Letter from Prague | All stories

This Letter from Prague is my first as an EU citizen. In fact this is not my only first this week. On Monday I made my first trip abroad as a citizen of a European Union member state. Of all places, I travelled to Brussels.

A week after the Czech Republic joined the European Union, European issues were put on the backburner by most ordinary Czechs in favour of matters of "worldly" importance - namely the 68th Ice Hockey World Championship. A tournament the Czechs won three times in a row, last in 2001. Think the world championship isn't important for European hockey fans? Nothing could be further from the truth!

In around a week's time - on May 1st - Czechs, as new citizens of the European Union, will be able to cross their borders at any point without a passport. Their Czech ID, or obcansky prukaz, will be enough to get them into Germany, Poland, Austria and Slovakia. That is surely something few could have imagined just 15 years ago.

The results of a study released recently show that Czechs are the most liberal nation when it comes to anything to do with sex. Overseen by one of our leading sex therapists, Petr Weiss, the study suggests that Czechs are among the most liberal nations in the world with regards to issues such as abortion, homosexuality, and infidelity. Only five percent of respondents were against abortions; the overwhelming majority believes that it should be up to the woman to decide whether or not to abort. Five percent also rejected homosexuality; however,

Just a few weeks now and we will cross the magic line. On May 1st we will all wake up in an EU member state. Of course, we are entitled to a last minute fit of nerves. The Poles are buying up sugar by the carload, the Hungarians are worried that they will no longer be able to buy full cream milk and we Czechs have been given reason to believe that curved cucumbers are not allowed on the common market.

Perhaps you are familiar with the comfort given by the objects that surrounded you in childhood. I grew up in Canada, although my family was Czech. Old family heirlooms from Czechoslovakia filled our house.

This is a rather sad Letter from Prague for me to write - it's my last. After five years I'm quitting as a full-time member of staff, to pursue a career with another radio station. It's a period of great change and no small amount of stress as I try to manage the transition from one job to the other. But it's also given me the opportunity to reflect on the times I've had and the changes I've seen since I first walked through the doors of Czech Radio on a warm, spring day in 1999.

It has finally hit the Czech Republic, too. I am talking about the "smash-hit reality entertainment show", known in Britain as Pop Idol, and broadcast under different names in many countries around the world. The Czech version of Pop Idol, which is a televised national search for new pop singers, has millions glued to the screen every Sunday night.

One of the small pleasures of living in the Czech Republic as a "foreigner" is noticing well-intended but ultimately hilarious attempts at word-for-word translation from Czech into English. It doesn't happen nearly as much as it used to, still, some funny mistakes do get through in small ways in day-to-day affairs and it can be quite amusing, for example, to scan your average pub menu for hidden "English" gems.

If you have been to Prague you will surely know Zlata ulicka or Golden Lane, a narrow street of tiny, colourfully painted cottages in the Hradcany district. The lane dates back to the late 16th century when the cottages, built into the castle's fortifications, housed Rudolf II's marksmen. Some people would have you believe the name Golden Lane comes from the fact alchemists once lived there; others will tell you that - in the days before plumbing - the only thing that was "golden" was the urine flowing down the lane's gullies. The tiny cottages