Fat Tuesday in Žižkov

Prague is split up into 10 districts. I live in Praha 3 in a town called  Žižkov. Now let me tell you about  Žižkov. It has an unusually high gipsy population and is known as being economically challenged. Therefore there are mini casinos and Las Vegas replicas on every corner with the occasional sketchy flower shop that stays open all hours of the night.  But recently Mallory and I were online looking for the famous strudel man who apparently lives around the corner from us and we stumbled across a description of  Žižkov I will never forget.  They said, ‘this is  Žižkov. It doesn’t pretend to be anything it is not. It just is.’ I love that.  Žižkov used to be an independent city and I think that got to their heads. They are offbeat and proud to be different.  But despite that it is easily forgotten, easily passed by; but those who do miss out on more than they know. 

For example, last Tuesday happened to be Fat Tuesday in Žižkov, a day within carnival that celebrates and encourages pigging out on meat – pun intended.  Each neighborhood is responsible for organizing their own carnival, but everyone comes to Žižkov cuz we da bomb.  Here is a segment from an expat newspaper called Stars and Stripes that I read "We are the most original," claims Zizkov town hall spokesman Jeronym Janicek, who notes that the neighborhood was one of the first in the city to resurrect the tradition in the early 1990s, after communism fell. A lot of people give the neighborhood credit for helping bring new life into a festival that had fallen into obscurity."

 So we headed out to explore this so called ‘carnival’.   As soon as we caught glimpse of all the commotion we realized we were the sole representatives of the age group ranging from 16 to 35.  It was clearly not the ‘cool’ thing to do in  Žižkov if you weren’t entertaining your sugar high toddler or benefiting from the senior citizen discounts. But nonetheless we were determined to partake in the festivities and so naturally we bought this gross, fat, greasy street sausage topped with a potato patty and a dry piece of bread.  I swear I don’t even remember what it tasted like because I had to swallow most of it in one bite so as to not offend my taste buds.  We’ve have a rocky relationship recently because I’ve started to cook more and more often.  My stomach wasn’t the biggest fan after that fiasco either.  But, never fear,  Žižkov came to save the day once again when we realized they were offering free beer and pastries just one tent over.  Suddenly the day got a lot better. And that’s when the party really kicked off. 

The drums started beating and the mob instinctively responded by sweeping us due east to the heart of the city center. Little make shift floats and men on stilts came out of nowhere and simply started to stroll down the middle of the street. So we followed their lead and took to the streets.   Seriously it was like the a silent dog whistle went off for all of a sudden the road was jam packed with people of all ages wearing masks, ridiculous costumes, and questionable accessories.

At each stop there was either a folk band from back in the good ole days or a truly cheesy clown juggler comedian thing, which the Czech seemed to love strangely enough – maybe it was something in the beer but I guess wouldn’t know, it was all in Czech – and ended with a speech from the  Žižkov mayor (or at least we think).  But, in conclusion, it was a successful day and it taught me a lot about the neighborhood that has been so kind in housing me for the past month.  It’s a bit wonky at times but it’s real.  They don’t hold anything back. They are proud to be  Žižkov and they will laugh at the really corny tricks from the comedian man if they want to gosh dang it! It’s  Žižkov. Don’t mess.