Prague 3 is great getaway from tourist areas

By KEVIN DEAN
School of Communication
University of Miami

PRAGUE— If you get tired of touristy Old Town, head to Prague 3.

There you won’t find any tour guides or cheesy crystal shops, just real Czech people going to work and living their lives.

In Prague 3, you can eat truly authentic Czech food and shop at some unique stores, too.

It’ll take days to experience all that Prague 3 has to offer, but here are some highlights that you can experience in just one day.

First, head to Restaurace Staroceska, located on the corner of Kostnicke Namesti and Jeronymova.

There you can eat fresh fish for only 145 kc. The roasted trout is only 95 kc, and it’s absolutely delicious.

Traditional Czech dishes like goulash and dumplings are the cheapest on the menu at 75 kc, but it is probably the most delicious meal Staroceska has to offer.

Or, if you want to splurge, go for the tender, juicy rabbit fillets (160 kc) and a few glasses of Moravian red wine. Staroceska has one of the best selections of fine wines in Prague 3.

After your meal, go out of the restaurant, make a right and walk one block to Levna Moda, a second hand store located at Jeronymova 7.

Second hand stores are good places to shop in Prague 3 because you can find authentic Czech clothing at ridiculously low prices.

At Levna Moda, vintage men’s dress shirts are 120 kc at the most. I found an authentic Prague police officer’s shirt for only 50 kc.

Men’s jeans and corduroys start as low as 60 kc and you can even buy weird t-shirts with handdrawn pictures of Pokemon characters on them.

The proprietor of this shop is a woman so she personally paints designs on vintage women’s t-shirts and then sells them for only 200 kc. Buy one of these along with a silk scarf for 30 kc and you’ll have a great gift for one of your lady friends.

You’ll pay up to 200 kc for a silk scarf at the Indian Market around the corner on Husitska.

After shopping, you will probably be thirsty for a cold beer, so make a left out of the second hand shop and then a left on Husitska.

Walking down Husitska you’ll find shirtless house painters walking around with paint all over their faces and chests sitting next to skinny men with long, black permed hair and matching leather vests and shorts.

Crazy old bearded men hobble around on canes so don’t walk too fast.

Keep walking down Husitska and on your left you’ll see Nekonvencni Bar. You can’t miss it because on the windows are paintings of blue-skinned men with red hair playing the guitar.

Inside, the beer is less than 20 kc and the jukebox is one of the best in Prague 3. You can listen to Kool and the Gang and Michael Jackson and A-Ha while playing foosball upstairs.

After you’ve had a few beers, keep walking down Husitska to Klub Kain, located right before the bridge at the end of the street. By nighttime, this place packs hundreds of music lovers into its small basement. Live rock bands play here most nights, but you should probably check out the venue’s schedule first so that you don’t get stuck seeing a horrible Czech punk rock act or some other crap.

If the music is bad, then you can always go next door to Bloody Blue Tattoo. Ivo, the main tattoo artist, will tattoo Tom Selleck’s face on your chest with the words “Mr. Excitement” underneath it for only 4,000 kc.

Now it’s time to go show off your new tattoo.

Retrace your steps back up Husitska to a small bar called U Vystrelen Yhooka, located on U Bozich Bojovniku.

Locals walk their dogs here after a hard day’s work to drink cold Gambrinus for 18 kc.

The bar is only a wooden shack where the bartender sits and a couple of wooden benches. The entire bar is open air and the floor is nothing but dirt and rocks.

Dogs run around your feet under the tables and I fed my nasty watermelon to a black lab that had been getting chased too much by an angry poodle.

It tasted like sauerkraut, anyways.

Train tracks run right above the bar and, whenever a train goes by, a headless statue of a woman near the bar wobbles and almost falls off.

The bartender is a skinny girl who likes to wear sundresses and hop over the bar to hang out with the customers that range from gypsies to business men to bearded men with open shirts carrying packs of cigarettes, flasks of whisky and pints of Gambrinus.

It’s funny to watch old drunken men like this light their cigarettes, especially when their hands are so full.

After this bar, walk to Cukvarna Lunie, buy some pastries and gelato with nothing more than the change in your pockets, and eat them on your way home while thinking about how much cooler this side of town is than the Charles Bridge and Prague Castle.

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