Where In The World is Mark Moeremans?

It seems like just yesterday when I was arriving in the USA after a semester in Barcelona.  No more Spanish, no more sun, no more travels…or so I thought.  Here I am…5 months to the day exactly sitting in another airport preparing for another great adventure.  It was in February when I began to think about summer jobs and it wasn’t until March when I applied for my dream job, an internship with One Laptop Per Child (OLPC).  To my absolute astonishment in April I was accepted for the competitive and prestigious job opportunity and now, May, here I am about to ship off.

There are many similarities between this trip and my last journey over seas…incomprehensible nerves, last minute packing, language prep, and just all around stress.  However there is a lot different this time around.  First of all LOCATION!  I’m going to PERU!  No more comfy European adventure I am roughing it all the way.  Different kinds of people and a different kind of Spanish make for a different experience.  Instead of jetting off from country to country I’ll be busing/hitchhiking across mountain roads to rural villages in the Andes.  Even more importantly, I’m not studying I’m working.  Granted everything in life is about learning I am going with a specific job to do.  One Laptop Per Child is a non-profit company that delivers inexpensive laptops to elementary school children in foreign countries.  Saturating the youth with technology in order to bolster education in the most remote parts of the world.  I’ll be working with kids and laptops, in a foreign country, in order to serve the poor, yup sounds perfect.

After a rather challenging semester mentally, physically, and most importantly socially, I believe it’s time I renewed my sense of adventure.  And with that, it’s time to renew my blog.  I want you all here, every step of the way.  I want you to see the beauty of South America, and meet some of the sweetest schoolchildren in the world, and I want you do it all with me through my eyes.  As the great Ms. Frizzle once said, “Get messy! Make mistakes! Follow me!”

So not 48 hours after my return from Morocco I was off again.  What destination would I be heading to next?  Russia?  Well I might as well have.  Off to Prague!  This trip is what we would call an impulse.  Pegah was supposed to come and visit me for Halloween in Barcelona.  Fine with me, no trips booked, get to stay in my city for a little breather…great.  Only problem is she couldn’t find any cheap flights so she quickly abandoned me in favor of Prague.  Luckily for me I recieved the invite and was fortunate enough to find a really reasonable ticket considering I bought it about a week before.

Prague is actually located in Czech Republic, formerly Czechoslovakia, and formerly a member of the soviet block.  Considered the jewel of Eastern Europe, Prague is the 6th most visited city in Europe.  Known as the city of 10,000 spires, Prague has some of the most incredible architecture of any city in Europe.  Somehow it manage to avoid being a battle ground during any of the European wars ever and so remains basically untouched and a perfect model of Baroque style, very pretty.  The flight over was fantastic, I flew on an airline I had never heard of “Smart Wings” so I was a little nervous.  Turns out it was actually a legit airline.  We’re talking free baggage check and an inflight meal!

Upon arrival I soon realized just how far east I was when I kept confusing my location with Moscow.  Czech the language is maybe slovic, certainly impossible, and most definitely useless.  If you only speak Czech what can you do outside Czech Republic?  Anyways try as I might I couldn’t even learn to say please, thank you, or hello while I was there.  This made it especially dificult getting from the airport to the hotel where I would be meeting the gang.  Luckily I ran into some people I knew in the Prague Airport (Pause for comments) and we made our way to city center together.  Finally, after getting lost walking around an abandon and sketch outskirt I finally found the hotel where Pegah and friends were waiting.

While the Czech Republic was recently admitted to the EU it is still not on the Euro.  Therefore a lot of things are really really cheap one of which was our hotel.  It was a great place, included breakfast, had internet, and only cost me 50 euros for my 4 night stay.  That’s 50 euro total, not per night.  We decided to stay in the hotel that night so we could get an early start on the city the next day.

We got up early Friday morning and after raiding the breakfast buffet we headed downtown.  We were lucky enough to have really nice weather and we saw all the major sites.  The famous Prague Bridge, the many many churches (which you had to pay to go into!) and the Prague Castle.  We had a great time just being tourists, something I don’t often do, and taking tons of pictures.  We even had an impromptu photo shoot in the Castle Gardens haha.  We had some traditional Czech food, “Goulash” which was beef with “dumplings” which was like bread actually made out of potatoes.  It was good, heavy.  They also had their famous Czech beer “Pilsner” which was about a euro for a huge glass, and very tasty.  Prague also had this amazing invention…hot wine.  It was spiced and flavored almost like Sangria but was hot like tea, but still very much alcoholic like wine.  It really warmed us up and quickly became a favorite, basically european hot cocoa.  

In contrast to Prague’s sweeping skyline, classical music, and stunning art, it’s nightlife is known for being about as classless as possible.  Absinthe Dens, hookah bars, prostitution, pub crawls.  ”The Prague Nightlife” is something I’ve been hearing about since I got to Barcelona so we figured we’d check it out.  We had a place in mind and after sprucing up we left the hotel in search of adventure.  Long story short, total bust.  We didn’t leave until after the metro had shut down and we tried to walk thinking it was close.  3 hours and hypothermia later we are back in our hotel room not even having made it halfway there.  The next morning feeling slightly defeated we took our time getting ready before venturing back into the city.

Saturday was Halloween and it was a cold cold cold fall day.  Cloudy with no sun, very communist feeling.  We hiked up a mini-mountain to find the Eastern European response to the Eiffle Tower.  It was bizarre seeing a blatant knock off but still really cool.  I just couldn’t believe I was seeing this random wannabee monument before I’ve even seen the real deal.  After we snuck into a “mirror maze” and we were clearly the oldest people there.  All tots with their parents, but that didn’t stop us from having a great time and we eventually had to remove ourselves because we realized we were hogging the fun….from 6 year olds.

Not that the sun was ever out to begin with but it set very early and when it did the temperature dropped about 15 degrees.  Weather.com told me it would be about 46 all weekend.  It was in the 20’s and 30’s the whole time.  We went back to the hotel determined to have a successful night on the town.  What we found was a pub crawl.  15 euros for all the beer, vodka, rum, absinthe, and hookah for 1 hour.  We were scared and for good reason.  In Prague you can’t even dress up nice to go out cause it’s so damn cold so sporting 4 layers I headed out.  3 bars, 1 club, and one of the most bizzare yet fun halloween’s I’ve ever had.  Being the only guy in our group of four I decided to be responsible in order to watch for my girls.  In summary:  I saw a man try and buy my friend.  I saw a cute Australian get carried out of the 3rd bar by her friends because she literally couldn’t move her limbs, I saw someone hold a UN conference with the number of international men she courted, and I saw why Prague is known for it’s slinky, sketchy, but crazy fun night life.

The next morning Pegah departed leaving me with my two new friends Erin and Emily.  We decided we needed to have a classy day to make up for last night so we went to a modern art museum (Cubism was huge in Prague) and then a classical music concert.  (In a church where Mozart had performed).  

Finally on the last day as I was preparing to leave we headed downtown to a huge shopping mall.  It was literally a slice of the US and made me feel right at home in Buckland Hills.  It was a really bizarre sensation.  Then just as I was about to leave I ran into Andrew.  Yup Andrew, just getting into Prague from Dublin.  Small world we live in.  I had just enough time to say hello and get a picture as proof of our serendipity before saying goodbye and heading to the airport.  

This was definitely a Halloween I won’t soon forget and Prague is a one of a kind city.  Culturally trapped between Germany and western europe, and Russia and the looming presence of communism.  This identity crisis was evident in all aspects of our trip from the German tasting food/beer to the Russian souvenirs and communist crests.  The title of this post is Coldest Winter by Kanye West because it was FREEZING!  So cold, I’m glad I went in October, everyone else I know is going end of November and to them I saw good luck.  What do you think?