Bratislava Hotels
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The next Prague? Really???
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I had read so many good things about Bratislava in guide books and online that I was really looking forward to visiting there. If I hadn't had such big expectations, I probably wouldn't have been so disappointed. As a city, there really wasn't much there. The buildings were nice, but nothing super special compared to other European cities. The central area was really small, with the Old Town even smaller. There was a pretty castle on a hill overlooking town, so I spent my first afternoon exploring it. I also walked around and saw all the statues and other monuments in the Old Town. Once I finished that, there really wasn't much else to see or do in Bratislava. I spent most of my second day sitting in cafes reading and drinking hot chocolate while watching the heavy snowfall outside and waiting for my bus to Budapest the following day.
My couchsurfing experience in Bratislava could only be described as interesting. I stayed with a Finnish girl who is studying costume design at a university in Bratislava for the year. Calling her an ego-centric drama queen would be a massive understatement. She can't seem to have a conversation, instead preferring to talk only about herself. Nonstop. In way too much detail. During the first evening I spent with her, I heard about every man she had ever dated and/or slept with in great detail. It was way more information than I ever wanted to know about her. I also heard about her father's problems with alcoholism and how she doesn't get along with her mother very well. She didn't ask even one question about me. To this day she still doesn't know any more about me than what is in my couchsurfing profile, including what I did while in Bratislava. I stopped trying to make it into a conversation and instead just smiled and nodded while thinking about other things. Definitely not the best of my couchsurfing experiences, but at least it gave me a free place to stay.
I had another interesting encounter with someone who recognized me in the Bratislava Tourist Office. I was using the free internet access to check my email when a guy came up to me and asked if I was from Chicago. When I said yes, he asked if I went to Buffalo Grove High School. After another yes response, he said that he's from Poland but had spent his senior year there and we were in physics and calculus classes together. I didn't recognize him at all, even after he told me his name and where he sat in the classes and still can't place him.
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