How long will the web last?
Monday, 12. May 2008, 06:46:33
At least until tonight when we, if in Prague, will find out. Opera's Håkon Wium Lie (nice interview), will count down to its doom.
Posts tagged with "Praha"
Ooh, shiny, shiny
Sunday, 11. May 2008, 12:45:19
This Thursday May 8, was a local holiday, the liberation day for the end of World War II. Liberation day used to be the 9th of May, but perspectives change. It also led me out into the Prague suburbs as the latest, and last for a while, extension of the Prague Metro was opening. In the 18 years since I first visited Prague, the metro system has doubled in length, with 19 new stations (Oslo in the same period added 3 new stations). It is a fairly young system, it opened in 1974, and is efficient, convenient and pleasant to use.
While I am an early adopter in the sense that I quickly visited the new stations, I actually never have bothered to be there at the opening (not the official opening, but when it opened its service for the public a couple hours later). With the next station opening in 2013 at earliest I took the trip to the suburbs where the three new stations, Střížkov-Prosek-Letňany, were located, or at least two of them. The terminus, Letňany, is placed in the middle of an empty field. There's an small planes airport nearby and it is just between two large suburbs (Letňany and Kbely). Supposedly the location could come handy if Prague won its 2016 Olympic bid, which is not going to happen. The station is integrated with a nice new bus terminal, as well as a new Park and Ride, so the communications in this part of town still have improved. 
What's more the station itself is pretty in blue-tinted glass and highly reflective chrome (at least for now). The most noticeable station of the three is still Střížkov. This dome looks like how the future could be imagined in the 1930s, or progressive architecture concepts from the 1970s. Open, light, and practical. Absent at the opening was commerce, no shops and no pubs or bistros. I can only assume that they will come later, one picture series indicates we can at least expect a hair dresser soon.More pictures can be found in my album. Skyscrapercity has a relevant thread, and then there is the metro site if you can read Czech or just like to look at the pictures.
A Prague Opera
Saturday, 2. February 2008, 14:27:44
And so it begins... On the circuitous route from the outskirts of Europe to the centre, going from Oslo through Linköping and Wrocław, Opera has finally reached Prague.
Forgotten
Thursday, 4. January 2007, 15:55:28
In Michle, between the proper urban architecture and the high-rise suburbs of South City, there is an area obviously created with a ruler&compass and city planning with an explicit lack of imagination. The streets have names like South-West IV, Lateral II, and North VII. But in between all these evidently planned streets on the map I saw this tiny stub of a street called Zapomenutá (Forgotten).Of course I had to go there. While in walking distance I aborted my first attempt in the summer. The road had no shade and while I was wearing a hat it was too unpleasant to get here under the sun. Now mid-winter it is much easier (though the picture is correspondingly dark, unfortunately, the day is too short).
An advantage of the unsurprising city plan was that I could guess where the pub would be. Admittedly I was off by 15m, but it was still good enough, and this is written from the Holy Hell pub (so named due to the nearby church?) during a fairly decent meal.
Revolutions past
Friday, 17. November 2006, 21:48:04
17 years ago, in a Friday November 17 far far away, the seminal event for the soon-to-become Velvet Revolution happened. The event itself, a sanctioned student demonstration ostensibly celebrating a martyr against the Nazi invasion 50 years earlier, mattered less than its aftermath: a fairly brutal police repression, augmented by a staged death by a secret police agent.
To my then jaded eyes, the depth of moral outrage among Czechoslovak citizen about this seeming police murder was endearing. This was shortly after Tiananmen Square (making everyone aware what was at stake), and even in Western Europe death by demonstration was not unheard of, or indeed 20 years earlier they had the self-immolation of Jan Palach and the 70-some killed in the 1968 Soviet invasion.
For me November 17 is connected with a fairly subdued plaque at the spot where the demonstration was stopped by the police. I don't remember when it was made, I think it was some time in 1990, probably at the anniversary. I do remember that in 1990 everyone would go out of their way to show you that spot, even if you had passed by a dozen times before. In the beginning were the revolutionary posters I mostly couldn't read at the time, then the candles, and finally the official plaque which was more or less the end.
The revolution itself officially lasted 11 days, including a theatre strike and a demonstration with an estimated half a million participants, which for a city of 1.2 million and a country of 15 million was an unmistakable signal the gig was up. The post-revolutionary euphoria lasted less than a year, it was commemorated a year or two more, and then the collective amnesia set in. Thereafter it was as it never had happened, it was never talked about. If I reminded anyone about it they were invariably embarrassed, a youthful and Un-Czech (the country had split by then) indiscretion they were aware of but rather would not remember.
As time went by a generation came to be that genuinely didn't remember it, because they never had experienced it (possibly apart from some weird and fragmented childhood memory), or the preceeding communist regime. That too embarrassed and secretly annoyed the slightly older generation. Until just recently when it became a subject again. Some of it was political, the high rating of the barely reformed communist party, as about the only protest party against the less than inspiring crowd of Czech politicians, did frighten the establishment and the anti-establishment alike. And youthful indiscretions are less embarrassing when you're not as youthful anymore. So nowadays it is a school subject, and if a revival is too strong a word (no expected theatre strikes) it is a reminder.
So today I decided to visit that old plaque. It is on one of the main streets, so it isn't as if I haven't passed by it countless times already, but I too haven't visited it for 15 years or so. It was much as expected, some strangely inappropriate posters and candles in massive appearance, to be taken pictures of by everyone in the audience with our camera phones. Having done that we all moved along.
1812
Sunday, 30. July 2006, 09:21:13
Prague is uncomfortably hot in July and August, making its inhabitants looking for a way out in those months. I had finished a trip to Silesia in the northeastern part of the country ending up in in the castle at Hradec nad Moravicí.
When it was time to return home I was running late, and looked up which connections I was to take, found a bus would leave at 18:12, which I just should be able to make. There was a map of the village and surroundings I took a photo of and started my forced march towards the bus stop, largely through a forest trail. Sure I could use a map service, a few sort of work with Opera Mini, but the response time and the zooming works a lot better with a picture. 18:10 I got to the bus stop and then I realised I didn't know in which direction the bus was supposed to be going and I had forgotten where the bus was going to. I had done my search on my laptop, not my phone, and there was no chance it could start up from hibernation in two minutes or anything close. All I knew was the departure time, which made for curious conversations with the driver.
— Is this bus supposed to leave at 18:12?
— No, I am running a little late, I'm supposed to leave at 18:05
— Thank you, then I'm not interested
Running across the street to catch the next bus in the opposite direction, I got second in line after a woman and her friend, and overheard her conversation with the driver:
— Is this the 18:12 to Přerov, there's not another bus going there?
— Yes, it is. I'm just a little ahead of schedule
— All right, then. I'll have a ticket
My turn. Having just finished T9ing "Hradec nad Moravici" and "Praha" I still didn't know what stop I was supposed to get off the bus at. Together with the lady and the driver we came to the most likely one. She too was going to Prague, and had looked up the route on the Web. I realised I had turned into an Internet package that was blindly following a route some server had determined traffic from Hradec nad Moravicí to Prague should use. Like that package I knew my final destination, but had no idea how to get there, being dependent on good routers on the way.
Or getting my laptop and phone to respond, so after some minutes I knew that I was on the right bus travelling in the right direction (most travellers to Prague would return in the opposite direction, the one I was coming from), and that I was going off a little earlier at the stop U Žida in Bělotín. That was close to the railway station where a local train would allow me to intercept an international train going to Prague. The 19 minutes interval were ample time to handle the couple minutes bus delay get to the station, realise the ticket sale was closed, return to the motorest U Žida, get a refreshing
, go back and cross the rails to the right platform, get berated by the loudspeakers from the unmanned station for not using the designated and safer underpass, and snap a few pictures. On the train I bought a ticket to Prague and was told that the main train was arriving only a few minutes after this train, which the IDOS site told me was correct, but as it was leaving many minutes later there was no rush anyway.
In the competition laptop vs phone it was a draw. Neither really measured up. Both got me to Prague in time, using a route no humans would have figured out, but neither provided me with the information I needed when I needed it. If the IDOS site had been a little more phone friendly the phone would definitely have won, but I still would have to type fairly long texts which the phone is unsuited for. Combined with geographical positioning I could have gone from "here" to "home" instead. The site tells about known delays for trains (only), but apart from actively monitoring that particular train I wouldn't know if the delay would cause me to miss a train nor would I be given a different route from there if it did. Such updates would favour phones.
When it was time to return home I was running late, and looked up which connections I was to take, found a bus would leave at 18:12, which I just should be able to make. There was a map of the village and surroundings I took a photo of and started my forced march towards the bus stop, largely through a forest trail. Sure I could use a map service, a few sort of work with Opera Mini, but the response time and the zooming works a lot better with a picture. 18:10 I got to the bus stop and then I realised I didn't know in which direction the bus was supposed to be going and I had forgotten where the bus was going to. I had done my search on my laptop, not my phone, and there was no chance it could start up from hibernation in two minutes or anything close. All I knew was the departure time, which made for curious conversations with the driver.
— Is this bus supposed to leave at 18:12?
— No, I am running a little late, I'm supposed to leave at 18:05
— Thank you, then I'm not interested
Running across the street to catch the next bus in the opposite direction, I got second in line after a woman and her friend, and overheard her conversation with the driver:
— Is this the 18:12 to Přerov, there's not another bus going there?
— Yes, it is. I'm just a little ahead of schedule
— All right, then. I'll have a ticket
My turn. Having just finished T9ing "Hradec nad Moravici" and "Praha" I still didn't know what stop I was supposed to get off the bus at. Together with the lady and the driver we came to the most likely one. She too was going to Prague, and had looked up the route on the Web. I realised I had turned into an Internet package that was blindly following a route some server had determined traffic from Hradec nad Moravicí to Prague should use. Like that package I knew my final destination, but had no idea how to get there, being dependent on good routers on the way.
Or getting my laptop and phone to respond, so after some minutes I knew that I was on the right bus travelling in the right direction (most travellers to Prague would return in the opposite direction, the one I was coming from), and that I was going off a little earlier at the stop U Žida in Bělotín. That was close to the railway station where a local train would allow me to intercept an international train going to Prague. The 19 minutes interval were ample time to handle the couple minutes bus delay get to the station, realise the ticket sale was closed, return to the motorest U Žida, get a refreshing
, go back and cross the rails to the right platform, get berated by the loudspeakers from the unmanned station for not using the designated and safer underpass, and snap a few pictures. On the train I bought a ticket to Prague and was told that the main train was arriving only a few minutes after this train, which the IDOS site told me was correct, but as it was leaving many minutes later there was no rush anyway.In the competition laptop vs phone it was a draw. Neither really measured up. Both got me to Prague in time, using a route no humans would have figured out, but neither provided me with the information I needed when I needed it. If the IDOS site had been a little more phone friendly the phone would definitely have won, but I still would have to type fairly long texts which the phone is unsuited for. Combined with geographical positioning I could have gone from "here" to "home" instead. The site tells about known delays for trains (only), but apart from actively monitoring that particular train I wouldn't know if the delay would cause me to miss a train nor would I be given a different route from there if it did. Such updates would favour phones.
Prague Guide for Norwegians
Tuesday, 4. April 2006, 11:57:33
- Note
- To change from Czech Crowns (CZK, koruna, Kč) into Norwegian Crowns (NOK, kroner, kr), use the Currency Converter.
- Airlines
- Norwegian, ČSA, SAS, and sometimes Sterling have direct flights to Prague from Oslo (Norwegian also has it from Bergen and Trondheim). I like ČSA, but they rarely come with good offers, so Norwegian is the airline I most commonly use and can recommend.
- Preparation
- Bring a passport, a mobile phone with charger, some plastic for the ATM, non-smelly clothes, and toiletries. If you have time and inclination read about Prague and the Czech Republic beforehand. Go for the stuff you won't discover on your own the first five minutes you get there (e.g. look for history, culture, architecture, current affairs). The Czech Republic uses all the normal standards for electicity, phone networks, etc. You can expect things just to work. Don't bring stuff, you don't need it. Unless you go to Prague in the winter where warm clothing is recommended. That way you don't have to check in any luggage either and don't have to wait for your luggage to come through. Check with Trafikanten for travel options to Gardermoen.
- Ruzyně Airport
- You will arrive at the Schengen part of the airport, this is the newest part of the airport (it opened in January), it is still pretty dull and by Czech standards exorbitantly expensive. When you get to the public part of the airport, head for the "Metro" booth and buy some tickets. You want a handful of the 20 CZK ones (more than enough opportunities to buy some later, then you can consider buying a multi-day pass or supplementary 14 CZK tickets).
- Money matters
- If you don't have Czech crowns go to the ATM first and get yourself some. It will ask you for innocuously sounding amounts like 4000 CZK. Don't listen to it! It is optimised for giving the minimal number of bills. You will get two 2000 CZK bills and spend needless time changing into something more comfortable. Ask for 3800 CZK instead. You will still get a 2000 Crown bill to split later, but the remaining 1800 Crowns are money ready to use.
- Leaving the airport
- It took some time to decide how the transport to the airport should go, not that there were much money for it anyway. There will go trains to the airport towards the neighbouring town and the green metro line A will be extended to the airport. You just have to wait at a decade for the train to arrive and somewhat longer for the metro. We'll see if there will be Schönefeld style walking to the stations when they arrive.
- If you can't wait that long
- With tickets in hand you go out the main door out front to the bus stops and start looking for 119. It is some 50 meters to the right on the next aisle. In some scenarios you might want to take another bus like the express bus to Holešovice, but then you figure it out on your own. Just sit on the 119 until the last station, and go down the stairways with a green M in front of you, your ticket is still valid (it lasts for 60 or 90 minutes). I assume you are going to a place like Flora further down the green line, but in some cases you would transfer to another line. The colour-coded charts are easy to understand. If you need to switch to the yellow line, do so at Můstek, to the red line at Muzeum.
- Hotel
- I have generally stayed in the Žižkov district. My hotel of choice has been Prokopka, but can also recommend the bed&no breakfast U Hejtmana, Hotel Kafka (with neighbouring Bílý Lev as overflow), and the hostel Pension 15. For the complete backpacker experience you could try The Clown&Bard. The latter two are closer to Jiřího z Poděbrad, for the others you can pick Flora, taking two stops on the 5 tram if you are feeling lazy (ticket still good).
- Annoyances
- The city hasn't fully reined in the taxi drivers, though they used to be even worse. Generally fixed rates at the airport at around 800 Crowns. Minibuses are at 400-500 Crowns, but you might get an opportunity deal if you pass by when they are leaving with empty seats. There are pickpockets at some places like in certain trams. If you expose your valuables at these places there is a non-neglible risk of not having them anymore. The ATM programmers.
- Getting online
- The Czech Trafikanten is vlak-bus.cz, you can find maps over Prague at mapy.cz. There are many free wireless nodes in Prague. The Prague 5 district has city-sponsored ones. If you are staying for longer you might consider getting a Czech SIM. For unlimited GPRS for non-residents Eurotel Go is currently the best option.
- Prague Underground
In the center you will never be far from a metro line, it is the fastest way to get around, and it is very good method to avoid getting lost. Learn the name of your metro station (and the colour of the line). When in another metro station of the same colour look for the station name on the signs overhanging the platform, go to the (left/right) side where your station is relative to the one you are in. If the metro is of a different colour look for the crossing line of your colour. The train interval range from a couple minutes during day, to about ten minutes in the evening. The clock tells how long ago the last train left. You can get a minute early warning by the draft of the train, so if you are on the stairs down you can catch the train.- Prague above board
- There is a slower, but much more extensive and tourism-friendly network of trams. The schedule show when the next tram leaves as well as how many minutes it takes to get there. Stops by metro stations are marked with an M and all trams pass at least a few. So if lost jump on a tram for a metro station, and then use the method above to get home fast. The arrows at the top of the signpost tells if the tram is turning off left or right, this is useful for opportunistic tram hopping (you want to go somewhere but don't want to wait for your tram number).There are also buses for the outer parts of the city, but apart from the airport you are not likely to take one of them. By midnight the metro and the regular routes shut down and the system of night trams and buses take over. They are recognizable on the signpost for the dark blue colour and for having numbers starting with "5". It can be handy to note the number(s) of your local night trams. The same tickets are used for night trams, there is no late night gouging.
- Language, the missing part
- Czech is easy, it is spoken the way it is written. It is the way it is written that will give you headaches. This is a vowels-optional language, the letters R and L can substitute for vowels. The vowels you do find are pronounced like in German or most other European languages. There really are only AEIOU, as long as you always pronounce the last two as ÅO you should be fine. Y is always pronounced I. The Czechs are not aware of the existence of other vowels. Single vowels are rare enough, there are not many diphtongs. Pronounce them as written, not vowel-shifted like a Norwegian. "autobus" is pronounced "aotåboss", not "æutobuss". Long vowels are marked with an accent (áéíóú), for perversity ú is in most cases written ů. If a vowel isn't marked as long, it is always short. "pes" (dog) is pronounced "pess", not "pes".
- Language, the consonants
- C is always pronounced "ts", the word "konec" (the end) is pronounced "kånnets". CH is a frontal mouth-clearing sound quite like Swedish skär, less close to the more guttural sound in Scottish loch. It is not the same sound as German CH. The haček accent (čďňřšťž) denotes a soft version of the consonant, in Norwegian that would be done by sticking a "j" after it, e.g. český is pronounced tsjesski. Ě denotes that the consonant in front is soft. There is an implicit haček for the letters DNT in front of I, dík (thanks) is pronounced djik, while dýk (several daggers) is pronounced dik. Z (Ž) is voiced S (Š). Unlike in English that distinction matters. At the end of the word or in front of unvoiced consonants voiced vowels become unvoiced, while unvoiced consonants in front of voiced become voiced. That is why "piv" (lots of beer) is pronounced "piff". The voiced/unvoiced pairs are B/P, DŽ/Č, D/T, V/F, G/K, H/CH, Z/S, Ž/Š.
- Czech grammar
- Grammar doesn't matter in any other language and it doesn't matter in Czech either. It is worth reading about, but not taking too seriously. If you are curious Czech uses a case system (different word endings) while some languages like Norwegian and English use word order. But this isn't that important. Most of the time you can figure out if the boy is playing with the ball or if the ball is playing with the boy. It can be useful to know that adding an -L to the verb puts it in past tense (-LA if you want to be female). Of course there are irregular verbs (though Czechs would claim it isn't so, they just have very many rules), and you can bend the words in numbers and persons and how polite you want to be. Whatever complexity you feel like adding, you can be sure Czech will provide it for you.
- Prefixes and suffixes
- This however is useful. Czech is a wonderfully constructive language. When you learn the stems like CHOD (walk), you will recognize vchod (entrance), východ (exit), chodba (corridor), průchod (passage), chodník (sidewalk). The prefix DO- is towards or into something, OD- is out of something. The suffixes tell what kind of thing it is, so –ARNA would be an enclosed space (e.g. kavárna, café, "káva" is coffee), while –IŠTĚ would be an open space (letiště, airport, "let" is flight). Grammar mutilates the word endings sometimes to the unrecognizable, so it can be useful to know some grammar to reconstruct the original meaning. Soon you will be constructing words, some which haven't been discovered by the Czechs themselves yet. A Czech-English dictionary is useful too.
- Listening
- Czech has the same misfeature as German, the most important part of the sentence comes at the end. With a Norwegian or English speaker you can just listen to the first words of a sentence and then go back to what you are doing. In Czech you must pay some attention while the speaker drones on towards the end, and there are many way to elaborate with nothingness so that the end is nowhere in sight.
- Climate
- May and September are the ideal months, April is much like May in Oslo, October can be chilly, especially towards the end, but unlike Norway it doesn't rain much. November and March are slightly better than Oslo, while December to February are like Oslo or colder. June and July can be sweaty, but after the occasional deluge lasting maybe 15-20 minutes the temperature is comfortable again. August is the month to leave Prague like the citizen do, it is hot and unpleasant and full of tourists.
- Away from Prague
- If you want to go to the rest of the country, the best option is generally by bus. It is as a rule faster, cheaper, more convenient than by train. Express buses are particularly fast and comfortable. The first problem is to find out which bus station to go to. The vlak-bus site makes this a lot easier (and you can check if train is an alternative at the same time). Not all Czech cities are attractive, but a lot of them are. It makes sense to stay in Prague the first time, and take the excursions the following times. Biking is another option, this also gives better chance to see Czech villages, castles and wilderness. For a relatively densely populated country, the Czech Republic has quite a bit of true wilderness, though cottage holidays by the carp pond is at least as prevalent.
Change of Address
Monday, 3. April 2006, 11:34:58
I left the hotel in for the last time today. Except for my flat in Oslo this was the place I had spent most nights the last few years. I have never lived long-term in a hotel before, but I could get used to it. The reason I left was that I had finally gotten the keys to my own apartment, signed the lease, paid the rent. I miss having a reception so that I didn't have to carry my keys around, the two keys to my door are fine but the key to the entrance door is a huge brass thing that seems more appropriate for ceremonially giving someone the key to the city rather than actually unlocking a door.
Having an apartment on your own adds a sense of freedom, having two is better, but I am really not a home-bound person. Whereever I sleep is where my home is. I use to call a small bag with my laptop, chargers and other work equipment my office, and a slightly larger bag with clothes and toiletries my home. Having your office in one hand, your home in the other, and not really having decided where to go next, that truly adds to your sense of freedom. In that respect I don't have homes, I have forward bases.
Another definition is whereever my subscription to New Scientist goes is my home. In that respect the Opera headquarters has been my home for the longest time, but not anymore. I have now officially moved to The Wineyards (Vinohrady) district in Prague, in the vicinity of Žižkov, Vršovice, and Strašnice. With the huge Prague cemetaries to the north the neighbourhood itself isn't among the liveliest, though I can claim living next to the permanent recidency of Franz Kafka for instance, but the communications are great and it is a short walk to the widest variety of what Prague can offer.
The transition into a remote worker isn't too hard as I haved worked from the beyond before, but there will still be some days before everything is in order. Making it work should be fun.
Having an apartment on your own adds a sense of freedom, having two is better, but I am really not a home-bound person. Whereever I sleep is where my home is. I use to call a small bag with my laptop, chargers and other work equipment my office, and a slightly larger bag with clothes and toiletries my home. Having your office in one hand, your home in the other, and not really having decided where to go next, that truly adds to your sense of freedom. In that respect I don't have homes, I have forward bases.
Another definition is whereever my subscription to New Scientist goes is my home. In that respect the Opera headquarters has been my home for the longest time, but not anymore. I have now officially moved to The Wineyards (Vinohrady) district in Prague, in the vicinity of Žižkov, Vršovice, and Strašnice. With the huge Prague cemetaries to the north the neighbourhood itself isn't among the liveliest, though I can claim living next to the permanent recidency of Franz Kafka for instance, but the communications are great and it is a short walk to the widest variety of what Prague can offer.
The transition into a remote worker isn't too hard as I haved worked from the beyond before, but there will still be some days before everything is in order. Making it work should be fun.
Akterutseilt og ved godt mot i Praha
Wednesday, 8. February 2006, 14:27:07
Still in Prague. Had I blogged using Opera Mobile or Mini I would have been at the airport in time (maybe a posting on battery life on mobile devices at a later time), but as the trip was almost a stopover in Oslo before going to Berlin a couple days later, and Berlin is just north of here, missing it was no disaster.
The travel time from my flat in Oslo to my base in Prague is 4 hours and 42 minutes including busses, metro, and walking distance plus a maximum of 29 minutes waiting (assuming no delays). The cost is 100€ upwards return fare for the ticket plus another 17€ getting to the airports and back (thanks to the the currency converter to figure that out).
Ten years ago travelling by bus would cost half again as much, and take 24 hours (twice that again, and slower and less convenient, if you travelled by train). Six years before that the Iron Curtain was still in effect, which didn't just separate the "East" from the "West", but the East from the East. A train journey in those days would entail as much standing still and be processed, or just as likely standing still for the purpose of standing still, as it would be actually rolling along at anything but high speed.
As the wireless connectivity of Prague is excellent, city-sponsored WiFi (partially) and unlimited GRPS connectivity to an acceptable price, working here is just as easy as it would be in Oslo, and a bit cheaper. Fifteen years earlier the Internet connectivity from the Charles University in Prague, the entire republic in effect (there was a further line to Liberec in the north), was a shaky 64kbps line to Linz in Austria. Then again at that time the infrastructure was abysmal, and apart from Austria, the Netherlands, the UK, and the Nordic countries that had megabit lines between their universities, the situation wasn't much better elsewhere. West Germany for instance was a X.25 morass that didn't "get" the Internet until years later.
The travel time from my flat in Oslo to my base in Prague is 4 hours and 42 minutes including busses, metro, and walking distance plus a maximum of 29 minutes waiting (assuming no delays). The cost is 100€ upwards return fare for the ticket plus another 17€ getting to the airports and back (thanks to the the currency converter to figure that out).
Ten years ago travelling by bus would cost half again as much, and take 24 hours (twice that again, and slower and less convenient, if you travelled by train). Six years before that the Iron Curtain was still in effect, which didn't just separate the "East" from the "West", but the East from the East. A train journey in those days would entail as much standing still and be processed, or just as likely standing still for the purpose of standing still, as it would be actually rolling along at anything but high speed.
As the wireless connectivity of Prague is excellent, city-sponsored WiFi (partially) and unlimited GRPS connectivity to an acceptable price, working here is just as easy as it would be in Oslo, and a bit cheaper. Fifteen years earlier the Internet connectivity from the Charles University in Prague, the entire republic in effect (there was a further line to Liberec in the north), was a shaky 64kbps line to Linz in Austria. Then again at that time the infrastructure was abysmal, and apart from Austria, the Netherlands, the UK, and the Nordic countries that had megabit lines between their universities, the situation wasn't much better elsewhere. West Germany for instance was a X.25 morass that didn't "get" the Internet until years later.
A room with a preview
Tuesday, 7. February 2006, 10:59:04
Quick note from a hotel reception in Prague, a couple hours before after the second preview of Opera 9 and labs.opera.com launched and a couple hours before my flight to Oslo will do the same. The preview offer all the goodies like native search editors, BitTorrent, and of course Widgets. But I wanted to point out an Opera 7 feature that we knew wasn't yet up to its full potential, namely User Style Sheets. We are not quite there yet, but we are closing in on it (as will undoubtedly the airport gates if I don't get going).
City Weekends
Sunday, 22. January 2006, 07:51:08
I came across the yearly survey over Norwegian vacation habits. The City Weekend is becoming a fixture, every other Norwegian do two and a half such trips on average. This is a direct consequence of low-fare airlines making direct travel cheap and convenient, and that the European cities are close by when travelling by plane. Australia and Africa are where people would like to go but don't, while USA has become dramatically less popular as a tourist destination.
Weekends are popular as you use up at most a couple vacation days, while I like the short trips for not having to bring a full set of clothes, thus lugging closer to the ideal nothing. The most desirable city in Europe according to this survey is Prague, edging out Rome, the previous favourite. Outed. I was in Rome last week and I am in Prague right now. Rome and Prague have much in common. Both are friendly cities to ease in to, you adapt to them as you arrive. Rome with its layering of time, place, and food, Prague with its architecture of hospitality, both merging an intricate past with a live presence, unafflicted by the monoculture of lesser cities.
Rome is a city built on top of itself, jumbling the brutal with the renewal. With a hub in the Colosseum concrete island the grid traces a history of subjugate or be subjugated. Today Rome largely follows the one Spanish rule: Thou shalt not miss lunch hour. If you do your whole day will be wasted, and the most you can hope for is a better tomorrow. But if you can stick to this rule Mediterranean life can be very seductive.
I'd never been in Rome in January before. In very late February it felt chilly for almost spring, but 10C (50F) was balmy for midwinter. It is a stroll in the park, a recommended activity when in Rome. Prague in January means winter, making even Oslo feel warm. Having hibernated for centuries in the frozen Czech highlands I came prepared for the cold onslaught, and the light in the historical center as it is staggering past you is special.
Prague, at the too-convenient crossroads in Europe, has mostly tasted subjugation in its cycles of rebellion, glory, and repression. As a city it has evolved this trade or flight reaction. When free everyone flocks there, when not everyone flees. Prague provides the convenience that everything works, no strange plugs, free wireless connectivity (if at the oddest locations), a well-functioning extensive transport system, no phone troubles, no Spanish rule, no pain except for the tingling at your extremities.
Weekends are popular as you use up at most a couple vacation days, while I like the short trips for not having to bring a full set of clothes, thus lugging closer to the ideal nothing. The most desirable city in Europe according to this survey is Prague, edging out Rome, the previous favourite. Outed. I was in Rome last week and I am in Prague right now. Rome and Prague have much in common. Both are friendly cities to ease in to, you adapt to them as you arrive. Rome with its layering of time, place, and food, Prague with its architecture of hospitality, both merging an intricate past with a live presence, unafflicted by the monoculture of lesser cities.
Rome is a city built on top of itself, jumbling the brutal with the renewal. With a hub in the Colosseum concrete island the grid traces a history of subjugate or be subjugated. Today Rome largely follows the one Spanish rule: Thou shalt not miss lunch hour. If you do your whole day will be wasted, and the most you can hope for is a better tomorrow. But if you can stick to this rule Mediterranean life can be very seductive.
I'd never been in Rome in January before. In very late February it felt chilly for almost spring, but 10C (50F) was balmy for midwinter. It is a stroll in the park, a recommended activity when in Rome. Prague in January means winter, making even Oslo feel warm. Having hibernated for centuries in the frozen Czech highlands I came prepared for the cold onslaught, and the light in the historical center as it is staggering past you is special.
Prague, at the too-convenient crossroads in Europe, has mostly tasted subjugation in its cycles of rebellion, glory, and repression. As a city it has evolved this trade or flight reaction. When free everyone flocks there, when not everyone flees. Prague provides the convenience that everything works, no strange plugs, free wireless connectivity (if at the oddest locations), a well-functioning extensive transport system, no phone troubles, no Spanish rule, no pain except for the tingling at your extremities.
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