Kutna Hora, etc.

The day after our Prague tour, we take a bus to spend the day in Kutna Hora, a very picturesque and quaint town about an hour away. Stopping briefly at Our Lady of the Assumption church, we proceed to our main reason for going there-the Sedlec Ossuary  (or “Bone Church” as Kyle calls it). Because the land had supposedly been sprinkled with dirt from Golgotha brought back from the Holy Wars, it was a popular place to be interred, especially during the Black Death. With the crypts having thousands of bones that were placed there to make room, in the 1800s a local carpenter was hired to ‘put them in order.’ He decided to build 6 pyramids with the bones, and then dismantled two of them in order to decorate the chapel, arranging intricate patterns of bones along doorframes, making crosses, and other decorations such as a coat of arms and a giant chandelier. It’s truly an experience (and Kyle loved this).

            After we were done with the ossuary, we had some time, so we wandered a bit through town, seeing the plague memorial, the Ursuline convent, St. James, St. Barbara, the Jesuit seminary, the Stone House, and the Italian Court (which used to be the seat of the Czech king). We skipped their cigarette, baby buggy, and alchemy museums.

            Buying some food at a local store, we had a little picnic on the bus stop lawn. Kyle got a Kentucky Baguette because he thought that it sounded interesting (“I bet you they don’t even know what a baguette is in Kentucky. They’d be like, ‘Bag of what?’”).

            We got back to Prague and passed through a little street festival selling local foods. A rusty van with a sound system and drummers had pulled up and interpretive dancers (whose dances included writhing over the van, twitching, and throwing powder on one another) danced. They were probably there to promote Stomp.

            We ate some thin crust pizza with George (ham, cream, and mushroom), and then head for Café Louve (famous for being the place where “thinkers” like Kafka and Einstein used to hang out) for dessert. “Finally, a place for my mental equals,” says Kyle as he eats a giant piece of chocolate cake. I get warm raspberries with vanilla ice cream, nicknamed “Hot Love.”

            Then we go to George’s to pick up our laundry, have some tea, shoot Kyle with nerf guns, and say goodbye.

            The next morning, we get packed and are heading to Munich. At the station, I help the Whitest Family from America find their platform, and later their train car (Kyle: Those people were seriously whitebread). Then a foreign guy asks for help. And when on the train, another guy comes to my cabin for help. I should start a business.

            Oh, and Kyle picked up a (wrapped) Kit Kat off the train station floor and intends to eat it. Kyle said, “You’re going to write about this, aren’t you? Can’t a guy eat floor Kit Kat in peace?” No. You can’t.