The Charles bridge

Despite the tourists, which I struggle with - the slow-moving, sheep-like oblivious hoardes checking off their bucket-lists (yes, I catch a whiff of the irony) - I revisited the Charles Bridge again on this visit to Prague. And again and again at that. For me it's the emotional centre of the city, the arch of history that binds the new city with the mediaveal. I

 confess to be in awe of this famous historic bridge that crosses the Vltava river, and whose construction began in 1357 under the auspices of King Charles IV, and only to be finished in the beginning of the 15th century.

It is wide enough, magnificent enough to fit four carriages alongside each other, also to take my breath away in awe at its haunting beauty. And that such a thing could have been constructed so long ago. Long before there was much happening on the southern tip of Africa where I am from.

Have I mentioned that Prague originated around about the ninth century? You cannot imagine what it's like to travel this ancient albeit relatively small city, which is jam-packed (jam-packed!) with over a thousand years of human endeavour and things to see...

Like the elderly artist on the bridge reading his kindle while waiting for customers to draw.

(I weep with failure when I take my pictures as they cannot even attempt to capture what I'm seeing with my eyes.)

Sherlock and friend

It was sunny and pleasant, very, today in Prague. Not that I care much about sunshine; nevertheless the city was transformed. The photo is of the riverside where I have been regularly taking my meals, mostly alone, with either dry white wine or good, dark beer on tap. 

I discovered Vinny restaurant Orlik on the Masarykovo nabrezi (nabrezi = rivderside) by chance on my first night here. There are NO tourists thank God (except for me of course!), very friendly and kind owners, and cheap, good Czech food. And did I say anything about the good, dark beer haha?

Tonight is my last night in Prague, for now. I will sleep when I'm dead.

I have met, online, a fascinating journalist with a large daily newspaper here whose name is Lukas and whose dog is Sherlock. I am going to meet him for the first time shortly, for coffee.

This, below,is the other side of the river from where I eat. It's also where my hotel is, in Andel and, ironically, across the street from Lukas's newspaper.

A life of almost unbearable intensity

I walk and I walk and I walk. Then I stop to piss and have coffee. To connect to WiFi and to write down my thoughts.

Then I walk and I walk and I walk. Then I stop to piss and have coffee or maybe a beer. To eat. To connect to WiFi and to write down my thoughts.

About it getting dark so early that it confounds me but turns my mind cozy. And thoughts about Kundera's Tomas and Tereza in his Prague. 

And thoughts about Kafka who lived, and who lived here for so short, but fully occupied this city before dying in his lover Dora's care on June 3, 1924 after a life of almost unbearable intensity.

I visit the city's only English bookstore, The Globe, where I stalk around quietly on the creaking floorboards beneath vaulted ceilings in a builidng that's about 120 years old and seems to have aconstant  stream of young American students through it.

I walk and I walk and I walk seeing countless faces of incredible and unsual beauty in this melting pot at Europe's heart. Features and faces and noses and skins and hair that I've never known nor seen before. Incredible and unusual features and also, sporadically, the colour blue of eyes that I can only describe as Siberian-Blue because I've only ever seen that striking colour in huskies by the same name.

I try not to have thoughts of home. Because back there I'll be soon enough.

And there's many thoughts about intimacy and sex, and about the sexualness of my travel and interaction with others in places of strangeness to me, where for me the ultimate and most intimate connection with a place is via a combination of mind and body with a person from that place-space.

And then because I'm human it's time to piss again. And the entire cycle begins all over, and shall contunue until I die. No problem with that: Piss. Shit. Cum. Blood. Ash. Dust. 

After that I'm in the WiFi. 

Postcards: CT - Munchen - Praha

The rain comes, as does spring

The days, the weeks, the months are flying rapidly by; spring has come early this year and I'm astounded that bar a few more (possibly freezing) cold spells, we are through the so-called 'worst' of winter.

After a week of fantastic spring weather that saw the inhabitants of this city flock in what I call 'champagne weather' to its coastlines, forests, parks, botanic gardens and mountains, the rain is again hurtling against roofs and windows. While The Mountain and city remain well hidden beneath a voluptuous elephant-grey duvet.

It's within this moodiness that I thrive: on fire-full hearths and the Cape's finest red wine, on Arabica coffe and toasted chocolate and almond croissants seeped in Belgium chocolate. This is the Cape's secret season.

Right now, like identical beads on a necklace, the days seep into each other while pressure and stress tenderise my shoulder muscles: even so I love my life, also the city that has adopted me, and a 'job' that embraces me, dances closely with me.

I'm happlily teaching an extra two evening classes, but they sap any remaining spare time that I had. The extra work is part of my now much shorter-term plan to completely free myself from debt's chains. My life is more streamlined and simplified than ever before - I'm champing at the bits as I sniff the hints of freedom in the air.

In the first week of September I'm savouring a trip to my alma mater, Rhodes University, in the Eastern Cape's Grahamstown. In fact, I cannot wait.

I'm also waiting to hear about a trip to Prague and the Czech Republic in early November; although it's going to stretch me intellectually - long story - I am embracing stretchment (new word). I am especially excited about seeing new shapes of noses, eyes, eyebrows, shades of skin, bone structures and lilting languages that are in such contrast to the ones on the streets that spiral and network around me right now. I long to taste other flavours, to look at a different sky and to plug into a history so startlingly different to my own.

Life is moving so fast right now,  that I savour these valuable coffee breaks - on my own and with myself - beneath the rain and away from the distracting knocks on my office door.

It's a beautiful day; life is beautiful. I am alive and blessed.