Bratislava
When Friday came along, John Paul, Brendon, Ali Decker, Kate Donnely and I hopped on a train to Vienna for our first Ten Day break. We went to Sudbanhof station which had a creepy blinking eye clock and got some pizza. There we got cheap tickets to Bratislava and got on the train. Once in Bratislava, we got off the train and immediately were impressed with the lack of cleanliness of this city. There was graffiti everywhere you turned and trash laying all over the ground in this underground train station. It was no different when we came above ground.
We started out looking around and slowly made our way up to the highest point in the city. Before this though, Brendan and I stopped in a modern art museum at no charge. I enjoyed some of the paintings, others I really didn’t like at all. After coming back out we continued up the hill to the highest point at the castle which had a huge banner on it advertising the addition of the Czech republic to the Euro currency. I found a great place to view the city from overlooking the river which is available in all the pictures. You can see a bridge that looked like a UFO and many (probably abandoned) churches. I began talking to these others tourists from England next to me while the others were talking on the other side of me. He had very interesting views on politics and our discussion lasted for about 30 minutes when John Paul came over and butted in, literally. This is where I began to pick up on an elitist attitude from him at least around me. Soon we left that peak and began to descend viewing a great sunsut through a gate on that hill. We got down to some gardens and saw another view of the city and of a great Church. Meandering down through there and crossing under a bridge, we soon entered the historic district of Bratislava. There were many wonderful shops and beautiful Churches . There was one main street which had all the shops and restaurants bustling with tourists. This is where we saw the first statue of a Bratislava man who would appear throughout the city. We got some good pictures with these fellows who we looked for throughout the city for about an hour, it was a lot of fun. Then we found a cafe in which we ate dinner, though I didn’t order anything except some dessert. I had brough two days worth of food (Monzerella balls and bread) in order to save money. It was recommended to me many times at this dinner that I should pursue engineering instead of lawyering…something I considered for a while. Too late. I can’t change the world in that profession. The tools Imight give to the world can be put into the hands of anyone, good or evil. Law is more direct.
We continued onwards and made it to the Bratislavan airport by 21:00 which we waited at. A big disappointment for me was that I had to pay 20 Euro instead of the 10 I would have had to pay if I had bought the baggage ticket online with the plane ticket. Because I risked not getting my baggage through I had to pay extra. But I had a beer and it was all better. We boarded the flight to Istanbul all excited and I sat next to Ali Decker. We finally took off and were off. I just kept thinking about how at every second I was the furthest east I had every been and probably will ever be. I tried to sit in an empty first class seat to look out the window to get a glimpse of the terrain but no chance. Back in my seat, we soon landed in Istanbul.
