I Heart Olomouc

Balloon seller at the Christmas markets. He has a cheeky grin!


During our stay in Prague, Anouska and I became increasingly tired of the 'big cities'. Since our trans-continental adventure began, we have craved authentic experiences. We got our wish in Vietnam and India, but in Europe it was harder to find. This is due to the highly developed nature of European cities and also because many European cities are geared towards attracting tourists, which basically means creating an artifical simulation of what is authentic. This is the reason we like to stay outside the city centre. Here, you get a better feel for a place. The pubs and cafes are where locals frequent, and as a result, you get better food, which is also significantly cheaper. My friend, Christina, hearing my plea to get away from the urbanised jungle, suggested we would find what we wanted if we visited one of the small Czech towns. After a search on the Lonely Planet forum, Olomouc kept coming up. People were commenting that it was a lovely, student town, cheap and untouched by tourism. It sounded almost too good to be true. So, we packed our things once again and caught a train out to the town that is apparently a modern utopia.


The hostel was called "Poet's Corner" and was on the 5th story of a building near the centre of town. Anouska unable to carry her her pack up, graciously allowed me to carry it as well as mine up for her. I cursed all the way up. When we finally got to the floor, having climbed innumerable step, I was expecting to see the St. Peter and the Pearly Gates, but all we found were more Australians. The hostel was run by ex-pat Australians. Unlike previous experiences, they were very pleasant and gave us a run down of the town and things to do and places to eat. It is also here that I met Jarrod, one of the employees from Melbourne, who was a kindred spirit in all things silly and who shares the same enthusiasm for 80's pop songs and the Beatles as I do.

"Hey Daniel, let's request "Come on Eileen" again! I don't know the words, but that doesn't matter".

Greg, the owner of the hostel is a mad ice-hockey fan. Every home game he rounds up his guests and takes them to see his beloved Olomoucs in a league game. The Czechs are masters at this sport. When Canada, the world champions lose, it is usually to these people. So we were expecting a good game. We found our seats, hugged ourselves tighly against the cold coming from the rink and sipped on our 1.5 Au beer waiting for the game to commence. Coming from a country where ice skating is a rare novelty and anyone who wished to pursue a career in it would be laughed at, I was amazed at the skill and dexterity these athletes displayed. I was also enthusiastic about the promise of brutality, of men being forced up against the barrier, in their mad frenzy to get the puck. The defining difference between a lot of sport in Australia is that it is fast paced. The game is divided into three periods of 20 minutes. The puck travels at great speeds, so it can be one down one end in a number of seconds. Being Australian, it wasn't long before my competitive spirit came out and I was cheering for the red-white Olomoucs and screaming at the opposition, calling them 'those wankers in blue'. The game lagged for the first half, but I didn't mind that too much as I enjoyed the cheap beer and the occasional man being squeezed into the glass. The second half yielded more entertainment with Olomouc holding out their lead against the blue wankers to take the game 4-3.

Anouska, taking an 'interest' in the sport.

Following the game, the group of travellers, consisting mostly of Australians, headed to a local brewery for a meal. Anouska and I ordered some potato pancakes and 3 pints, to go with the 3 we had already consumed at the game. From there, the group headed out into the snowfall to go to the best student bar in town, "Vertigo", which takes its name from the 1958 classic Alfred Hitchcock film starring Jimmy Steward and Kim Novak. It even has a print of the film on one side of the wall. It is a smokey, bohemianesque bar, which has 1.5 Au pints and plays a lot of rock and roll music from the 1960s. It was here Anouska and I further downed 3 pints, making the grand total of the evening 9. That is almost 5 litres of beer each. The night went from mild to wild when Jarrod and I initiated the trend of chair standing when "Come on Eileen came on". From here the night descended into a rowdy rabble with a group of very drunk Australians and Czech students dancing and singing along to classics. We went home as the sun was rising. I woke up feeling fine, despite the indulgance of the night before. Anouska however, could not manage to leave the hostel before late afternoon. We didn't learn our lesson obviously. Two nights there we were there again doing the very same thing.

Jarrod standing, me with a stupid face, Alex at the back and Simply Red in the foreground. He didn't like being called that, or being told (by me) that Simply Red is really ugly. I wonder why?


Judge for yourself.

If you're an architectural enthusiast like myself, you will find yourself leaving your travel companion to deal with their self imposed sickness to walk through the cobbled streets for a few hours to admire the design and beauty of the buildings and the statues of Olomouc. It is very similar to Prague with old Gothic buildings nestled in narrow laneways, except for one noticeable difference. Tourism has not touched upon the innocent beauty of this town. There is only one Macdonalds in the town centre and no Starbucks,

Burger King or Kentucky Fried Chicken. Where many cities have large metal structures twisted into indiscernible shapes and called "art", Olomouc has stuck with baroque stone structures, a mark of its cultural refinement. I think the true character of Olomouc comes out at night. Walking down the dimly lit streets is like being in a Franz Kafka story. The absence of neon lights in place of low watt floodlights brings out a nocturnal atmosphere that is unique to this place. The picture to the right emphasises the errie mis-en-scene that would probably occur in a David Lynch film, but which happens every single night here. But when one finds themselves separated from the drinking group at 4am in the morning, somewhat intoxicated and lost, the streets turn into a Gothic nightmare, where demons lurk in the shadows, the tortured facs of stone gargoyles seem almost alive and every face you pass stares at you in surreal disbelief. It might not seem so from the comment just made, but I am completely in love with this place. It is just so interesting. Give me some money and something to do and I would never leave.

Town Square at night.

You would not expect a small town in the Czech Republic would be home to an amazing cultural life. When you travel, you learn to assume a little less, because the world is so large and diverse, that anything is possible. The arts scene in Olomouc is like a university campus. Something is always on. If it's not jazz, then it plays, art galleries, independent films and tribute bands. They even have performance art at pubs. At pubs! I swear! Imagine seeing all that in Perth! I know, it's hard. And when you hear tribute band, you automatically think substandard, but the Doors group we saw was fantastic. The lead man came on stage, with long locks like Morrison himself, spoke to the audience in Czech and launched into an almost 2 hour set, doing the best impersonation I have ever seen. This little place in the middle of the Czech Republic with a population of 102000 should be renamed the cultural capital of Europe! It is absolutely brilliant.

I praise this place so much that the mayor should save his time and hand me the keys to the city now. If this place wasn't ideal enough, a paragraph concerning the cuisine will further promote this city as a modern day utopia. My favourite dish here was "Gossiping Aunt's Potato Pancakes", which was potato pancakes cooked with spinach, pork and cheese. The quality of the food overall is, like most things, better than in Prague. If Anouska wasn't drooling over pig knuckle, then she was exclaiming the culinary prowess of the pork stuff with cheese or the peach chicken. They not only make fine food, but sweets as well. Cafe '87 is home to the famous Chocolate pie, a delicious dark chocolate sensation that will wet your mouth and melt your heart. You can also pick up a lovely honey cake or even different cheeses covered with fruit sauces from the jazz club. There is an established dining culture here, which accounts for the reason why eateries can be found all over the city, from pubs to cafes to restaurants. Even one of the tea houses do food. I suspect the abundance of food is why Anouska has taken so well to Olomouc. I am very surprised that we have not gained any weight.

The perfect coffee companion.

Christmas is a time of friends and family. This doctrine is strongly followed in the Czech Republic. This can be seen in the festivities at the Christmas market of the town square. Hundred of small, wooden stalls are erected selling all kind of seasonal treats from hot wine punch to children's toys. The Olomouc christmas markets has a loving and warm atmosphere that I have never seen before. Families come to celebrate the joy of Christmas, while couples kiss under the lights. Old friends share a hot wine punch and pass on their season greetings. It is a beautiful display of human interaction. It is sad to think that if this kind of event was staged in Australia, it would be hijacked by drunked youths. I am glad to see that there are places in the world that Christmas still means something other than material gain. I believe we still practice that believe individually in Australia, but as a society the spirit of Christmas is nothing more than a excuse of excess.

Give me that one, and that one.