Czechoslovakia? More like Czech Republic and Slovakia

In this episode, Ryan…

-seeks out a 25 000 year-old naked Slovakian woman

-trips out to Prague’s Black Light Theatre

-canoes over dams in Southern Bohemia

Slovakia

My Lonely Planet tells me that Slovakia is famous for two things, hockey pucks and beautiful women. One look at the tall blonde Slavic waitresses, (in the classy black skirts and the red-sleeved tops…) in the Schokocafe where I’m writing this is enough to tell me that the latter is true, and I’m pretty sure, based on the jerseys I’ve seen in shop windows and posters on the wall, that come winter-time the puck drops and the population shouts “SLOVAK-ATTAK!” or some such cheer that actually sounds less like English and more like Slovakian (like on one poster it read SLOVENSKOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!), but I just wanted to say “the Slovak-attak” in reference to sporting ventures. Frankly, a nation obsessed with hockey is nothing new to me, though this one at least seems willing to celebrate if it gets the bronze, but it is different to see such hockey-fandom without the trappings of the NHL. And hell, and while I don’t get my citizenship revoked for saying this, maybe it would be nice to give little ol’ Slovakia a gold one of these times. C’mon, its not like they’re Russians or anything.

Ah Slovakia, the name itself sounds like something out of a vampire novel, an exotic locale that nobody actually goes to, but here I am, and what’s more there are other people here too, and what’s more, people actually live here, and we call them Slovakians. They call themselves… well, let’s just call them Slovakians. Yes, Slovaks do have their own language (as you might have guessed by that whole Slovensko thing), but all I can say is D’akujem (Thank you), Ahoj (sounds like “Ahoy!” like a pirate, means “hi”), and SLOVENSKOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! (which means Slovakia, I think, though they probably stamp an abbreviated version on your passport). Actually there’s another country in Europe called Slovenia, which is already only 2 different letters away from being Slovakia, so those two must get confused ALL the time.

Okay, history blitz. Slovakia, if you wondering just where the blazes I am, is the eastern half of the former Czechoslovakia. Basically, in ancient times (aka the 1990s) there was this thing called Communism, and it fell. As a result, parties starting appearing all over the place a bunch of countries in Eastern Europe declared their independence, so Slovakia took one look at Czech Republic, and said “Czechy, honey, we need to talk, I think we need some space from each other. I want to start seeing other diplomatic communities.” The Czech Republic was cool with having a more open relationship though, as long they remained friends or at least diplomatic trade partners. So after hiring expensive lawyers, they took a Velvet knife right down the center of the name Czechoslovakia, and the Czech Republic and Slovakia were born!… and like many open relationships promptly went their separate ways.

So yeah its in Eastern Europe, about an hour east of Vienna and just across what was once an iron curtain (no word on where the dismantled iron was sent, all the plethora of Windmill generators on the Austrian side seems to be a good bet). And I came here down the frick’n Danube River! People said you couldn’t take a boat from one land-locked country to another land-locked country, but I proved them wrong! Most of the trip was in Austria, but when we went through these 2 Lord-of-the-Rings style cliffs (okay maybe not that momentous) we had entered Slovakia and Bratislava lay before us.

Bratislava is almost as much fun to say as Slovakia, and was a city I had never heard of until about a month ago. It’s much smaller and quainter than Vienna, but it still has the feel of a capital, mainly because it is one (Capital of Slovakia). The old town, where I’m staying, is dominating by a large castle (Castle Bratislava) on one side and narrow cobblestone streets on the other (I’m beginning to sense a pavement pattern here). The streets are very picture-esque (apparently kings and queens have a habit of coming here to get coronated), and the patio-cafes are absolutely to die for. In fact, I’m typing this in one right now, while I sip a hot Schokolade that tastes like melted chocolate covered strawberries. MMmmm. Though I can’t say the same for the curdy Slovakian Sheep-milk cheese (Slovaks love their Sheep milk) or the wine-soaked Hungarian goose-liver on apples.

I will say Slovakia is noticeably different than Austria and Hungary (the Slavic influence is overwhelming here, Slovakian Easter eggs dominate the souvenir shops while traditional dance show pamphlets line the hostel wall—its like being at Dauphin, Manitoba’s National Ukrainian festival all over again), and you can definitely tell you’ve moved into a post-communist state. While old traditional buildings are the highlight of the town, there’s also a curious amount of communist era land marks (in particular, the cityscape on the other side of the Danube is concrete row after concrete row of block-based construction, the degree of uniformity of which makes North American beige subdivisions look like epitomes of individualism), and I especially liked the KGB bar where you could drink vodka with a doobie-smoking Vladimir Lenin and throw darts at Josef Stalin in between an American and Soviet flag. Lenin’s wooden statue also has an upside down cross engraved into his forehead inexplicably, making him look kind of badass.

Bratislava is also the home of likely the oldest man-made artifact I have seen in my life. The Moravian Venus, a 25 000 year old sculpture made of mammoth tusk can be found in Slovakian National Treasury in the heart of Bratislava Castle. (Just to give you a bit of perspective, history didn’t even officially begin until about 7 000 years ago). Basically this item (which was actually found in Slovakia, surprising since the countries so small) consists of a headless naked female body with rather exaggerated breasts that apparently served as some form of “fertility token” (think Stone Age Playboy Magazine or Cosmo). Regardless of what “purposes” it was originally intended for by its makers, it now it sits in a giant super-futuristic plastic pyramid (pretty damn cool in its own right) and is so small in comparison that I actually walked right by it a couple of times. Nevertheless, Slovakians consider this pre-historic plaything to be a national treasure, in fact their number one national treasure (with the possible exception of anyone on their hockey team who plays in the NHL), and you can even see it engraved on the backs of some of their coins (meaning Slovakians hold it in as high esteem as Canadians do caribou and loons). So next time you’re reading Cosmo, just remember, you could be inspiring future currencies.

That said, Slovakia I’m afraid I’m going to leave you now to pay a visit to your ex. While its been a number of years, I’m sure it’ll be good to see how ol’ Czechy’s doing. What he’s been keeping up to and all.

The Czech Republic

Like Hungary and Turkey, the Czech Republic is one of those countries that lends itself to a bountiful plethora of bad puns like “Czech it out!,” or “Czech into Prague” or “your traveller’s Czech just bounced.” In Canada, the country’s probably most famous (or infamous) for its skilled hockey players who often upset us at International competitions. It’s also that country that people often confuse with its earlier manifestation, with people saying “Isn’t that close to Czechoslovakia?” To which I answer, “Yes, very close.”

If you know any city in Czech Republic, I bet you 10 crowns its Prague. Called “Praha” by the locals, I remember hearing about this city back in the 1990s as this undiscovered gem of Eastern Europe. Of course back then, the wall had only fallen recently and Prague was just opening up to tourists, but anyone who visits the city now would hardly call it “undiscovered.” The city has literally become overrun with American, Canadian, Australian, British, German, and Korean tourists, making me feel somewhat sorry for the Czechs who fought so hard to regain control of their city from communism only to have the Soviet tanks replaced with drunk backpackers. Even the Museum of Communism is located behind a McDonalds and seems to cater towards the tourists with its advertisments filled with matryoshka dolls with fanged teeth or teddy bears carrying Krusknikov rifles and its English posters for purchase reading “You couldn’t get laundry detergent but you could get your brainwashed,” “Communism: Ice Cream for Everyone,” and “Come with us back to a time when America still stood for Freedom (Incidentally, Eastern Europeans tend to take a very negative view of these appropriations of Communist culture.” Nevertheless, as annoying as drunk backpackers are, they are a far cry from putting up with foreign military force—and at least Prague makes a tonne of kronola off its tourism industry.

The city itself is indeed very beautiful (The Czechoslovokian surrender to the Germans in the Second World War meant that the city was not subjected to the kind of mass bombing that leveled many other European capitals). The highlights for me (and for most) being the Charles Bridge (A wide pedestrian bridge built in the late Middle Ages or Renaissance period, with many elegant statues and arches) and the old Jewish quarter (Prague’s Jewish community, incidentally, was historically very large and indeed had its own mythological legends, such as the golem of Prague who was constructed out of clay by a rabbi to defend his people from the onslaught of anti-semites. It is supposedly being kept in the attic of the Old-New Synagogue, one of the city’s oldest, but the attic is not open to the public). There is also a clock in the town square that apparently serves as a giant cuckoo clock, with the 12 apostles marching out following by a drum beating skeleton. I never saw it though, as I went to the building twice on the hour and nothing came out. Apparently the creator of the building was blinded by his king, because the king didn’t want any other town to have such a masterpiece, so the creator cursed the clock in revenge. Apparently, his curse has worked.

While it was ridiculously touristy of me, I also checked out one of Prague’s black light theatres. Basically, black light theatre is what you would get if cirque du soleil smoked marijuana at a glow and bowl nite at the 10 pin lane. Basically black lights—which are actually more dark purple, cause light coloured clothing to appear to glow while dark coloured clothing basically disappears. It makes a fairly impressive display as actors can easily make objects appear to float in the air (Since there is no talking, the plays are more about spectacle than storyline). Since the original black light theatre was not performing while I was in Prague, I was told to check out a rip-off company that catered more towards Prague’s “International visitors.” Nevertheless, it was a fairly intriguing performance, based presumably along the lines of Alice in Wonderland, although it deviated greatly from Lewis Carroll’s original. For one, I don’t recall Alice ever going to Prague, encountering giant Rabbis, shaking hands with flying disembodied white gloves, or dancing topless and almost naked with an Apple ala Eve from the Bible (that last one was of particular surprise to the Chinese family sitting beside me). They also had a gentle magician type character that seemed to be leading Alice (who incidentally was played by a fully grown woman) through this madness, although he seemed to me to be a slightly Michael Jackson-esque Lewis Carroll (which probably wasn’t far off the historical truth).

At any rate, I did not spend my entire time in the Czech Republic (aka Czechland or Czechia or just Czech) in Prague, although I did meet my old Czech friend from Taiwan, Ivana. Together with her boyfriend and some her other Czech friends (and one German guy named Christian who spoke English and was given the duty of talking to me in it), we all went to an area in southern Bohemia (the western half of the Czech Republic is Bohemia) to go Canoe-ing on the Vltava river. The biggest town in this region is a picturesque little villa named Cĕsty Kumlov, but we only stopped there for meals. We even went one night to a small village called Rozemberk where we watched a walk around play about a ghost who lives in an old castle (the play took part in different rooms of the castle). The play was ostensibly meant to be spooky, and the actors all dressed in period costume, and the narrator especially had very chilling eyes, but I think it lost some if its chill factor for me being entirely in Czech language (I was constantly asking for translations from Ivana). Nevertheless, it was a fairly well done play, I think, and while we never saw any actual ghosts and this was the 100^th performance and so they gave us all wine and certificates which was alright by me.

This, however, was a camping trip, and each day we take down our tents canoe downstream. Ivana and her girlfriends really got into the act dressed up from head to toe like pirates (with makeup, plastic swords, and fake rats) as they cruised down the river (they were dressed like this all through the summer heat) and singing traditional Czech songs which often resembled Beatles songs with Czech lyrics. Considering our geographic location, I tried to get them to sing Bohemian Rhapsody, but there were no takers. The Czech men of course sported that quintessential article of European swimwear fashion—I am talking of course of the Speedo, which was barely covering many a man’s genitalia, regardless of his age, size, or degree of body hair.

As for the canoeing itself, the canoe route was very fast, and there were mainly cliffs, forests, and picturesque towns to canoe through. On the otherhand, the river was often very shallow (we were always hitting rocks), my canoe partner Christian had never actually canoed before, and the Czechs have this rather odd tradition of canoeing over dams, which they didn’t tell me about before hand. Granted the Czechs have built special chutes beside the dams which are slightly safer, theoretically, but they still go over these things with no helmets, rapidly moving water, and with little to no hope of avoiding the rocks at the bottom if they tip (in some cases, there’s even a wall at the bottom you can run into). Needless to say, it can be quite fun, although not when you do tip (as happened to us 4 times) and find yourself being thrashed about in rapid water against sharp rocks. That said, no pain no gain, and if you do manage to stay on the dry side of the surface its quite exhilarating. Also, its always nice to know you’ve successfully survived doing something that would be officially banned for safety concerns back home.