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Hi Electron - I'm intrigued by this. I made it to Prague last summer (2022) and I was thrilled, even though I was only in decent condition for 4 days. Too much too fast and dying to go back and do it on a more relaxed stretch, and include some surrounding areas. But to your question: what do your native Czech friends talk about between themselves (if you're just listening like a spy)? I hired two guide, who both ended up being pretty young foxy women and a bit young for me (more or less haha) but both were very engaging and enthusiastic to chatter on about whatever I wanted to talk about. I tried enough of my flimsy crash-course Czech to make them laugh sympathetically but because they both spoke quite decent English we talked about a lot. History was a big topic, but I played an open mic with one of them, she was a singer, and then took her to a very nice dinner near the Charles Bridge. What a fantastic town! Anyway, I didn't feel any restrictions or damper from them on anything "greenhorn" I was asking. We visited Chesky Krumlov and blabbed about the Soviet era (a lot of American apartments look more forbidding than the ex-Soviet ones I saw down there I tell ya), and about Czechia in general. I parked myself in one of the taverns along the south end of town and pretty fast got into a chat with the server. They all seemed to be pretty willing to talk to a foreigner. I have a conversational approach with new people/environments that goes: however they're communicating, that's how I do it. If they want to be more silent (like all the morons I grew up with in American Midwest), then I just back off till they want to talk. As things loosen up, and there's a lot of beer in Czechia to help with that haha, then I just start pumping people about what they're interested in, etc. Everyone likes talking about themselves, so...listen up!  And if you speak Czech already then you've got a lot more conversational grease than I had. Curious to hear the results of any adjustments you make. Cheers,  jack,  California USA

PS - FYI, Americans are even more "ironical" and sarcastic by a long stretch than anyone I've ever talked to from the UK, so that's something else I keep reined in until I know the ground.

Well, I am not sure. I'm American and I have this style, to make a totally ridiculous comment that makes no sense or is the opposite just to be funny. Central Europeans in general seem to be a bit surprised, but usually they laugh just from being surprised I guess...if someone has spent time in UK or US they aren't so surprised, so maybe it's a cultural thing? But this style isn't much of a problem for me.

I would say that Czech culture, or I guess "acceptable" topics that people bother to give the time of day to, are not usually very hypothetical. I mean there is a wide variety of people and you can certainly find more imaginative ones, but almost always with Czechs we are talking about something realistic, that sometimes goes off into "what if?" but usually the attitude is more like, why worry or bother thinking about that? It doesn't exist right now. So maybe people don't really see the point of having an argument about something that isn't a tangible issue in their lives right now?

Also, Czechs do like to complain They will even complain about how much Czechs complain! So you can almost certainly start a conversation about flat prices, or gas prices, or fruit prices, or stupid tourists, or this friend you have who is such a jerk. They don't necessarily go in for discussing a solution to the problem...that's never going to happen, with THIS government (whichever government it might be)...but they'll probably be down to moan about it with you