Bratislava (12 May 2007)

I now finally have some time to breathe and relax and so, here's an update before i rush out of the house again.

Went to Bratislava with a couple of my friends here last last saturday. Wasn't really expecting much cos erms... Bratislava is pretty small and it just pales in comparison to Vienna. We planned to reach there at around 10am and get back to Vienna by about 6pm but the stay was shortened because of various reasons, which will not be mentioned here.

Anyhow, Bratislava turned out to be a pleasant surprise and Taina and i are planning to go there again soon for some shopping and good food.

First of all, some info about Bratislava. I had such a hard time trying to tell my parents where it was so i won't be surprised if some of u dunno where the heck Bratislava is. I didn't until i got here.

It is the capital of Slovakia and is also the largest city in Slovakia. It borders 2 countries, namely Austria and Hungary and is only 60km away from Vienna (i only spent an hour on travel even though it was to another country). The city was called Pressburg in the past and was a key economic and administrative centre of the Habsburg (Austrian) Monarchy. It was once upon a time part of Czechoslovakia and joined the EU only recently in May 2004.

Alright, now the history lesson is over. You may view the pictures. =P

The fountain in front of the presidential building. This is really quite cool and nice if u were to think about it. Slovakia was a Baltic state all the way till recent years so to have something so modern and nice looking was pretty impressive.

We were kinda expecting all the buildings to look something like that which may help to explain why we were so surprised with the modern looking buildings and the fountain. Sorry... it's just that we had a stereotype of former Baltic states.

After Monica and I met up with Taina and Evie, we started with a tiring climb up the hill to see the castle. I was happy to see that the castle was worth the climb. =P

Here u see the Danube (Donau) River from the castle. Quite cool yea? My second Donau Capital. The first was Vienna, now it's Bratislava and in July, there will be Budapest and i'm missing out on Belgrade but it seems a little too far to travel there now.

The view of the old town from the castle.

And oh, something strange about the old town of Bratislava. They had a lot of funny sculptures and statues like the one u see above. They would appear in the middle of streets and it was quite a fresh experience for us cos in Vienna, everything is so prim and proper and jokes like these are really hard to find.

Anyhow, Bratislava was really nice and i'm definitely game for another visit there sometime soon but with different company this time. I thank God that it is only 60km away from me right now. If not, i would have killed the people who made this trip not as pretty as it should have been.