And the Rains Began to Fall…

North of Bratislava, close to the Austrian border, is a town called Malacky (pronounced: Mah-lat-ski.) After our weekend in Brno, Lisa and I met up with several other teachers for a week of teaching in this location. With less than 20,000 people, it’s not a big place, but serves as a central hub for a number of surrounding villages.

Spring (Or Summer?) Is Here!

Back in December, Lisa and I were stationed in Sabinov, Slovakia so that we could teach in a nearby village called Ražňany (check out the end of my post “A Familiar Face in Prague” to read about that week.) Recently, our company sent us back to Sabinov for another week of teaching. Luckily for us, the job was actually in Sabinov this time. So, this meant that, instead of taking a bus early in the morning, we could walk to school from our accommodation in about five minutes. Additionally, Sabinov was a blistery, frozen winter abyss the first time we were there, so it was nice that the town would have an opportunity to redeem itself.

Beneath the Mountains

[Warning: There are very few pictures to accompany this post. That is because Lisa was off teaching in a town called Snina and is the keeper of the camera—seeing as it is her camera. I apologize in advance.]

Aerial view of Spišská Belá next to the Tatras.

We left Levoča and I made my way to a place called Spišská Belá for a week of solo teaching. Spišská Belá is a cute town that is situated along a main road that leads into the High Tatras mountains. Consequently, from the town, one can catch a breathtaking view of the mountains on a clear day. Fortunately for me, Spring decided that this was the week that it would awaken—ending this year’s brutally long Winter for good—and I was able to see the mountains most days during my stay. The walk to school was about 10 minutes long every morning, but it was one of my favorite parts of the day; once I got past the gas station, the landscape opened up invitingly and the mountains became available to any desiring onlookers.

Quite stunning.

Tackling Spiš Castle

After leaving the mountains, Lisa and I received notice that I would be working the following week in Spišská Belá and she would be working in a town near the northeastern border called Snina. Since we were already in this general region, we decided to spend our weekend in a town called Levoča. It’s a pretty nice place with an attractive square, though it was under some construction during our stay. The only real reason we went there, though, is because it was a nice jumping-off point to visit Spiš Castle—the biggest castle in Slovakia and, arguably, Central Europe.

Entrenched in Trenčín

After teaching in Nitra, all five of us (Lisa, myself and our three new colleagues: Ryan, Jack & Robert) decided to head to Trenčín for the weekend. Trenčín is a town in northwestern Slovakia, near the Czech border, that has about 56,000 people and is known for its rich history—it has been around for nearly 2,000 years— and remarkable castle.

Fun fact: Zdeno Chára is from Trenčín, as well as some other notable Slovak hockey players in the NHL, and the Stanley Cup has visited the town on four separate occasions.

East to West: Koŝice to Bratislava

So, after visiting Prague for the second time (the subject of my last post), Lisa and I made our way to Koŝice—where our company is based in eastern Slovakia—to work on a few things: paperwork regarding work permits, the opening of a bank account so I can be paid, and attaining a cheap phone. All of these things happened and, while they took an entire week, don’t really seem worthy of taking up a substantial part of my blog. There are a couple worthwhile things about Koŝice that deserve some attention, though. First, we found possibly our favorite restaurant so far—Med Malina. It is a Polish restaurant and its name literally translates into “Honey Raspberry”, which is apparently a phrase that is uttered by Polish people when they eat something that tastes really good. Like ‘Mmmmm’—but more creative. The menu is very reasonable in price and they offer all the traditional dishes that you’d want to see—haluŝky, pirohy, garlic soup, goulash with cabbage and sausage, etc.

We may or may not have visited it three times in two days…

Secondly, situated in the main square of Koŝice’s Old Town (right next to a Gothic cathedral which is very impressive architecturally but pretty eerie at night since they don’t keep it lit) there is a fountain known as the musical fountain. Basically, it is a pretty generously sized fountain with anywhere from 15-20 streams of water that shoot randomly up in the air like geysers. But, like the name clearly implies, they do so while accompanying music blaring from the speakers which are located behind various benches around the fountain. It’s kind of a pleasant idea, really—maybe if accompanied by some solid orchestral pieces or something poignant like that.

But this is not the case.