Breaking it Up: Praha (Prague)

...Now that my ladder's gone 

I must lie down where all the ladders start 

In the foul rag and bone shop of the heart.

--William Butler Yeats,  "The Circus Animals’ Desertion"



On the third day of the new year, before my friends had woken, I packed away the few things I left out the night before that I would need in the morning, I pulled on my coat and my gloves and my scarf, and I headed out into the still debris-strewn streets of west Berlin. I took the metro to the train station, headphones in, drifting in and out of attention to the world around me once I had gotten myself where I needed to be. I boarded the train and sat in the window seat even though my reservation was for the aisle. We pulled away from the station and I realized I'd be riding backwards. I slouched in my seat until I was comfortable and I slept for a while and when the train's stopping at a station woke me up we were no longer in Berlin or a city and I saw a man looking down at his ticket then at me so I started to rise from my chair but he waved me back and sat beside me. I nodded at him gratefully but didn't speak and he didn't speak and I continued to watch the world pull backwards away from me and I tried not to think about my friends or Kosovo or turning 30 or my guilt or all the thousand little things I chide myself for every day. I tried to empty my mind and let the words of Bob Dylan fill it and watch Germany slip away and feel peace.

I did try.

Prague was frigid and the wind bit through my jeans, through my muscle, seemingly through my very bones, the minute I stepped out of the train station. I followed a group of rolling suitcase-touting tourists to the town center. I couldn't get a good internet connection anywhere so I ducked into a hotel, blinked my eyes sadly and asked for a street map. I checked the street I was on and found the street of my AirBnB and felt a rising surge of triumph when I found the building number of my apartment followed by a swift plummet when I realized I had no way to contact the host. I wandered up and down the street seeking internet or an idea of what to do, whichever could present itself first, before my host stepped out and recognized me, let me in, gave me the key and left me to my solitude.

I have never had an AirBnB meeting/key exchange that was not an exercise in patience and fortitude. But it's still the best way to go, to my mind.

I looked around the little studio that would be my home for a few days and now, not consumed with finding my way through a strange city, the edges of my mind began to refill with all the doubts and anger and sadness I'd been pushing away so I went back out into the street and let the crystalline cold of early January in the Czech Republic freeze me into a human-shaped automaton. I walked around a bit and went to the grocery to store to stock up on supplies (beer, junk food) and returned to my temporary home to thaw and sleep.

I walked through the famous Christmas market, past the famous astrological clock, across the famous bridge and up to the famous castle and I looked on at the famous beauty of this city and I felt mostly nothing.

I stared at this church from an alcove where I was hiding while waiting for a momentary blow-up of snow and wind to pass, and I felt nothing.

The skies cleared and I felt nothing.

I took pictures of things I thought were beautiful and things I thought were strange or interesting, but I felt nothing.

I sought out things I'd read about, I went through the motions of a person on vacation, and I felt nothing.

I looked at the lights and the people and I smelled the meat and the beer and the potatoes and the garlic and I felt nothing and I heard the singing and the deep, bellowing clangor of the city's church-bells and I felt nothing.

I returned to the apartment after my wanderings through the city, because my legs ached below where my coat protected my torso and thighs. I slept then, mostly I slept, for the several days I was there. I slept and I drank and I ate and I thought and then I remembered. I thought about my host family in Topanica and I thought about my host family in Rahovec and I thought about Trump and I thought about the friends I had made and I thought about all of the friends I have said goodbye to, unable to say if I would ever meet them again and I thought about that professor in college who inspired my stupid Peace Corps dreams and I thought about all the reasons why I should stay and do what was right and I thought about all the things it would mean for me to do that and I thought about all the reasons why I should go and I thought about all the things I would feel if I did that and I remembered the moment I was looking on the Peace Corps website at the list of countries who were taking TEFL volunteers and I remembered choosing Kosovo and I remembered riding my bike through the excruciating heat of mid-day summer in Hanoi to get my documents mailed in time and I remembered the agony of waiting, of people asking about my application and having no answer, and the ecstasy when I read my invitation while sitting in a cabana on a beach in Thailand with Zach and I remembered the first night of my stay in Georgia when I was bewildered and freezing and I remembered the feeling that my life was moving forward somehow and I remembered leaving Chile and thinking I'd never teach or travel abroad again and I remembered the panic attack I'd had walking down the street of New York with my mom a few days before I flew to Prishtina and I hated myself more strongly, more acutely and more venomously than I had ever hated anyone or anything before in my entire life.

And then I slept and I tried to forget.

I did try.

Breaking it Up: Amsterdam

there was something about

that city, though

it didn't let me feel guilty

that I had no feeling for the

things so many others

needed.

it let me alone.

--Charles Bukowski, "Young in New Orleans" 

Amsterdam is a great city. I enjoyed it the last time I was here, which was a very different kind of visit from this one. But both times I found it a romantic, interesting place. It's got a history full of tragedy and beauty. Most places do, I suppose, but there's something about Amsterdam's that captures my imagination. Although the Netherlands (like Germany and Belgium) feels like a very well-organized, well-funded place there is an element of chaos in Amsterdam that promises something more than other cities. It feels like a city for oddballs. Who knows what will happen? Maybe I'll wake up and visit a house re-purposed into a shrine for cats. Maybe I'll wander around, dodging trams and bicyclists. Maybe I'll buy an armful of tulip bulbs. Maybe I'll stumble through one of the parks, drinking as much of the incredible beer and eating as many waffles as I can get my hands on. Who's to say?

Taking in the night scenes after arriving on our train (the night-bus we had taken was not allowed within the city limits but thankfully it dropped us at a train station only about 15 minutes away). It was all beautiful and charming and then, suddenly! Whoa! Sexy... Santa lingerie? What?

We walked through the red light district as well, as our hostel was located essentially inside of it. You can't take photos there which I am 100% in agreement with. I found it fascinating but also sad and pretty creepy. I don't know what was worse, looking through the glass-paned doors at the red and pink lit women sitting in their underwear, winking and preening for the gaping passers-by or the understanding of what was happening behind the doors whose curtains had been pulled close. It's kind of overwhelming.

Then there were windows that made me not at ALL uncomfortable because they were selling me dutch cheese. And gouda and prima donna are things we should all be able to love without shame.

Approaching the tulip markets, from the other side of the canal.

Later, inside:

This building on the corner is most certainly standing aslant. Or all the other ones are. SOMETHING is askew in this picture.

Our first full day was utterly gorgeous and later I was grateful we'd chosen to spend it mostly walking around, enjoying the weather and relaxing. Our weather would take a turn after the first day but at least we were able to enjoy some sun for a while...

I'm not sure if these pictures are arranged in chronological order but they are organized by things we saw so here we go:

Cait and I visited a street that's known for its antique shops and their elaborate, ornate window displays.

We spent a LONG time drifting slowly through the Museum of Bags and Purses as it was not only fascinating but we obviously had the important task of deciding which ones we would be taking home with us.

This was terrifying. Cheetah face purse.

Literal crocodile/alligator bag. Not just skin. The whole dang shebang.

Other exotic animal wares. Unfortunately besides the obvious peacock I don't remember what these were made from, but they were definitely not PC leather choices.

I don't remember which were our favorites but I'm pretty sure Cait or I would have been happy with basically any of these.

Or this.

Enamel.

Medieval chatelaines, or uber-keychains, the modern purse's predecessor. Medieval ladies would just hang these from their belts with all the tools they might need for household tasks.

Obviously, for me, the coup d'grace. I was ready to break several laws to make this purse my own.

Next up, Katten Kabinet, the museum that started because some guy had a cat he really liked and when it died he started collecting cat memorabilia that somehow snowballed into this incredibly odd shrine:

Cats. Everywhere.

The sacred...

...AND the profane.

Floating cat face in the sky sees all.

Next, the Torture Museum (this one is not worth the money and I don't recommend it. It's gimmicky and consists of mostly woodcut illustrations of torture):

We ended up moving through this one pretty quickly as it was somehow both unsettling and cheesy.

The second/third days in Amsterdam did not gift us with weather anywhere NEAR as nice as the first day, but it was a damn fine atmosphere for someone considering giving up on their dreams of the last decade.

Anne Frank House. I saw this on my last visit and did not elect to stand in the half-day long line to see it again, although I'm very glad I had that experience and would recommend it to anyone.

We skipped the tulip museum but we did venture into the Cheese Museum, which besides this very silly display in their tiny basement was actually just a cheese shop. No complaints here. They had samples out for literally ever flavor of cheese they were selling. I know this because I tried them all.

I will take that car tire of Prima Donna, though.

On one of our afternoons we split up for a while and I visited the Oude Kerk, the oldest building/church in Amsterdam, which has been transformed into a modern art exhibition space. It was really interesting to see how the artist had chosen to make his pieces interact with both the philosophical and aesthetic elements of the church. I dug it.

The works inside the church are from Dutch artist Marinus Boezem, the shattered glass pieces are from a series called "meteorieten". As in, meteors, I assume. Which felt appropriate since they were reflecting the star-strewn ceiling of the cathedral. The slivered pieces kind of resemble the meteor's tale but also because of how they distort the image the ceiling looks like it's moving as you walk around the pieces.

This part was called "labyrinth" and to get to the column you had to walk into this white curtain spiral that was waving gently from a couple of strategically placed fans' air currents. I guess there was not a lot of elements involved, the fan and the spiraling, draped sheet but the effect was ethereal and beautiful.

That does not look particularly restful.

On our last day we wandered over to one of the city parks. We dropped in at the Diamond "Museum" which, although free, I do not think deserves the title of museum. It's like one room of displays with some placards and a few recreations of famous diamonds and then in order to exit you have to walk through this complicated, multi-floor tunnel of high high HIGH end jewelry stores while salespeople eyeball you expectantly. That experience was negative fun, it was the opposite of Batman. 

  

Finally, we ended up at the "i amsterdam" sign and to our delight, the Christmas market behind it where we had one last indulgent Dutch meal and enjoyed the kids playing a game of pick-up ice hockey before heading back to the hostel to pick up our bags and head to catch our night bus to Copenhagen.