Where the Prague am I?

In January of 1995 I moved to Vienna, Austria to "study" abroad. Two weeks into it, I began my primary objective: to travel through Europe and I took the train to Prague. I remember it snowed a bit and I drank a lot with some newly acquired friends, fellow Americans including my perfect travel partner for the duration, Heather.

We got off the train, drunk, in the middle of the night, with no cellphone or local currency or Atm. I remember finding a taxi driver and somehow he took us to a hostel and somehow we paid him something, as you did in those days.

We fell in love with Prague, meandering the charming streets, meandering so much that we got lost a lot and perhaps in a tipsy haze, we started exclaiming: "where the Prague are we?!" This phrase has lasted twenty years, as I use it anytime I am lost to this day. "Where the Prague am I?" I will ask driving somewhere new for the first time.

My other memory of Prague is traveling there with my mom. I have two distinct memories: one of her getting her wallet stolen in the Prague subway. Luckily she heeded my well-honed travel acumen and had removed all valuables - save her checkbook, which I don't think was much use in the Czech Republic. The other memory is of us going to see a Marionette performance of Don Giovanni, which was fantastic. The actors sang amazing opera while working puppets!

Twenty years later, Prague is still charming as hell. Even teeming with tourists, I would just look up to find another stunning building and have its charm wash over me.

My return was slightly triumphant. I was here to present my new violence against women in elections framework on a panel. The panel went well and by far the best part for me was sharing it with one of my all time heroes: Monica McWilliams. Monica was a key figure in the Northern Ireland peace process. She was one of two women to be elected to the first NI parliament. The list of her accolades is long. The last time I saw her was testifying on Capitol Hill.

After the panel, she and the others on the panel grabbed lunch. It was so great to chat with her and remind her that we met in Belfast in 1997. We remembered people together. It was wonderful.

With but a few days in the ground, I mostly wandered around old town. My hotel was located just on the other side of the Charles bridge. I traipsed that amazing site frequently, each and every time awe struck. In fact, I was always having to sprint on the other side, late for a conference event, because I couldn't stop taking pictures.

My hotel, the Aria hotel was quite a bump up from my hostel and pension days. Themed on music, my room was on the Jazz floor and looked out onto the Vrtba gardens, a secret garden in the middle of the city that is a UNESCO world heritage site. After a long day, I went up to the rooftop restaurant and ordered homemade strawberry dumplings, watched some fireworks go off over the city and felt grateful for my life.