The Continuation of "Oh God! Go back!"

Friday last was our first full day in Prague, and we were determined to see as much of it as possible. I believe I've previously mentioned the Museum of Communism and the walking tour, and I briefly alluded to other events of that day, but really, there's so much more to tell.

After the tour completed, the four of us split into pairs to go see the places each was more interested in. Suzanne and I headed up to Prague Castle, which as its very name might suggest, is a highly popular tourist attraction. I found it to be a bit pricey because of its popularity. However, if one still carries a student i.d., as I conveniently do, one can get a discount in price. Sometimes that discount divides the cost in half. Is this dishonest? Yeah . . .but if I still look enough like the girl in my graduate i.d. pic to get away with it, I'm going to take advantage of the money saving. I'll go to confession later.

I might have mentioned some disappointment in this attraction. Yes, the St. Vitus Cathedral was phenomenal, and I probably have more pictures of this than anything b/c it has amazing stained glass windows which I love, and they didn't charge for picture taking like other places did. Can you believe how people will milk you for money? Geez. However, then Suzanne and I went to the St. George Basilica, which has been around since maybe the 13th century, but hasn't been kept up at all, so you can hardly see the murals on the walls. Almost nothing has been translated into English, so I couldn't tell what saint's sarcophagus rested there. There were bones in an altar, but again, couldn't tell whose. Then we went to the Royal Winter Palace. Doesn't that sound like it should be fantastic? Well, it wasn't. We only got to see about 6 rooms, none of which had much furniture it them. I had hoped to see the rooms laid out as though the royal family still visited there. Big disappointment.

Then it began to rain, and as my feet were aching, I told Suzanne I wanted to sit in the courtyard and watch the people rather than see something else I wasn't impressed with. Yeah, I was a bit grouchy. Poor Suzanne. I also wanted to hit up the post office there and stop by the bank-o-mat for some money, and hopefully to change one of my Czech bills into some change to purchase some passes for the tram. About 5:45, I head into the banking area, which says that it closes at 6. I approach a woman behind the desk who doesn't seem to be busy. My brain registers that she seems to be in charge of audio tours rather than banking, but I thought I could at least ask her about changing my money for me. I notice that the woman next to her is busy helping some others. As I ask this lady about changing my bills to change, she seems confused.
"You want me to change Czech money to euros?" she questions.
"No, I wondered if you could just give me the change for some of the Czech money I have. I'm trying to get change to buy a tram ticket, and the bills I get from your bank-o-mat are too large," I respond.
"I'm sorry. We are closed." She said this firmly and folds her arms over her chest as she stares at me.
Perhaps there was something lost in translation, but I could feel my temper flare up at her. I closed my mouth and glared at her. I glanced pointedly at the woman next to her still helping those others. Really, you're closed? Funny, your coworker isn't, and your sign says you're not. But I could see she wasn't budging, so I stomped out.
Suzanne appeared, and we decided to head out to meet Marty and Hannah at the mirror maze. We attempted for some minutes to find a ticket machine to ride the tram back down the hill as it was some distance to the maze, but we couldn't find one anywhere, so we began to walk. We attempted a short cut through a park that ended up taking us out of the way, so we retraced our steps. As we curved around the never-ending hill, Suzanne notices a path that seems to take a more direct route, so we head that way. Then she stops and turns back. Apparently the guy coming up on that other path thought it was quite deserted and didn't have all his clothes arranged the way he should for passersby. We hurried down the original path to get away from him.
Finally we are able to make it to a tram station and find a place that will sell us two 1-day tram/metro/bus passes with our large bills, so we hop on the tram and take it as closely as possible to where we are to meet. It is 7:15, and we're supposed to meet H and M at 6:30. We find our way to a park and realize we have to climb up a steep hill via stone steps. We glance at ech other, shrug our shoulders and keep going. Up and up and up. Finally we reach what looks like where we're supposed to be on the map. Nothing but a couple of restaurants. It's about 7:45, and we're quite hungry. We decide to eat at the cheap little place we find. S gets some potato cakes that taste like dishwater, and I get this hamburger that looks like a veggie burger, but has pink . . .something on the inside. It's disgusting. Then we begin our hike back down. We see a different path that looks less steep, and we're hurrying down. Suddenly I hear, "Oh God! Go back!"
Suzanne whirls around, and I catch a glimpse of a scraggly-looking guy with a half surprised, half excited look on his face, and I get a chill all over as I change directions to follow her. "Two in one day! I can't believe this!" I hear S exclaim. She's rather shaken and disgusted as she races along. I for some reason can't stop laughing rather hysterically at her tone--until I notice that the guy is following us up the path we've just taken, and then I bite my tongue to push myself almost to a jog. Nervously, I ask if he's still behind us, and I try to mentally prepare myself for how to defend myself, but I can't think of anything except fear. "Don't know," she gasps, and we keep going.
Finally we reach the bottom of the hill and other people, and we look behind us. Not there, thank God. We cut our losses with the maze and rush back to our hostel. No more drama today, please.