June, Foodie Time
Photo: Lucerna Passage
I've picked the Lucerna Passage as my featured picture this month. I like the place so much that I include it on 3 different tours. If I'm not in shorts by June then we've got some strange weather issues but in general you'll find it comfortably warm in the mid 20s (Celsius) but get that SPF on or you'll fry like a chip. No State Holidays this month but just note that Jewish sites are closed on June 9th and 10th for "Shavuot" (that's sun/mon this year). Look out for weekend food/drink festivals on the riverside. Remember that June 8th is "Museum Night" where all the museums in the festival are free to enter from 7pm up to 1am. Check the Prague in June post
What's Been Happening on the Sites
Visitors to livingprague in May hit 53,209. I answered more than 30 emails from people looking for a bit of advice for their trip.
NEW! Prague Architecture Tour is now live. A 2 hour look at why the city looks like it does and who designed it.
UPDATED livingpraguetours pages to show photo galleries and new Architecture Tour.
UPDATED The Trip Planner repaired external links and added a Public Transport section.
UPDATED Media Kit to show the Trip Advisor 2019 Award..
IN PROGRESS : Prague Towers, Castle Day Trips, Cheap Food - Jidelna.
Check the BLOG to see the latest 200 posts on the site.
I've offered this discount to my tour clients for the last year for those specifically looking for authentic Czech Garnet, Diamond Garnet and Crystal. The shop has now extended the range of the discount so now I'm offering it to any visitors to Livingprague. It covers gold, precious stones, semi-precious stones and cut/engraved crystal. Just click the picture and print the associated voucher. Redeem at the shop (Old Town location).
Livingpraguetours.com
Awarded Trip Advisor **Certificate of Excellence 2019**.
LIVINGPRAGUETOURS at https://www.livingpraguetours.com runs exactly the same tour booking system and carries exactly the same tours as the parent site at livingprague.com. It just gives me a better platform to describe the tours, about me and my tours ethos but regardless of which site you use it's still me and you can read about the whole secure booking process at https://www.livingpraguetours.com/tour-booking-process/.
 The latest tour to be added to the site is the Prague Architecture Tour. People that do any of my existing tours are always amazed by the eclectic nature of the buildings here and of course many of them have stories so on this tour I tell you those stories but in this case we take a closer look at the influences on the city, the architects that were asked to redesign 20% of the city, their styles and some of their signature works. It covers everything from 1344 up to 1974 but we'll concentrate on the Avant-Garde period 1898 to 1925 which includes all the Art Nouveau and Cubism etc. As it's a specialised tour it will run initially as a private option and may become a scheduled tour later in the year depending on the demand.
I'm holding at number 14 out of a total 658 walking tour options in the Trip Advisor rankings which puts me in the top 2% of listed tours. Of the top 10 private tours in Prague ranked by Trip Advisor, I'm currently 5th. More and more people are finding me just with a simple search for Prague Walking Tours.
Quick Links:
In Prague
Kissing problem
Every May 1st Czech couples have to find a blooming cherry tree to kiss underneath, It's a kind of local ST Valentines day but this year Spring came early so the guys really had to search around to find a late bloomer.
Student's Choice
Prague came out on top in a survey by AppJobs which focuses on student lifestyle i.e. how easy it is to get work, the type of work, cost of a beer and social opportunities.
Enough Said
President Miloš Zeman decided not to promote the head of counter-intelligence to General stating that he'd made unfounded allegations about Russian influence on Czech democratic processes i.e. elections. The following day he gave a WW2 "Victory Day" speech AT the Russian Embassy IN Russian. And the day he gave that speech? May 9th, not the official end of WW2 which is celebrated on May 8th. May 9th was the day the Soviet army entered Prague.
Stuffed Animals
Up until October 1st will be your last chance to get a photo with a big Teddy/Polar/Koala bear, Lion or Mole in Prague as from then they don't qualify as street performers and will be banned. No word yet on the spray painted guys and the "gravity" guys.
Bloody Mary
There's going to be a rebuilt "Marian Column" on the Old Town Square which is sure to cause some arguments. The old column was torn down by the public in 1918. In recent years when the location of the column was marked on the square the text which translated as "on this point the Marian Column will one day return" had acid poured over it.
Trivia
No Cheating
In the last three years Charles University rejected 50 academic theses which failed a basic online plagiarism check. This has prompted a review which is going back 10 years.
Bad Debt
About 5000 Czechs under 18 (actually 3000 of them are under 15) have a bailiff order against them due to unpaid bills for fare-dodging or overdue library books.
Not in My Backyard
The Czech Republic is the EU country LEAST likely to provide sanctuary to an asylum seeker. Currently only 1 in 10 requests are successful and in the last year nobody was settled in the country.
Trails Away
The very first Tourist Hiking Trail opened 130 years ago and was paid for by the Czech Tourist Club.
Classical Outcasts
The Prague Spring International Music Festival this year was opened by the Bamberg Symphony Orchestra. The orchestra was originally formed in 1946 with musicians that played in the German Philharmonic Orchestra in Prague and were expelled after WW2.
Throne Alone
If you enjoyed watching Game of Thrones then you might be surprised to know that although many of the sailing scenes are using CGI, the real boats were made in the Czech town of Lipnik nad Becvou.
Going Up!
Interest rates went up to a whopping 2%, the highest for 10 years..
The number of children attending International Schools rose from 2744 in 2008/9 to 9274 last year.
Surrogate pregnancies are increasing with around "several dozen" born in the last year. However, commercial surrogacy is still a criminal offence here.
Joining a motorway in the wrong direction will be less likely as the number of "STOP-Wrong Way" signs will be increasing.
Following the raising of the single person income poverty line to CZK11,963 per month the number of Czech pensioners currently below that line is now 190,000 with some having to get by on less than CZK8000 (320 Euros) per month.
There were 711 cases of TBE (Tick-borne Encephalitis) in 2018, largest since 2011.
Going Down!
International investment in Czech companies in 2018 was 895 BILLION Crowns, down 15% compared with last year.
The country is looking to make up a shortfall of around 100,000 blood donors.
The cost of calling from a Czech mobile into another EU country fell to CZK6 (or less) per minute which is HALF what it was.
Of the 150 weather stations in Czech running continuously for the last 30 years, 25 of these stations monitored the coldest May 8th on record this year.
Czech's position in the Rainbow Map fell a couple of places to 31st out of 68 European countries. Rainbow ranks a country by it's attitude to LGBTQ issues.
Unemployment rate went down from 3% to 2.7% in April 2019.
Bye Bye
Jan Munk - Chairman of the Prague Jewish Community and for 27 years a director of the Terezin Memorial. .
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