The Foreigner's Guide to Living in Slovakia

Bratislava castle is in the midst of a reconstruction project and according to an article in the Slovak Spectator, the project will take place over the next four to five years. Though some areas will be restricted, the castle is not shut down and visitors are still welcomed.

What are they doing? They are restabilizing the castle’s foundation as well as renovating castle hill and the surrounding areas, back to their original Baroque look.

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Recently I read an article in the Slovak Spectator about the Hotel Kyjev, called Jewel of modernist architecture slated for demolition. The hotel, located in Bratislava at Kamenné námestie, may be destroyed along with the Prior (Tesco) department store buildings as part of a development project called “Centre Plaza”. No date has been set for any action.

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As an English teacher in Slovakia at the university level, I sometimes had the opportunity to work with students on their thesis work or projects. By chance I worked in the Department of Architecture at the Technical University in Bratislava. Though usually my input to students never went beyond the assistance of academic writing, I appreciated that I was none the less exposed to a range of works regarding architecture.

Architecture interests me. And undoubtedly, living in a new environment makes a person more aware of their surroundings. Over the years of living in Bratislava, there was only one architectural structure that created in me such a varying range of conflicting and strong emotions: Nový Most – New Bridge.

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For someone like me who likes to imagine what village life in Europe was like centuries ago, the village museum of Vlkolínec is a treat. Imagine being able to walk through a village where traditional houses are preserved, and to be able to go inside the homes where people once lived and worked. In Vlkolínec you can do exactly that.

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Continuing on the subject of blocks of flats, these last few months, my husband and I lived with my father-in-law in his communist-era apartment block. Living there brought back so many memories of my experiences and the things I noticed when I first moved to Slovakia and lived in a panelák (I also lived in an apartment block in Bratislava but it was built in the 1920s and was not a panelák, thus, a different living experience). Here are some of my personal thoughts and memories, some good and some not so good:

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In continuing with the idea of sharing more about what it is like to actually live in Slovakia, I’m posting what I wrote about blocks of flats in The Foreigner’s Guide to Living in Slovakia:

You can’t escape them. They’re everywhere. From Bratislava to the small towns deep in the countryside, the unmistakably utilitarian, communist architecture sometimes stands out as a glaring eyesore. If you are traveling from Vienna to Bratislava you can’t miss the clustered blocks in the distance, looking quite formidable (they’re not that inspiring up close). The view from Bratislava castle looking over the Danube to the blocks in Petržalka, the most densely populated area of Bratislava, is quite amazing.

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One of the dominant styles of architecture found in Bratislava, and across much of Slovakia, is a style called socialist realism. This style of architecture originated in the Soviet Union and then was spread to many other communist countries. In Wikipedia, socialist realism is described as follows:

“[Socialist realism] depicts and glorifies the struggle toward socialist progress… . Its purpose was to elevate the common worker, whether factory or agricultural, by presenting his life, work, and recreation as admirable. In other words, its goal was to educate the people in the goals and meaning of Communism.”

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