Back Home Again in Indiana

Ok! finally I have a moment to write about Prague. I don't want you to think that we didn't like it. It was very beautiful in the city center and very different from all the other cities we had visited in Europe. It was quite chilly and mostly grey everyday but we didn't mind. It even snowed one morning and we got some great pictures of Prague castle in the snow. And the actual snowflakes were so huge that when they landed on you you could easily see the beautiful shapeswith five points. (There is a picture on Damien's photo site of me with one in my eyelash!) We took a tour of Prague castle and it's cathedral which wasn't finished for 600 years due to wars and changing of authority over the centuries. We didn't know much about Czech history so it was very interesting. The city was full of old Czech style churches, colorful building facades and tourists shops full of wooden puppets and jewelry. From what we had read in guide books the food in Prague was going to be bland, heavy and inferior to the rest of Europe. But don't listen to guide books!!! We thought Czech food was some of the best of the trip. Lots of bread and potato dumplings, thin slices of nice meat with delicious sauces and of course outstanding beer!!! The prices for food were cheaper than we were used to back home and in western Europe but other things were the same or more. For example, prices to get into tourist attractions, good hotels, and rent for apartments. The public transport system though was quite nice and cheap and easy to use. We mainly used the tram system that went through the city streets. We had heard the people were rude esp. in restaurants. I wouldn't say they were rude, just unenthusiastic. It comes from years living under Communisim. So why didn't we stay? We both interviewed with a big English school in Prague. The job itself sounded okay but the fact that it would involve 15 hours of travel time per week and only paid US$550 a month after taxes was not. We would have been on our own to find a place to live and rents are western prices!! And we wouldn't have gotten paid for more than 2 months. We didn't have enough money to last that long and set ourselves up and then we figured we even once we started getting paid we wouldn't be able to do anything and would come home penniless!
So, to make a long story short we decided to leave. then the real hard part began. What do we do now? We spent the next 5 days in Prague staying on hard beds in an empty hostel on the "other side of the tracks", religiously stopping off in internet cafes to do research, and trying our best to see the city as tourists before escaping! Of course our best option were to fly to the US or Australia. Airfare to the US was much cheaper of course so we opted for that. Damien had never been to the US and it would be a good place to regroup and figure out what we wanted to do next. We bought plane tickets from Prague to London and then from London to Indy flying out 2 days later. It was all a bit hectic and was a LOT of traveling in a short period of time. Even though we didn't have any money to do anything in London we managed to have an interesting 2 days going to the (free) science museum which was outstanding and hanging out in Hyde park.
So, we have been in Indianapolis now for about 3 weeks. I have been showing Damien around and we drove down to my old college town the other day too. Been to some musems and hung out with my friends and family. He is bascially on holiday so doesn't have to worry about anything but I have to get some money coming in! I have been interviewing for jobs this week and finally got one. I am very excited about it. I will be the administrative assistant for the Japan-America Society in Indiana. It is just a small 3 person office (including myself) and it will be a lot of work. But it pays pretty well with good benefits and most importantly I will be working with Japanese people everyday and get to use and maybe even improve my Japanese language skills! It is a great oppotunity for me.
Well, sorry this is so long but I wanted to update everything until now. I have organized all my trip pictures and will post some more today. Damien has posted some so you can check out his link.
cheers