The day before yesterday we walked around in our neighborhood, which is the Jewish Quarter. You know how I've been going on and on about all the churches and cathedrals I've seen? Well, the day before yesterday I saw a synagogue! Unfortunately, we weren't allowed to take pictures inside, and the outside was at a weird angle and wasn't as significant. But it was pretty cool because that synagogue was built in1270 and is one of the oldest synagogues in Europe. It's called the Old New Synagogue. Weird, right? But I guess it was the newest synagogue when it was built and it's the oldest now so it kind of makes sense. After we toured that we walked around and saw two other synagogues from the outside, one of which is called the Spanish Synagogue because it's very Moorish influenced. So cool! We were also supposed to see the cemetery (the awesome ancient one that's outside my window) but that didn't work out in the end. I should also mention that the cemetery was first used in the early 15th century, not the 13th century which I said before. But it was the only cemetery allowed to Jews when the Jewish Quarter was a ghetto so even though it's pretty small, about 40,000 people were buried there and it's a whole floor above the street. People are buried 12 layers deep! I guess it makes sense because it was the only place for them to bury people. The only way it stays up so high above everything else is by a giant wall. Pretty crazy. Anyways, after the synagogues we went to another cathedral in this beautiful plaza and then went to the Mucha Museum.
The Spanish Synagogue
In case you didn't know (because I sure didn't before two days ago) Alfons Mucha is a famous Czech artist who developed a beautiful style of graphic art in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He was also extremely patriotic and made a series of HUMONGOUS paintings--20 in all--called the Slav Epic, each commemorating a different moment in Slavic and Czech history. I think I heard that all of the paintings together cover almost half a square kilometer! Pretty awesome and/or crazy, huh? Anyway, the day before yesterday we went to his museum of graphic art. His stuff is beautiful and was very innovative at the time. I totally would've wanted him to make my posters and advertisements, and that's pretty much what he did except each one was a gorgeous piece of art.
Examples of Mucha
Yesterday we got out of the house pretty late, and eventually made our way to the National Gallery, the site of the Slav Epic. The museum was pretty huge so we only got through the top two floors before we decided to just skip all the way down to the first floor to see the Slav Epic. It's pretty amazing. You can't really tell from a photograph but the smallest are no smaller than 20 feet x 20 feet and the largest are AT LEAST 40 feet x 40 feet. When it comes to paintings Mucha is good--not the best but still very good--but the sheer size of the project is EXTREMELY impressive. It was also very interesting because I am part Slavic, a part of my family culture that I am not that familiar with. Generally I just say I'm Russian, but that's not at all accurate. My maternal grandfather's family comes from what is now present-day Slovakia. They were Carpatho-Rusyn, which means they belonged to a sub-ethnic group of Slavs that live in the Carpathian Mountains. This was an area that was constantly being taken over by the Ottoman and Austro-Hungarian Empires, and we think that my great-great grandfather left at age 18 so as not to be recruited by the Austro-Hungarian army. So it was pretty cool to be able to learn more about Slavic history and patriotism through the paintings.
These were some of my favorites
So that was what happened in the last few days. Today will be a rest day because we've been traveling and going places every day for the past two and a half weeks! Seriously we haven't had a single day just chilling at home. Which doesn't sound that bad but is very tiring. So today will be an open day except for tonight, when we'll be going to the opera!!! I'm super excited because I have never been to the opera before, ever. I would've liked my first trip to the opera to be Carmen, but oh well, any opera is exciting! We are going to see Die Fledermaus, which means The Bat, and it's a comedy. I'll be sure to share more about that adventure tomorrow!!!
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