The Fox’s Tail: New Year’s in Europe? Don’t mind if I do!

Blog — By fox on January 16, 2012 6:13 PM

Editor’s note: This post is the third in a series about my trip to the World Juniors in Prague in 2007/2008. I went with a large group, about 350 Canadians, and spent time with them in Vienna and Prague before venturing to visit family in London.

The Fox’s Tail is a blog featuring a hockey perspective from a girl working with a hockey team in Canada.

By Fox

My, it sure has been a busy week! I have been getting lots of hours at my job, and of course busy with my puppies — Team photo this Thursday! (Using Mr. Fox’s camera since mine is out for repairs. I’m actually really sad. Hope it’s fixed soon!)

Last I left you, I was about to tell you of my experiences with New Year’s in Europe. But first, I want to tell you about some of the cool people I got to meet while I was heading back to the hotel. We were in a train with our friends from Alberta, who were detailing meeting Ken Holland’s daughter in a bar in Prague earlier in the week. (If you’re going to wheel, go big or go home, right? That’s what I thought.)

My friend and I were in a compartment for six, heading from the rink back to Prague. We skipped the later game because Canada wasn’t playing and we wanted to go out partying, so instead of taking the group bus back, we took the train. In our compartment was a young mother and her toddler, a little girl who was playing with an Ariel mermaid toy. The little girl held her doll out to me, so I struck up a conversation with her. (Well, as much as you can talk to a pre-school kid haha) Turns out, this kid was like hockey royalty in training … she and her mom, Sarah, and Sarah’s dad were headed back to the city after spending the day in Pardubice with the head of the family, none other than TSN play-by-play guy Gord Miller. (I just read something saying their little girl, Blair, is now 7.  Oh, how time flies.) Very cool to meet the Miller family, they were extremely nice and told us all kinds of cool stories.

(Sidenote: found this awesome story - from the Edmonton journal that has a couple Prague anecdotes in it, like “A few years ago Blair was worried Santa might not be able to find us in Prague but we  told her we would make sure we would let Santa know what hotel we were in,” says Gord.)

That night, my girlfriend and I went out to some club, and when we left at 5:30 a.m. the place was still bouncing. We stopped in the square to grab something to eat on our drunken walk home. I am normally EXTREMELY opposed to street meat (it’s the Montrealer in me. Street meat is illegal there so there are no hotdogs in the streets. Vomit.) … but in Prague, they have pretty much everything, including frosty brews, for sale on the sidewalk. I ended up eating this … cheeseburger? And I don’t mean a beef patty with a slice of cheese. I mean a piece of cheese, a thick square the size of a burger patty, that was breaded, deep-fried and served on a bun with sourkraut. No joke. If I were sober I don’t think I could’ve choked it down, but drunken mess me? Sure, sounds good!

New Year’s Eve day, it got ugly early. The boys busted out a massive bottle of vodka on our way to the early game. I blame Newf, Kramer and Pennypacker for this. We were getting pretty good at arriving at the rink, putting down our stuff, grabbing a beer, crushing it before warmy, heading back in to shoot photos, running back out at intermission, having a smoke, grabbing another beer and crushing it before heading back in. (Did I mention the beers cost the equivalent of 1.78$ Canadian?)

The first game was Sweden vs. Czech at 2 p.m. Some of our group didn’t come out to Pardubice with us at all that day, and some left after this game. Those of us who came to watch hockey stayed til the end, even though Canada was playing Denmark and we smoked them. Between games, as usual, we headed to the Hat-trick lounge, and no way …. Phil Pritchard was there! (If you don’t know who he is, he’s the guy that carries around the Stanley Cup for a living.) He explained SO many times where the Cup was, we started answering for him when people would ask. It’s in California. At the Rose Bowl parade. (That was the year Anaheim had won it, and they wanted it to be in the parade.)

We stayed til the very end, then hopped back on the bus, which the boys somehow convinced to stop on the way back to Prague to get more booze. Then, we drove back to the city and straight to the river, where we got on a boat. The first thing that happened when we stepped onto the boat, was we were handed a shot. Yeah, It’s now about 10 p.m. — we’ve been drinking since 1, the only food they serve at the arena is hotdogs (which I’ve already told you I don’t eat) so I haven’t really eaten much since breakfast. I’m bombed. The shot was of a Czech traditional liquer, similar to goldschlager, but without the sparkles in it. But the same type of spicy idea. Was good. Then, someone hands me a beer. Then someone starts spiking glasses of punch and we’re eating this HUGE feast of really good food, and people are getting really excited for midnight.

In Europe, it is tradition to light of fireworks at midnight. So, we’re cruising down the river on this boat, and everyone wants to go to the top deck, which is open air, so we can watch the fireworks. And someone starts chanting “GO CANADA GO” soooo we all start doing it. Then, someone starts singing O Canada, so we start doing that, too. Next thing I know, we’re crushing sparkling wine (Champagne, but not really because it wasn’t made in France) out of the bottle, we’re singing “Livin’ On a Prayer” on the deck of this boat … and people are throwing fireworks at us off the bridges as we pass them. What!

Now, just when you think this night could not get any more crazy, at 1 a.m., we dock the boat. We head back into downtown Prague, and I don’t even think I dropped my stuff off at the hotel, we continued onto some bar just off the square. It was an Irish pub called Rocky’s. If you recall, my nickname on the trip was Rocky, and the boys decided to tell the owner about this and he ended up bringing me a very large quantity of Bailey’s all night. Then we decided to do some shots of Absinthe (don’t let anyone tell you that trash you can get on this side of the pond is the real stuff … I assure you, it is not the real stuff. This … was the real stuff. FML.)

So, around 3, we closed down that bar, after meeting these crazy Welsh guys who were in Prague for holidays, we brought them to this other bar down the

street from the hotel I was staying at, which I don’t really remember much of, other than a guy was wearing a shirt that said, “Not Now Chief, I’m in the fuckin’ zone” … Please tell me you guys remember this video. All you high school kids who watch Jersey Shore, this came out when you were probably in Grade 5, and had more than 30 million hits on YouTube before it was taken down last month.

Anyway, we stayed at that bar until 6 a.m. at which point I was so drunk and tired and disoriented I had to finally make my way back to my hotel room — still not quite sure how I managed. But I did.

And New year’s day? Ugh. I woke up at 3 p.m. … finally crawled out of bed in my sweats around 5 p.m. made my way to the square, got some greasy food and headed right back to bed for some German MTV. (English shows, like Next Bus and Cribs, but with German subtitles.)

On Jan. 2, we headed back to Pardubice, where Canada took on Finland in the quarter-final. You will scratch your head and wonder what the heck we were doing playing in the QF … until you remember, Canada lost a round-robin game that year to the Swedes back on Dec. 29.

 

I met another guy with a camera as big as mine, and we made friends. He wasn’t actually from our group, but he was from Toronto. We’re still friends now, and in addition to both enjoying photography and hockey, we also have a similar taste in vehicles. We drive the same make and model car (same year, too, but mine has a bigger engine and is faster haha which I like to remind him of once in a while if he gets out of line.

And some more of Tavares for you.

As an aside, I must say I have improved an awful lot as a photographer since this time, and I’m actually a little bit sad I wasn’t better with my camera when I took these … especially since I had access to equipment a lot better than what I have now! (Well, now I currently don’t have ANY camera since mine is not working … hope it’s fixed soon!)

On Jan 3, there were no games for us. Some people took overnight trips to Carlsbad and Vienna, and some people went to the other city hosting, Liberec, where the relegation games were being played. I opted to hang around Prague, because, well, it’s just a damn cool city. I have been to Paris and London, and I can easily say

Prague is the coolest place I have been.

Stay tuned for my next installment where I’ll wrap up the rest of the 2008 World Juniors in Europe. Don’t worry, there’s still plenty more beer to drink!

- Foxy

Question, comment, chirp? Get at me … Twitter @hockey_foxx or e-mail me at redline_blueline@hotmail.com .. For girl stuff (and hockey) check http://hockeyfoxx.blogspot.com