Prague, the best American city, and Dresden, the city that used to be as beautiful as Prague.

EDIT: pictures added after the fact, I am not going to bother fixing the text to make things sound right...and now I am out of time, so more photos will be added later.

Getting to Dresden
Ok, its been a while since I updated, so hopefully this will be a bit long. Since we left Darmstadt for Dresden, we have been enjoying some relaxation. We took trains all the way, which involved several transfers. We managed to either miss a stop, get on a wrong train, or something...and had to do an extra transfer somewhere to get back on track, delaying our arrival in Dresden about 30 minutes, to the dismay of Jeff and Jess who had come to the station to greet us with a sign. It was ok, since we were both enjoying the train ride to its fullest, me with a bottle of orange soda mixed with orange liqueur, Frank with his bottle of jagd bitter, a store brand jagermeister, and some cheap beer in plastic bottles. We met some interesting people on the trains, a pair of guys from Forchheim (where I have relatives I'm going to visit soon) on a weekend bike trip that showed us maps from radweit.de, which has really comprehensive bike maps of places in Germany. They told us of the wonderful smoked beers of the area in the near of Nuremberg, which I am looking forward to enjoying. There was also a group of women who were doing a 'girl's only trip' and were taking a train to make up for going the wrong way for most of the day, to the dismay of the hardcore biker of the group. We traded shots of jager and gummy candy for chocolates and an extra cheese sandwich they had. yum. All the bikers we meet on these trains seem to be fun people on interesting trips from all sorts of backgrounds, something that surprised me at first. I expected the majority of bikers to be younger people taking trips with friends. Frank had a not no friendly meeting with a young skinhead at a train station along the way, which is apparently uncommon, but not unheard of here in eastern Germany. I finished Brunelleschi's Dome, on the ride and now I want to visit Florence to see the marvel of engineering firsthand.

First look of Dresden
Getting off the train, we were a little unprepared, in the way it makes it a fun game to find where we needed to go. All we had was an address for Jeff's building, the international guest house that was a 10 minute walk from the Hauptbahnhof (train station just doesn't sound nearly as cool). Frank unsuccessfully talked to some cab drivers trying to get directions, but one of the people we had helped getting bikes on and off the trains was coming out and saw us saw me waiting there and asked if I knew where I was going, and after explaining everything, he said he knew exactly where the guest house was and offered to take us there. After a couple minutes of biking drunk, including Frank running into me, we arrived at the door of the guest house, to be greeted by Jeff and Jess, drinking on the rockgarden on the roof of the lobby. The guest house is a giant green tower, 17 stories of newly renovated socialist era apartments. It looms tall and bright, as a beacon for the international guests who get lost in the city and need to find their way home at night.
After getting things up in Jeff's room, we headed out to Neustadt (new city) where most of the pretty buildings are, a lot of them restored after the firebombing, which left most of Dresden as a big crater on the Elbe. While in Neustadt, we all got Doners (im too lazy to find the character, but the o is supposed to have 2 dots over it). Doners are wonderful food, made in shops that stay open late and are run by Turkish immigrants, and doners are very filling, and very cheap. Back to the city: Neustadt is separated from Aldstadt, the old city by the Elbe, and is crossed by several bridges,most of which are pretty, and add to the view. The area around the river has been reconstructed a lot, and so sitting on the bank of the Elbe, which is oddly just a large overgrown field that kids sit in groups and drink in, you get an idea what the city looked like pre-firebombing. (I really should upload some pictures...).

Other Things We've Done
In no particular order, but I will try to keep it chronological. The second day in Dresden, Jeff took us on a bike tour of the city, showing us some of the original buildings that survived, some buildings built in the GDR era, and the Zwinger, which is a castle-like building that has a nice big courtyard with green areas, fountains, and a relaxing atmosphere. We decided to take a 20km ride down to the next city down the Elbe, Pirna. The ride was good, there is a nice bike/pedestrian path that follows the river on one side and has big fields on the other side, with the occasional beirgarten or restaurant. My knee and hand did ok most of the trip, and are feeling much better now after several days of staying off the road. We got Doners in Pirna and relaxed by the Elbe for a while before heading back to pick up Alex (Jeff's big brother) from the Hauptbahnhof, since he was spending a few days here in Dresden before going back to visit Prague, where he lived for a while last year. That night we all went down to Neustadt for Indian food with Jess and Emily.
The next day began with Frank, Alex, and me going to the Mensa for Lunch with Jeff and friends. The Mensa is the cafeteria for the universities here. There are several Universities here, and several Mensas to go with them. However they are run separately to some extent, and you can go to any of the Mensas you want. They have several menu options, as any school cafeteria should. There is a menu outside the entrance, but all it really is good for is the pictures, since the writing is in German. The Alte Mensa is the closest one to the building where Jeff works, so that is the one we have gone to most frequently. To get the student price for our meal, we first tried the confusing group all paying together, which worked for the first few trips. Since then we have resorted to a slightly smoother approach of checking out one at a time and doing a handoff of the keychain (which has the RFID tag for Jeff's account on it). The other Mensa we went to one day was arranged in a very odd setup, with all the menu options on screens at the base of staircases, and you had to pick based on the picture, then go up the associated staircase to get in the right line. This makes for a whole pile of staircases and an overall feeling of poor use of space to me. The lunches you get are fairly diverse, ranging from the standard and safe pizza (watch out for weird toppings!) or one of our favorites, the as much pasta/sauce/toppings as you can fit on your plate for a low 1.80 euro or something, to some completely unidentifiable stuff, like the plate of random things with sour cream in the middle I had today. Usually the food is pretty good, I would say slightly better then I'm used to for cafeteria food.
Back to what's been happening. The three of us went wandering around Dresden, seeing some of the more industrial side of the city. Stopped by the Netto (cheap local grocery store) to pick up some beers and wine for the night to come. The plan was to have some drinks and then go out and get ice cream when Emily came over. After the wine and hanging out on the rock garden for a while (followed by the elevator lobby after it started raining), the only people to go to the ice cream shop was me, Jeff, Emily, and our new friend Tom, an older man who happened to live in the same building who had joined us for some beer and such in the lobby. The rest of the group was left here, to eventually wander around to buildings under construction to have fun and then get doners. The ice cream with Tom group did just that, and got back and went to sleep on the kitchen floor, thanks to the 3 other people (Alex, Frank, and Debbie, Alex's friend from Prague visiting Dresden) filling up the room already.
The next day began as so many have. Sleeping in, meeting Jeff at the Mensa for some lunch, meeting some more friends at lunch, along with Terri, who we had met at a previous Mensa lunch. After lunch, more wandering around the city, which eventually led us to the shopping mall off of Pragerstrasse. More beer drinking and Doners for dinner. A relaxing night overall.
The next morning, Alex headed off to Prague, where we will meet him soon. For Frank and I met the gang for Mensa lunch again, came back and took a nap (rough life, I know). Another night of drinking, in the company of friends. We also went to the Aquarium at some point, which just meant beer was expensive. Another fun night, concluded with a dance party in Jeff's room, youtube will have the video soon.
Another morning, more sleeping in and then lunch at the Mensa, meeting another of Jeff's friends, Ray. The afternoon was packed with activities like finding an ATM and buying train tickets to Prague, then booking our hostel online. An otherwise relaxing afternoon, I spent some time helping Jess get in her room and straightening her key. Doners for Dinner on the way to the train station, mmm. A nice train ride, made more amusing with some drinks.

Prague
Ah, the best American city, in the words of Alex. We arrived at 9 or 10 pm in the middle of the city, with a map printed with hard to read street names, and then we realized we weren't quite on the map. Oh, and none of us speak any Czech at all. No worries, this is when things are fun. We managed to get to the hostel without much trouble, got checked in and found we had gotten a bit of an upgrade on the room, no 12 bed dorm, but instead a 4 bed room, with no one ever getting put in the 4th bed. We were off to meet Alex after getting our stuff settled, he was our nightlife tour guide since he had lived in Prague for a while a year ago. The first night, we were off to a club called Nebe, which happened to be a street over from our hostel. It was in the basement of the building, and had a good number of people dancing, and ok beer prices, for a bar/club. A good night of dancing and drinking was had by all. Pizza at a Turkish/Balkan Doner/Pizza shop up the street, which hit the spot.
The hostel (Chili Hostel, if you care) we were at served free breakfast, consisting of bread (rolls and sliced), along with various toppings - butter, jams, some weird meat spread, and best of all, spreadable cheese. Roughly the consistency of cream cheese, it came in several flavors, of which i have no idea what they were. To drink, there was the option of coffee, tea, orange juice (not like OJ at home, slightly tangier), and lemonade. yum. The rest of the day was spent buying books at the Globe bookstore across the street, then wandering to a park on an island to read and write in journals, etc. More wandering around the city followed, with much admiration of the beautiful architecture that is everywhere in the city, since it has never been involved in a serious conflict that didn't end somewhat peacefully. There are pictures to be added here. After wandering, we met up with Alex for dinner at a Czech restaurant, where Frank managed to talk his way out of paying some of the couvert charge for condiments. We then headed to Club Bordo for an Indie Czech concert featuring Road Side Mary and The Prostitutes. Interestingly, all the music is in English (the Prostitutes even had British accents), but all the talk between songs was in Czech. There was a DJ/dance party after the show, I was very tired by the end of it all.
Another bread and spreadable cheese breakfast at the hostel the next morning (
Saturday morning, if you are keeping track). Another day of wandering the city, I think this was the day we climbed a big hill on the west side of the river, got a glimpse of just how big Prague actually is. There are paths leading up the side of the hill, and a flower garden and some fields on top, along with a tourist area which includes the viewing tower and the Funicular railway, that simply runs up the side of the hill at a great incline. We were supposed to meet Alex for dinner at Bohemia Bagel, but we ended up at 2 different locations - He meant the original, THE Bohemia Bagel. Our hostel desk pointed us to a different one, and we never met. Dinner was delicious anyway, for those of you from Jacksonville area, it was very similar to Bagelmeister. For the rest of you, it was an American bagel shop where you could get all kinds of bagels with cheese, meat, egg, etc. They even had American sounding menu sections like "from the grill". We met up with Alex at his hostel after this, and we rushed off to catch some trams, a few rides on the underground, and walk around a while to find Blindeye, described as a grungy ex-pat bar in some review. Getting there, it seemed somewhat empty (it was past 10 pm at this point), so we all got drinks and talked to people at the bar. There was a large man, we found out his name is "Big Rock", and he is a band manager, cleaning up hotel rooms, making sure they get where they need to be on time, getting drugs for them, solving any problems they have. I can't recall any of the band names he dropped, but there were quite a few we recognized in the list. He also talked about his girlfriend, who is "displaced Czech royalty" with 4 castles that her family owns, one of which is hers. Yea... As the night goes on, so do the stories, and then someone noticed there was a plaque on the bar that states:
BIG ROCK
is bigger then you,
and this is his seat.
I guess he did do something, even if it is simply being a very good regular customer. However, every attractive female who entered the bar the rest of the night made her way over to BR and gave him a hug and peck on the cheek. Make your own decisions. Anyway, we ended up staying out till 4 or 5 am, without anyone realizing it, which was odd. We let the hostel desk know we were going to stay another day, so we wouldn't have to get out by 10 am the next morning. He forgot to mention this to the cleaning staff though, which led to a funny language barrier situation when they came in to clean, and all 3 of us were still asleep. They didn't speak English well, we sure didn't have any idea what they were saying in Czech, so we all did the awkward we aren't going and we can't talk to you thing for a few minutes till they laughed and left. The rest of the day was spent wandering around some more, along with some more napping. The night was spent at Chateau Rouge and M1, two bars that were not particularly exciting, perhaps it was just an off night.

Back to Dresden
Our last bread and spreadable cheese breakfast! Then wandering off to the store to get some wine for the train ride back to Dresden. An uneventful ride, except maybe my adventure trying to open my wine bottle without a corkscrew (I later realized I did have my knife with a corkscrew in the bottom of my bag...) The cork was synthetic, which doesn't compress like real ones. After a few minutes of struggling (and making some progress) with my bike tool, the man in the next seat over offers his wine bottle opener after the ticket checker goes by, and we manage to solve the problem. When we got back to Dresden, we immediately went for Doners, even before we went home. The guys at this shop are great, they recognize us coming in now and seem to really enjoy the fact we are loud Americans speaking English instead of German. Anyway, the rest of the day was spent hanging out with people and enjoying ourselves.
Tuesday, after another MMMMensa lunch, Alex came back from Prague, and we all went out to Katie's Garage in Neustadt for some good dancing and stuff. On the way there, we stopped at a chinese place for dinner, and Frank and I dipped out for a few minutes to get a doner before coming back to finish our dinner at the chinese place. yum. Katie's Garage played lots of good music, including Forward, Russia! that Jeff likes and a few I enjoy like Radiohead and the Dresden Dolls. We talked to some of the locals there and made some German friends to hang out with later.
Wednesday was the 4th of July, aka America Day. We celebrated by eating hot dogs while drinking some beer, and singing patriotic songs and such. We went out for ice cream with Tom...err...I mean Stephen, and Emily. On the tram ride home, we had a German offer to sing with us and another wish us a happy July 4th.
Thursday - a lot of nothing. Mensa for lunch, Frank was busy making preparations for his next leg of the trip (we are splitting up for a while so he can see some things that are of interest to him while I visit some relatives in Forchheim, Germany). I had a bit of a headache so I avoided drinking, but we all went out for donerteller mit pommes (basically a doner, but on a plate of fries instead of in a piece of bread).
Back home, we didn't do much else, an early and uneventful night.
Today! Finally. I'm feeling better. Frank got off for his 10 am train to Krakow, Poland(?). I spent a bit of time finishing this entry (I know I've waited too long to do this). Lunch at the Mensa with Jeff (the last one!) and soon I'm off to buy my "happy weekend pass" from the Hauptbahnhof. This pass is pretty cool. It is pretty cheap (33 euros) and it's good for up to 5 people for all regional trains all day. This means that Jeff and Jess will probably ride with me to Forchheim tomorrow, then spend the rest of the day training around till they get back to Dresden. In the end, it will cost the same if I had gone alone. Well, I want to get to the HBF and back before Jeff gets home from work, so I will leave you now. If I am bored and motivated later, I might try to add the pictures that should go with this post. Bandwidth limits are keeping me from putting all the pictures up.

May the Force be with you.