McMorran in Singapore: Prague, Prag, Praha (you get the idea)

I haven't been to Prague since 1993. 19 years is a long time between visits for any place, but the Velvet Revolution, in which Czechoslovakia became democratic (breaking from the Socialist sphere of Soviet influence), had only occurred in 1989, and the Czech Republic (where Prague rests) had just split with Slovakia in January of 1993. A lot has changed, but the city is still beautiful, at least to me. The front desk staff at our hotel didn't see it that way.

On our way out the door one morning we noticed a light drizzle and the darkness that hinted at a long dreary day. We stopped at the front desk to ask T for some assistance.

"This may be a long shot, but do you happen to loan umbrellas?"

"Yes, we do." His voice rose at the end with a cadence that indicated English was not his first language, but that we was comfortable enough to joke in it.

He pulled two umbrellas from behind the desk and slowly opened them to test how well they were working. The first worked well. He closed it and handed it to me.

"Where are you from, T?", I asked, curious to know where his brand of English originated.

"Czech Republic," he answered, as he inspected the second umbrella. "I am from here in the Czech Republic."

The umbrella was slightly broken. He peered deep into the heart of it, sizing up its faults. "Dirty, disgusting and old."

I almost felt sorry for the device that surely had kept many people dry during its life, but which had seen better days.

"What, the umbrella?" I asked.

"No, Prague, the Czech Republic. My country is dirty, disgusting and old."

In a certain light Prague is certainly all of that. However, for many tourists, the dirt represents the centuries of dust that gives this place its charm. The dirt adds authenticity. It hints at dark times under the Nazis and Soviets, and it undermines any claims of Prague as a theme park, cleaned up just for tourist enjoyment. Disgusting? Is he referring to the seamy underbelly that one imagines to be all around? The “casinos” that operate 24 hours a day behind heavy doors and blacked-out glass? The overwhelming presence of groups of men from what appears to be Russia, Poland or the Baltic regions?

Old – no one can deny that Prague is old. But, again, this is what draws so many from around the world. Prague may have been on the adventurous backpacker’s itinerary twenty years ago. Now it is filled with groups of high school and middle school groups from around Europe. Groups of adults of all ages follow guides holding flags and colorful umbrellas, speaking dozens of languages – German, Polish, French, Italian, Spanish, Chinese, and English of the U.S. and U.K. varieties. Strangely missing were the Japanese tour groups that were so common and so frequently discussed in tourism literature from the 1980s onward. The Japanese are in Prague, but they tend to be traveling in pairs or alone. Could the Japanese be the new post-group tourists?

For T, a worldly, humorous, man in his mid-20s, I suppose his country’s age holds little attraction. For a country with so many artists and thinkers who have been globally important and innovative, there is a fine line between clinging to the past and celebrating it.

Being from elsewhere, we celebrated the "dirty, disgusting and old" streets for three days. At times we struggled to squeeze past the masses of tourists just like us, but overall we loved the long days (sunrise at 5:00am, sunset at around 9:15pm) and the old buildings, many of them with architectural embellishments not commonly seen in most places - statuary seemingly holding up balconies, brightly-colored facades, paintings of designs and figures on a massive scale. It was a wonderful time of the year to be in a beautiful city.