Bratislava

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So we had a few days off and a few of my friends and I decided to cross the old Iron Curtain and see what life was like in Slovakia. We did very little there as we were only in country for a day. We saw some cool things, and some pretty ghetto things, and all in all, Slovakia is a lot more developed than I was expecting (and I wasn't expecting something as bad as Hostel or Eurotrip either)

My favourite memories of Bratislava are the mediocre english that filled the streets (pictures of which are included) and the general laid back attitude that everyone had. For instance, when we were going into a museum about ancient Slovakia, Alia asked the young man at the desk if we could take pictures, to which he responded, "yeah, sure." We then asked him which direction the exhibit was, and asking if the stairs were the beginning, to which he responded "yeah, sure."

The perhaps most exciting thing I saw was when we were wandering through town at night and happened across the St. Martin's procession. Apparently, it was Saint Martins day (which I thought was the day before, since there were kinder marching through the streets with lamps in Hütteldorf that night... but whatever), and we saw a large glow of lamps and people outside the large St. Martin's cathedral in Bratislava. The bells rang forever, and eventually we found ourselves in a large glowing snake of marching people processing through the streets with lamps and being merry. It was fantastic.

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Photos

The Grass is Greener
The grass is greener on the other side of the Iron Curtain. Actually, this picture is from a previous stop through Bratislava, but its the same city... whatever.

Eastern Europe
Here I am trying to look like an Eastern European dude.

Sweet Rundown House
I'm not sure what this house is, I think it is a hotel nowadays, but it is kinda rundown, and is in oldtown.

Ballin'
Katie shows how we roll in Slovakia. The currency is kind of low (a nice meal, like way nicer than I've had recently in Austria) cost something like 8€. Of course, its even cooler spending something like 1000 Sk on it, since its 1000 of something.

Soviet Era Statuary, V1
This is at the foot of some state building. Department of agriculture or something.

Castle Bratislava
This is a castle (hrad) at bratislava. It lacks the fortifications that would have made it as strong as Salzburg, as Eric has kindly pointed out.

Communist Housing Projects
These are some sweet communist housing projects. Eric loved these more than anything I think.

Eric Loving The Communism
Eric is a little pink around the gills. You can't tell because of how artistic this picture is. (artistic = black and white, for those who came in late)

Us
Here we all are, photo courtesy of a wall and my camera's timer setting. Notice how this picture might not have even been taken in Bratislava.

Satna
I always appreciate being told where to put my cloak

Daniel in some bricks
I guess these mark some archaeological findings. I guess they are the built above some Great Moravian Basilica, I could only find any English descriptions of them on wikipedia.

Ghetto
It got dark and we were in some ghetto, so Katie was showing me how she ghetto she is.

St Martin's At Night
Using the night feature I found on my camera. This is the church with the procession while the procession was starting.

Gathering Crowds
Here are some of the followers of the procession while they were gathering outside. Imagine that the church is an immense early gothic cathedral and theres still a whole congregation of these people inside the building.

Nightlife
Brati is known for its nightlife. Here is one of the streets on which we ate at night, with a cool tower.

Bad English
I thought Americans butchered our language. This is just a small sample of some of the bad English in Bratislava.

MEAT
I don't really know... but there was lots of posters for various meats here.

MEAT II
Another specimen

Comments

[Tiffany]

Those eastern European living spaces (skyscrapers) are definitely from the Stalin Gothic school. t

[Ben]

meats are murder. plain and simple.