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Rachael Weiss is an Australian author with Czech roots, who has just published her second book about Prague, based on her own experience of living in the Czech capital. The memoir, called The Thing about Prague, is chock-full of entertaining stories about how she went about looking for a job, finding an apartment and trying to blend in with Czechs. On the occasion of the book launch, I asked Rachael Weiss what made her write yet another book dedicated to Prague:

Petra Pospěchová’s recently published Regionální Kuchařka, or Regional Cookbook, is full of interesting recipes from around the Czech Republic, from her native Valašsko in the east of the country to the former Sudetenland in the west and all points in between, with each section introducing readers to a dozen or so local specialities. When I met Pospěchová, one of the country’s best-known food writers, I asked her if it had perhaps taken somebody from outside Prague to put together such a book.

Over 170 tonnes of food was donated to Czech charities and NGOs in the second national food collection that took place over the weekend. Individuals, supermarket chains and food producers all chipped in to provide some 350,000 meals for those in need. Organizers consider the food drive’s second edition a major success, and say that a recent change in tax rules will prompt companies to donate more food in the future. I discussed the results of the national food collection with Pavlína Kalousová, the head of Business for Society, a corporate responsibility platform

If you think you know pretty much everything there is to see in Prague, you should definitely visit the website Praha neznámá or Prague Unknown. As the title suggests, it focuses on the lesser known historical, architectural and natural sights in the Czech capital, such as the first functionalist housing estate, a marshland situated just fifteen minutes from the city centre or an artificial lake where President Masaryk used to swim. I spoke to Praha neznámá’s founder Petr Ryska and started by asking him how he got the idea to create it in the first

For the first time ever, non-Czech audiences have the chance to get acquainted with Jára Cimrman, a unique phenomenon of Czech culture. The fictional character has enjoyed immense popularity with Czech audiences for more than five decades. One of the Jára Cimrman plays - The Stand In – was recently translated into English and is now being staged in Prague’s Jára Cimrman Theatre by a group of Prague-based, English speaking actors. I went to see the final rehearsal.

The start of November is traditionally connected with All Saints Day or Dušičky. Over the past week, Czechs have been visiting cemeteries to light candles and lay flowers on the graves of their loved ones. But many Czechs still find it uncomfortable to talk about death and dying.

For the first time in history, a concert by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra will reach an audience of thousands in the Czech Republic and Slovakia. This weekend the philharmonic’s concert at Prague’s Rudolfinum will be broadcast live in around thirty Czech and Slovak cinemas.

The guerrilla art group Ztohoven, known for their controversial projects and often operating in anonymity, have made a somewhat surprising move. This weekend, they opened an official institution, a so-called institute of crypto-anarchy. Situated in a former factory building in Holešovice, the Paralelní Polis or parallel world will serve as a hacker space, a hub and a bitcoin café. According to its founders, it will offer the public a possibility to “step out of the system”.

This week Prague is hosting its biggest annual design festival, Designblok, with dozens of presentations, exhibitions and fashion shows taking place in the city. Unlike in the previous years, when it occupied various industrial spaces, Designblok has now moved to the centre of Prague. The festival’s main exhibition space – the so-called Superstudio – is located right on Wenceslas Square. When I spoke to Jana Zielienski, the director of Designblok, I first asked her why they decided to make this move:

This summer, an off-Broadway theatre in New York put on a play about the actress Hana Pravda and the athlete Miloš Dobrý, two extraordinary Czech Jews living in Prague before WWII. The documentary drama “The Good and the True”, which has run for two months, follows the life of the protagonists who however never met in real life. Originally written and directed by Daniel Hrbek for Prague’s Švandovo Theatre, the intimate play conveys the courage and determination which helped the two people survive the horrors of Terezín and Auschwitz.