Tour of Capitals: Bratislava

Bratislava is the little known capital of Slovakia, a country nestled in the middle of Austria, Czech Republic, Hungary, Ukraine and Poland. After its seperation from Czechoslovakia in 1989, the Slovak Republic was established with Bratislava being the capital.

Bratislava seemed to be the poorer brother of its former sibling, Prague. It reminded me, in many parts, of Malaysia. More of those less developed parts of Malaysia, like Ipoh. There are little skyscrapers or modern buildings. The streets are dustier, buildings look older and the general feeling of the place is a little dilapited.

There wasn't a free tour of Bratislava. In fact, we did not intend to go to Bratislava at all. I just happened to see it on google maps and saw that it was a capital and so slotted it into the itinery. A one day tour of the place to see how it looked like.

I didn't remember much about Bratislava. On the first day that we arrived, we heard that there was this food festival going on. Thus, we set out to search for it. We asked this man in the park where the festival was supposed to be held and he kindly offered to show us the way. Well, turns out that the expo that he brought us to didn't exactly sell food. It was an exhibition for coins and there was a 2 euro entrance fee that we got duped into paying. To cut the story short, we ended up looking at coins instead of food.

However, there is a silver lining.
In the expo, they have a food stall thingy going on that sold lunch. Being famished from all that walking, we decided to settle ourselves and make full use of our 2 euro entrance fee.

Although Slovakia is using euros, their prices are still far from the price in France or Vienna so that meant that we could still have a decent meal. I ordered a sausage and a soup. The sausage had traces of lard in them again, but it was better than the one in Budapest. It had more flavour... But what I liked from that meal was the soup. It was the sour cabbage soup that I had mentioned earlier. Ahh... I don't have the pictures cos its with my friends. Have to get it from them. But anyway, it looks like shredded vegetable soup, and it IS shredded vegetable soup. Its just that it is sour. Like tom yam soup, but not spicy at all. Yea, that is a pretty close description.

After lunch, we just walked around the old town. It was a bummer that the Bratislava castle was closed due to reparations and the other castle, Devin castle, was a pretty long bus ride from town. In the end, we didn't go to the important destinations and had to be content with just the old town.

There wasn't anything much that we hadn't already seen in our tours. But, I have to point out a very curious church that we visited - the Blue Church.

Just like what the name suggests, the Blue church IS blue. From the roof down to the doors.
The architecture is curiously like the one in Budapest and I could have sworn that there were turkish influences on the design of the building.
When we arrived, it was in time for a session of mass. There was this kind elderly lady who beckoned us to enter the church, saying (more like gesturing though, cos we didn't understand slovakian). Inside was also a curious study of design. Yes, even the interior was blue. Blue in the candy sort of way... So this must be how Oz looked like from Dorothy's point of view, except that its all baby blue instead of green. Hmm. Interesting.
All pictures from the Blue church was taken off the big WWW. I don't think it was polite of me to be snapping my camera when a mass is ongoing. But evidently, many people don't think the same way, as seen in Vienna when I DID attend a session of mass. Ah, but I'm getting ahead of myself. That is another story to tell. Stick around a little while I finish up Bratislava.

Anyway, the main highlight of Bratislava had to be the food. Really, I'm such a pig. First thing when we arrived is always to check out the local food market. Haha. Its a nice place, a good place to find out more about the local people and their ways. And besides, they often sell great cheap food!

But no more filet mignon for me in Bratislava. However, I did stock up on plenty of junk food to bring back to Switzerland. I had bought 3 giant Snickers, an Ice cream (my first Ice cream since Singapore!! Gelato doesn't really count...) and 2 bagfuls of nuts and dried fruits. Honestly, I think I'm so healthy in Switzerland because I am too broke to spend money on junk food... A pack of chips for 2 Fr (about SGD2.70)? No thanks, man!

Also, evidently, the beer here is pretty good too, so we bought a can of local beer to try. Not too bad, a little better than Tiger, I think, but I still prefer the german beer that I can get here in Switzerland.

What else is there to say about Bratislava? Hmm... Not much, I think.

Perhaps it would have been much better if we went to the outskirts of the city to the Devin Castle. After all, I heard that the view there is nice. Too bad we had so little time.