This is how you don't touch people.

So, it's been a while. Given that there is a line of people behind me waiting to use the only computer in the hotel, and I have not seen a proper internet cafe in all of Prague, this will have to be short. The friends' page will have to wait until Phoenix before I can go through it thoroughly. If I miss anything dead important / pertaining to me specifically, please point it out. It's been difficult to get internet lately; Erfut didn't have any usable internet within a fifty minute radius, and all of the cafes in Amsterdam were beneath hash bars where those-under-eighteen are not allowed, and though I am a legal adult, I couldn't leave half my group stranded for an hour.

Hopefully all of my emails won't bounce back this time. The AOL SMTP server really hated Belgium.

Let it be said that last night I was serenaded at my very Czech dinner by Hannibal Lecter playing "Don't Worry, Be Happy" the accordion. I kid you not. The guy was a dead ringer for Anthony Hopkins, just a bit fuller in the cheeks. It was extreme.

I absolutely love Prague. The souvenir shops here are extreme, and I'm usually not one to be swayed by tacky souvenirs. Excellent marionettes and beautiful glasswork and pocket watches, that sort of thing. I want to find a pocket watch of the astrological clock in the town's main square (think alchemical-arcane, yet understated), but so far, no dice. I'll settle for what I can find. I also found a nifty weapons shops with damn cheap wares (among them semi-automatic guns) I wanted to browse longer, but the group moved along pretty quickly. Hopefully I'll get to go back. Some of those knives look rather attractive. This is a lovely city, and compared to the rest of Europe, things are cheap. The beer is cheaper than water or soda, and beer tastes like piss to me the majority of the time, but that is negligible. Yesterday was miserably hot, but it has been overcast and drizzly all day today, which was lovely. We took a six-hour walking tour of the palace, the cathedral, the Holocaust memorial, the Jewish cemetary, and a rather ornate Spanish-styled synagogue, among other things. The Holocaust memorial was sobering. The walls are thick with the names of Czech Jews that were slaughtered, and the upper floor is dedicated to actual drawings by children who were in the concentration camps. That latter part was a real hit to the gut. They're childish Crayon drawings like those you'd see from schoolchildren today, except they feature various topics from life in the camp dorms to their parents to memories of home to dragons and princesses. Next to each name was either a date of death (all either 1943 or 1944), or a note that the child survived the camps. I'd say that only 20% of the names--max--had the "survived" note. Those pictures are a hell of a lot more powerful than the hundred-thousand names on the marble walls. It's the Anne Frank effect: attaching a life to the death.

Amsterdam was a bit disappointing, given all the hype I've heard about it, but it was still enjoyable. We browsed through the red-light district, which is quite open in advertising its wares (didn't know some of the men dressed like sailor-rejects of the marching band), but I did notice that a couple of the ladies in the windows looked rather young and inexperienced in their movements. I wondered if they were there willingly, or if they were thinking about a home from which they were stolen--where people love them and respect them as human beings--or if they were just broken in spirit. Most of the whores were lounging in doorways and talking casually; it's sort of a mockery of the "gathering around the water cooler" concept. It's just another day of work to them. Since our free day there was on Sunday, the condom museum (boasting the world's largest collection of condoms) and the sex museum were closed, so we took a stroll and argued about what we were going to do, until we decided to go to the Hard Rock Cafe for dinner. Death Cab for Cutie happened to be playing in town that evening, and one of our friends secured a handful of tickets, so half of the dinner group, myself included, saw that. I am admittedly not a big fan, having heard their stuff perhaps twice, but zychi wanted to go, so I went. It made me think of voodoobob, as I know that is one of her favorite bands. It was a good show, though it took me a while to get into it. We also visited Anne Frank's house--you know, the secret annex and everything--the details of which I will spare given that I assume most of you have studied her story in one form or another. It was, again, sobering. I can be a real bleeding heart when it comes right down to it.

Apparently, Dutch marijuana is far stronger than the varieties one can find in America. I would not have either point of reference, but I heard scatterings of interesting high-stories.

Oh, somebody decided to title a porn movie Serving Ryan's Privates. Brilliant. Pornos have the most creative titles. Apparently Anal Ramming 14 is available now. I've been waiting for that one for months. I have the first thirteen of the series on remastered surround-sound DVD. Autographed and everything.

Erfut was a one-night stop on the way to Prague, during which not much else besides a soccer game happened. Tomorrow we have a may-be-canceled tour of a small mining town here in Czech, and the day after that, we spend two days commuting to Berlin, and from there, back to Arid-zona. Home sweet home. That will be July 3, which means I'll be traveling Fourth of July weekend, God help me.

The day I get back, everybody will be at Anime Expo, so when you all get home, I'll be there. Probably still sleeping. If, for whatever reason, you guys don't hear from me before you leave, have an orgasmic time, take lots of pictures, and grope CLAMP for me. (keichisfuuma, you're still getting my Tokyo Babylon Photographs signed if possible, right? I'll be indebted to you.) Tell everybody I say hello, and that I'll make every effort to attend more conventions the rest of the year. I am sure you guys are hella busy with the last-days con-rush. I'll be thinking of you guys and the convention those days, you can be sure.

It's the last leg of the trip. I'm having a blast, but I'll also be happy to be home. Then it'll be time to start frantically setting my college schedule and taking care of things on that side of business.

There is a Japanese movie on TV behind me with Czech subtitles. I'm understanding infinately more Japanese than Czech.