Living in Prague as a foreign student
Moving to Prague might be difficult so this article covers some tips that might be useful for your survival.
Prague as a city
Prague is quite safe as a city. There are no dangerous areas per se. But exercise necessary caution and common sense. From 9 PM in the evening there are many drunk people/drug addicts in the streets.
Unfortunately, Prague is a tourist city with many scams. See this list to avoid some of them.
Groceries
Most of you will live at the dormitory named "17. listopadu". The bad news is that there are no grocery stores near that dorm. Fortunately, there are online delivery services that deliver there. Examples are Rohlik and Kosik.
Aside from that, I suggest you shop at supermarkets to be on the safe side. Examples are Albert, Billa, Lidl, Tesco, etc.
You might miss food from your home. Here is a list of ethnic shops I am aware of:
SAPA center for asian food. It is quite out of the city though so I suggest you make it a half-day trip during the weekend.
Kolobok for Russian food.
Eating during the day
During the day you might want to get a lunch. Czech restaurants usually have a lunch menu where meals are cheaper but the selection is limited. E.g. a normal menu may have 20 dishes at prices >= 250 CZK per dish but a lunch menu will have about 4 items at ~180 CZK a dish. Here is a list of restaurants near the Mala strana building.
Also you can make use of student cafeterias. The dish usually costs around 120 CZK. Usually you need to top up your student card and pay with it in the cafeterias. The nearest ones to the Mala strana building are:
There is one being built in the basement of Mala strana building but it is not active at the time of writing this article (October 2024).
Getting around
Public transportation
Public transportation in Prague is excellent and I suggest you use it. Excellent means that you can get anywhere using it, transfers are simple, and you usually don't need many of them. I suggest you get a yearly pass from the official website. Apply for a student discount if possible.
The modes of transportation are subway, trams, buses, boats, and a cable car. One thing to note is that public transportation tickets (including the monthly/yearly pass) also apply in trains as long as the station you are travelling between start with the name "Praha".
Google maps is usually good at finding a route. From my experience it does not use the subway as much as it should though. So when you plan a route using Google maps, always try to manually check if there is a faster way using the subway.
Shared bicycles
There are some shared bicycle services in Prague. The most prominent examples are Rekola and NextBike. The rental price is quite cheap but the biggest advantage is that if you purchase a public transportation yearly pass, then you get two free 15 minute rentals per day. Meaning that if you register at both Rekola and NextBike with your yearly public transportation pass, then you get four 15 minute rentals per day for free.
Schengen area
One thing to note is that Czech Republic belongs to the Schengen Area. Countries in the Schengen Area do not patrol borders. (October 2024 With the notable exception of Germany as of right now, if you plan on visiting Germany, make sure that your paperwork is up to snuff) Meaning that you can visit any of them from Czech Republic without having to get visas or even showing passports at the border. I suggest you use this opportunity to explore Europe. Cross country travelling can be done with buses (e.g. RegioJet or Flixbus]), trains or planes. For trains, finding cheap tickets is quite a challenge and I don't know much about it. For flying, try using e.g. Google Flights, Skyscanner or Momondo for searching for affordable flight tickets. Note that if you use a low cost carrier such as Ryanair or Eurowings, you need to pay for checked luggage or cabin luggage.