Halloween often has the reputation of being an imported US holiday in Czechia, but long-term Prague resident Dinah Spritzer wanted to find a way for her half-Czech kids to be able to enjoy trick-or-treating - so she got the idea of making it about more than just children getting candy and joined forces with a Czech charity. The event has since grown from 53 kids taking part seven years ago and raising CZK 14 000 to an expected 1200 – 1300 people participating this year, with Dinah hoping to raise at least CZK 200 000. I spoke to Dinah at her home in Prague‘s Vinohrady district to find out more.

The Prague Sounds music festival is set to kick off on Tuesday, ushering in more than two weeks of performances, with concerts ranging from classic jazz to hip-hop. On the eve of the event – formerly known as Strings of Autumn – I spoke with head programmer, Guy Borg.

The new film You Will Never See It All puts the spotlight on Ján Mančuška, a conceptual artist who is not so well-known in his native Czechia despite having works in the collections of Paris’s Pompidou Centre and MOMA in New York. The film picked up the Best Debut prize in the main competition at the Ji.hlava documentary festival , which is where I spoke to director Štěpán Pech.

One of the laureates of the 2023 Gratias Agit awards, handed out by the Czech Ministry of Foreign Affairs to people and organizations for promoting the good name of the Czech Republic abroad, is Jan Marek, a leading expert in the field of pediatric and prenatal cardiology. Although he has spent the last 18 years working at Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children in London he has maintained close ties with his home country. I caught up with him on his last visit to Prague to talk about the challenges and rewards of his profession.

Czechoslovak Independence Day celebrates the founding of the independent state of Czechoslovakia on October 28, 1918, after the collapse of the Austro-Hungarian Empire at the end of World War I. Events are held around the country to mark the anniversary and honour Czechoslovakia’s first president, Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk.

A new study from the FOOD Barometer survey commissioned by the Czech Chamber of Commerce sheds light on how Czechs eat on a daily basis. The study revealed that Czechs are much less guided by the nutritional value of foods, and that while awareness of the importance of healthy eating is improving – the country still drags behind the European average, and Czechs often wait to change their diet only upon advice from medical experts. To discuss the results, I spoke with Prague based nutritionist, Valerija Gerfanova.

The film ‘Brothers’, based on the Cold War story of the controversial Mašín brothers who formed an armed resistance group and fought their way out of communist Czechoslovakia to freedom in the West,  premiered in Prague on Wednesday night before its official release in cinemas around the country. The film, which has been selected by the Czech Film and Television Academy as the Czech Oscar nominee for 2024, captures one of the most divisive stories of the Cold War.

Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala visited Israel on Wednesday to signal his country’s strong support for the Jewish state in its war against Hamas. Amid calls for a humanitarian ceasefire in the Middle East, the Czech head of government said Czechia would stand up for Israel’s right to self-defence at Thursday’s European Council meeting in Brussels.

Olympic Halftime by Czech-Japanese director Haruna Honcoop is one of the most anticipated works at this year’s Ji.hlava documentary film festival. It highlights “white elephant” venues often left behind after Olympics – and the debts that host cities can be saddled with for decades. I spoke to the documentarian ahead of the film’s world premiere on Wednesday.

Representatives from forty countries gathered in Prague on Tuesday for the second International Parliamentary Summit of the Crimean Platform whose main aim is to support Ukraine's efforts to restore its sovereignty over the Russian-occupied peninsula. Speakers to the gathering stressed the importance of liberating Crimea, not just for Ukraine, but for the rules-based world order.