random
I keep postponing my trip to the
gynecologist. I’ve been imagining her waiting by her door with the clammy
clamps, cursing me under her breath with some weird infection. I haven’t been
really home in more than a month now. My ob-gyn’s bitching at me; some friends
I haven’t been able to hang out with for a long time are bitching at me, if my
kitchen could talk it will be bitching at me in chorus with the mountain of
un-ironed clothes I have stocked in my overfed hamper. Every weekend when I
come home, I tell myself how I should be heaving myself from the couch or
the bed and to places I haven’t seen in the CZ, but I simply can’t
lug my limbs towards being productive. Instead I argue with myself and watch
creepy movies about cannibals and perverts (Hannibal Rising, Perfume). All I
can currently manage are food trips.
Food tripping with G is a priority. My humble culinary skills are fully indebted
to those many many times when we had a craving for something and the only way
to extinguish our yearning was to cook the dish. When we bought the pressure
cooker — I remember lugging it to the car giddily, all of its 10 liter glory - I vividly pictured in my mind how quickly caldereta can be cooked with it. We have suffocated all
his neighbors with our ceaseless charcoal-burning activities, we have invented
100 more uses of cabbage in our dishes because it’s the only vegetable abundant
in the CZ, we have gotten tipsy with beer or wine even before we
finished cooking so many times. I have gone home with almost all of his
Tupperware containing all the leftovers, because I can eat adobo
for three consecutive days without complaining and without ever forming bladder
stones (at least not yet). We kid each other all the time that when you put two
high A individuals in the kitchen, you’ll end up with a clean kitchen in no
time. Like nothing happened. It’s true, we work like a factory, I even measure
productivity levels at times. Before he even puts the mixing bowl down to the
sink it’s already washed… okay I’m exaggerating but we’re really pretty
efficient. G can release in me all that has been bothering me with work, advise
me on it and make me laugh at myself. That is, over garlic whiff and a tv show which
we simultaneously watch (mostly Oprah’s wildest dreams or Grey’s Anatomy). I’m
going to miss that. So much. Like I’m going to miss Prague.
I
would miss prg but not working in prg, not really. These
past three years have been just about changing and managing it, I want to have
some peace. Not that I will escape all the worries totally because what I
actually will transfer to is change management. Yaha. Still, the alteration of
characters I have to deal with is enough to refresh me.
But
I will definitely grieve for prg ,
the city. If there is one word to describe prg, it should be picturesque. It is
postcard beautiful, even when it’s plagued by traffic and tourists. The fact
that a lot of period films are shot in prg
is enough to explain how much of the old is left and how elegant the
architecture remains to be. When I thought I was going to be indefinitely
staying here
I inevitably forgot how magnificent the places I pass through going to and from
work are. That’s how it is when they seem to be so everyday to you. My route
passes through Jiraskuv Most that has a great view of the Vltva river, the p r a g u e Castle and Charles bridge, a view that can take your breath away if you
happen to be stuck in traffic on the bridge and a flock of birds flies over
your car and suddenly snaps you from
your daydream. For the longest time I have not even cast a second look at the dancing building (a Frank Gehry and Vladimir
Milunic masterpiece dubbed Fred and Ginger after Astaire and Rogers) when I
turn the corner towards the direction of my flat. That is mainly when I am busy
contending with a blondie who cut me a couple of hundred meters before.
Now
every time I stroll along little cobbled streets, to find a recommended club,
bar or restaurant which has just recently opened, I look around dazed at
buildings, trying to figure out if they are of the Baroque or the Renaissance
period.
A
couple of weeks ago, I went to dinner with G in this Argentinean Steakhouse.
The sirloin, the empanadas, the tapas and the wine were all excellent. Although
a lot of people were looking at us because we are both exotic (i.e. not white) and
they were all probably wondering which one is actually the girl. We were also
very close to the grill, which heightened our adrenaline and increased our # of
words spoken per minute. A magician came over and made me his monkey for the
night – with card tricks and 500 euro bills which he produced out of ashes –
while a couple tangoed around the tables. It fabulously mimics a Latin bistro
with big doors, palm and the smell of good spices. We finished with a cosmopolitan (in honor of
the most confused woman in the world, Carrie Bradshaw) for me and a beer (in
honor of the Czechs who I will be leaving soon) for him. We started at 7pm and
finished eating at half past nine, and since I was going to meet M for the
Latin Night in Radost in the same area, G and I decided to walk around. We
ended up in this charming little piece of the old town
area where Chez Marcel is. Under a tree we talked and laughed and talked and
fell of the bench giggling — about Grey’s Anatomy (long story, you have to see
us perform it for it to be funny, at siyempre siya si Meredith Grey), about
men, about our holocaust weekend trip – it’s a trip we’re planning in order to
visit all the concentration camps in most of e a s t e r n e u r o p e – and the possible
difficulties we will face with having to pose and smile in front of a gas
chamber, of curing higad irritations with vinegar, of our life in p r a g u e and of
how we are going to miss each other.
We
were sitting on a bench under a big tree (I think it was oak) spurting fits of
laughter… in the middle of dreamy prg
on a spring night. It was so simple and yet that night will be so difficult to
forget. With a wonderful friend, I also realized, this city can give you a great backdrop for memories.
