Goodfellas Redux/Prague Spleen

The order of this entry is going to be a little backwards, because I'm dead set on using the following as my introductory line:

As far back as I can remember, I always wanted to have an impromptu date with a Bulgarian hooker. I walk into the bar and a girl accosts me and says "hey, can I buy you drink?", which prompts me to think "my goodness, how novel," but also sends up a warning flag or two. We converse, and she's draping herself on me in ways that can only be described as unladylike. About a quarter of the way through my beer, she asks "so, you want to smoke grass? If you buy, I get really good stuff" (maybe it was from Memphis). Warning flags three and four come up. At about this time, I'm starting to get a more nuanced idea of this girl's...occupation, and the bar staff is looking at her with mixed degrees of disdain and disgust. I have backup in case anything gets strange, so at this point ít's a good idea to be a little cheeky...you know, go the extra step and turn this into an anecdote. She finishes her drink and says "okay, next I want shot of havana club rum...250 crowns. You buy." Now, the lady DID buy me a drink, so perhaps I owed it her, but 250 crowns is a shade less than $15. That's a fuck-off expensive drink in what was a pretty reasonable bar. I figured if I shelled out the money, I'd be buying something more than a drink. I pointed out that she wanted one hell of an expensive drink, and the subtlety fell off..."you give me drink money, you take me home."

I see.

"I thought such things were usually the consexquences of dinner and a movie..you're skipping a couple of steps." The grin on my face as I said this was irreverent and probably galling.

"You no like? You no want? My daddy will be here in couple hours, he give you better price. You no want?"

Nope.

She gets up and goes off to work the room, and I mumble some Russian under my breath...tsiganka (Gypsy girl). Apparently this is close enough to the Czech word, because the barkeep stares me dead in the eye, nods firmly, and says something that sounds like"tochno"(exactly). The naughty lady of the night returns to the bar and asks me why I'm not gone yet. "I am running business here. If you no want, you leave." I smile and tell her I have a beer to finish. As guys come in, she keeps looking over to me angrily and saying "ciao. Ciao!" I just smile and nod.

This was the same bar where Fred, my French-Canadian friend, bought me my first nip of slivovice on the night prior. It's a 100-proof plum brandy that tastes like sin, orphans, and the liquid incarnation of suffering itself. After the shot, the only thing to say was "ow."

In other news, someone absconded with my camera yesterday. Dammit. I wake up; it's not in my locker, and I think "it's gonna be a BAD day." I was wrong. I found a place to play. Whether there are any openings for random Americans remains to be seen, but at the very least I can watch. I go first on Monday. More as things happen I spent last night more or less babysitting some people from my hostel...you know, making sure they didn't go home with any Bulgarian hookers.