The last century has not been an easy one for the Czech Republic and Slovakia, and 2018 is an important year of remembrance. It’s the 100th anniversary of the birth of the Czechoslovak state which existed prior to German occupation in 1938. It’s also the 50th anniversary of the “Prague Spring,” a brief period of political liberalization during the dark decades of Soviet domination which ended with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.
Shortly after Communism’s collapse, Kosice — pronounced (roughly) “Ko-sheet-seh” and located in southeastern Slovakia not far from the Hungarian border — began a resurgence that has turned the city’s core into a walker-friendly history lesson. There is now a pedestrian-only passage stretching from Kosice’s modern inter-city train station, through an adjacent park to a pedestrian-only zone of shops, restaurants, a grand opera house, a lighted-choreographed fountain, and numerous restored 13th and 14th century churches, inside of what was once a medieval city with a wall to protect it from invasion by Mongol tribes.
Yes, that’s right. Mongol tribes! History is long here. Portions of fortifications dating from the 13th Century have been preserved.
Kosice is home to the oldest annual marathon in Europe, conducted since 1924. Discounting Athens’ connection to the original Olympic marathon, Kosice has the world’s second greatest marathon tradition, behind Boston’s celebrated race.
It’s a point of significant national pride that Kosice will co-host the World Ice Hockey Championships with Slovakia’s capital, Bratislava, in 2019. And while this is an indication of how much has changed since Iron Curtain days, the recent Russian aggression in near-by countries suggests that, perhaps, the more things change the more they stay the same.
JER
ALL OVER THE MAP 