Prague really is golden

Hello blog fans! (I'm dubbing you "Carroteers"; if anyone has a better name, let me know.)

This is my last full day in Prague, and the MedNet conference has concluded. All that's left for me to do is SHOP, EAT, and BOOGIE! In that order.

I won't belabor you and myself (time to get downtown to the Christmas markets, already!) but rather will offer a few select impressions and images. I might go into some other things later on. For now here's a few fun things to ponder.

Now, then. Does anyone have any idea what this is?

Neither did I. It was found on the wall of my hotel room right next to the door. After a call to the desk about having no working lights, I learned something new that evidently one would only know by staying in European hotels. At least, I assume that's where they get it from; I don't really stay in hotels much, so pardon my ignorance.

It's quite ingenious, really -- you stick your key card into it as soon as you walk in to the room, and it enables all the room lights. It holds your key safely until you leave, at which point the lights will be deactivated, so as not to waste power. (I wonder if this was actually borne out of a culture of conservation, such as the CEE countries would logically have had before 1989 and then until their post-revolution economic recovery. Makes sense, anyhoo.)

Here's my hotel, the Prague Crowne Plaza. Kind of elegant & grand, kind of tacky. Four stars (not five, mind you), but kind of in a run-down neighborhood with not much else around it. It's 2 tram stops & then a metro ride away from the old town, which is a pain but once I figured it out it became not a big deal.


A shot of the hotel lobby decked out for Christmas. Other than the creepy unused reception halls tucked in every corner, my favorite thing about this place is the fitness center, which is the most-modern and well-kept-up part of the Crowne Plaza.


I'll hafta check this museum out sometime in the future. (All matrioshka dolls should look like that -- they ARE evil, ya know.)