My experience inBratislava (capital of Slovakia) was indifferent. Well, I didn'tspend much time in the company of natives, so I cannot actually sayanything about them, except what happened to my parents, but thatcomes later on. I stayed on with my extended family and friends. Iwas very pleased to see them, especially since with some I haven'tbeen in contact for ages. One negative thing about Bratislava that Ican state are the prices that are charged to visitors of Bratislava.I must say that the customer is not getting his moneys worth. It'strue that this is the capital city, but lets be realistic, if youwant to keep people visiting Bratislava, do something about thisissue.
So this is Bratislava, asI observed it. However the M.R. Stefanik airport that can be found inBratislava is a whole different matter. I was flying to Kosice, atown near my own, in the Eastern part of Slovakia. I can say withoutany problems that the airport in Bratislava is one of the shabbiestairports I have seen in Europe. People flying in to Slovakia, willhave an interesting opinion about the country as a whole upon seeingthis “gateway”. Already in a mood upon entering the building, Iwas positively surprised by the helpfulness of the guy sitting behindthe check – in counter. For flying with a low cost airline I wasamazed at the level of professionalism that I have encountered.Unfortunately my mood turned for the worse once I tried entering thedeparture gate. People were queued from the gate entrance right upto the cafeteria. I was surprised that they didn't form a snail trailleading through the cafeteria's tables. The queue was moving at aspeed of a micro snail, no offense meant to the snail species. Oncemy girlfriend and I arrived at the front of the queue, mind you therewere about 30 other demoralized passengers waiting in the queuebehind us, we were “greeted” by the security personnel. What abeloved sight. These individuals were so keen to empty our pocketsthat my girlfriend had to point out the contents of her bag, todemonstrate that a particular Slovak hand cream was within the limitof 100ml. I do not mind people emptying their pockets, we had nothingto hide so we were more than willing to comply with the requirements.I still vividly remember walking around the Milan – Malpensaairport in plastic slip ons, since my boots were beeping at everysingle check. Back to the M.R.S. airport, what was most annoying wasthe attitude that the security personnel had when they askedpassengers to empty their pockets and bags. I told the securitypersonnel that my boots tend to beep, remembering my Milanexperience. I was informed in a very unfriendly manner, it sounded asif they were dealing with a retarded person, that of course I shouldtake them off. It would be have been awfully nice to be provided witha pair of plastic slip ons to walk around in, but I guess at thisairport it was not the case (unfortunately) Then when I had mypersonal items scanned the operator stopped the machine and told me(he didn't ask!) whether I knew that I had a bottle of liquid packed.Of course I knew, I bought it in the duty free prior my departure. Ihad the receipt in the bag where the bottle was found, but this stillseemed to pose a problem for the operator, since he was looking atthe bottle and the receipt for about five minutes, making everyone inthe queue grumble. He then consulted his colleague whether apassenger can transport a bottle that is not packed inside a cardboard container, but only placed inside a plastic bag, of a duty freeshop! What a moron! Of course you can! What do people do when theyhave connecting flights! Are they meant to get pissed out of theirminds before passing the control in the transfers area, so that thesecurity will not remove liquids (alcoholic beverages in this case)they purchased in duty free shops at the previous airport! Well afterthe consultation with the colleague, I was allowed to proceed withall my items intact. Unfortunately we were delayed upon take off asnot all the passengers managed to pass through the check in controlin time. Mind you had there been only one machine I wouldn't mind butthere were two machines at that gate, so why not use all that isavailable in order to hurry up the processing of passengers! Nexttime I travel from M.R.S. airport I will surely ask the security whyaren't they utilizing resources available to them.
Later on I will writeabout my experience in the Eastern part of Slovakia.
