Too Much Party

"Stay away from Buenos Aires.." the man told us.

His name was Matthias, and his words were coated in a thick Argentinian accent. He spoke in a shy whisper, and he seemed pained as he offered up his forceful warning with urgency. "Don't go to Buenos Aires," he repeated. "Too much party in Buenos Aires."

We were in the self-proclaimed 'chill-out zone' of Hostel Elf in Prague. It was Day 10, and our first night in the city. We'd arrived an hour or so previously, and had been welcomed into our new home by an overly-friendly Czech fella who looked and acted uncannily like our former schoolmate Andy Brock. With a jolly enthusiasm he'd walked us down hallways gratuitously daubed in grafitti, past scrawled song lyrics and back'n'forths of unbridled wit*.

* One joker had taken it upon himself to write "Kentucky Freud Chicken.. Motherf###in' good!" on the wall to the kitchen.

Our room was definitely our best yet. Spacious, comfortable, and (just like the rest of the hostel), unquestionably 'hip'. Before he left us to unpack, Andy Brock had imparted the most important of words to us in broken English.. "Beer for sale at desk upstairs".

It was perhaps no surprise, therefore, that one hour later we did indeed find ourselves on the recieving end of Matthias' words of wisdom in regards to the Argentinian capital and it's abundance of "party", as we drank down the sweet hostel beer. However, right then we weren't in Buenos Aires, and had no immediate plans to visit said city. We were in Prague, and the night was young, so we set of to investigate..

The first thing we discovered about Prague was that it's currency is weak. This roughly translates to: more food for less cash. We indulged, wolfing down full meals at a Chinese resaurant before heading into the town centre to an upmarket Italian 'ristorante', where we imbibed sweet dark ale and munched on our second course of the evening (excessively large pizzas) followed by our first deserts of the trip (Ice-cream sundaes with fresh fruit and whipped cream). This might sound sinful, but we quickly got used to the feeling and ate like this for the rest of our time in Prague.

Sweet, sweet gluttony.

The other thing immediately obvious about Prague is it's status as an up'n'coming Amsterdam, in it's loose attitude to such delights as prostitution and erotic dance cabarets. We chose not to indulge in these particular activities, of course, but one couldn't help feeling stereotyped by the locals given the number of times we were approached by seedy promoters, who thrust fliers and business cards into our hands in the hopes of scoring some clients. The best encounter of the night came when we were cornered by one such promoter. In a lecherous Czech drawl he offered us the (interestingly vague) possibility of "girl for sex". I indicated to him that The Hugless Stone might be interested in just such a prospect, and his eyes widened. He stalked ever closer to The Stone, whispering, "500 kroenig? Girl for sex, 500 kroenig?"

The night ended after a few hours in several local bars, away from the drunken English louts and the aforementioned promoters who target them. On the bridge overlooking the river and the city as the lights sparkled like stars on the water, we came to the general realisation that even as Prague may be becoming more and more an easy destination for twats seeking cheap thrills, that doesn't take away from the fact that it's an amazing city. The historic buildings and cobbled streets.. the kind and friendly locals.. the whole package adds up to something really special. Just as lively as Paris and just as pretty as Vienna, we were in our favourite city so far.

The rest of our time in Prague felt somewhat like we were living in a 'happiness' montage from one of the cheesy Hollywood movies our Viennese friend Idiom Jim would have happily dubbed as "shit"..

We decided to take the following morning to do things on our own, taking a break from each other whilst everyone was happy and on good terms. I spent a good hour at least one the phone to my family back home, before wandering the side-streets and hidden corners of the city then ending up in the town square with a good book and an over-powering sense of calm and satisfaction. We were defining ourselves on this trip at last. The Pristine Marmott and The Disgusting Hippo had followed their respective noses for culture and headed round a museam detailing the history of the city, whilst I'd enjoyed discovering the unknown areas and The Hugless Stone had.. well, I don't know what he'd done with his morning. Maybe he'd sought out his propositioner from the previous night and taken him up on his offer, maybe he hadn't. The only thing I know is that we all met up once again for lunch, happy to see each other and with no real desire to know why The Hugless Stone was suddenly 500 kroenigs less well-off**.

** This series of less-than-subtle hints have no merit or truth behind them, I should clarify. Honestly.

That afternoon we all laughed until we cried as The Marmott read out an article from a copy of The Guardian he'd bought, all about the Big Brother scandal which had apparently seized England in our absence, after contestant Jade Goody had made racist comments about another 'housemate'.

"Goody's comments are surprising," the paper said, "given that her mother is a practising Muslim who has observed Rammadan for the past nine years". The article continued thusly..

'A mini-cab driver, white, middle-aged and Bermondsy born, has a foot in each camp. "What she has been saying is terrible," he says. "Especially as her father is a nigger." Asked to expand, he explains that her father is mixed race. "You know, half a pint of Guinness".'

Thanks, Cabbie.

We spent the evening going from bar to pub to bar to pub. Perhaps we were living into the Englishmen-abroad stereotype, but either way the pattern went exactly the same with each bar we visited. The Disgusting Hippo would force us to go in so he could use the facilities***, and after one drink The Hugless Stone would make us move on because he didn't like the way the barman was looking at him.

*** The Hippo responds, "No, I didn't need to shit, mostly I just needed to wipe my arse a lot". Truly disgusting.

We got back to the hostel in the early hours of the morning, but instead of heading straight to sleep, we decided to take advantage of the free internet access available. Mostly, this meant us all crowding around the computer whilst The Stone read out entry after entry a blog by our former collegue Chris Postle. It's totally serious and probably the funniest thing ever in the history of time.

Naturally, reading his blog got us to talking about who we'd most like the punch in the face until they bled and needed major reconstructive surgery. Eventually, after an hour of playing that game, we realised it was past 4am, and fast headed to the land of nod.

Just as well, because the next day was jam-packed and action-filled. After a cold shower in the morningtime, we made our way to the outskirts of the city to visit Franz Kafka's grave. None of us really knew much about the man, but it was a gorgeous day and a nice walk. However, by the time we'd traversed the cemetary for more than an hour looking for Dr. Franz, we were getting a little tired of his elusivity. A quick consultation of the map cleared up the confusion though, as it turns out old Franz was Jewish, and thusly buried in the special cemetary next door. We made our way inside, but The Hugless Stone was accosted by an irate security guard who impressed upon him the importance of covering his head when inside the Jewish section (the rest of us were already wearing hats). However, he had nothing suitable to hand, so was forced to borrow a yarmulka from the front desk. It was tiny and wind-speeds were high that day, so much amusement was had at The Stone's expense as he tried his best to keep this tiny headgear from flying off into the distance, and we tried out best to photograph him doing so****.

**** One day I'll update this blog with said photos and videos, when the technology to do so is more readily available to me than that of the internet cafe in which I'm currently residing.

After the cemetary, we rode the metro back into town, narrowly escaping being caught without tickets by the guards who suddenly appeared at every station we pulled in at. Naturally, such a daring escape from prosecution demaned our standard Big Lunch, which was had shortly afterwards at a restaurant dominated by a group of hungover English knobheads (the technical term, I believe..), who took an offensively great pleasure in the ever-increasing volume of their guffaws.

In search of peace and quiet, we did as any sensible people might have done; we headed to a pub to watch a football match on a huge screen. Arsenal vs. Man U., to be precise. A dirty game by any standards, Arsenal snatched a deserved victory in the final moments of the second half, much to the delight of The Pristine Marmott, who appeared anything but "pristine" by the final whistle. Drenched in sweat and with veins dangerously close to popping through his forehead, he was decidedly 'pumped'.

As we left the pub after the game, we were cornered one by one by a Liverpudlian woman who might have had one drink too many, given that it was only 5pm. "Were you 'appy with that result?!" she demanded of The Marmott and The Hippo, who both responded enthusiastically in the affirmative. But if I hoped I was getting out of there on the quiet, I was wrong. Nearly at the door, I felt a hand on my arm as she yanked me back inside. "'ey!", she shrieked at me with glee. "Your mate.. I thought 'e were gonne have a heart-attack there for a minute!"

Thanks, Cilla Black-alike.

Back at the hostel, despite plans for a quiet evening of poker, things spiralled out of control once again. The game began with torn-up map pieces as chips and an air of jokery. But we were playing in the hippest hostel in Prague, and it wasn't long before the spectators started to build up. First to pluck up the courage to ask to join in was Andy, a bike-messenger from Minnesota. He was perfectly nice, and gave us novice players some helpful tips, but DAYMN! He was boring as hell. Seriously, nothing. Nada. Zip. The guy just had nothing to say. The height of our time with him was when The Hugless Stone discovered they had a similar music taste. "What do you think of the band 'Swans'?", he asked our American amigo. "They seem alright," Andy replied, "but to be honest I haven't heard much of 'The Swans' stuff". Ever taken by his obsession with inanity, The Stone jumped on him. "I'm sorry to be pedantic," he said, not sorry at all, "but I believe there's no definite article preceeding the name 'Swans'. They're not 'The Swans', they're just 'Swans'."

Riveting.

Next into the game was a Dutch guy from the Haig ("I just live there, I'm not in the government..", he was quick to clarify). His only hobbies were "snowboarding and poker", he told us, and with that revelation whipped out a snazzy silver briefcase with the most professional poker set inside I'd ever laid eyes on. Suddenly our map pieces were a thing of the past, and we found ourselves playing amongst kings.

The first round we were playing for fun, and perinal-loser The Disgusting Hippo suddenly found himself on a winning streak. "That's a lot of fun on the table!" one guy said, referring to the winnings that Hips had just won after a particularly good hand. Our Dutch friend formed a bizarre shape with his hand. "This means 'F### you' in Israel", he said, sharing a smirk with his Israeli pal sitting next to him. "So, me and Ishmael here, when we play poker, we make this shape with our hands to the guy who's winning.. it means, we respect that you're chip leader, but f### you!"

At this point, the cringe-factor was through the roof, and I was suddenly relieved that the first game was nearly over and a money-game was scheduled next, from which I could easily remove myself.

We learnt a valuable lesson that night. Making friends in youth hostels is all good, but sometimes just because someone's a fellow traveller, doesn't change the fact that they're still an idiot. Sadly, The Hugless Stone took longer to realise that than the rest of us, as he spent the next few hours battling it out with the hardcore few still playing for cash. Inevitably, after an admittedly good fight, he lost, and walked away from the table that night a solid 100 kroenigs lighter in the pocket.

That was our last night in Prague, and by all accounts our visit to the city had been a fantastic success. The montage was over, although the aura of happiness that surrounded us showed no signs of fading. They say conflict is always neccessary for good drama, so perhaps in the interests of this blog I'll go stir up a fight or two right now to write about next time.

Join me then to see if I live up to my promise, and to hear about the rest of the adventures we find ourselves getting into.. when we take Berlin!