PragueScape

One of the things I find charming about Prague is the tradition of regular folks -- usually from the country, it seems to me -- coming into the city to sell things from their gardens, often outside metro stations.

Little bouquets of wild flowers or grape hyacinth, freshly picked and daintily tied and wrapped in leaves of ivy. Bunches of daffodils. Stalks of pussy willows.

I caught up with these two friendly folks outside the metro station at Hradcanska. I bought a bunch of flowers from each to give as a gift.

I don't know their names, or where they're from, but they brightened my day, and I thank them.

PragueScape

As I was taking this picture of a roadside potato seller in my home village of Cerny Vul, I could sees an older man approaching me from my right. He was carrying plastic bags in each hand, and was wearing a large overcoat. He must have just gotten off the bus from the stop up the hill.

I didn't expect him to say anything to me, that's for sure.

"What does that sign mean?" he asked me, in perfect, if accented, English.

"It means if you buy three bags of potatoes, you get two bags free," I replied.

"What's someone going to do with that many potatoes?!" the man said.

"Yes, that's an awful lot of potatoes," I agreed. "I guess it shows how important potatoes are to the Czech diet."

"You'd have to have all of your friends over for a potato party!" he said.

Turns out he's a civil engineer living for the time being in Cerny Vul. I was dressed in my cycling clothes, which is why he said he spoke English to me right off the bat.

"You'd never be a Czech in that outfit," he said, which of course isn't true in the slightest.

I never did get his nationality.

He asked me what I was doing in Prague, and I told him I worked for Radio Free Europe. He was very familiar with it.

"Make people happy, and make people free," he said, as we shook hands and parted ways.

PragueScape is a photo series documenting the quirky, the delightful, the odd, and the unexplainable side of life in the Czech capital.

PragueScape

pince-nez /pins-ney or pans-ney/ n. a pair of eyeglasses with a nose clip instead of earpieces.

I saw this dapper gentlemen sitting on the Prague metro as I was riding home from work. Dressed in an elegant black suit and a bowler hat, and balancing a pair of gold pince-nez on his nose, he was a vision from 1890, not 2008.

The pince-nez had a delicate gold chain hanging from its right lens.

I don't think I've ever seen anyone wearing a pair of pince-nez before.

To make the time-warp even more striking, he was busily tapping away at some sort of PDA or Blackberry.

I can only presume there was a horse and carriage outside his metro stop, waiting to whisk him home.

Forgive the blurry image. I was a little shy about taking the gentleman's picture, so I turned off the flash.

PragueScape is a photo series documenting the quirky, the delightful, the odd, and the unexplainable side of life in the Czech capital.