Brno bound

IF there was ever a city that needed another vowel in its name it’s the Czech settlement of Brno.

Barno, Burno, or even Berno would be so much better than Brno.

It would make the name of this place a whole lot easier to say, and not require those visiting the place to pause before they pronounce the word and practice folding their lips and tongue around the syllables.

While Brno is short of a vowel it doesn’t lack any charm, and is a particularly delightful place to visit when the springtime sun is shining over Eastern Europe.

Brno was on the itinerary today, it was the place we stopped for lunch during the drive from Prague to Bratislava, and we had time to walk along the main street and wander through a neighbourhood market.

It's strawberry-growing season in Eastern Europe and many of the stalls that had been set up beneath umbrellas in the square near the Old Town Hall were setting punnets of the plump fruit to the shoppers wandering the impromptu aisles.

I could smell the strawberries before I could see them, the warm late-morning breeze was washing across the fruit and distributing the pleasing  aroma around the piazza, and it was that authentic perfume that only comes when berries have been grown by hand in a family’s veggie garden.

Brno, which sits in the south-eastern corner of the Czech Republic near the borders with both Slovakia and Austria, is the country’s second largest city with a population of around 370,000 people.

It’s also the capital of the state of Moravia – the southern portion of the Czech Republic is occupied by the states of Moravia and Bohemia – and it seems that some of the people who live in Brno consider they are Moravian first and Czech second.

Back in 1991, when a national-wide census was conducted, 19 per cent of the people who lived in Moravia declared that their nationality was Moravian.

And Moravia does have some famous sons with Oskar Schindler of Schindler’s List fame, the father of genetics Gregor Mendel, Secessionist architect Adolf Loos and all-round smartie Sigmund Freud hailing from this part of Europe.

It seems that Brno residents are also very clever when it comes to cooking pancakes.

My travelling companions and I ordered pancakes for lunch and while mine came with bananas and caramel sauce another of the sweet combination was cottage cheese and chocolate while two member of the group had a savour creation featuring the ingredients of a Waldorf salad.

Prague's guards

I HAVE another riddle for you.

Who are the most photographed men in Prague?

No, it’s not the male cast members of the top-rating soap, the latest pop idol or the roster of the town’s top football team.

The blokes who have their photo snapped thousands of time every day are the Prague Castle Guard, the military men who stand at attention in blue-and-white boxes to protect the historic complex that sits high on the hill above the Czech capital.

Each soldier, dressed in grey trousers and slate blue jacket decorated with strands of colourful cords and patches, stands at attention for 60 minutes at a time with the changing of the guard ceremony happening every hour.

Prague Castle, which sits in the heart of the city’s beautiful Hradcany neighbourhood, has been home to the Czech parliament since the Velvet Revolution in 1989 so the soldiers have responsibility for protecting the country’s top government officials as well as getting their picture snapped.

Tourists who venture up to Prague Castle should give themselves a few hours to explore the complex as it sprawls across an area of almost 70,000 sqm, with the spectacular St Vitus Cathedral just one of the attractions.

``According to the Guinness Book of World Records, the Prague Castle is the largest coherent castle complex in the world,” the attraction’s website explains.

``A UNESCO World Heritage site, it consists of a large-scale composition of palaces and ecclesiastical buildings of various architectural styles, from Roman-style buildings from the 10th century through Gothic modifications in the 14th century.

``The famous Slovenian architect Josip Plečnik was responsible for extensive renovations in the time of the First Republic (1918-1938). Since the Velvet Revolution, the Prague Castle has undergone significant and ongoing repairs and reconstructions.’’

You know you're in Europe when...#4

YOU know you're in Europe when...there are more wind turbines in the farmer's paddocks than cows and sheep.

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Stop and go

QUESTION - How do you know when you're in part of the old East Germany?

Answer - The traffic signals that tell you when it's safe to cross the road are cheery boys and girls. 

This was one of the gems of information I discovered in Dresden today.

We were told that, instead of using the thin man that we see in Australia and everywhere else in the world, the East German government decided to adopt a more robust and cheery chap with a hat and an extravagant gait.

And not to be chauvinists, they included a chick with a ponytail and an equally jaunty walk.

See, the Commies were not such bad blokes after all.

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Communist fizz

BACK during the darkest days of the Cold War, we decedent Capitalist running dogs in the West were chugging down bottles of Coke like it was the fabled elixir of youth.

But behind the Iron Curtain the good Communists were enjoying another fizzy drink, the folks in the Soviet states were drinking a politically-correct beverage known as Vita Cola.

When I was in Dresden today, one of the unfortunate settlements that found itself deep in the heart of East Germany when that nation was split in two back in 1949, I got to sample what the Commies were drinking when we were rotting our teeth guzzling Coke.

We had lunch at a little cafe near the Green Vault, occupying an outdoor table to make the most of the perfect blue-sky day, and as I perused the drinks menu I saw the listing for Vita Cola.

"East German cola with a dash of lemon juice," was the way the beverage was described.

When it arrived it tasted more like a flat version of the no-name cola your grandmother used to keep in the outside fridge, with a couple of lemon wedges submerged in the bottom of the glass.

The liquid version of functional Stalinist architecture, not bad just not particularly good.

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Phoenix from the ashes

ONE of the first things I was taught at journalism school was to never start a story with a cliché.

But if there's one occasion when that rule should be broken it's writing about the city of Dresden.

That's because this former East German settlement is the phoenix that has risen from the ashes.

Towards the end of the Second World War, when the good guys were chasing Hitler's goons back across Europe, the Allies decided it was time to make a statement by firebombing Dresden.

The event is still controversial because, at the time, the city was said to have no military significance.

Dresden was home to around 5,000 people but more than 600,000 refugees from other parts of eastern Europe, mostly women and children who had lost their homes and had to survive with their men away at war, migrated to the destination because it was seen as a safe place to hide from the hostilities.

There were no military camps in Dresden, and the only link to the war was a transport depot on the outskirts of town.

During three days in February 1945 more than 650,000 incendiary bombs were dropped on the city, devises that were designed to crash through buildings and then explode once they were inside.

The entire city caught fire during the raids, and while the final death toll is still debated it's thought that around 250,000 people perished.

Most survived the actual bombing but died in the inferno, with many suffocating after the tunnels they were sheltering in filled with toxic gases from the blaze.

When the fires were finally extinguished the city was rubble, but it didn't stay that way for long.

Reconstruction started in 1946 - the first buildings to be rebuilt were the pavilions surrounding King Augustus the Strong's Festive Garden - and work continues today.

The town's Semperoper was another public structure that had to be rebuilt after World War Two, but this wasn't such a tough ask because it had already been built twice before.

Dresden's first opera house was constructed in 1841, but that burnt down 27 years later when one of the gas lamps used to illuminate the stage started a fire.

It was reconstructed in 1878, destroyed again in 1945, and then put up for the third time in 1977 when Dresden was part of East Germany.

The reconstruction process was controversial, especially during the early days of Communist occupation, when many of the locals didn't have a roof over their head.

Many people objected that ornate structures were going up to accommodate opera and art, while they didn't have a place to live, but the Communists said culture was the soul of the city and the buildings were needed to restore identity.

I'm glad they did, because the Dresden of today is an enchanting place.

We did a day trip from Prague, something that's very doable now the borders are open and a long stop to check passports isn't part of the journey, and we had four hours in the settlement after the two-hour drive north.

We did a walking tour with a local guide who told us stories from the two most significant events of the city's history - the 1945 fire bombing and the years of the Communist regime - and then had a couple of hours to explore on our own.

The most famous building to be revived is the city's baroque cathedral, the Frauenkirche, and it's easy to see just how much of the grand structure had to be recreated.

After the bombing only one corner of the cathedral was left standing, so everything from that point was build to imitate the original.

The locals tried to save as much of the original materials as they could, and today the black bricks mark the originals with the lighter stones showing the new material.

I walked past the cathedral a couple of times, and was interested to hear from our guide Petra that the building didn't receive a direct hit during the bombing but was destroyed by the blaze.

All the surrounding structures caught fire, generating an enormous amount of heat which caused the church's timbers to ignite, and the Frauenkirche collapsed two days after the last plane flew over Dresden.

I knew about the cathedral, and was keen to see that for myself, but the unexpected treasure was the long porcelain mural that occupies one wall of Augustus' castle.

Back in 1847 a local art teacher painted the mural on the wall - called the Procession of the Dukes it captured some of the city's most famous medieval residents in full military regalia - but the picture soon washed off in the weather.

In 1905 the whole scene was put onto 24,000 Meissen porcelain tiles, which were fired twice to make them perfectly weatherproof, and the mural was recreated.

While the whole area was completely destroyed in 1945, only 200 tiles were damaged by shrapnel and they were quickly replaced.

While most of the city has been rebuilt to look like the original, some parts were changed and a river-side promenade is one of the post-war improvements.

Before the bombing bleak apartment buildings occupied the riverbank, but after the firestorm the area was left vacant and an elevated footpath constructed to let people get to the museums and galleries in the part of town.

After wandering around town I found myself on the footpath, and walked back to the bus while eating a scoop of strawberry gelato and enjoying the spring sunshine.

And it was something I appreciated doing, because I imagine there were great blocks of time in the city's recent history when eating a scoop of gelato while taking a leisurely walk beside the river was the last things the local could or wanted to do.

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Night life

I HAVE a bit of company on this European jaunt.

It's a group famil -- media familiarisation tour -- and I'mtravelling with a PR person and three other travel writers.

It's nice to have someone to eat or shop with, and wandering around in groups adds a bit more security when exploring locations frequented by pick pockets.

The other great thing about having company is that I'm able to see a bit of each destination after the sun goes down.

When I am travelling solo I tend to find my way back to the hotel by the time it gets dark, so don't see much of the lights.

For the past few evenings my little group has been heading out for dinner just before dark, which comes late in this part of the world during the month of May, and then taking the scenic route back to our hotel.

Tonight we had dinner in Prague's Republic Square, and then walked home along then tourist streets and through Old Town Square.

It was dark by the time we arrived in the heart of Prague, so we got to enjoy this very pretty part of the Czech capital all lit up.

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You know you're in Europe when...#3

YOU know you're in Europe when...there are just as many dogs in the shops, restaurants and museums as on the footpaths outside.

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Ghetto blast

BEFORE the start of World War Two there were more than 35,000 Jews living in Prague.

Just a few years later, after Hitler's army was defeated and it was safe for the Czech Republic's surviving Jews to return to their homes in the nation's capital, only 3,500 moved back.

A large number of those who never returned died in the Nazi's concentration and labour camps, or simply fell victim to Hitler's Final Solution.

The loss of so many residents changed the face of Prague's Jewish Ghetto, the neighbourhood just a stone's throw from Old Town Square.

Before the Second War dozens of synagogues offered services, shops and businesses catered to the specific needs of the population, and a cemetery provided a place to bury the dead.

After to conflict six synagogues remained – only one providing a place to worship with the others turned into museums and memorials – and the glorious Art Nouveau buildings that define Prague were filled with residents who practiced a variety of faiths.

While Prague's Jewish Ghetto got the most press during World War Two, when Jews from around Czech were moved to the capital and locked within the wall of this inner-city neighbourhood, it had been home to this persecuted slice of the population for centuries.

The first Jews migrated to Prague in 920, and were given a place to live in the city's fifth district in the 1200s, and over the next few centuries they survived under various regimes who either flat-out hated them or barely tolerated their existence.

On five different occasions they were expelled from the city, and only bought their way back by paying high taxes, and there were even rulers during Austria's Hapsburg Dynasty that also locked the residents behind the walls and only let them out during the day when they were needed to work menial professions.

Today visitors to the Czech capital can do various tours of the Jewish Ghetto – walking jaunts with local guides or self-guided excursions with an audio devise giving commentary – with most expeditions visiting three synagogues as well as the town hall and cemetery.

I did a tour with a local guide this afternoon and the Two most impressive buildings we saw were the Pinkas Synagogue and the Spanish Synagogue, but for very different reasons.

The Pinkas Synagogue was constructed in the 16th Century, utilising the Renaissance style of design, but inside is what's memorable about this building.

In the 1950s, just 10 years after the end of the war, the names of the more than 77,000 Czechs who died on Hitler's command were written on the internal surfaces, in the same way that the names of America's dead are engraved on The Wall in Washington DC.

The names are written in disturbingly small print, with the family name etched in red paint and the first names of all the members of that clan who perished drawn in black.

Standing back and looking at the walls there seem to be only a few red names, and lots of black words between the scarlet letters, indicating just how many members of each family were killed by the Germans.

The inscription at the entrance simply states "this synagogue, where for centuries Prague’s Jews came to worship, is now a memorial to some 80,000 innocent men, women and children who have no grave and would otherwise remain forgotten''.

The Spanish Synagogue, which is a stroll from this thought-provoking memorial, is worth a mentions because of it's Versace-like decorations.

Every surface in this structure is covered with tiny golden tiles, some just making patterns while others become part of an ornate picture, and the windows are filled with stained glass in the same autumnal tones.

This place of worship was built during the 1800s to commemorate, according to our guide, ''the great time the Jews had in Spain''.

At that stage Prague's Jews were trying to assimilate, to become closer to the Catholics to reduce some of the drama, so the men and women were allowed to sit together during services and there was an organ to accompany the singing.

It was left to decay during the Communist years, but renovated after liberation in 1989, and now it is a tribute to over-the-top decorating.

Our tour also visited the Jewish Cemetery, the graveyard in the Ghetto that accommodates the remains of more than 120,000 residents.

The oldest headstone was erected in 1350 and when the cemetery was full a layer of dirt was added so new bones could be laid to rest on the next level, with our guide explaining that today the are thought to be at least 12 layers.

The Jewish Ghetto is just another Prague neighbourhood now, and it doesn't even look anything like the original because the first one was completely demolished in the 1890s and the current Art Nouveau buildings put on a new grid of streets.

But it's fascinating to walk around a collection of blocks that provided the backdrop for so many significant moments in religious history

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