Welcome Back to Suburban Bohemia

6 May, 2012 / PraguePig.com / No comments

It seems like a long time ago now but I used to write a column/blog, called Tales From Suburban Bohemia, about my life in Prague.

Then everything changed.

The things that once sustained me — irony, internet memes, smoky pubs, football, indie rock — began to lose their appeal and I started to wonder what I was doing with my life.

I lost a ton of weight (again), began wearing shirts and chinos, and started taking myself terribly seriously.

The interesting things going on in my life were no longer things I felt comfortable writing about.

Tales From Suburban Bohemia fell by the wayside, along with the rest of the Stumpy Moose website.

Instead, I got in touch with my emotions. It was terrifying.

After 15 years, the relationship that brought me to Prague came to an end and I was suddenly a single man in a strange new world.

On good days, the possibilities seemed endless; on bad days, I felt utterly lost.

I grew up a lot, tried new things, made new friends and even had a go at dating.

Somewhere along the way, I fell in love. Twice. (Neither quite worked out the way I’d hoped but there are worse things in this world than having smart, funny, beautiful friends.)

I probably drank too much but, this being Prague, nobody seemed to notice.

Generally, though, I was much happier and healthier. For the first time in a long time, I felt alive.

And yet…

I missed that guy — the king of useless stuff.

He may have been an anti-social tubber but he made me laugh.

And as the dust began to settle and some degree of normality returned to my life, the pendulum seemed to swing back the other way.

I learned to love football and music again and began to rediscover my sense of humour. Sometimes I even wore a T-shirt.

It was time, I realized, to revive Tales From Suburban Bohemia.

To the relief of pretty much everyone involved, I won’t be dealing with any of the stuff I mentioned above here.

Instead of affairs-of-the-heart and midlife crises, I’ll be going back to basics. Readers of the old Tales From Suburban Bohemia will know what to expect:

Irrelevant observations about expat life in Prague.

Endless obsessing over pre-packaged sandwiches.

Over-long reviews of boring Czech museums.

Obscure Rutles references.

That kind of thing.

The adventure continues…

Sam Beckwith
Prague, Czech Republic

“Caught between the real me and the need to change”

Category: Suburban Bohemia /

The Gábina Partyšová-Josef Kokta-Daniel Zahrádka ‘Love Triangle’

22 April, 2012 / PraguePig.com / No comments

Up to 120,000 people demonstrated against the government in Prague on Saturday but that wasn’t enough to keep Gábina Partyšová off the front pages of both Blesk’s and Aha!’s Sunday editions.

The cause of this tabloid feeding frenzy is the apparently precarious state of the 33-year-old TV presenter/singer/glamour model’s 10-year-old marriage to Josef “Pepa” Kokta, a 55-year-old “former market speculator”.

Partyšová’s decision to take 32-year-old photographer Daniel Zahrádka to last weekend’s TýTý awards ceremony, rather than her husband, has inevitably led to speculation that Gábina — who presents Prima’s Top Star Magazín show and also has a pop career under the name Gabriela — is having an affair with Zahrádka, despite her describing him as a “family friend”.

Under the headline “Husband Face to Face With ‘Lover”, today’s Aha! features photos of Partyšová, Kokta, Zahrádka and Zahrádka’s wife taken in the car park of Soho, a fancy sushi restaurant in Prague 4-Podolí.

In an interview with Blesk, meanwhile, Kokta, says he doesn’t regard extramarital sex as being unfaithful, that he isn’t considering divorce and that he’s still in love with his wife.

Blesk helpfully runs a box alongside this interview, headlined “Gabina’s Difficult Choice”, contrasting photographs of “Sturdy Pepa” — dressed in a Hawaiian shirt, beach shorts and flip-flops — and “Dude Danny” — wearing a “romantic scarf” and “long, shiny boots” and with his “belt buckle of victory” highlighted — and invites readers to vote for which one they’d choose.

One thing about this story strikes me as odd, though: Is it at all significant that much of this speculation also features in the press section of Partyšová’s official website?

Category: Czech Celebrities, Music, Sex, Television /

Video: High-Speed Prague Police Chase

14 April, 2012 / PraguePig.com / No comments

Just another day on the streets of Prague:

Uploaded to YouTube by bohdees with the following description:

Police chase from 3rd of April, 2012, recorded from police helicopter above Prague. Suspect is trying to escape in his black VW Passat, police cars are chasing him, finally the suspect is arrested. During this chasing, police is shooting at black VW Passat, unfortunately hits another car.

Anybody know which part of town this is?

(Link via Robert Polo)

Category: Crime, Czech Police, Uncategorized /

Meet the New Česká Miss: Tereza Chlebovská

2 April, 2012 / PraguePig.com / No comments

Česká Miss 2012

Tereza Chlebovská (centre) was named Česká Miss (Czech Miss) on Saturday night by a jury chaired by Italian actress Claudia Cardinale and will represent the Czech Republic at the upcoming Miss World, Miss Earth and Miss Universe beauty pageants.

(Wikipedia describes Miss Earth as “an annual international beauty pageant promoting environmental awareness”. So now you know.)

The 21-year-old describes herself as “an ordinary girl with a sense of humor, sometimes irritable, who goes after her dreams”, and her motto, loosely translated, is “Whoever wants something finds a way; whoever doesn’t want something finds a reason”.

Born in the unpronounceable west Bohemian village of Třemešné, she grew up in Krnov, an industrial town in Silesia, way over on the unfashionable side of the Czech Republic, and currently studies music and health education at the University of Ostrava (Ostravská univerzita).

Her interests are dance, sport (mainly volleyball), modelling, cookery, travel, LARPing and spending time with family and friends.

Blesk.cz, a Česká Miss media partner, invited Tereza to its offices this morning, where, in the slightly creepy tone Czech tabloids reserve for beauty queens, they describe how she “bewitched” Andre Regli, the Swiss ambassador to the Czech Republic, who, somewhat randomly, happened to be passing through.

(Not really backing up its claim, Blesk breathlessly describes how “the ambassador spent a long time shaking hands with Česká Miss 2012″ and how they “exchanged several sentences”.)

Saturday’s pageant also saw Linda Bartošová (pictured left) named “Česká Miss World” and Tereza Fajksová (right) “Česká Miss Earth”, which sounds impressive but is really just a fancy way of saying LOSER.

And yes: I did make up the bit about LARPing.

Link

Category: Czech Celebrities, Sex, Television /

Drunk-Driving “Mafioso” Lobbyist Roman Janoušek Injures Woman, Flees Crash Scene

25 March, 2012 / PraguePig.com / No comments

Roman Janoušek Infographic

Roman Janoušek’s campaign to become the Czech Republic’s most-hated man is off to a flying start.

Two days after telephone transcripts emerged apparently showing then Prague Mayor Pavel Bém asking the lobbyist for his approval of city property deals, Janoušek allegedly fled the scene after injuring a woman while driving drunk.

Described by Blesk as the “biggest Mafioso in Prague” and, in a banner headline, “Mr. Pig” (steady on!), Janoušek reportedly hit a 51-year-old “foreigner of Asian origin” while driving away from the scene of a prang on Vyskočilova street in Prague 4-Michle on Friday afternoon.

According to Blesk, the 43-year-old multi-millionaire had driven his “luxury Porsche” into the back of the Asian woman’s Volvo then hit her as he drove off. The woman suffered multiple injuries and was later taken to Motol hospital.

The tabloid’s coverage of the incident, which took up the first five pages of its Saturday edition, includes a helpful infographic (pictured above), vaguely reminiscent of Taiwan’s wonderful Apple Daily animations.

Police later apprehended Janoušek, whose nicknames include “Voldemort”, on Pujmanové street in Prague 4-Krč, and after interviewing him for several hours, began criminal proceedings against him and released him.

Janoušek’s current whereabouts are unknown, leading Blesk to speculate that his powerful associates — who also include deputy Czech police president Ladislav Husák and Prague’s deputy chief prosecutor Libor Grygárek — could be conspiring to protect him.

For non-Czech speakers, ČeskéNoviny.cz has an English-language account of the incident, albeit one somewhat less colourful than the Blesk account linked to below.

Link

Category: Corruption, Crime, Czech Police, Politics /

Break Dance Ride Injures Two at Matějská pouť

18 March, 2012 / PraguePig.com / One comment

A ride that injured two girls has been removed from Matějská pouť (St. Matthew’s Fair) at the Incheba Expo Praha fairgrounds in Prague 7-Holešovice.

The accident occured on the afternoon of Thursday 15 March when a car fell off the Break Dance ride — a regular fixture of Matějská pouť and other travelling fairs that visit Prague. (I’ve been on it myself at least once.)

While the ride itself has been removed from the fair, a video of the Break Dance still figures prominently on the official Matějská pouť website‘s homepage — complete with an unintentionally ironic soundtrack of screaming thrill-seekers.

The cause of the accident, which is still unknown, is being investigated by the police.

iDnes.cz has photos and video of the scene of the accident at the link below.

Link

Category: Accidents, Carnies /

Know Your Czech Celebrity: Karel Gott

11 March, 2012 / PraguePig.com / No comments

Karel Gott

In this new feature, I’ll be introducing the celebs who are the mainstays of the Czech tabloids. And where better to start than with legendary crooner and septuagenarian sex symbol Karel Gott?

Here, then, are 10 things you should know about the “Golden Voice of Prague”/”Sinatra of the East”/”Bringer of Good News”:

1. Gott’s big break was becoming one of the resident singers at Divadlo Semafor in 1963. The Prague theatre was at the forefront of the Czech pop scene in the early ’60s, launching the careers of several singers.

2. His breakthrough hit, released in 1963, was Oči sněhem zaváté (“Eyes Covered by Snow”).

3. He’s won the Zlatý slavík/Český slavík (Golden Nightingale/Czech Nightingale) “best male singer” award a record 37 times. He first won the prize, the winner of which is decided by a nationwide poll, in 1963. This year’s (2011′s) triumph was his 13th consecutive win since 1999.

4. He’s huge in the German-speaking world, where he has a lifetime contract with Polydor. His big breakthrough came in 1965 when he was “discovered” by Austrian producer Ossi Drechsler at the Bratislavská lýra (“Bratislava Lyre”) festival.

5. He had a six-month-long engagement at Las Vegas’s Frontier Hotel in 1967.

6. He represented Austria at the 1968 Eurovision Song Contest. The song, Tausend Fenster (“A Thousand Windows”), finished joint 13th with two points.

7. Gott signed the Communist regime’s notorious Anticharta in 1977, publicly opposing Charta 77 (“Charter 77″), a document drawn up by Václav Havel and other dissidents demanding that the Czechoslovak government respect basic human rights.

8. Gott, who turns 73 in July (2012), is married to 36-year-old Ivana Macháčková-Gottová

9. Gott became a father for the fourth time in 2008, at the age of 68, when Ivana gave birth to Nelly, his third daughter. Gott has one other daughter (Charlotte) with Ivana, and a son and a daughter (Dominika and Lucie) from two previous relationships.

10. In 2010, he ventured into hip-hop, collaborating with German rapper Bushido on Für immer jung, a single based on the Alphaville track Forever Young.

Category: Czech Celebrities, Music, Sex /

Prague Police vs. Blind Accordion-Player (Video)

8 January, 2012 / PraguePig.com / No comments

Prague’s finest tackle a major threat to law and order on the mean streets of the Golden City: the blind accordion-playing busker on Národní třída.

This daring operation, involving around 10 Městská policie (Municipal Police) officers and three squad cars, was captured on video by YouTube user František Hucek last February (2011).

Link

Category: Czech Police, WTF /

Parts of Murdered Woman Found in Prague 3 and Prague 4

1 January, 2012 / PraguePig.com / No comments

A severed pair of hands found in Prague 4-Modřany and a human torso found in Prague 3-Žižkov belong to the same woman, according to a police autopsy.

The hands were discovered on Tuesday 6 December in the Kunratický potok woods, not far from the Jižní spojka highway; the torso was uncovered on Saturday 24 December in another wooded area, Lesopark Krejcárek.

According to police spokesman Tomáš Hulan, the cops are still waiting for confirmation from DNA experts that the hands and torso match but are working on the assumption that they belong to a woman who died on Monday 5 December.

It’s thought that the body parts were those of a 40-to-45-year-old blonde or redhead around 170-175 centimetres (5′ 7″-5′ 9″) in height.

The police are treating the case as murder.

Link

Category: Crime, Czech Police / Tags: , , , ,

VoZP’s Shameless Havel Death Cash-In

26 December, 2011 / PraguePig.com / No comments

VOZP

As the Czech Republic mourned Václav Havel’s death, which bright spark at health insurance company VoZP (Vojenská zdravotní pojišťovna; “Military Health Insurance”) decided this tasteless banner ad was a good idea?

Roughly translated, the copy reads: “Former president, writer and dramatist Václav Havel, an insurance-holder with VoZP Czech Republic, has died”

It’s since been removed from the site.

Category: Advertising, Internet, WTF / Tags: , , , , , ,
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