In which things get better

Okay, so yesterday I went to the consulate, at 10 am this time. When I turned up, there was already about 6 people crowded around the gate in front of me. It took about 15 minutes before anyone came out of the consulate, during which time more people turned up and started pressing up around the gate. During this time, just to set the scene it was drizzling slightly... When the gatekeeper finally came out, rather than letting people in in any kind of fair-seeming order, he would point to people he wanted to come in. What??? As (I think) Scotty said, it was like waiting behind the velvet rope at a nightclub, except at this 'nightclub' I was slightly worried the crowd would turn vicious - you should have seen everyone pressing forward whenever the gatekeeper approached, like at a rock concert or something. Actually, it put me in mind of those photos of the last helicopters leaving the American embassy in Vietnam... Anyhoo, whenever the gatekeeper came out, people were shouting out (in Russian) what they were there for, which seemed to sway the gatekeeper somehow, although I couldn't tell whether he was just letting people in for new passports, or for visas, or what was going on. Some people were waving little slips of paper, which panicked me slightly since I didn't have one. After about 45 minutes of this, I worked my way up to right before the gate and summoned the courage to bleat 'visa' the next time he approached. No result. However, on his next trip to the gate, I was given the nod. Sweet! Once I got inside, I saw that there was some method to the whole affair - there were different queues dependent on whether you were getting a passport, applying for a visa, or picking your visa up, so whenever he escorted one person out from a particular queue, he would try to pick someone who needed to go to the same counter. Even so, have the Russians not heard of waiting rooms or something?
Once inside, I was (as I had been all week) wracked with anxiety over whether I had all the requisite documents and whether I could actually afford the visa fee. When I got to the counter I said in halting Russian "I need a visa..." I was planning to go on "by tomorrow, how much is it?" but the visa guy cut me off (in Russian) with a sarky "I know you need a visa, can I have your documents please?" Okay, fair enough, I was at the visa counter, but come on, I wasn't actually just being Captain Obvious (another Laurie-ism) I did have a point if he'd let me finish... Anyway, to my relief, the forms were fine, no AIDS test required, and the visa fee was about NZ$120, which I had, and which I thought was fairly reasonable for next-day service.
I couldn't really relax up until this morning, when I picked up my visa (woohoo!) because I was nervous that I'd turn up and they'd be all "we've found an irregularity in your application, Miss Gwan", but no such problem - I'm off to Russia!

Yesterday I also booked my flight, out of Berlin, and today I picked up my train ticket. So Monday morning I leave Prague for a 5-hour train ride to Berlin, then spend the night there before flying out to Moscow Tuesday morning (it is much cheaper to do it that way - lets say, with the train ticket and hostel etc. 200 euro as opposed to about 500 euro to fly direct from Prague).

I also arranged for my replacement credit card to be sent to me in Moscow, and today I picked up some emergency cash. Mum promised the guy at the bank that I would 'give him a plug on my blog' - yes, since I have an audience of millions who look at me as their god, here you go. Bruce from the National Bank at Auckland University is a star. Sarcasm aside, he really was great - called me about 5 times to talk about various options to get me a card and cash and always friendly and nice... Well done, Bruce.
I have a sinking feeling that I'm going to be absolutely stony broke in Moscow (and there's nothing like being in an unfamilar city to drain one's funds) but I will have a place to live, which is the main thing, and I suppose I'll just have to tighten my metaphorical belt (although good news, my literal belt needs tightening as well... pity it's on the last hole and I can't tighten it, so it really does more to weigh my pants down than to hold them up) and stick it out as best I can until whenever it is I start getting paid.

I definitely have mixed feelings about leaving Prague. I've really come to love the city, and most of all, the friends I've made here. I've been running around extorting promises from people to 'try' to come and visit me in Moscow, and I'm sure we're all going to have a good time this weekend, my last in Prague :( But, at the same time, I'm going to be living in Moscow, which is by far the coolest thing I've ever done in my short life to date! Stay tuned for Muscovite adventures soon...

In which everything goes all f@ck!d up

It's been a few days between posts (unusually, I know) because I've been having a bad old time of it. On Monday I was pleased as punch to find a full-length coat at Tesco for $70 (okay, it's probably not the world's best coat, but at $70, how can you go wrong?) and then have a halfway-decent passport photo taken, when, on arriving back at Greg and Laurie's flat I went to pull the photos out of my wallet to show Laurie and... no wallet. I'm always really careful about keeping eyes and paws on my bag plus it closes with a big velcroed flap, so I don't see how anyone could have managed to pickpocket it, but I'm at a bit of a loss to explain how it jumped out by itself. My working theories are either that I left it on a counter or something after buying something (which would make me an idiot) or that it somehow flew out when I took my scarf and gloves out on the way home. Well, it's not the end of the world, of course, but it does leave me in the tricky position of not knowing whether I can afford my Russian visa (more on that later). Plus there were lots of things in there that are irreplaceable (e.g. student ID) or a pain to replace (driver's license). However, I didn't have much money (maybe $20) in it, mostly because I don't have much money full stop. I did have a 100 euro traveller's cheque at home though, which I'm enormously grateful for now. My lovely and wonderful mum sorted me out with the bank though, after I spent 150 crowns I really couldn't afford to lose on hold with the bank in NZ before some stupid girl came on and said it would take 2-3 weeks to send a replacement credit card and I would have to be there for whenever it might turn up in that period!

On Tuesday I went down to the police station to report it, which was actually a very pain-free process, with a lovely Engilsh-speaking copper (although I realised later he didn't actually bother to take a contact phone number, which I suppose reflects the odds of it actually turning up). Don't think I'll claim on it with my insurance, I doubt they'll pay anything out - you know how they are...

After the police station, I had to go pick up my letter of invitation from Russia, which involved going all the way out to the airport and following some very vague instructions as to where I should go. Eventually I found the right neck of the woods, after asking about 3 people for directions, but genius here thought she was collecting a letter from DHL... Literally hours later, and after an emergency (and VERY pricey) email check at the airport, I found out it was UPS that had my package. I had actually found the UPS building, but since I was convinced it was DHL I needed (who were actually down the road a little bit), I did plenty more wandering first. So that was a frustrating day, but I wound up with my precious letter of invitation in the end.

Armed with the letter of invitation, the next step is actually getting the visa. Since the only website I can find for the Russian Embassy/Consulate in Prague lists email addresses and phone numbers that don't actually work and has little information of use, I managed to turn up 5 minutes after the visa office closes for the day (naturally it's only open for 2 hours, from 10 am - 12 pm...) so that was an exercise in frustration. It also exposed how fricking awful my command of the Russian language is these days. The only address on the website is actually the Embassy's address, not the Consulate's, so I went there first and had a little conversation with the gatekeeper or whoever in my execrable Russian:

Russian guy: Slushaiyu ("I'm listening" PS excuse awful transliteration if any Russian scholars happen to read this)

Me: Gavaritye po-anglitsky ("Do you speak English?)

RG: Po-russky! (Russian!)

Me: Khochu visi (I want a visa)

RG: Visu (Your grammar sucks, lady) He then proceeds to give me the address of the consulate - I understood what he was doing, but I just couldn't catch the street name (which, to be fair, is Czech of course)

Me: Ummm, ummm, adress...

RG: Repeats it about 4 times

Me: Ummm...

RG: (Periodically) Sluchaiyu

Me: Ummm, ne znaiyu russky slovo... adress, a, b, c... ("I don't know the Russian word, address, a, b, c" - a vain attempt to get him to spell the street name... Eventually I got it, but I couldn't remember even how to say 'thankyou', all I could think in was stupid Czech 'dekuji'! Of course when I left I remembered it was 'spasibo'...)

So it's probably due to my poor Russian skills that I wound up late for the visa... Once there, I think I figured out that the visa I want costs 1500 crowns, which is about $100 and is about half the money I have, so I'm fervently hoping that I read the information correctly. I was freaked out because it definitely said somewhere on the info board that Czechs needed an AIDS test, and if I need one too I'm probably sunk in terms of getting the visa in time to get to Russia on Tuesday, but I've just looked at the Embassy website again and it says you need the AIDS test when applying for a visa for more than 3 months - for some bureaucratic reason I have to apply for a 3-month single-entry business visa and then when I'm in Russia convert it into a 12-month multiple-entry visa, so if everyone could just cross all their fingers and toes that that's correct & that the visa does cost 1500 crowns, then I might just be able to make it to Moscow on time.

Moscow calling

Hurrah! I've just heard that the letter of invitation, the necessary first step to getting a Russian visa, will be arriving in my hot little hands on Tuesday. I still haven't heard anything back from the Russian embassy, so who knows if I need to organise an HIV/AIDS test or any other such requirement, I think I might just show up on Wednesday or something if I don't hear from them by then.

I've started making my little preparations for Russian life - buying some warm(er) clothes, primarily. I've also taken the liberty of trawling around on the net for some information on Russian life.
In winter, it can fall to 30 degrees below zero (hmmm, let me just close my eyes and imagine that for a second - nope, can't quite manage it) and washing machines, I learn to my dismay, are not readily available 'be prepared to handwash' :(
From the US Consulate, I've learned that swarms of children (possibly armed with knives) sometimes attack tourists, knocking them down and stealing their possessions. Always fun... Also, neo-Nazi racist movements are on the rise in Russia, so one should take care if of 'African or Asian origin'. Well, at least that's not me.
You should also take extreme care who you drink with, as drink and food spiking is also on the rise.
Security on Russian internal flights is apparently a little hazy, leading to two Russian commerical airliners being downed by terrorist acts in the last few years. And of course, terrorism is not restricted to the skies - we all remember the Beslan school siege and the opera house siege. There have also recently been explosions in Russian marketplaces, which 'appear to be motivated by commerical concerns, rather than targeting foreigners' - business Russian-style, huh?

What have I let myself in for?

However, my school (well, they are in the business of recruiting foreigners) has this to say: 'Once someone has expressed an interest in coming to Moscow, every mother will no doubt be beside herself with worry. Reassure her - it is not as bad as you have read in the Western press.'

In case I sound like I'm down on Project: Moscow, I'm really not - still looking forward to it, but as An Awfully Big Adventure, some of which will be scary in the extreme, but which will also be lots of fun, I hope. I'm aiming to be in Moscow by the 15th of November, which is really not so far away now. Luckily I've also lined up a hefty list of people who have promised to come visit me, so they'd better not let me down!


In my Prague life, things are ticking on... Friday night we went out to gay night at Radost, a yummy vegetarian restaurant slash club. I sneaked (snuck?) in my own vodka as a cost-cutting measure (shush!) and justly endured the slings and arrows of my outrageous friends. It was fun, although both ladies and gentlemen were generally impervious to my charms. Yesterday Scotty, Sonja and I went shopping, where we outfitted Scotty for winter in Prague, since he came sadly under-equipped for the season (not what we expect from a native of Thunder Bay, Canada - his warm clothes are being shipped as we speak...) and then we headed back to Carolyn's for movie night Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure ha ha ha with Laurie, Greg, Gracie and Alasdair making up the rest of the gang. Today Scott, Sonja, Greg and I went to an exhibition that contrasted photos of Prague from the last 19th - early 20th century with photos of the same areas today. It was interesting seeing how much has changed, considering to the casual eye (minus the tourist tat), one would imagine that Prague's been preserved more-or-less intact through the ages: not so!

PS It has snowed a little the past few days, mostly while I've been tucked up in bed, and it hasn't been the sort of snow that's stuck, unfortunately, just a few wee snowflakes in the air. Well, I'll get plenty of snow soon enough.

The minutiae of life

Hello all, nothing interesting to report really.

The guy on the next computer is looking at porn in public - classy.

I have moved out of the hostel (yes!) and on to the floor of Greg & Laurie's new flat (bless them). The taxi driver yesterday flipped out when we tried to get him to drive a little further than the expected destination (Laurie told him the metro station and then was going to direct him from there) but since there was much yelling and swearing in Czech accompanied by 'Nerozumim! Nerozumim!' (I don't understand!) whenever we tried to say anything to him (his English wasn't brilliant, but up until that point, he'd managed...) we got out at a random point and had to drag my one insanely heavy suitcase and Laurie's two suitcases and five or so plastic bags the rest of the way.

I have to sleep on the floor now, but it's all good. Greg brought his mattress into Laurie's room as well last night, since he managed to freak himself out with the thought that he was going to die from inhaling poison gas in his room... Apparently there's a weird chemical odour in there, I don't know, I couldn't be bothered getting up to investigate it. In any case, he deserves to be a bit freaked out considering he came home while I was in the bathroom this morning and hid behind the kitchen counter and scared the living daylights out of me because I didn't know anyone had come home. He's constantly trying to surprise people with such tricks, and considering I screamed it's probably one of his most successful to date, dammit!

I managed to get the deposit back on the costume, due to the sewing/gaffer-taping skills of the indominatable (sp?) Alasdair. I took Carolyn's back as well, which of course he threw on the floor without so much as glancing at, before proceeding to open mine up and look at it, for some god-unknown reason (isn't it always the way, though), but our expert repair job passed muster, so I didn't have to throw the enormous sum of 1000 crowns (c. $70) down the drain.

Only other thing of note is that the weather has finally turned here. It's gone from being astonishingly mild (most nights, as I told mumsie, warm enough for just a t-shirt) with a couple of episodes of what I would term NZ-cold thrown in, to being properly cold. Not quite as bad as in Canada, where going outside felt like a slap in the face, but cold enough so that you feel the air you're breathing in is burning the back of your nose a little bit. According to www.weather.co.uk, it's currently 2 degrees (today's high!), but feels like -4 due to wind chill. Don't know about that, but it was certainly chilly last night, and there are snow showers forecast for this evening/night (low of really -4) and tomorrow, which I'm excited about. I'm excited about wearing coats and gloves and scarves and hats, and I know "this too shall pass" and probably rather quickly, but I'm going to enjoy being excited for the moment. Expect lots of photos if it does snow.

Cesky Krumlov etc. etc.

Sorry for random jumbled order of pics -

Scotty prepares to deliver the death-blow

A heavily-cropped Halloween shot - too much cleavage for the net!

Cesky K from above

This beautiful little gorge was right by the road - but we had to scramble across inhospitable terrain to even find it - nice work making us do it, Greg

The castle at night

The Gregster makes a new friend

Cesky K framed by an opening in the castle walls

Me and Laurie

Me and Sonj up at the castle

Looking down at the Vltava curving around Cesky K

The Cesky Krumlov goat - ah ha ha ha I love this photo sooo much - wish I took the original, but alas, it's a photo of a poster at the castle - but it is an authentic CK bridge the goat's on

A young couple in love high above Cesky K

I love the light in this picture - for some reason it really makes me think of a Brueghel painting,. this for example - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Brueghel_the_elder_-_winter_landscape_with_a_bird_trap.jpg

The Cesky Krumlov painted tower

My other squirrely friend

This way for Kafka

The man himself

Me as the Halloween wench and Al the sexy vampire. Yes, you're correct, we do have EXACTLY the same makeup on.

Woah, blusher overload! Ah fondled by the incredibly hot Brandon Flowers... I mean, Scotty. Doesn't he look pretty in his eyeliner? Pity he squirmed like a little baby girl while I was putting it on him! PS there's the rip in my costume which would only get worse in the course of the evening.

Priceless... I've got Scotty just where I want him, but he's straying (note location of hand). Al seems quite content in a Scotty/Carolyn sandwich there. Drunk, moi? Never!

Me & Carolyn were the only ones to really make an effort, the rest just went with crazy makeup. Sonj, Scotty, Carolyn & Al with his patented "it's Halloween, I'll run around with my mouth hanging open" look.


Don't worry, he's a fully qualified breast inspector, I checked his credentials... PS wait until you see my version of this photo - no matter what Scotty may tell you, he's intent on head-butting me boobs. I also love Al's shocked expression here.

At Cesky Krumlov. Ah, oh so pretty. Whose idea was it to bring Greg, though? Yes, this was the best available shot of the boy...

Some interesting chairs at CK



Open your heart to the leaves, my child

Couldn't you just see Sonj in a lovely leaf snow-globe?


Scotty following the principle, "if you love them, set them free"


My eyes! My precious eyes! Greg tries to fend off the rampaging leaves...



Hello all, someone other than my mum has noticed with 'alarm' (not really) the lack of blog entries in the last couple of days - most unusual, I admit. Have been super busy doing fun things, so here's the scoop:

Thursday - went to the Trades Fair Palace, which houses the National Gallery's collection of 19th and 20th century art - mostly Czech, although a lot of Picassos, from the boring analytical Cubist phase... Some interesting pieces, but definitely not the best gallery I've ever been to. Plus it's overwhelmingly massive - once I was in I fully understood why there was an option to pay for single floors rather than the whole deal. I did like that there's a Czech cubist painter called Kubista... I also walked 3 kms out of my way trying to find the place. Last time I try to navigate by following supermarket signs, grrr.

Friday - visited the big graveyard not far from where I live (PS, have been in the hostel, or 'hovel' as it's affectionally nicknamed, for a solid month, with a few brief interruptions!) and found Kafka's grave in the Jewish graveyard. The best part of it was that the sections and plots are numbered, so they actually gave you the coordinates of Kafka's grave ha ha. It was also really pretty, tons and tons of trees everywhere, and everything looks fab at the mo with the autumn colours and falling leaves. They also have these weird little cubbyholes where people put people's cremains. Some of them were all decorated - one even had a mini christmas tree in it (when's the last time that person's ashes were visited?). On Friday night we had to relocate to another hostel with Laurie's friend who's visiting from Berlin. Sigh... When I removed my suitcase from Carolyn's yesterday it was (I reflected) the sixth time that I had trundled it up or down the road from her place. Ah c'est la vie de la travelleure. Yeah, I made that last word up.

Saturday - up bright and early (7 am, yikes!) to catch the bus to Cesky Krumlov with Laurie, Christina (Laurie's friend), Scotty, Sonja and Greg. Sonja and Greg were late getting there and the bus almost left without them (Greg's fault, doubtless). The journey was as uneventful as you'd imagine - oh, until the bus rear-ended a car, of course. Although it was a minor prang, no injuries as far as I could see, we had to wait on the side of the road (with the bus actually blocking the lane and causing a giant traffic jam in this little blink-and-you-miss-it Czech town) until the cops came and investigated, including taking photographs and using one of those wheely measuring things to see how far the bus was from the side of the road, how near to the zebra crossing the crash occurred, and other arcane bits of useless information. After that, despite the bus being perfectly fine, I'm sure, we had to wait until another (and less comfortable bus, at that) arrived from parts unknown to carry us the rest of the way, an hour behind schedule.

Once in Cesky Krumlov, we went to the church, wandered up to the castle but didn't go inside (Czech 'castles', well, based on the one in Prague and now the one in C.K., consist of fortified palace complexes rather than single buildings, so you are able to go up and wander about without paying to go in anywhere) then went on a guided tour at night with a guide who was sweet but very nervous and answered most questions with "I don't know, I will find that out but now there's no time". We had a yummy dinner at a vegetarian place and then made a half-hearted attempt to party the night away before everyone came to the conclusion that bed was actually a much more attractive option at that stage.

The next day, Laurie and her friend went back to Prague early, to give Christina a chance to see some of the sights of Prague. The rest of us spent all day wandering about and generally behaving like 12 year olds (Greg's influence) - scrambling over fences and along river banks, exploring an abandoned shack up on the hill (made that much more frightening by the true-crime stories Scotty had regaled us with in bed the night before), having fights with piles of fallen leaves,and playing two-on-two soccer with a ball we found in the park (me and Sonja against the boys - and it ended in a draw, way to go!). Lots of fun! We decided to take the train back to Prague after our little bus adventure on the way to C.K., which was almost a disaster as well, since when we changed trains at Cesky Budejovice we knew we'd have to run to get seats, but it turned out the train blew right past where we were standing and stopped at the far end of the platform, so there actually weren't enough seats let alone the chance for us to sit together (people were actually sitting in the corridors). However, like the cunning bears we are, we nabbed a table in the dining car, and for the modest outlay of a pot of tea each (hot chocolate for me), enjoyed the ride in far more style and comfort than if we had actually managed seats in the main carriages. The train still managed to arrive back in Prague an hour late, but oh well - we had fun on the way, playing games and chatting etc.

Monday - went to my first ever Halloween party, outfitted as a wench (so yes, not very different from my usual wardrobe). It was fun, but what started at the beginning of a night as a small hole in the (insanely uncomfortable, plastic) bodice of the costume expanded through the evening into a large hole until eventually Grace took it upon herself to basically rip off the entire front of my outfit - thanks, love! Was meant to take it back today, but haven't quite managed to figure out a way to fix the thing. Will have to find needle and thread somewhere and practice my abysmal sewing skills, methinks!

Culture Clash

Differences between Kiwis and the less fortunate members of our global community:

• The rumours are true: North Americans really can't operate the sophisticated technology of a knife and fork simultaneously. I was happily eating away when Carolyn said "Oh my God, look at how she uses her knife and fork!" I was the star of the dinner table. Then she had a go and literally couldn't do it. Weird. I actually saw someone who shall remain nameless chase a piece of pasta to the edge of his plate and then use his finger to push it on to the fork. There's where a knife would really come in handy.
• Americans all seem to think that 'kiwi' is an insult, no matter how often I assure them it's not. The American guy from the hostel made a good point though - you wouldn't go around calling people 'Japs' or 'Frogs' or whatever, so they think 'kiwi' comes into the same category.
• None of my friends can understand the difference between my 'e' and my 'i' sound. We have endless conversations along the lines of: Me - "So I was talking to this Czech girl" Friend - "Wait, a chick girl?" Me - "No, Czech, Czech, like the country we're in..." They tease me a lot about my accent (they all have normal accents, dammit) but I think this is a situation where they literally can't hear the difference between the sounds. FYI, 'pokies' for 'slot machines' is also very amusing to Americans. And they don't say 'mince' or 'I can't be stuffed'. Learning things all the time.

In a culture clash of a different sort, I went to the Museum of Communism yesterday (at the suggestion of the brilliant Heather). The exhibits were okay, but my favourite bit was a short film they showed made up of archive footage. It was really moving to see Soviet tanks and massive demonstrations in Wenceslas Square, a place I know so well, but which is obviously so different from those days. There was footage of a crowd just standing there doing nothing, then all these riot police just started jogging towards them, and when they got there you could just hear the people start screaming straight away as they started beating them... It all seems a long time ago, but of course most people I see walking around on the streets would have experienced Communism to some extent... Obviously I knew that, but it makes you think a lot more about it being a reality.

A Night at the Opera

Saturday night we had a 'quiet' one in at the hostel with two American guys who were staying in our dorm, Barrett & Mike, who were pretty cool. In fact, Laurie, Barrett & I ended up going out at 6 am and coming home at 9.30 haha. We went to one of the infamous 'herna' bars, dodgy locales on every corner where, so it was rumoured, you could fulfil all your gambling, drug, and prostitute-related needs. Maybe we went to the wrong herna bar - we were the only ones in there and it was perfectly fine. The gambling part was true, though.

That night (Sunday) I went out to the opera - yes, the post title wasn't a sarcastic ode to my stop-out behaviour. Me, Jo, and Elishka got our cultural fix at a performance of Aida. It was pretty cool, the theatre was really nice. For pretty much all of the first half we had no clue what was happening: I picked up the occasional word from the Czech subtitles and Elishka speaks pretty good Czech, so in the mini-intervals between acts we tried to piece it together, with average results. In the proper interval we got a programme, which helped a lot. I liked the big choral numbers, some of the solo/duo songs were a little dull, but all in all, it was a good experience. There was even at least one song I'd definitely heard before - what a culture vulture!

Monday was another quiet day. Most stuff (museumy-wise) shuts down on Mondays in Prague. (Cesky Krumlov trip fell apart, btw, but this weekend for sure.) So I just went shopping, got some gloves and a scarf and chilled. At night, me, Laurie and Scotty made dinner and watched Grease (Scotty had never seen it before, gasp!) & Sonja, Greg, and Carolyn turned up later, which was cool.

Oh yeah, before we got the movie we went to this photocopy place so Laurie could photocopy some stuff for her lessons. It was so funny, when she went to pay she accidentally gave the woman the wrong change. The woman stood there saying '85' in Czech, and after a moment, Laurie sorted it out. But the woman just stood there with her hand out, and printed a receipt, pointing to the total, '85'. Laurie counted it again - definitely 85 - still the woman kept standing there. I counted it - 85. This random customer who was next in the line counted it - 50, 60, 80, 85. Finally the woman said 'It's fine' and put the money away. Ah, the bizarrities of the Czech Republic. Was it because we were English-speaking, because she was an ass, because she was trained up by the Communists to make everyone's life a series of small frustrations? We shall never know, but it was amusingly weird...