I spent the morning on one of the best museum trips I’ve ever taken. In Prague’s old town, there is a Jewish Quarter. There are at least five synagogues within a stone’s throw from each other, and a massive, yet tiny, cemetary that was quite impressive. I’ll get back to that seemingly oxymoronic comment in a second.

For 480 Czech Crowns (at yesterday’s close, that’s US$28.25) I bought a single ticket that gave me entrance to five synagogues, the Old Jewish Cemetary, a Ceremonial Hall and the Gallery of Robert Guttmann.

These sites were extremely crowded, but the attendants were very helpful in moving folks along, and every artifact was clearly explained in Czech and English. And Hebrew, in some instances. But let me get back to that comment for a minute.

The Old Jewish Cemetary is one of the most important sites on the ticket. It was established in the beginning of the 15th century and the oldest gravestone is that of Avigdor Kara from 1439. The whole area was less than the size of a football field, but has more than 12,000 gravemarkers.

Experts say that there are many more graves than gravestone in this cemetary, though. As the area was “expanded”, the residents brought in more dirt, and the new graves were layered overtop the old ones. Now, the top of layer is more than 15 feet higher than the street level.

It was one of the most haunting and interesting moments on the tour.

Another interesting sight was the Spanish Synagogue. The temple was inspired by Moorish design and was built in 1868. Rich wood panelling is gilded and painted withflowing designs and deep reds and blues. It made me catch my breath.

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I’ve made my way from Cesky Krumlov to Prague, the capital of the Czech Republic. Prague is like a beehive. There are so many people here, and lots of them are native, but even more are tourists.

I spent this afternoon on a four-hour tour of the city with a local woman named Helena. We saw the city castle, which is the biggest in the Republic, and - of course - bigger by one square meter than the castle at Cesky Krumlov.

Besides the great pictures I’ve taken, and the short video of the crowd standing before the Astrological Clock waiting for the next hour to strike, this city has taken me by surprise.

It’s hip and young, and yet attracts tourists from every walk of life. From young backpackers to Japanese businessmen in suits parading Prague Square… they are coming from everywhere. This is exciting to me, and no doubt to the folks watching the Czech economy.

I passed some American tourists who casually noticed the Czech-made car, the Skoda. I mentioned to them that the Republic, and the whole region is home to every major auto manufacturer - GM, Ford, BMW, Mercedes-Benz, etc, etc.

That’s the side of Eastern Europe that lots of folks don’t know about.

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I spent my first day here in Austria wandering around the old Schönbrunn Palace, where the family of the old imperial family lived. The grounds were beautiful. The world’s oldest zoo is also there, and I have to say, things are looking pretty busy over here, dispite what some “recessionists” would say.

In fact, both legs of my flight were full, and the zoo and palace were crowded with tours, and today is Sunday!

Now, on my taxi ride from the airport to the hotel, I passed a power plant, a massive one. OMV is the largest utilities provider in the country, so it wasn’t a surprise to see its name plastered on the side of a building.

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They say when the U.S. sneezes, the whole world catches cold…

Well, it’s time for a trip to the drug store. More and more often, that means Central and Eastern Europe, or Emerging Europe.

For our Taipan VIP subscribers who attended our August Global Summit conference in San Francisco earlier this month, you may remember me mentioning a couple companies. Big names… Internationally recognized pharmaceutical companies like Teva Pharmaceuticals (TEVA:Nasdaq) and Sanofi-Aventis (SNY:NYSE). They’ve set up shop in places like Hungary and the Czech Republic.

Hungary is one of the most developed pharmaceutical and biotechnology sectors in Central and Eastern Europe. Hungary boasts the strongest biotech sector among the twelve new EU member states. That has enticed seventy core biotech companies to set up shop in Hungary up to now and 170 companies have some kinds of biotech related activities. The reason? Cost savings. Companies can save 30-50% compared to Western European enterprises.

But there’s another side to the drug industry and it’s increasingly finding a home in this very region.

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