After 2 ho-hum cities back to back, I was starting to worry that as we headed East I wasn’t going to like the places we visited as much anymore.
But I couldn’t have been more wrong!
We arrived at night and from the very beginning I started to fall in love with Budapest. Our taxi driver didn’t rip us off. A lady on the street stopped to ask if we were okay (while we waited outside our hotel to get in) and if there was anything she could do. People here smile at you on the streets.
It was also really warm, 27-28 degree’s, although the River Danube was overflowing from the rain and floods of previous weeks. In a way, both reflect this city and its people. Warm, overflowing with kindness. Cheesy, but true.
Budapest is made up of two sides, the East of the Danube, Buda and Pest, where we stayed. They pronounce Pest like a Kiwi with a thick accent would say “pashed”. Budapashed. I love it.
We did a walking tour the first morning, and visited the Terror House in the afternoon. Its located in the building that the communist regime governed from (and meted out punishment in the basements below). We learnt the Hungarians under the communist regime were treated almost as badly as the Jews were under the Nazi’s. Concentration camps, government sanctioned murders, many thousands died. It seems the Red Army liberators quickly became power hungry subjugators.
But like Berliners, Budapestians (??!) haven’t let it get them down. They’re creative, laid back and individual. And communism only ended here in 1989.
During the 45 years the Commies were in control, they erected hundreds of statues around the city. You can tell a communist statue in the same way you can spot communist architecture. It’s huge, solid, blocky and unadorned.
Basically the statues all look like giant grey concrete Lego men.
As soon as communism ended, the first thing the people of Budapest did, was take down all the statues, and replace them with new ones. Ones that have absolutely no political message whatsoever. Just pretty statues, with no message, that make you feel good.
I like the way the Hungarians think.
What they did do however, with all the leftover communist statues, was create a gimmicky park, called Statue Park, where tourists can go to look at the once dominate symbols of the stronghold the Commies had over the city, but are now simply a tacky tourist attraction. It’s a smart way to take away the power they once represented, forever.
Touche' Budapest, nicely played.
We ventured to the local Market Hall, where our guide had assured us was the best place in town to get cheap, authentic Hungarian food. She was right. We both ordered the stuffed paprika (very popular here) which is basically a capsicum stuffed with mystery meat and rice, and served with a handful of potato cubes boiled to within an inch of their lives, and all covered in some sort of tangy tomato sauce. It was amazing. I ended up going back two more times just to eat it again. Delicious.
She also recommended we try a local ‘sweet’ called Túró Rudi, which she said was only available in Hungary (reading between the lines we gathered it wasn’t really liked anywhere else). It’s a sort of sweetened reduced cottage cheese bar covered in chocolate. You even buy it in the cheese section of the supermarket. Although we were dubious, we tried it, and again, delicious! I can’t really describe it accurately, but if you ever make it to Hungary, try it.
The last Hungarian specialty we tried was strudel. Hungarian strudel is totally different to normal strudel. Where normal strudel has lots of pastry and a small amount of fruit, Hungarian strudel has lots of fruit and a small amount of pastry. My favourite was sour cherry.
We also visited the largest synagogue in Europe, the Dohány Street Synagogue. Yawn. I've discovered synagogue’s are very boring inside. But we also visited St Stephen's Basilica, which was the exact opposite - beautiful and huge. The Catholic’s really know how to decorate. It’s a church dedicated to the first king of Hungary, St Stephen, who introduced Catholicism to Hungary in order to avoid invasion. Apparently he was canonized after his death, so they decided to dig up his body after 45 years (for some unknown reason) and discovered that though the rest of him was decomposed as you’d expect, his right hand was perfectly preserved.
So of course they cut it off and put it in a display cabinet inside the church. I saw it, and I can tell you that the thousand years since, haven’t been kind to the hand. It’s small, it’s brown and definitely not preserved anymore. More like a dried out monkey hand clutching some jewels.
The Hungarian’s are also responsible for some great inventions. The guy who invented the Rubix Cube (Erno Rubik). Hungarian. The guy who added fizz to water, creating soda water (Anyos Jedlik). Hungarian. The guy who created the simple but life changing ballpoint pen (László Bíró). Hungarian. Apparently even the word “hello” can be traced back to Hungarians. They tested the first telephone exchange system, and when they said “can you hear me?” in Hungarian, it sounded like “hello?”. Needless to say, it stuck.
And then, just when I though Budapest couldn’t get any better, I discovered something wonderful. The beer here is cheaper than water.
Europe, we have a winner.
