PRAGUE WITH IVO
Everything takes a long time here. Holiday. Prague crowded. Into centre on the Metro1. Walked down Wenceslas Square, into the old town. Astronomical clock, Kafka’s birthplace, Charles Bridge, lunch, the Castle, Metro, home. Tired, plenty of Turkish coffee which I am already starting to like2.
From the southern suburbs of Prague. The Metro station young-Toby takes from nearby Barbora’s flat is initially called Primátora Vacka. (After the politician Václav Vacek. Prague’s first Communist mayor.) This changes to Roztyly soon after young-Toby arrives.
Many names are similarly being changed, for reasons young-Toby understands only generally.
Look at it.
How I love the Prague Metro — and how long I’ve been trying to give something I published that title.
(Image credit for the tile: Samppa Kytömäki on flikr.)
After his first, second and third cups, someone teaches young-Toby the secret of this coffee — add sugar and stir after the grains have formed their scurf on the surface. After this, they obediently settle to the bottom of the small white cup, and you are able to drink without spluttering.
Soon young-Toby will find he’s able to buy coffee beans at the small local minimarket. You can get a big bag quite cheaply. After you’ve paid for it at the till, there is a communal grinder near the exit door. Everyone who buys coffee uses the same grinder, because why not.
With this, as with payphones charging 1 crown for any call, and laundry rooms in apartment block basements, and cheap workers’ canteens, young-Toby gets to see and use the vestiges of a Soviet society. The red stars have gone from atop the buildings on Wenceslas Square, and the shop windows carry different slogans, but much of how you get things done in Praha - or don’t get things done - has not yet changed.
Privatazace (privatisation) is coming, and fast. It is a word that young-Toby will hear on the radio and TV more than almost any other.