We REALLY do have friends in Prague...and here's proof!

Lately, when Jeff comes home from work, he has been teasing me that all of the "friends" Ella and I spend time with are imaginary. He wonders why he never meets them or even sees them in any of our photos. Finally, I was able to disprove his theory!

It started with Dylan's one-year birthday party. Dylan is from Great Britain and he turned one year old on Wednesday. His mom, Ali, hosted a little celebration and I got some photoevidence of our friends:



Then, Saturday (yesterday), we went exploring a part of Prague we hadn't spent much time in (southern Nové Město) and ended up at Children's Island (Dětský Ostrov) where we ran into Lucie, Jeremy and Alice. (See aside below.) Children's Island is a whole island dedicated to children as a playground. It is fantastic! Here are Alice and Ella on one of the swings...the girls weren't crazy about it but the parents were enjoying it!



To top it all off, as we were leaving the metro to return home, I noticed another mom and baby I had just met this week...I got Irina's attention and we had a chance to chat and meet each other's husbands before the babies insisted it was time to move on.


Aside: It's a small world (an aside about Lucie, Jeremy, and Alice)

One day early on in our time here, we were riding the metro after a day of exploring and we ended up "sharing a moment" with a couple and their baby daughter...the two babies were exchanging smiles and waves and so the parents ended up exchanging smiles, too. We all got off on the same stop. No conversation took place as Jeff and I assumed they were Czech and we would not be able to really say anything to them. The next week Ella and I were at the park and the same mom and daughter arrived. This time, the mom spoke to me in Czech and then in perfect English. This was Lucie and Alice. Turns out, Lucie's husband, Jeremy, is from the US. When I told Jeff about this meeting he was very interested to know where exactly in the US Jeremy is from...I thought this a bit strange...but things started to add up after our next meeting with Lucie and Alice when I was able to tell Jeff that Jeremy is from the Boston area and that they had vacationed in Florida back in June. Here's where things get really interesting! In June, the two Jeffs were here looking for our apartment and on their last day in Czech toured Terezin (former Jewish concentration camp/prison). There was only one other man on their tour. He was from Florida and was doing a house exchange with a young couple from Prague. He told the Jeffs that the wife was Czech and the husband from Boston and that they were very nice and he should give Jeff their contact info. He never did. But we met them anyway! Yes, it is a small world....


Some other photos from our walking tour of Nové Město:


Ella and "New" Town Hall (Novomětská radnice) circa 1367. Another link if you want to get married here.



Jeff and Ella share a laugh over lunch.



Orthodox Cathedral of Sts Cyril & Methodius. Note bullet holes.



The Dancing Building, aka the Fred & Ginger Building.

With that, I must start my Sunday!

Until next time,
Maylia