Czechmatediary

One of my Facebook friends posted this while I was aimlessly browsing FB. Since I am a Prague girl I found these little facts quite interesting ;0)

CZ: Jestlize pochazite z Prahy (nebo jste pouhym milovnikem Prahy) a ztravili jste v Prazskem metru nekolik hodin denne, tyto fakta vas bodou zajimat.

PRAGUE METRO - SURVIVAL CHAMBER FOR 325,000 PEOPLE!!
The Prague Metro serves about 1,5 million passengers a day, which makes it the seventh busiest metro system in Europe.
But it is a piece of history as well. When communism collapsed in 1989 revolution 14 stations with names reflecting Communist ideology were changed to be politically neutral. “Lenin station” was renamed „Dejvická“ after a surrounding neighbourhood. „Anděl“ station was known as „Moscow Station“ – until now you can find there several pieces of propaganda art promoting Soviet-Czechoslovak „friendship“ (Czechoslovakia was occupied by Soviet army in 1968..)

INTERESTING FACTS
The line A of the Prague metro is a giant “survival chamber” built for thousands of people in the case of a nuclear attack. You can see the giant metal doors at every entrance. (more…)

OK, here is yet another addition to our photo-gallery of Prague-under-snow. The My Czech Republic blog took some awesome pictures of the Czech capital (and other places) just a few hours after it stopped snowing earlier this past month. Click here to view all of the images - it really looks like it’s from some kind of a fairy-tale.

CZ: Jestlize jste ve snehove nalade, My Czech Republic blog zverejnil nekolik naaaadhernych, pohadkovych fotek zasnezene Prahy a okoli! Kliknete zde.

You know how much they all talk about how much snow is in the Czech Republic now? I got a proof! These wonderful Prague pictures (taken by a generous donor - Peter) were taken just a few days ago. And if Prague is snowed-in, you know that the rest of the Czech Republic is REALLY snowed in.

CZ: Vite, jak se vsude stebeta o tom, kolik v Cechach napadlo snehu. No, a ja mam dukaz! Fotky (velkodusne darovane panem Petrem) zasnezene Prahy! A vime preci, ze jestlize je Praha zasnezena, tak zbytek cele Ceske republiky je opravdu zapadly pod horami snehu.

Kampa

Do you know Anthony’s Bourdain’s show called “No reservations”? If not, now is the perfect time to start watching it because this daring culinary chef  will be introducing Prague and its ‘crazy’ culinary art! Catch this episode  on Travel Chanel Monday, Feb 1 at 10 PM E/P.

CZ: Anthony Bourdainova show zvana “No rezervations” bude pristi tyden o Praze! Uvidime, jaky ‘blaznivy’ chod objevi v ‘te nasii kuchyniiii ceskeeeeeee…” ;0)

Divejte se v pondeli, 1. unora na Travel Channel a to ve 22:00 E/P.

Do you like places like Disneyland? Go and see the new fairytale land in Prague! The all-year exhibition shows off solely Czech fairytale themes, such as Pernikova chaloupka (Gingerbread house), Sipkova Ruzenka (Rose princess), Dlouhy siroky a bistrozraky, O vetrnikovi a mesicnikovi and other Czech classics.

Although the new museum was build in the place of an old laundry room in Zizkov, the whole construction cost about 7 milion crowns. One can see expensive reproductions of  3-meter tall mochomurkas (a poisonous Czech mushroom), a 5-meter tall tree stump (with dangerous gangmen living in it) or a life-size gingerbread house with some cool witch sound effects coming out from within. Among other attractions, you can also experience a ‘real-life’ Czech hell!

In case you would like to take your kids there here is the address and the hours of operation: (more…)

At a strike of a each hour, a bunch of excited tourists swarm underneath the Prague’s famous astronomical clock. You can hear English, Japanese, German, Italian or Chinese spoken, but Czech language is a rarity. Once the clock strikes, the commotion begins: bells start to ring as a parade of 12 apostles circles in and out of the clock, with a scary figure of an antique skeleton finishing up the round, while ringing his sad little bell.

A similar performance can be seen now in Slovakia as well. Yesterday marked a historical unveiling of a new astronomical clock in Stara Bystrica - the first moving astronomical clock in Slovakia ever! (more…)

My friend Iva just told me a big secret: did you know that if you have a T-mobile account and live in the US you can text message to Czech/Slovakia for $0.20 per message (both incoming and outgoing messages)? The bad news is that I don’t have a T-mobile account but I thought some of you would find this information helpful….or maybe everyone but me knows about this already??

For further information visit T-mobile website.

CZ: Ma kamaradka Iva mi prozradila velike tajemstvi: vite, ze kdyz mate mobilovy ucet s T-mobile a zijete v USA, tak muzete textovat do Cech nebo na Slovensko za velmi nizke ceny? Prichozi a odeslane sms stoji pouhych $0.20! Spatna zprava je ta, ze ja T-mobile nemam, ale rikala jsem si, ze by tuto informaci nekdo z vas, ctenaru, ocenil….nebo to uz vsichni, krome mne, vi???

Pro blizsi informace se obratte na webove stranky T-mobilu.

Only about 7 years ago (2002) Prague underwent one of the most horrendous floods in the city’s history. Besides the historical downtown completely disappearing under water, the Prague’s zoo was flooded as well. The zoo staff managed to evacuate more than 1,000 animals, 800 birds, 150 reptiles and 100 mammals prior to the upcoming flood (making it the largest and the fastest evacuation of animals in the history of zoological gardens). Unfortunately, 14 mammals and 130 birds died during the floods, including the male seal Gastron, who swam more than 186 miles down the Vltava river to Germany, was resuced days later but died on the way back home thanks to exhaustion, stress and infection. Among the animals that had to be put down was 35-year-old Kadir (see image bellow), an elephant popular with zoo-goers, who became trapped by rising waters and could not be rescued. (more…)

I found a really nice report about Brno, written by this guy who is originally from there and recently came back to Brno for a short visit as a tourist. The article is short, sweet and entertaining (read the article right here). Now, all of you Moravians out there, tell me if you agree with him!

CZ: Nasla jsem vam moc hezkou reportaz o Brne, napsanou clovekem, ktery v tomto meste vyrostl a po dlouhe dobe se do nej  vratil na par dni jako turista (clanek si prectete zde). Ted mi, vsici Moravaci, musite rict, jestli s nim souhlasite!

This video is hilarious (thanks for the tip Jamie)! It makes fun of Prague’s International Airport, calling it the Franz Kafka Airport, “a place of suspicion and confusion, where time simply disappears”.

CZ: Toto video je opravdu vyborne. Dela si totiz srandu z naseho Ruzynskeho letiste a z jistych duvodu ho nazyva Letiste Franze Kafky - “misto neustaleho podezreni a zmatku, kde se cas jednoduse vypari do vzduchu…”

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