Europa Central
Gothic · Beery · Cultured
Czechs drink more beer per capita than any other nation — about 188 litres per person per year.
Más allá de la capital, las principales ciudades son Brno, Ostrava, Plzeň — cada una un centro de cultura regional, economía e historia. Prague survived World War II with its medieval core intact — a concentrated density of Gothic, Baroque, and Art Nouveau architecture centred on the Charles Bridge that makes it perhaps Europe's best-preserved historical city centre, a fact that draws 8 million visitors annually to a city of 1.3 million.
El idioma oficial es checo, que refleja el patrimonio cultural del país y lo conecta con una amplia comunidad internacional. Internacionalmente, República Checa se contacta mediante el código +420. Czechs blend central European pragmatism with a tradition of literary irony that runs from Kafka through Hašek's Good Soldier Švejk to Havel — a philosophical orientation that made the Velvet Revolution of 1989 uniquely appropriate as a method of overthrowing communist rule: bloodless, creative, and quietly relentless.
República Checa comparte sus fronteras con Polonia, Eslovaquia, Austria, Alemania. El tráfico rodado circula por la derecha, en consonancia con la convención de
La vida económica y cotidiana se rige por la zona horaria de UTC+01:00, alineando el país con sus vecinos regionales.
Svíčková na smetaně — beef sirloin in a cream sauce with bread dumplings, cranberry jam, and lemon — is the Czech national dish, and the accompanying Pilsner Urquell or Kozel beer is consumed with the conviction that Czech brewing (the world's first pale lager was developed in Plzeň in 1842) has never been equalled.
Ice hockey is the national sporting religion, with the Czech Republic winning Olympic gold in 1998 with Dominik Hašek, Jaromír Jágr, and Petr Forsberg — a team assembled from NHL players who played for their country rather than their clubs, producing a tournament performance still discussed as the finest national team achievement in the sport's history.
Bohemian Switzerland (České Švýcarsko) in the country's northwest contains the Pravčická Gate — Europe's largest natural sandstone arch at 26 metres wide — rising above a deeply eroded sandstone landscape of towers, gorges, and river canyons that inspired 19th century Romantic painters and formed the visual template for European ideas of sublime wilderness.