Lessons learned and remembering my first week: Slovakia

Lessons learned.

#1 Pack light.

#2 Only bring essentials.

#3 Pack food on travel days.

#4 Bring two plug adapters for charging electronics. (They are small and light hence not a contradiction to #1)

Apart from tomorrow's journey home, this is the last day of my month-long trip to Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Toronto and Nashville. Before this trip, I had not been back to Europe for 20 years and I had not travelled for a month at a stretch.

I found out that I have recovered sufficiently from a severe injury to be able to manage a trip such as this one and that I am capable of travelling on my own but I do think that it would have been more fun to travel with a companion: spouse, sister or a friend. I don't know when I will have the opportunity to go to Europe again, but when I do, I plan to rent an apartment, to have the freedom to shop and to cook, to feed myself more healthfully than staying in hotels allows.

The first few days in Bratislava were emotional. I liked staying in the old town but at the same time I regretted not being closer to my sister's place which is out in the suburbs, especially since she had just had surgery. My hotel was near the statue for which my mother, in her youth, was the model; walking past it several times every day made me feel closer to her. My cousins took me to visit her final resting place in a beautiful cemetery in Bratislava, where she is surrounded by her family in a peaceful park-like setting, with trees shading her family's plot and the birds chirping all around. I am glad that I was there and can see in my mind where she is.

In Bratislava, I also had the pleasure of meeting a young man and his mother to whom I am related on my father's side. The young man I met is my father's cousin's son. Does that make him my second cousin? My father's cousin passed away about 11 years ago. My own father died in 1985, I never saw him again after we left Czechoslovakia in 1968. My second cousin and his mother were wonderful to me, on my first day in Bratislava they tok me to Malacky, where my grandfather's family used to live, they showed me around the 300 year-old house and garden that they still own there and use as a summer get away, they took me to the cemetery to visit the tomb of my great grandfather and his family, they showed me several of the buildings that great grandfather had built, including the synagogue from 1886 which is now a cultural centre. A part of the house that my grandfather had grown up in still stands though it is now a shop, it was closed so I could not go in but even so I felt a connection to the place. They also took me to a lovely working farm where a number of rescued animals are now happily living and where they also make and sell traditional sheep's cheeses and also make and sell freshly baked bread. We had a wonderful lunch there of traditional Slovak food.

I also had a wonderful time with my nephew and his wife and sons. They fed me home cooked meals, took me to the ruins of Devin castle, we visited family in Svätý Jur and went wine tasting there, and we all watched hockey together, a game which Slovakia won. My nephew and his wife took me to see their garden plot, not far from their apartment, in a beautiful country setting. The plots are rented from the railway and people cultivate vegetables, fruit trees, flowers, build small or larger abodes on them and generally use them to get away from the city. It is a beautiful spot and Benny, the chihuahua, took the opportunity to run away, at least for a time.

While in Bratislava, I also enjoyed a visit to and tour of the University Library where I met and spoke with several librarian colleagues. We had a great lunch at a local pub and we watched the start of another hockey game, the outcome of which I don't remember or perhaps don't want to remember.