Monday, October 31, 2005

Prague photos

Lack of inspiration (and a cold, which kept me home all day) led me to go through some of my Prague photos. Here are a few.

This first one was weird. We were walking through the palace complex, and I saw an amazing thing: this head at a window. I stared for a while, and it didn't move, so I thought it was a mannequin head. It was an odd place for a mannequin head to be, so naturally I took a picture. Then I found my friend.

"Look!" I said, pointing. "Look at that head!"

She looked, but it wasn't there.

I stared. Where had it gone? I checked my camera, and sure enough, there it was. It was a REAL head. It still looked odd, though.



These are sort of suitable for Halloween, I think. They were taken in a puppet shop. I wish I'd bought one, now. They were great.







And this is a Frank Gehry building, locally known as the Fred and Ginger building, because it appears to be dancing. It looked kind of messy in real life, but in pictures it looks good. I had never heard of Frank Gehry before this trip. One of the advantages of travelling with an architect is that you get to learn stuff.





Here are some details of the top of the building, which was rather photogenic.







And here is the changing of the guard at the palace. These guys stand there not moving and totally expressionless, while people stand beside them and pull faces and take pictures and kiss them and so on, and then when they change the guard they march off, totally expressionless ... except the guy in the middle, who could not contain his glee at finally being off duty (almost), and I caught him.



There was some work going on in the palace, and scaffolding all over one of the buildings. People were disappointed, but I thought it was all rather picturesque anyway. Don't you think this guy looks like he's going to break into song? He didn't, but I took his picture anyway.

4 comments:

The Village Idiot said...

Do they have Halloween in New Zealand? How about Japan? I just read that there's a backlash against it in Europe right now because it's too "American" but I would swear that some European brought it over here in their knapsack or something. (Maybe I'll go blog about that, now that I think of it).

As always, your pictures and your comments are terrific. The guy on the scaffolding does look like he might break into song, I love the fred and ginger building and the head in the window is priceless.

Thank you for being here,
the idiot.

kenju said...

Love the head in the window, and I can see why you'd be spooked if it disappeared.

That building looks drunk!

Anonymous said...

Always learn something from Badaunt...Frank Gehry's building is called "Dancing House" (literal translation) and I love it; I just found "Turning Torso" in Malmo Sweden by Santiago Calatrava....I want to see one of these buildings and am jealous as all get out of Badaunt!!! But grateful she shares her adventures.

Artistic Soul said...

Great shots! I am hoping to visit Prauge this summer, so I might ask you for suggestions of places to visit if it pans out!