I made it to Slovakia! For some background on this country… for centuries it was ruled by Budapest and called “Upper Hungary”, it was also ruled by the Habsburg Empire out of Vienna, but most of us may know it as being combined with the Czech Republic under the name of Czechoslovakia shortly after World War I. On Jan 1, 1993, the two countries split and Slovakia became independent. They joined the European Union in 2004 and adopted the Euro as their currency in 2009. So all in all they are a fairly young country on their own.
I’m in Bratislava which is the capital. It’s right on the Danube (just like Budapest and Vienna) and it appears to be a thriving city. I didn’t get here until later in the afternoon so after getting checked in to my hotel, I went down to the main square and took one of the “free” tours. The guide was really knowledgeable and explained the country’s history in a lot more detail than I gave above. We walked by their White House (the pic of the large White building with the flags), St. Michael’s gate, which is the last surviving tower of the city wall (tall white building with green top), and the Old Town Hall (tall yellow tower with the green top).
The town has several whimsical statues spread around town and I included two. The first is a jovial man doffing his top hat which is a statue of Schoner Naci. He was an eccentric old man and very poor but he always offered a smile and a gift to women. He’d whisper “Schon” to the ladies, which is German for pretty, which is how he got his knickname.
The other one is called “Cumil” which means “The Peeper” and he’s grinning at passersby from a manhole. There’s no real story behind this one, the artist just wanted to create a fun icon. The guide said people think because he had that sly grin that he’s looking up woman’s dresses!
The next pic is of the pretty Slovak National Theater with the fountain in front. It opened in 1880 and at the time half the shows were in German and half in Hungarian. It’s used now for all their various arts programs like the Opera and stage productions.
After that we walked out of the Old Town to this quaint little “blue church”. It’s a Catholic Church but everyone calls it the blue church as you can see why. Even the inside was blue. Our tour guide was actually baptized there!
After all that walking I was hungry so I stopped by this restaurant that is supposed to have the best traditional Slovak food. I asked the tour guide for the recommendation as well as what to order and she said I have to order the National Dish which is “bryndzove halusky”. I included a pic. It consists of small potato dumplings with sheep’s cheese and bits of bacon on top. Not the healthiest and it tasted OK (isn’t everything better with bacon on top! Lol) but it was kinda heavy and I couldn’t finish it. But as they say, “When in Rome…”
But lastly I have to share two crazy holiday traditions that the tour guide told us the Slovaks do. For Christmas dinner they always have fish. They prefer carp and the tradition is you go out and buy it fresh 3 days before and let it swim in your bathtub for 3 days! When we asked her why, she never really answered other than to say they want the fish to be fresh. Weird!
Even weirder and kind of bizarre in this day and age but at Easter the tradition is on Easter morning the men whip the women (mildly) and throw a bucket of ice water on them! Again when we asked why and what it means we never really got a straight answer. I think it was a “lost in translation” thing!
Hope everyone had a great day! Hope my Carolinians won’t be affected too bad by the hurricane. Stay safe!
Jeff
The Wandering Italian 