Yet Another Trip to Slovakia, Part 4: Banská Štiavnica, Bratislava, and Bernolákovo

Continued from Part 3:

The Drive to Bratislava with a Stopover in Banská Štiavnica

On Wednesday of our second week in Slovakia, we finally left Podrečany for our now-standard trip to Bratislava. We decided to break up the long-ish roughly 2.5-hour drive by stopping in Banská Štiavnica to have lunch and ice cream, and piddle around the town's gorgeous historic center a bit. However, while Banská Štiavnica is technically located between Podrečany and Bratislava, it's still a little out of the way. But given that it's easily the most beautiful historic town in Slovakia, and the surrounding countryside is equally stunning and idyllic, it's worth the extra bit of time it takes to pass through there. (I've written about the town more extensively in this post.)

However, once we arrived, we wound up wasting a lot of time trying to figure out Banská Štiavnica's thoroughly confusing new parking scheme. On all previous visits to Banská Štiavnica, we'd just roll into town, find street parking right smack in the center - where parking always seemed to be ample and free - and enjoy our visit. 

Nowadays, all street parking in the historic town center is marked with new text-heavy signs which essentially say that unless you're a resident, you can only park there for 30 minutes, and they monitor how long you've parked there via some computer chip that has apparently been placed inside everyone's cars. What's not conveyed at all on these signs is where you can park if you're not a resident and you want to park longer than 30 minutes.

We learned that you now have to go to one of three designated paid public parking lots, two of which are located at the south-eastern end, down the hill from the old town, and a third sort of at the other end of the old town, high up the steep hill next to the Nový Zámok (the new castle). If you don't have cash to pay at these lots, you can download some app and pay via smartphone (though how you actually do this isn't explained at all). We only learned about the parking lots when Terezia decided to hop out of the car and go into a cafe to ask an employee how the hell this system works and where we can park.

All three parking lots are located about one third to half a mile away from the central town square. Now, that's not a crazy distance, per se, but it's not exactly convenient either - especially with young kids in tow - as they all require a fair amount of hoofing it some distance up and down hills before you get to the very center of town. We chose the closer of the two lower lots. (All three lots had only a smattering of cars parked in them.)

While Banská Štiavnica is unarguably one of Slovakia's most beautiful and picturesque historic towns, it's not generally crammed with tourists, like the mega-popular medieval hill towns of Tuscany or Provence. It's certainly popular, but it's too far off the beaten path to draw many foreign tourists, which make up a huge chunk of any town's tourism. We've been there at different times of the year and it's never been even remotely clogged with tourists, despite the odd tour bus group that comes through. So, while I'm sure the locals must've complained about some perceived lack of parking due to the day-trippers, it's hard to imagine that parking was ever truly that big of a problem (and indeed, on this day, there was ample street parking in the center), and these new designated parking lots are just far enough away to make visiting the place kind of a pain in the ass.

It's a little maddening to consider all the ways the town could've approached its supposed public parking conundrum that could have generated more revenue and been less of a kick in the pants for tourists and day-trippers.

For a brief recap: Banská Štiavnica was a hugely important and booming mining town for centuries, but had become a desolate, forgotten backwater by the early 1900s when other more modern mining operations in the broader region eclipsed it, and its own mines became depleted. Because it had lost all its relevance by the time of communism, the communists never got around to messing with it or modernizing it, so the town dodged a bullet, and that's why it has remained one of the most perfectly intact historic towns in the country. After communism, the town's people recognized the value in what they had, so they faithfully restored it and transformed it into the UNESCO World Heritage destination that it is today.

At any rate, we had a solid lunch at a mellow place called Penzión a Reštaurácia Kachelman, which had outdoor seating on a terrace overlooking the main drag. We then had some very tasty, if slightly overpriced, ice cream. But by the time we made it to the central town square with the elegant town hall and clock tower, Simon was already pooped from the walking, and we kinda needed to get back on the road, so we really didn't get to spend much time there.

I realize nearly everything we've done on this trip has involved visiting towns and sites that we've already explored - and written about - but part of what makes this trip different is that Simon is now old enough to have some kind of understanding of the places we're visiting, and to make long-lasting memories of it all (he remembers nothing of our previous trips to Slovakia). What's cool is that he now points things out that I'm often pointing out. For example, we'll pass by some cool, old, ornate Gothic clock tower or church spire, and Simon will say, "Did you see that tower, Dad? Did you take a picture of it? Do you have your camera?" So, I don't know how much he's truly appreciating the value in these things, but it's cool that he's now noticing the things that I focus on and processing them.

Banská Štiavnica really is one of the few historic towns in Slovakia that feel like you could be in some picturesque, old-world medieval hill town in Bavaria or France. That would be the perfect concept for the town's tourism campaign: "Hankering for a town in Slovakia that actually looks and feels like Europe rather than some drab, communist armpit? Come to Banská Štiavnica!"

Bratislava

After Banská Štiavnica, we took a very scenic, green, and winding back road that goes through a large, dense forest and the old mining village Hodruša-Hámre, and eventually links up with the main R1 freeway (which heads west towards Bratislava) at Žarnovica. From there we continued on to our first destination in Bratislava: Terezia's cousin Ľudmila and her husband Christoph's flat in the Dlhé diely district of the city. 

They live in a gorgeous, modern flat with cool views of both the cluttered city skyline and the soft, green (but punctuated by hundreds of wind turbines) Austrian countryside. (You can tell where Slovakia ends and Austria begins because Slovakia has no wind turbines.) They bought the place a few years ago, and it's spacious enough for them and their two daughters, aged five and one.

The view from Ľudmila and Chris' flat towards Bratislava's old town.

The view from Ľudmila and Chris' flat towards Austria.

It was awesome to see Simon and Sasha (Ľudmila and Chris' older daughter) playing so nicely with each other. Sasha just turned five, so she and Simon are the same age. Even though they don't speak the same language (Sasha speaks Slovak and German, but knows only very limited English; Simon obviously speaks English, but his Slovak is very limited), they still had oodles of fun together, and they found their own ways to communicate with each other.

Simon has no cousins or family of any kind that are anywhere close to his age in the US, so it really means a lot to us to see Simon bonding so well and having such an awesome time playing with his cousins in Slovakia (Sasha is actually Simon's second cousin, but we're close enough with Ľudmila and Chris to simply refer to her as his cousin). We spent pretty much the entire evening at Ľudmila and Chris' flat on their spacious rooftop terrace, where Simon and Sasha had room to run around, play, and be totally silly together. 

The weather has been quite warm for most of our stay, and it was warm enough for us to hang out with Ľudmila and Chris on their terrace late into the night. Their terrace has this total LA cocaine party vibe, and they told us the previous owner was a single middle-aged woman who was involved with fashion design, and was notorious for throwing wild all-night, drug-fueled parties. They said she was even known to find homeless people and random weirdos milling about in the neighborhood below and invite them up to her flat to do drugs.

After spending the night there, we got out early the next morning so Ľudmila and Christoph could work (not everyone's on vacation, obviously), and we did our now obligatory excursion into Bratislava's Staré Mesto, or old town.

This was the first time we strolled these streets with Simon without pushing him in a stroller (though he walked around quite a bit on the last trip), which was nice for a while, until his legs got tired and we had to drag him to the restaurant where we'd planned to have lunch - Bratislavský Meštiansky Pivovar - while he whined about it incessantly.

 

I'm happy to report that the scaffolding has been removed from the facade of the big Art Nouveau-style building in Bratislava's main square that caught on fire in a Christmas market mishap in 2018. However it used to more of a soft, pale yellow/cream color, and now it just appears to be white. Also, now St. Michael's Gate is completely covered in scaffolding, as it's currently undergoing some badly needed restoration work. It's such a major, defining monument for the city, though, that it's too bad they weren't able to at least cover the scaffolding with a blown-up image of the tower like they did for that building on the main square when it was being repaired.

We had ice cream at Luculus on Hviesdoslavovo namestie, which is a bit overpriced (by Slovak standards) but quite good. I think Záhradná in Lučenec is still the ice cream shop to beat, though!

Simon insisted that we ride on one of the city trams, or električky, as they're called. He kept spotting them around the city as we were driving to and from Ludmila and Chris' place, and he quickly grew obsessed with riding one. The entire time we were ambling through the old town, Simon kept repeating, "I want to ride a tram. When can we ride the tram? Where do we find the tram? I want to ride the tram NOW! Let's go to the tram!" We eventually caught a tram at the Kapucínska stop at the northern end of the old town, and took it all the way down to the Miletička public food market, then hopped off and caught the same line going in the opposite direction. Simon never gets to ride on public transportation back home, so this kind of thing is super exciting for him.

I've mentioned before how on past visits, we'd notice that certain shops or eating establishments that used to be there were empty or replaced by new ones, and this was still very much the case this time - perhaps even more so. We couldn't help but wonder if some of these places were casualties of the Covid lockdowns, since that obviously killed tourism for a while, which is the economic lifeblood of the old town. I noticed a few touristy gift shops and restaurants that had been around for years were emptied out and shuttered this time.

 

We always reminisce about our time in Bratislava when we stroll through these streets, and I honestly do miss the place. For all of its faults and quirks, which I wrote about ceaselessly and sometimes kind of caustically when we lived there, I do think I could live in Bratislava again someday - under the right conditions, of course. Terezia's not as sure if she could do it again, however, but she does miss the city sometimes, and we both have a lot of happy memories of living there.

Lunch at Bratislavský Meštiansky Pivovar was not quite as great as last time, but this place still remains a cut above the rest of the restaurants in this part of town, and it's always packed at lunchtime. Try getting a table there even five minutes past 12:00 noon at your own peril!

I didn't manage to get any photos, but I did see several shops in downtown Bratislava with Ukrainian flags in their windows. This is a marked contrast with the Slovak countryside where I've seen scant evidence of support for Ukraine. Of course, when the war started, there were demonstrations in Bratislava and a few other towns against Russia's invasion, so you're naturally going to see more pro-Ukrainian sentiment in bigger, more metropolitan areas.

Bratislava's castle lit up in the colors of the Ukrainian flag in late February, shortly after the invasion began.

After lunch, Simon perked up quite a bit, so we stopped by the playground in Jakubovo námestie, which features a large, old-school communist-era play structure. Simon spent about 30 minutes climbing all over it and playing with some sand toys. This has to be the biggest play structure we've seen so far in Slovakia. The old-school communist aspect of it is kind of amusing because it lacks many of the safety features that modern-day play structures all tend to have. Simon is old enough and coordinated enough to handle it, but there are definitely some spots that could be problematic for slightly younger and less sure-footed kids, like the shaky bridge that's set at an almost vertical angle so that you have to climb it like a ladder. You can spot the old communist play structures right away because they're often made from wood beams and slats which are painted in the exact same bright primary colors.

All the old-school communist play structures are painted in the same basic primary colors, and are often made largely of wood. You don't see quite as many of them as you used to, so spotting one in a park is becoming somewhat of a novelty.

From there we drove to Tony's house in the vibrant, bustling cultural hotspot of Bernolákovo.

Bernolákovo

I won't bore you again with all the details of the rapidly expanding yet still quiet and humdrum suburban town of Bernolákovo. It's just that I continue to be bemused by the town council's apparent failure to keep up with its crazy pace of growth. Last time I mentioned that the population boom had put such a strain on the town's schools that they had to add a bunch of modular containers to accommodate all the additional students. And the fact that the town still only has a total of maybe six restaurants and/or pubs is utterly bizarre.

Old photo of a street in a riveting, newer subdivision of Bernolákovo, circa 2011.

On our first night in Bernolákovo, I met up with my British expat friend James. I feel bad because I always end up making him trek out from Bratislava via bus or train to meet in some dingy restaurant/pub in Bernolákovo. He says he's happy to do it, but at some point I'm going to need to overcome my fear of navigating the confusing regional bus system by myself. This time we went to the El Camino Pub and Restaurant, located at the center of "downtown" Bernolákovo's wild, pulsating nightlife. El Camino has a large, shaded, outdoor terrace - perfect for that evening's still-warm weather after a day of temperatures in the mid-80s.

James got me up to speed on some of the recent political developments in Slovakia. In my previous post, I wrote about the troubling attitudes of some Slovaks about the war in Ukraine and Ukrainian refugees. James explained that all of these petty grievances (refugees allegedly getting preferential treatment, people being outraged over the price hike of flour, food, and gas as a result of the war, etc.) are simply oft-repeated talking points by Robert Fico and his Smer party, which people just seem to be regurgitating. Fico knows these grievances (most of which aren't grounded in reality) will resonate with a sizable portion of voters, so he's stoking their misplaced resentment to get his party back in power. (Smer is currently in the opposition in parliament and not the majority ruling coalition.)

But man, to take an utterly horrifying war started on the skimpiest of pretexts, and the plight of millions of displaced refugees, and trivialize them just to milk more votes out of miserable and selfish people is a sickening and deeply cynical move. But this is coming from a man who had the audacity to recently call Ukrainian President Zelensky a liar and claim that he is "harming Slovakia's national interests," so it shouldn't be surprising.

The thing is, as James pointed out, Slovakia has a generally free press which reports on the war in Ukraine each day like most other Western countries. So, how can one see all of that horrific death and destruction on the television every day and yet feel more outraged by a price hike in flour or refugees with nicer cars? It suggests an alarming inability to imagine being in someone else's shoes, as another friend of mine recently noted.

Some of the more pro-Putin Slovaks seem to think that the US or Biden did "something" to piss Putin off, and so he decided to take it out on Ukraine. The problem is that, as James agreed, no one can offer a coherent or fact-based explanation of what the US supposedly did. Others seem to think Ukraine was on the verge of secretly joining NATO, but again, that's ridiculous. A lot of these anti-NATO narratives are pushed by Fico.

Fico is facing a trial over a number of charges pertaining to corruption and organized crime. This is part of a broader corruption crackdown that has led to charges for a number of big figures affiliated with Smer. Some people I spoke to are skeptical that Fico will be found guilty, but others hope this will be the thing that finally takes him down. He and his Smer party have no coherent or discernible political agenda; they just seem to want to stay in power, and they do so by tapping into the baseless fears and grievances of their voting base with a toxic blend of right-wing populism and nationalism. I'm just worried that if they do wind up back in power, Fico will go full-on Viktor Orban and try to make Slovakia more illiberal, corrupt, and Putin friendly, like Hungary. Fortunately, the next general election isn't until 2024, and right now both the Slovak PM Eduard Heger and President Zuzana Čaputová are proving to be good, smart, sensible leaders.

One reason it may appear to some Slovaks that some Ukrainian refugees drive "better cars" or are "too good" for jobs offered to them is obviously some of them are either affluent or at least have the means to abruptly go abroad. In countless news segments I've seen where a reporter is hunkered down with Ukrainians in a bomb shelter, the people are always asked why they didn't flee the country, and their answer is often that they didn't have the money or means to leave. I haven't seen any actual stats on this, but you're probably going to see a lot of smart, educated, highly skilled people with money fleeing the country, because they can, and this should go without saying, but they obviously shouldn't be any less worthy of help and sympathy than refugees with less money or fewer skills.

James knows a few people who have taken in refugees, including his girlfriend's family in eastern Slovakia, and he mentioned that some of them were offered money and even employment options, but they turned it down because they didn't need it; at that point, they simply needed a safe place to stay.

The other thing is that, as James pointed out, it would be in Slovakia's best interests to entice some of these refugees to stick around. They're getting a lot of smart, skilled, educated people from Ukraine who would be a boon to Slovakia's workforce and economy as employed, tax-paying residents.

More Bernolákovo (and Surrounding Environs)

We had a pretty low-key time with Tony in Bernolákovo. On Friday, after piddling around with the kids at a local playground, Tony took us to lunch at a restaurant called Furmanská krčma, located in the Carpathians on a forested, winding road above/beyond the town of Modra. With the place nearly empty except for a couple of burly guys slurping some hearty looking soup, I wasn't sure what to expect. The look of the place evoked the vibe of a cozy, rustic mountain chalet, from its log-cabin-style exterior and steep A-framed roof, to the misshapen wood burl tabletops, the wood-paneled walls, and the wood-beamed ceiling. With the weather up in the hills feeling 30 degrees cooler than down in the hot flat lands, the chalet vibe seemed fitting.

For some reason, a radio behind the counter with very poor static-laden reception was blasting some kind of talk show or interview so loudly that it was difficult to talk over it, so Tony politely asked the waiter to turn it down. The waiter, a tall, low-key guy in his 50s who seemed to be milling about looking for something to do, obliged despite seeming a little surprised by the request.

The food, however, was outstanding. I ordered one of the lunch menu deals - the pork knee - and this was indisputably better than a similar-sized one that I had in Paris back in 2014. Served on a massive bone and encrusted in a thick layer of crisped fat and collagen, the meat itself was mouthwateringly moist and tender, and the rich flavor packed a serious punch due to the perfectly aggressive seasoning. The portion looked massive, but once you removed the bone and cut away all the flavor-enriching fat, the actual edible pork wound up being a reasonable portion.

Terezia ordered the fried cheese, called vyprážaný syr, which is a staple Slovak and Czech comfort dish that she likes to get at least a few times whenever we're in Slovakia. Every restaurant in the country has it on the menu. It's frankly usually kind of blah, but when a restaurant does it well, it can actually be quite good. This place used a distinctively flavored smokey cheese, and the tartar sauce (which you're supposed to dip each bite in) was clearly homemade and perfectly seasoned. The fries on the side were nicely crisp and satisfying. This was a great example of vyprážaný syr done right.

Vyprážaný syr, or fried cheese.

After we paid the bill, Terezia told the waiter that the pork knee was better than one we had in Paris, and he got a real kick of that. He even took the effort to say "thank you" and "goodbye" in English as we were leaving.

Two Strange Lakes

The next day Tony took us to two somewhat odd lakes: Zelená voda (which means green water), close to the Bratislava airport, and Slnečné jazerá (Sunny Lakes), in the town of Senec.

Getting to Zelená voda required driving about 1.3 miles down a rough dirt road, the entire length of which was an obstacle course of large, suspension-wearing potholes. We followed Tony in our rental car as he slowly and carefully snaked around the holes, while some impatient local behind us was riding our ass the entire time. Once there, the water was indeed quite green, but not in a majestic way—it was more just kind of swampy. We saw people in boats, several guys fishing, and a few people sunbathing on the shore, but no one was swimming (the water seemed a bit too murky for that). There was an outdoor "bufet," which served beverages and some food, with lots of outdoor tables and a small adjacent playground. 

Hanging out at Zelená voda.

Throwing rocks into Zelená voda. The water doesn't look as green in this photo. You don't see the sunbathing couple just out of frame, to the left of Tony, looking like their mellow has been harshed by the two little kids who came barging down to the lake to throw rocks into it.

Slnečné jazerá was strange in a totally different way. It's located in the town of Senec, not outside it - it's not nestled in some gorgeous, pristine natural setting. About 75 percent of the lake's shoreline is spitting distance from a large industrial complex, busy major roads, a mid-sized train station, and lots of suburban sprawl, while maybe a quarter of it backs up to flat, open crop fields. It's apparently a massively popular recreation area, and not just for swimming on warm summer days - people actually stay there overnight and even camp there. One corner of the shore is dotted with these ugly box-like rental cabins, which look like small, sad modular offices on construction sites with severe, prison-like iron bars over the windows. There's also a big grassy field for car camping.

Aside from three good-sized beaches, the rest of the shore is crammed with mostly affluent-looking lakefront homes. Some are older communist affairs, but many are sleek, new, and ultra modern; all sharp angles, white stucco, shiny chrome trim accents and railings, and lots of glass with multi-level outdoor terraces overlooking the lake, which look designed for all-night cocaine-fueled ragers. I'm told a mix of rich Bratislava yuppies and oligarchs/mafia types have been buying up the shore like mad and building these flashy weekend party homes. The lake is like a glorified puddle in a dreary small town, yet it's apparently considered a popular destination akin to Lake Tahoe (albeit a million times smaller). It's a peculiar scene.

We had an extremely mediocre lunch at a funky place there called Lobster, which has gone to great lengths to look like a quaint tropical island resort, complete with a fake pirate shipped docked at the outdoor dining area, and hut-like cabins for rent on a dock over the water. The ship was closed when we were there, but had tables inside and on top for dining on crowded summer days.

Unfortunately, I have no pictures of any of this!

The rest of our time was spent piddling around Tony's house. We spent a lot of time in his garage, located at the very back of his large backyard, because it was cooler there than on his sun-drenched back patio, and comfy too, since he'd moved an old Ikea couch out there.

Again, it was lovely to watch Simon and his cousin Tea play so nicely together. As with Sasha, they don't really speak the same language (Tea speaks Slovak, obviously, but knows only a handful of English words and phrases, though she learned a new one - "What the hell?" - from Simon), but they still manage to communicate with each other. Tea had apparently been excitedly telling everyone in her preschool all week that her American cousin was coming to visit.

It's also nice that Simon, Sasha, and Tea are now at an age where they can play with and entertain each other with minimal adult supervision. That means they can play and do their thing near us or in a nearby room, while we can mostly relax, sip beverages, and chat uninterrupted. I really wish we could do more of this, for Simon's sake and ours. It kind of makes me wish we lived here again so that Simon could grow up close to family and cousins his age.

On Sunday morning, we left Bernolákovo and headed back to Podrečany.

Click here to see all the photos of the trip so far.

Yet Another Trip to Slovakia, Part 3: Bread, Bojnice, and Bad Attitudes

Continued from Part 2:

Buying "Tomorrow's Bread" (and Getting Rained on) in Tomášovce

We made another trip the second Sunday of our vacation to Terezia's dad's grave at the cemetery in Tomášovce. Simon insisted that we take the train because he thinks it's loads of fun to go on trains, so even though it looked like it could rain at any minute, we indulged him, since it's only one stop.

Waiting for the train at Podrečany's station.

Tomášovce's breathtaking architectural gem of a train station.

But as we were walking to the train station, we couldn't help but notice the ominously dark clouds just to the north of Podrečany, and a wall of similarly dense, dark clouds coalescing south of Podrečany. Once we got to Tomášovce, we started seeing flashes of not-so-distant lightning and hearing the rumbling of thunder. This was going to have to be a quick trip.

Photo courtesy of Terezia, taken at the entrance of Tomášovce's cemetery.

A storm's a-brewin': You don't often get skies like this in the Bay Area.

However, the impending downpour didn't prevent us from stopping by a local bakery on the way back to the station to get a freshly baked loaf of bread. This bakery has nothing that looks like an obvious shopfront, and aside from a small, simple, partially obscured sign that reads "Pekáreň klas" on the front of the house, there's scant evidence to indicate that a commercial business occupies the space. It's tucked away on a residential street between houses. Strangers from out of town would possibly have a difficult time finding the place. But the aroma of the freshly baked bread wafting outside into the driveway was a beautiful thing to bask in.

The unassuming entrance to Pekáreň klas in Tomášovce.

The bakery is still not currently letting people inside due to Covid, but Terezia's mom apparently knows one of the ladies who works there, and she was happy to sell us a loaf of their bread through the doorway. The woman also gave Simon an additional two slices of bread for free, which he happily took and ate on the rest of the walk back to the train station.

I have to say, this bread was positively mouth watering: slightly rustic in its overall form/shape, it was as fresh as can possibly be, and still very warm to the touch, with a beautifully crisp, slightly crunchy, thin, golden-brown crust, and pillowy-soft, warm, and insanely fresh on the inside. This was the kind of bread you imagine getting at some quaint little bakery in Paris, and it had the taste and consistency of the perfect Parisian loaf. 

The amazing loaf of bread before we decimated it.

Simon is not a bread guy. He's never really been interested in eating bread, and oftentimes when he's eating a sandwich, he just eats whatever is inside the sandwich and leaves the bread. But he ate this bread with gusto. Terezia's mom started tearing some bits off one of the ends of the loaf on our way to the train station, and Simon couldn't get enough. Once we were back at the station and waiting for the train, he kept going up to Starka and tearing little pieces off himself. My point here is that this bread was so tasty and fresh that even Simon loved it. It was still warm inside even by the time we got back home.

And this was technically the next day's bread. Every evening around six o'clock, people stop by this bakery to purchase a loaf from that day's batch, which will be distributed to local shops the next morning. They only sell large white loaves, like the one we got, and darker wheat loaves, as well as both in a smaller size, and they bake it in wood-fired ovens. While this place is technically called Pekáreň klas (pekáreň is bakery; klas is the head or tip of the wheat), the locals simply refer to it as "going to buy tomorrow's bread." If this place existed in the Bay Area, you'd have a line of yuppies down the block every day at opening time.

Simon in a bread coma, waiting inside Tomášovce's stunning world-class train station.

At any rate, by the time we made it back to Tomášovce's mesmerizingly beautiful communist-era train station, the rain started pouring down. After waiting 15 minutes for the train to arrive, it was still coming down in buckets. Yet, when we got back to Podrečany a mere five or six minutes later, it was bone dry. As someone from California, where it barely ever rains at all anymore, I love these localized thunderstorms, where in one village it's raining hard enough to drench your entire outfit in a matter of seconds, with full-on thunder and lighting, and literally in the next village over, there's not even a drop of rain.

Strange Attitudes by Some Slovaks About Ukrainian Refugees

For many years, Terezia has been getting facials and her eyebrows done by a woman in downtown Lučenec. She used to do this regularly when we lived in Slovakia, and she now always schedules an appointment with this woman whenever we're in town.

When Terezia went to see her in our first week of this trip, the woman launched into a bizarre tirade against Ukrainian refugees, complaining that they're only willing to take "the best jobs," and that they're refusing to take low-wage assembly line-type jobs because they apparently "think they're too good for them." She went on to claim that Ukrainian kids are taking up spots in daycare centers and preschools that would have gone to Slovak children, and kept pushing this view that the Ukrainian refugees are getting preferential treatment.

So, yeah, let's just ignore the fact that these women and their children have just fled a horrific war zone, often with only as many bags as they could carry and a now-useless currency, and are separated from their husbands/fathers for who knows how long (possibly forever for some). 

I'm unable to take photos of Slovaks with strange views towards Ukrainian refugees, so for some visuals to break up the text, here's a picture of Simon and his cousin Tea (pronounced Tay-ah) on a new play structure in Podrečany. There are no refugees staying in Podrečany, at the time of writing, but I hope if there ever are, people here will be more welcoming of them than you'd think they'd be based on their comments.

Terezia has often said that jealousy is a deeply ingrained and pervasive characteristic among Slovaks. She says they always assume everyone has it better, and they're quick to cut anyone down who they perceive as having more. But the fact that some people would extend this jealousy to Ukrainian women and children who are literally fleeing for their very survival, leaving their homes, friends, family, and possessions behind, is pretty disturbing.

Terezia's mom was talking to a neighbor who, in addition to complaining about Ukrainians getting preferential treatment, was livid that the war is causing a rise in the prices of flour and other basic foods and ingredients, as well as gas and oil. She asked how can we take care of all these refugees when Slovakia can't even take care of its own people? Terezia's mom then asked this woman, "Well, how would you feel if you were suddenly forced to flee your home and your country with only one bag on your back?" The woman gave no response, and Terezia's mom just turned around and walked back home.

In this article, it's mentioned that some Slovaks in an east Slovak town are actually jealous of the Ukrainians coming over the border because they apparently have better cars! Let's conveniently ignore the fact that people from the big cities in Slovakia, like Bratislava and Košice, also likely have better cars than people in some town out in the sticks.

It seems so intensely selfish to me for people to think this way. Ukrainians are fleeing death, rape, and senseless destruction and violence. They are escaping to countries like Slovakia to keep their children from getting murdered, and you're going to get into a snit about the price of flour? These refugees could very well have literally lost their homes - and everything they've worked for - and you're going to bitch about them, from the comfort of your not-bombed-out home, getting preferential treatment? The fact that this apparently needs saying is absolutely insane to me!

Again, no photos of Slovaks with unfortunate attitudes towards Ukrainians, so here is a picture of Simon and his cousin Tea on some swings at the little new play area in Podrečany.

Terezia's mom and brother insist there's quite a bit of pro-Russia sentiment here in Podrečany, as well as in the broader region. I'm told there are a lot of older folks in the countryside who look back to the Soviet days with a certain fondness because, as they'll tell you, during communism, they always had a job, a roof over their heads, and food on the table. The way they saw the transition to a free-market economy was that the store shelves may have suddenly been stocked with more food and product choices than you could shake a stick at, but they couldn't afford any of it, so what good was it anyway? There was also fear that capitalism would bring financial instability, the social safety net would disappear, and they'd all end up penniless and living on the street. Never mind the fact that these people still have jobs (or pensions if they're retired), roofs (which most of them own) over their heads, and food on the table.

So, this kind of thinking sometimes manifests nowadays as a pro-Russian attitude. However, this base jealousy from seeing refugees welcomed with open arms is a problem that could be occurring irrespective of how one feels about Russia or Putin.

It doesn't help, however, that when Ukraine's president Volodymyr Zelensky addressed Slovakia's parliament on May 10, former two-time prime minister, friend of Putin, and professional asshole Robert Fico sat out the speech, along with a number of MPs from his party, Smer, and afterward he accused Zelensky of "lying daily" and harming Slovakia's national interest. Even though Fico and his party are currently in the opposition and not part of the ruling coalition, the problem is that he and Smer just won't go away, and they always seem poised to do well in upcoming elections, despite being tainted by a growing list of scandals. I said this in an earlier post, but we are truly lucky that Fico is not in power right now. The EU does not need another unsupportive country like Hungary trying to throw a wrench in the works.

Things are a bit different in bigger cities like Bratislava, where you have a higher concentration of people with more diverse views, and who are perhaps a little more aware politically. As a result, you're more likely to find people there who support Ukraine and want nothing to do with Russia, and more likely to find people who aren't getting into a snit about some perceived preferential treatment of Ukrainian refugees.

But not everyone in the village is pro-Russian or anti-Ukrainian. I've been curious to see any signs of pro-Ukraine sentiment on our trip here, and on one street in Podrečany, someone has put up a big Ukrainian flag, which is high enough on its pole to be seen from Terezia's mom's backyard and elsewhere around the village. As a lifelong anti-war liberal progressive, flag waving has always left a bad taste in my mouth, and still does. To me it smacks of mindless jingoism and a kind of antagonistic, divisive "us against them" mentality, which I cannot relate to. But in the context of this reportedly prevalent pro-Russian sentiment among people in villages like this one, hoisting this flag seems like kind of a daring statement. Interestingly, this flag is the only sign of support for Ukraine I've seen so far out here in the middle of the country.

If you look closely, you'll see a Ukrainian flag in the middle of this photo (click to enlarge it), just over the tops of the trees. I'm not a fan of flag waving, irrespective of the cause, but I was curious to see if there are any signs of support for Ukraine in Slovakia. This is the only such sign I've seen so far anywhere out here in the middle of the country.

Despite the unfortunate and unhelpful attitudes towards refugees that I'm hearing about, it should be noted that there are other Slovaks who are apparently happy to help them. As long as this country's policy is still to welcome the refugees, and as long as some people are doing the right thing by treating these people humanely and putting them up somewhere safe, that's what's most important.

Bojnice Castle and Zoo

 

Finally, here's a castle and town I haven't written about before! Terezia and I first went to Bojnice - a small town and castle of the same name in the Trenčín region - during our first trip to Slovakia together over the 2010–2011 winter holidays. But when we went there to see its famed castle, back then you had to take a guided tour if you wanted to see the interior, and they only did guided tours if there were at least 10 people lined up. Since this was right between Christmas and New Years (i.e., not tourist season), and it was the dead of winter with everything covered in snow, we were the only ones there, and it was highly unlikely anyone else would have turned up that day. So, we didn't make it inside.

 

Nowadays - thankfully - they don't force you to take a guided tour; you can just do a self-guided tour, taken entirely at your own pace, and they give you a little pamphlet with all the info about the place that you'd need. So, getting inside was no problem this time.

Bojnice Castle, technically called Bojnický zámok, is generally considered to be Slovakia's most beautiful castle, and it's certainly one of its most popular, despite being kind of tucked away in a part of the country with little else to lure foreign visitors. Its design was directly inspired by the famous castles of France's Loire Valley, which is pretty obvious when you lay eyes on its striking, ornate, fairy-tale-like exterior.

However, Bojnice is arguably a bit of a sham. While many of those Loire Valley castles date from the late Medieval and Renaissance periods, Bojnice only acquired its Loire-inspired form when it was radically rebuilt in 1888–1910. Of course, there has been a castle on this spot since the early 1100s, though it was reportedly just a wooden fort then, which was gradually expanded and rebuilt in stone over the subsequent few centuries.

The castle was owned by various families over the centuries whose names loom large in Slovak history, notably the Csák, Corvinus, Thurzó, and Pálffy families. The Pálffys sold it to Jan Antonín Baťa, owner of the famous Czech Baťa shoe company, in 1939, but it was confiscated by the Czech state in 1945, and has remained state owned ever since.

It was Count János Ferenc Pálffy who was responsible for the Loire-inspired rebuild. Because the rebuild is not all that old, it does seem to have a squeaky clean Disney Land quality to it, which can be a bit of a turn off if you prefer your European castles to be covered in a centuries-old film of soot and grime. However, it still cuts a striking figure with its imposing height and grand design.

It's a pretty massive complex, and you obviously don't get to see all of it. You go through a series of rooms done up as accurately as possible in period furniture, and at one point you ascend a broad, stone spiral staircase that takes you up through several floors of one of the fat, round bastions. You see living rooms, bedrooms, dining rooms, a bathroom, big cavernous rooms that were used for god knows what, etc., many of which were adorned with wildly ornate ceilings and floors, and/or very cool stone-carved fireplaces. There's also a portion that descends underground into the rocks directly beneath the castle.

Like seemingly every castle in Slovakia, Bojnice also caught on fire at one point, though this conflagration occurred in the 1950s, much later than most castle fires, and the state paid for the necessary repair work.

A photo of the castle after it caught on fire in the 1950s.

Regardless of what you think of the castle, its Loire aesthetic and immaculate condition certainly make it stand out among Slovakia's many castles, so it does offer a unique experience in that regard. Plus, it's a damn sight nicer than Bratislava's boring castle that resembles an upside-down table.

The only bit of annoyance at the castle occurred when we were close to reaching the top of the big bastion and Simon said he suddenly had to pee "really bad." Note that Simon steadfastly refused to pee when the rest of us all went the moment we entered the castle. So, Terezia asked one of the staff members who stand there in the rooms and tell you not to touch stuff if there was a restroom close by, but she said the only public restroom was the one all the way down at the bottom by the entrance, where the rest of us peed when we first arrived. So, Terezia had to take Simon back down through the long, labyrinthine route to the entrance, while her mom and I waited up in the bastion. On their way back up, Terezia discovered a shortcut which the staff woman several floors up totally neglected to tell her about, and which would've saved her a lot of time and energy.

The village of Bojnice directly below the castle is not as interesting visually or historically as you might expect. It's objectively "nice" in that it is clean and well taken care of. It's centered around a long, rectangular main square decked out with two long rows of large shade-providing trees and broad pedestrian footpaths, and lined with restaurants which all have inviting outdoor seating (when the weather is nice). But in terms of visual appeal, it's quite lacking compared to historic towns like Trenčín, Kežmarok, Bardejov, or Levoča. Most of the facades look boring, plain, rebuilt, and/or new. It has none of those goopy, ornate, old Medieval, Renaissance, or Baroque facades that line the main squares in other historic towns.

The Zoo

After eating lunch in a decent restaurant in an alley off the main square, we hiked back up the hill just past the castle to get some ice cream, and then went to Bojnice's zoo, located pretty much next to and behind the castle, which is another popular attraction the town has to offer. I really wasn't sure what to expect, so I kept expectations low. The Oakland Zoo, by where we live, is quite nice and has thoughtfully conceived habitats for the animals to live in, and I've been to the world-class San Diego Zoo a couple times, which sets the bar exceedingly high. 

Bojnice's zoo was actually nicer and better maintained - and significantly bigger - than I thought it would be. But to see a number of the of the animals, like the elephants, you have to trudge up some incredibly steep and lengthy walkways, which take you far up the hill behind the castle. While I personally have no problem with steep hills, our five-year-old son, like many kids his age, has his limits, especially when you've already spent the morning walking up and down the inside of a massive castle. Also, we went with Terezia's mom, who is in truly outstanding shape for her age at 73, but she nevertheless needed to take the hills at a slower pace and with periodic breaks. We made it as far up as the elephants and camels, but there was another loop further up the hill that we just didn't have the energy for. We still saw maybe two thirds to three quarters of the zoo, though, and Simon was especially happy to see the bears.

Most of the animals seemed to have decent, appropriate habitats, though the enclosures for some of the birds, like the eagles and condors, seemed a bit cramped. Some of the monkey enclosures also appeared to be a little on the small side, though you are able to get up nice and close to some of them, and they had plenty of structures to climb and swing on. There's a massive elephant building containing a large terrace that you can view them from, but none of the elephants were in there when we passed through it; instead, they were in the vast outdoor area behind it where you could only view them from a distance.

Overall, Bojnice's zoo seemed to be pretty nice and well kept up, but it badly needs something like a gondola or funicular that families with young kids and grandparents in tow can ride to the top of the hill, allowing them a fuss-free walk back down.

Click here to see all the photos taken on this trip so far.