From Prague for Beginners:

In my flat, I shower for the occasion. My bathroom is 2 meters square (a little more than 6’ per side) and tiled in ombré squares that shade from pale tan to dark brown, set in rows so that they look like dull Northern Lights. The floor is larger off-white tiles. It’s clean enough, as the tiling was done last year, though the tub and sink are old and chipped a bit.

To shower, I step into the tub which is quite deep and narrow; I adjust the temperature at the faucet, which is a trick that took me several months to learn. The hot water heater (called a karma by Czechs) is on-demand, meaning that the water first comes out icy-cold, then suddenly gets boiling hot. It cycles through the cold/hot business as long as you take a shower. There is no shower head, as you find them in the US. Instead there’s a long, silvery snake attached to the faucet. You manipulate a lever to get the water to come out of the snake, which you hold and aim at various parts of your body. Lifting the snake, I get my head wet, then turn the water off to avoid an icy or boiling blast. I put on shampoo, then turn the water back on to rinse. This is the shower.

There is no shower curtain, nor any way to install a curtain, so I am careful. The first time I showered, I flooded the floor with water, causing a leak in the flat downstairs. This is a classic expat blunder. Luckily the woman in the flat beneath me was civil when she came up to tell me I had caused a waterfall in her kitchen—she pulled me, wrapped in a towel, down to her flat to see what was happening. I apologized in English and said “bohužel” several times; she understood me well enough. Now I shower as Czechs do, one body area at a time. You get used to it.

The toilet in the corridor took more getting used to. It’s at the end of the enclosed corridor that looks out over the back garden. This corridor was apparently once open, which is still common all over Žižkov; people hang their laundry in these corridors. There are usually toilets in little closets (WC means water closet; now I know why) along these corridors. Ours is ours alone, as Shannon and I have the only key. We keep it clean, so it’s really not unpleasant. There was a learning curve when I moved in, which taught me not to drink any liquids after about 7 PM if I didn’t want to go out there at night. You get used to it.