedlec, an industrial town. I chose to walk from the main station to the historic town. On the way I visited the ossuary in Sedlec. Back in the day dirt was brought back from the holy land and sprinkled there, and after that, all the rich and important people wanted to be burried there. I think they ran out of room, but anyways, they now have 40,000 sets of bones. I guess they were just mounded in the chapel, but in 1870 someone got creative and hired a designer to decorate the inside with bones. It's a very grusome place. One of the main decorations is a chandeler made out of all the bones in the human body. The rest of the bones are piled in six pyramids at the edges of the chapel.

I've also done a lot of walking around Prague. I revisited Charles Bridge, and have been in and out of the old town square more times than I can count. Today I visited a church dedicated to this doll of the baby jesus that's supposed to have amazing healing powers. I also walked along wenceslas square, really more of a very wide street than a square, and around one of the islands in the Vlata river that divides Prague in half. The main way I get around here is by tram. The trams seem to go everywhere. There's also buses, and three metro lines.

Last night I went with Jan's stepdad to the local resturant in their neighborhood. It used to be a place where people exercised and played futbool, built as an effort to increase national identity by sports played together. Now it's a nice outside pub. You can tell it's a local place because .5L of beer is only one dollar. And it's some of the best beer in the world. I had goulash in a bread bowl. Although goulash was originally a hungarian dish, the czechs have also adopted it as one of their national foods. Although it's pretty heavy stuff, I like most czech food that I've had. Especially the dumplings!