Amongst Tourists

I recently entered a Guardian Witness Been There photo competition - its subject was street life.

I don't often take photographs of people, so my street life is more likely to be a nice building or architecture feature.

One picture did come to mind though: a photograph I took of tourists in Prague's Old Town.

In it, throngs of tourists await their chance to photograph the moment that figures appear on the Astronomical Clock on the Old Town City Hall. During summer, thousands of tourists and tour groups fill the Old Town Square.

Though I'm a tourist myself, I get great enjoyment listening and overhearing the observations of other tourists - such as:

• "Switzerland is SICK!!!" a woman exclaimed to her friend.
• "I'm going to have some serious CzechSlovak meat tonight!" said an Australian man on a train to Prague to his travelling companion.
• "Oh, I really like it here, it's so quaint!" said a young American woman wandering into a square in Budapest.
• "What's in Bratislava?" asked a Canadian man to his wife.
  "Well... there's a beautiful cathedral," she replied.
  "What? Another one?! There's a surprise..." said he wearily
• "Well, now, look at all this art!" said a woman as she wandered into the Prado Museum in Madrid.
• "I want to go where we belong!" said a woman arguing with her boyfriend in Prague's Wenceslas Square.