Riding the Bus in Bratislava

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Cheap flights–they’ll be the death of me. I suppose I have to thank Ryanair. They really know how to reel in the students. Our spring break was coming to an end, and we needed a way back to Sevilla from Vienna. Most flights were so expensive it wasn’t even worth thinking about it. Taking trains would be twice and expensive and take three times as long. Then we discovered that Ryanair had a flight from Bratislava to Bergamo, Italy. Bratislava was only an hour or so by bus from Vienna, so it was perfect. We would take a cheap bus into the Slovak Republic, get to see another city and country, then fly away on our way home. So we thought.

Bratislava has a bad reputation, to say the least. I think American films are to blame for this. First, “Eurotrip” gave everyone the impression that it was a ghost town where 5 American cents could get you royalty status. Then, the movie “Hostel,” which slandered not only the city, but hostels in general, gave Americans the impression that Bratislava was filled with people who want to mutilate you. When people heard we were going to Bratislava, they scratched their heads.

My friends and I, well, we didn’t really care about that nonsense. We were going to experience it on our own and then make up our minds. Taking the bus from Vienna, we slept most of the way. By the end of our trip we were downright exhausted. I woke up a litte before we entered the Slovak Republic, only to find some of the most beautiful countryside I’d seen in a long time. Fields that went on forever, little houses tucked into the earth like hobbit houses in the Shire, and fields as far as the eye could see with wind-powered generators. “This is going to be a nice little trip,” I thought.

Then we entered Slovakia. The area just seemed to be in a depression without any hope of improvement. As we entered Bratislava, we passed one slum after another. There seemed to be a couple nice spots, but in general, the city lived up to its reputation. Getting off at the airport, we threw our bags in a lock up, exchanged some money (very favorably for the euro), and waited for the bus. At the news stand, we later found out our tickets were very overpriced. Once we got on the bus, we followed everyone elses moves. No one scanned their ticket and simply tucked them away. We thought to ourselves, we’d better hang on to the stub. Three years earlier in Rome I’d had a problem with the police in the Metro when I threw away my ticket stub. I was fined 50 euro, and since then had been very careful to keep my tickets.

Now, as we rode the bus further into the city to get some lunch and explore a little, we were suddenly aware of a man asking people questions. When he got to us, he said something we didn’t understand, then said “Ticket, your ticket!” We showed him our stubs. And he immediately became angry and told us we had to get off with him at the next stop. For some insane reason, we followed him off the bus, along with two other people, a young girl and an old woman. The old woman simply walked away, but the young girl was also a Slovakian and said she had no idea what was going on.

The man was wearing plain clothes and claimed to be a Metro cop. He took our passports and wouldn’t give them back until we gave him either 35 euro each or 1250 coruny. This man had no identification, didn’t speak English very well, and was acting very aggressive and not trustworthy. We told him over and over that we’d paid for our tickets but had no idea we had to get them scanned. He told us the tickets were invalid because they weren’t stamped and if we didn’t pay he would call the cops.

As the argument got louder, a crowd soon developed, and we were getting very scared. Here, in Bratislava, we’re going to be attacked by a mob because of a stupid Metro cop. We just wanted our passports back, but he refused to give them to us. We told him that without identification we couldn’t trust him, and that it was illegal for him to hold our passports. We spat off some nonsense about him breaking the Geneva Convention and that we were going to contact the embassy and he would lose his job. Apparently, his only ID was his number, #38, and we jotted this down. He kept saying he would call the cops if we didn’t pay, and he could just follow us to a bank and we would take out the money for him. “That’s extortion, you idiot,” we cried.

His actions were getting more and more eradic, and we kept a close watch on him incase he tried to run off. We finally got him to call the cops, because we thought it was better to deal with them than him. We were wrong. When the cops finally came, they were angry at having to speak English and deal with Americans. “When I come to your country, I have to speak English and know your laws, but when you come to Slovak you think you can just run around without paying for tickets and break our laws,” said the angry cop as he rubbed his eyes. We told them over and over that we paid, showed the tickets, yet they didn’t care.

Luckily a couple of people watching who spoke English were trying to help us. They were arguing with the Metro cop and the police, probably saying they’re just dumb American tourists who don’t know any better. They were also making sure it didn’t get out of hand. Finally the cop held up his hand and said, “You either pay us the money or we put you in jail.”

What were our choices? We had to dish out 35 euro each, bringing us down to nearly nothing left. After we got our passports back and the cops left, the Slovakians who tried to help us said, “Welcome to Slovakia…Corruption.” He was trying to say that the people aren’t bad, but the government leaves much to be desired. He asked where we were from, and I said Boston. He knew of the Bruins, and Elyse asked if he’d ever been to America. His friend didn’t understand, so he had to translate. The man burst out laughing. “If I’d been there, I wouldn’t be here right now.”

We jumped back on the bus, this time stamping our tickets, and found some restaurant in another crumby part of town to have some beers and get lunch. We were so rattled and upset we needed to calm ourselves. Eventually we laughed about the whole thing, but were still in shock at what took place. We were mostly upset about the Metro cop taking our passports, since that was all we had. Our few hours in Bratislava wound up costing much more than we planned. We went back to the airport early and couldn’t wait to get the hell out of dodge, vowing never to return.