By Griffin Major
On the last day of the program, we took the morning train from Ostrava to Prague. We spent the afternoon seeing as much of the city as possible. Our hotel was near the center of the city, so we first passed the National Museum. It has many exhibits focusing on the Czech Republic’s biological, natural, and national history. In front of the National Museum is Wenceslas Square, featuring a spectacular statue of Saint Wenceslas. The square is of great historical importance because of the massive protests that took place there in 1989 as part of the Velvet Revolution, which was a non-violent demonstration against the Communist regime.

We walked to Old Town Square, which has the famous Astrological Clock, the old town hall, two beautiful churches, and a monument to Jan Hus. At the top of every hour people gather in the square to watch the clock chime. An old story goes that back in 1490, when the government contracted an artisan to construct the clock tower, they were worried he would replicate the work elsewhere. To prevent this, they decided to have a hitman blind him. I feel like they could’ve asked him nicely instead. It is unclear, however, that this is story is actually true.

Prague has a strong Jewish culture imprinted into its urban form with various synagogues and a famous cemetery close to the city center, because of the high population they had in the past. Very sadly, this population was deeply affected by the holocaust. We passed the oldest active synagogue in the world, which was built in 1270. Down the street was an above ground cemetery, and it had 10-20 foot high walls because they would fill the dirt over the bodies.
We then walked across the Charles Bridge, which connects to the other side of the river and was named after Charles IV, the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire. He made Prague his capital, and he founded Charles University, one of the oldest universities in Europe. From the bridge and the river, you can clearly see the Prague Castle at the top of the hill, which is now the seat of the Czech president. After we walked back across the bridge, we made our way through various neighborhoods to our last group dinner.
For dinner we went to a traditional Czech restaurant, where I had venison, cranberry sauce, potatoes, and a beer, which is a Czech staple. The dinner was bittersweet because it was the last night of a trip where we made new friends and great memories together as a big band of college kids adventuring across Europe and learning a great deal along the way. I wish I could go again and relive the best month of my life!
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