Prague’s Petřín Park is considered by many to be one of the most romantic places in the city. It is especially true on May 1st when Czechs commemorate their own equivalent of Valentine’s Day. We write briefly about May First, the Time of Love on My Czech Republic.
Below are two pictures taken today at Petřín.
I visited the Easter Market on Old Town Square today. We had some rain on and off, but the market was still busy.
If you want to read about Easter in the Czech Republic and the tradition of the pomlázka, visit our Czech Easter section on My Czech Republic.
Today is the Day of Three Kings. Caspar, Melchior and Balthazar (in Czech Kašpar, Melichar and Baltazar) were the Biblical gift bearers but I think of them as the “light bearers”. The Czech saying Na Tři krále o krok dále means that on Three Kings Day, we’re one step further on our way to longer days. Which is definitely a welcome trend after the two dark months of November and December.
I just read somewhere that the Day of Three Kings marks the end of Christmas. I did not know that. But the truth is, my parents always keep their Christmas tree up until around January 6 and we just took ours down today.
We would like to wish all our regular, occasional and accidental readers a very Happy New Year! We hope it is a good one for all of us!
Dana and Jeff
It’s Christmas and we’re spending a nice, relaxing time at home. The gifts were all given last night, on Christmas Eve, as is customary in the Czech Republic. As every year, some people were still gift shopping yesterday. I’m glad we were not among them. We kept busy doing some last-minute cleaning, wrapping gifts, making potato salad and frying carp for dinner.
I bought our Christmas tree on Náměstí Míru last Wednesday. It is 1.3 meters tall and came to 400 Kč. It was shedding needles as I was decorating it yesterday and it is already turning a rusty color. I wonder how long ago it was actually cut.
Getting the carp was a bit more dramatic. In the Czech Republic, you can either buy carp live and keep it in your bathtub until it’s time for you to kill it (!!), or you can have it killed and cleaned by the vendor right in front of you. Neither is a pleasant experience for an animal lover like me, so I had Jeff go out and bring back some carp fillets. He came back with a bloodied bag and ”very fresh” carp, which had supposedly already been floating dead in the tub before he bought it. I tried to believe him…
Here are some pictures of the season:
Christmas market on Náměstí Míru, ended yesterday
Christmas market on Old Town Square, open till January 1
A Christmas tree vendor - choose your tree and take it away, or have it wrapped for an additional 20 Kč
A carp vendor on Národní třída
P. S. I had carp and potato salad for breakfast.
