What to do when you've just recently made new friends on your Year Abroad? Take a day trip to a foreign country, of course! And what better foreign country, than one that apparently has absolutely nothing to recommend it whatsoever?
In the three weeks I'd spent in Vienna, I'd heard a lot about Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia, and none of it had been good. Words like "hell-hole" were bandied around, and the only positive comment came from my flatmate, who told me that "it's nothing like a capital city, but they do have a Tesco there".
They did indeed have a Tesco there, in fact they had several. Tesco was the first thing we saw as we entered the city, and the last place we visited before we left. And before you start thinking that this makes us incredibly sad ex-pats abroad, I would like to point out that the supermarkets in Austria are terrible. They're tiny, they have no range of products, they sell out of things by mid-afternoon, and they close on Sundays. After three weeks of that, anyone would be excited to see a real supermarket (or at least that's what I keep telling myself - in my defence my flatmate also gets excited about real supermarkets).
However, we were pleasantly surprised, because Tesco wasn't the only thing to see in Bratislava. Admittedly it was small (which was a blessing, as it meant that there was no need for Hannah to embarrass us with the giant map which she'd decided to bring along), but there were things to see. For one, there were lots of interesting statues for us to take photos with (and nothing makes a day trip better than doing stupid poses next to a statue). Our proudest moment was finding the statue we'd seen on the internet, a man crawling out of a drain, and coercing a random passer-by into taking a photo of us with it. We also climbed up the hill to the castle, where we got a great view over the river and, perhaps more importantly, found a playground in which to relive our childhood.
At the top of the hill, we also sampled traditional Slovakian cuisine in a restaurant. Traditional Slovakian cuisine is very similar to traditional Russian cuisine, filling and not much else. The menu featured an assortment of dumplings and cabbage, but not unpleasant dumplings and cabbage, and the restaurant had a certain charm - if charm equals a slightly creepy cellar and a very creepy bird in the corner, that is! Not something that I'll necessarily be trying again, but certainly a cultural experience!
So all in all, I wouldn't say that Bratislava is deserving of it's terrible reputation. However, I'm not sure that I could have entertained myself for more than a day there, so don't all rush at once to book your tickets!
In the three weeks I'd spent in Vienna, I'd heard a lot about Bratislava, the capital of Slovakia, and none of it had been good. Words like "hell-hole" were bandied around, and the only positive comment came from my flatmate, who told me that "it's nothing like a capital city, but they do have a Tesco there".
They did indeed have a Tesco there, in fact they had several. Tesco was the first thing we saw as we entered the city, and the last place we visited before we left. And before you start thinking that this makes us incredibly sad ex-pats abroad, I would like to point out that the supermarkets in Austria are terrible. They're tiny, they have no range of products, they sell out of things by mid-afternoon, and they close on Sundays. After three weeks of that, anyone would be excited to see a real supermarket (or at least that's what I keep telling myself - in my defence my flatmate also gets excited about real supermarkets).
However, we were pleasantly surprised, because Tesco wasn't the only thing to see in Bratislava. Admittedly it was small (which was a blessing, as it meant that there was no need for Hannah to embarrass us with the giant map which she'd decided to bring along), but there were things to see. For one, there were lots of interesting statues for us to take photos with (and nothing makes a day trip better than doing stupid poses next to a statue). Our proudest moment was finding the statue we'd seen on the internet, a man crawling out of a drain, and coercing a random passer-by into taking a photo of us with it. We also climbed up the hill to the castle, where we got a great view over the river and, perhaps more importantly, found a playground in which to relive our childhood.
At the top of the hill, we also sampled traditional Slovakian cuisine in a restaurant. Traditional Slovakian cuisine is very similar to traditional Russian cuisine, filling and not much else. The menu featured an assortment of dumplings and cabbage, but not unpleasant dumplings and cabbage, and the restaurant had a certain charm - if charm equals a slightly creepy cellar and a very creepy bird in the corner, that is! Not something that I'll necessarily be trying again, but certainly a cultural experience!
So all in all, I wouldn't say that Bratislava is deserving of it's terrible reputation. However, I'm not sure that I could have entertained myself for more than a day there, so don't all rush at once to book your tickets!
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