The Petřín Park is a good place to rest and read the Green Toolbox.

On Monday the 13th my girlfriend Lisa and I came to the capital of Czech Republic. We are both active members in the Flemish Naturefriends organization ATB De Natuurvrienden and were excited to visit ‘Praha’ and the IYNF office for our first time.

Since we had a couple of days to visit the capital we decided to ask IYNF to help us guide trough the magnificent city. We are both quite interested in a green lifestyle, that’s why we wanted to see the city from a green perspective and get to know the cool places in town. And what is a better way to get to know a city than by help of the local people? Although… when we met those locals, it seemed they weren’t so local like we had imagined them. Together with the help of Alex, who is an EVS volunteer from Romania, and Miguel from Spain who is doing his internship at IYNF we investigated the city.

Thanks to the Green Toolbox, we know also which things we have to avoid.

Yes, indeed you read it right, we ‘investigated’ Prague. Our mission was to have a look around and see if Prague is putting an effort on stimulating ecological and sustainable behaviors. Besides the fact that Lisa and I were already guided with the help of Alex and Miguel, we felt like some extra ecological guidelines were needed. We heard very vaguely of the existence of a ‘Green Toolbox’ and a ‘Green Map of Prague’. That smelled like an adventure so we decided to try to find the magic book that would lead us to the map, and that map would lead us to the investigation treasures!

So Alex, Miguel, Lisa, our shared imagination and I were going deep into the dungeons of what is called ‘The Archive of IYNF’. As the name already suggests, it doesn’t really sounds like the feeling of excitement… But since IYNF is an organization that will celebrate its 40th birthday next year, you can imagine that after 40 years there will be some old treasures to find over there. And so we started our journey with our search for a book called ‘The Green Toolbox’. We have heard it’s a book with many tips what you can do to reduce your impact on our little blue planet, and when you use it effectively, a lot of daily problems will disappear! Your financial problems will resolve themselves, your waste will get useful again, in the morning you will travel happier to your work, your stomach will stop making crazy sounds, you will get to know sustainable places around the world, and what I personally liked the most… you will be much, much more outdoor during your life!

So when Lisa and I heard all this, our level of excitement increased immediately! We grabbed a torch and went downstairs, deep down we came across a very big pile of Green Toolboxes. There were literally heaps and heaps of them, it kind of felt like a ‘Sustainability Paradise’. Not only we could both have a book for ourselves, we could also take them with us and spread them around for friends, family and fellow Naturefriends! What a surprise!

And so it happened we had succeeded our first part of our ‘investigation adventure’.  We climbed back upwards, with the direction of the wonderful city Prague. We already had found the book, so now our goal was to find a certain ‘Green Map’ of the city. In the Great Green Book stood that there was a chance that we could find it at a bar called Sicily Café. So we decided to go there, we didn’t actually know where to look, because how would you find a map, when you don’t have a map to find it?

Luckily we were guided by Alex and Miguel, who knew this strange upcycled place. It seemed our luck was running out when we heard they didn’t have the map. The only good thing was that they confirmed the existence of the map, and that is where we got our motivation to go to that one place you never want to visit as a tourist: The Tourist Info Point! We were surprised that even there they could only show us the map online, but we got the tip to go to a vegetarian restaurant called ‘Maitrea’.  Not only were our stomachs filled with amazingly delicious food… we also found the map there! Yippee!

The map showed us a lot of places where you can find local or vegetarian/vegan food, a couple of cool places that is a must see in Prague and some shops where you can buy biological and ecological stuff. We started our investigation across the bridge, leaving Staré Město (The Old Town) behind to explore the part of the city that was still unknown territory, even one of our guides had never been there. Together with the map and The Green Toolbox we investigated a couple of touristic hotspots. We went to the famous Petřín park, that is situated on a hill, and from there we went to Pražský hrad (Prague’s castle), where we enjoyed a very nice view of Prague.

And it has to be said, Prague is a very clean city! Besides that our investigation turned out to be quite positive. The concept of recycling is already quite a normal habit here, the public transport is cheap and very efficient, you can buy the famous local food ‘Trdlo’ which you can find on every corner, there are a couple of vegetarian and vegan restaurants, you can rent bikes in the city (although it has to be said that the city is not well prepared for bike rides) and Prague counts a lot of big public parks where you can escape from the crowded city.

So besides the fact that it was not an easy task to find the green map of Prague, overall our investigation ended with a positive feeling! Anyone who hasn’t been in Prague will experience the city a lot different with the help of the green map and maybe you will enjoy the city even more with the fantastic help of the volunteers at IYNF. Let us know if you have found some new extraordinary places, because we are sure it will not be the last time we’re visiting Prague!

Trdlo is a sweet local product that we couldn’t miss.