obamarama

i woke up quite early this morning and made my way up to the castle square to see barack obama.  i missed him in baltimore, so i thought, hey why not.  the line to the metal detectors took about 40 minutes.  then i waited some more as the square filled with people, and when he finally came out, it seemed like half of the crowd climbed on the shoulders of the other half.  so i did not exactly see him, could not even figure out where he was speaking from, but there were big screens with czech subtitles.  so i saw obama through the crowd through a tree through a screen.  meanwhile, in wenceslas square, there was a protest against the american radar.

hello spring

the city was stuffed with people today, because of the easter markets in old town and wenceslas squares, and if that didn't make it impossible to get anywhere, the prague half-marathon caused any remaining space to be blocked off.  i walked around for about an hour and that was enough, so i went home and worked on an illustration assignment for eight hours straight.  

while the religious aspects of czech easter were suppressed under communism, the pagan tradition of welcoming the spring remains a bright and cheerful celebration.  the most recognizable symbol of czech easter is the decorated egg, which girls give to boys on easter monday (april 13th this year).