Thoughts about Slovakia I've stored up...

1) Fashion. It is seriously a fad here for women to walk around, being seen, in boots (often patent leather), a large purse, and hair [and sometimes a coat or scarf as well] that are all the exact same color! I've seen a cherry hue, plum, and turquoise...and that's only so far.

2) Dogs. There are a lot of German Shepherds, which I like, but I think they are actually used as guard dogs here. Every single one that I pass, trapped in a backyard, absolutely barks it's head off at each passer-by. It's as if they are trained to think that every innocent person is a potential suicide bomber, come to blow up their backyard. Their owner isn't even around! It's like the dog is personally offended, and angry, that I would even consider walking on the sidewalk outside their turf.

3) Drivers. No one pays attention to pedestrians. I am beginning to wonder if drivers would even stop if they hit one. Or maybe there is no manslaughter accusation if you kill someone with your motor vehicle? Oystein actually looked up statistics [since he was so outraged when he arrived] and apparently Slovakia has the highest rate of traffic accidents. I don't ever want to hear crotchety neighborhood folk raging about unsafe drivers in the US again!
3b) Yet they still have crosswalks! No one honors their existence and people jaywalk anyway. So I ask: what the heck is the point? The country doesn't have a huge excess in their budget, but they could have saved quite a bit of euros on the white paint, the time it took to paint them, and the cost of the labor itself. But no one asked me....

4) Snow. Maybe I've mentioned the beautiful sunny days we've had here recently... I'm pretty sure we went 9 flawless days in a row (still freezing though) before the sky let out a huge blizzard again today. It's like Mother Nature stores up all the snow somewhere and lets it ALL out on one big, long, cloudy, snowy day. But she doesn't want to ruin Slovak's day every day, so she spoils "us" with the warmth and sunshine until the day comes where she can't hold the condensation any longer and literally a foot of snow falls in 24 hours. Then, however, the sun comes out, melts almost all of it, before - oh wait - the cycle starts over. This has seriously been the pattern all winter.

Welcome to Slovakia where nothing makes sense....