Boat Party

◊ Well, FYI the boat party Thursday was somewhat of a bust. I heard that there were 350 people on board and I swore I saw a sing stating that the maximum capacity of the boat was 250. As you can imagine it was rather crowded. The party theme was "Heaven or Hell" and so everybody was supposed to dress along these lines. For my "costume" I pined a sign that said 'Optimist' to my hat because, as you all know, Hell is full of optimists. Not too many people got the joke but I thought it was funny which is all that matters. Anyways, as soon as I boarded I could tell that the evening probably was not going to end well. Near the back of the boat where we found a table were what appeared to be futbol hooligans dressed as angles. Ironic, no? This particular group were making an incessant chant and jumping up and down hitting the outdoor canopy like they were trying to break it. I grabbed a Budvar and kicked back for a nice cruise
◊ The cruise it's self was nice. We headed south up the river, going under most of Prague's bridges. Every time we did all of the people on the top of the boat would scream like there was no tomorrow. The music was a pretty good mix that covered pretty much every party genre know to man. I had a few nice conversations and got a few pictures. I even ran into Maro who I have not seen in more than a month. About 20 minutes into the cruise I was in the mood for another beer. Somehow in that time they had "run out of clean .5L glasses and could only pour .3L glasses." I found this hard to believe because the Czech version of washing beer glasses consists of dunking them in hot water for a few seconds to wash out the old beer. Once I tasted it, however, I knew exactly what was up. It tasted like water. I figure they underestimated how much beer 350 college students are capable of drinking in one evening. To ensure they did not run out and have a riot on their hands, they cut the portion size and watered down the drinks. I didn't bother with the drinks for the rest of the night. I know most of the pictures I have here are not very good, but it was dark and I was on a moving boat. Cut me some slack.

The tram ride there. I forgot my ticket and had to run back to Masarykova. Oops.

Going under the Charles Bridge




Vysharad

◊ Embarrassing Story: Down in the student club a few months back The Russians were making idle chat with some Czech guy we were sharing a table with. I wasn't really listening because I was watching someone make a drunken fool of themself on the dance floor. One moment they were talking about majors and he turns to me, offers me a handshake, and says "I'm standard." Without looking or thinking, I returned the handshake and replied, "Oh, I'm electrical." Everyone at the table gave me the oddest of looks and that was when Lira lead over and whispered, "That was his name!" Oops. Boy did I have egg on my face. To this day I am still uncertain as to what his name actually is, only that it sounds exactly like Standard. Obviously I have been avoiding him since out of embarrassment. That did not work on that boat and it made for an interesting conversation.

My Czech buddy Maro.
Oh yeah, and Nelson after about 10 watered down beers.


None of these next pictures really turned out or are any good for that matter.
I present them to you purely for their artistic value, which may or may not be very high, but it is all they have.

◊ Near the end of the cruise the Spanish began to get more and more rowdy. The hooligans began to chant their traditional futbol chant. "Ole Ole Ole Ole Ole Ole Ole Ole ...". That is about when furniture began to be thrown overboard. Then beer glasses started to go too. Also, someone reached over one of the bars and reportedly stole a bottle of whisky and a bottle of wine causing the closure of the bar. Once we were docked, the party was supposed to continue until 2AM. This did not happen because the staff decided to throw the whole lot of us off of the boat. Their first attempts on the part of the crew to convey the fact that the party was over did not go over so well. In fact it did not go over at all. The revelers on the top deck had a moment of awkward silence before going back to chanting and jumping around. I decided to make my way to the shore where I could get an entertaining view into each deck as the crew struggled to clear the boat of rambunctious foreign students and their Czech cohorts. By far the most amusing was watching the confrontation with the Spanish students on the top deck. It took a lot of convincing and a whole lot of shoving before they finally acknowledged that they were going to have to leave.
◊ By that time, however, exiting the boat was becoming a daunting task. There was only one narrow gangway on or off. It had not been a problem during boarding because that took place over a period of one hour. There was much confusion among the students as to why they had to leave and many did not believe it or take it seriously. These people took the liberty to stand on the outside walkway which was the only way to the front and then off. Most of the people were stuck behind them and yet they could not see the terrible traffic jam they were causing with their choice of location.
◊ I checked the time and noticed that it was not even midnight so some of us made a dash for the nearest metro station to catch the last train home. I hear that many of the students decided to take the party to a dance club and that it too stunk. And if you were wondering, I have not heard of anybody streaking across the Charles Bridge, least of all me.