Last week I had an opportunity to visit Czech Republic due to some GLEN meetings and seminars. Some observations:    * Prague is cool. I have been there before, maybe 2-3 times, but this time again I had to note that being in Prague feels like being in the "West". Maybe it has something to do with some  white-brick-pedestrian-paths (which looked like in Brussels) but I haven't got this feeling in other Eastern-European capitals, maybe only a bit in Ljubljana... but Tallinn, Riga, Warsaw, Bratislava, Budapest - try harder! :p  * Prague is cheap! In a non-touristic pub it's still possible to get a beer for less than 1 euro... normal rate was 1,5 or even less. In Tallinn the going rate is around 3 Eur or more and it sucks...  * Vietnamese shopkeepers - I hadn't realized that there are so many of them  in Prague! It was a bit awkward, out of place. Like Chinese shopkeepers e.g. in Santa Fe, a small Latino beach village in Venezuela...  * Estonian weather starts pissing me off! I got 5 days of sun in a row in Czech Republic! Goddamn! Why our old Fenno- Ugric forefathers didn't have enough wit to stay in foot somewhere in Central-Europe, like the Hungarians did?! But NO... they had to march to the North...  * Prague expat community - almost by accident I met an old acquaintance from the Student  Union days who has lived in Cz for some 3 years. We had some beers in a nice pub/ bar (which had also nice waitresses :) with her American and Finnish friend and from their stories I got a feeling that the local expat community there is quite alive and kicking. And it's not only the diplomatic community but also musicians, call-centrers' workers, etc. Very nice :)  * Problematic air-travel - on the day I was supposed to return back to Estonia my plane took off from Prague, flew some minutes and then  turned back. We changed the aircraft and then made it nice and smooth to Tallinn. Probably the pilots just wanted to fly in a bigger plane or something :p  The best thing occurred, however, when I called my mother later that day. She was not surprised that my plane was late, she only wanted to know why.. It turned out that she had already checked the arrival times of the planes at Tallinn airport from some fancy internet website I hadn't even heard of... Seems that there is no more digital divide between  generations (my mother is over 60) and that's a bit scary. At least she doesn't have yet a Skype account next to her MSN one...  * After a year or more it was again cool to participate in some GLEN activities!