Swanson School of Engineering

Going to Karlštejn castle yesterday, there were surprisingly more language barriers than any other place on this trip, but somewhat less of a cultural barrier. When I first found out we were coming to Prague, I tried to start learning the language a bit, but was told by many people that almost everyone speaks English in Prague. For the majority of the trip this was true, especially with younger people who we could almost always approach in English. We also learned a few basic phrases from Jana and in our language course which was helpful, but people almost always would respond back in English since they could tell we’re Americans whether the giveaway was our clothes or loud voices. The first time there was a big language barrier was when everyone was trying to order at the first bakery that we went to near the IOCB, but Jana was there to translate for us. I was surprised that when we went to Karlštejn the area was a really small town and many of the vendors didn’t speak English, and this was the first time that we had to adapt on our own to communicate. This however wasn’t a problem at all and the vendors were happy to have us there and laugh with us, and while it was all other tourists walking around I enjoyed the area.