Budapest - Two Great Cities - One Great Place

This past weekend, I travelled with three friends, Sonja, Rado, and Alison, to Budapest, Hungary. We left Bratislava Friday after school and took the 2 1/2 hour train ride to Budapest. When we arrived, we attempted to find our hostel. After wandering around the city for about an hour, we found the hostel. Figuring here would be where we would put our bags down, we let out a sigh of relief. First day = no problems. So they thought. Nevertheless, they were not aware of my travelling curse.


We walked into the hostel and the receptionist said, "Sorry two groups of people booked the same room. There is no room here for you."


"What do you mean?" We asked. "We have the confirmation e-mail in our bag."
"Someone must have booked the hostel 5 minutes before you did. This doesn't happen often but it does happen."


I laughed quietly and then asked when he found out about this problem.


"When I came in to work this morning," he responded.


"And why didn't you communicate this problem with us?" I asked.


"Usually we do, but today was a busy day."


Yeah, another busy day at the hostel. I'm not sure what that means. I wanted to ask, "You were too busy to send us an e-mail or phone us?" But I figured I would get nowhere, so I sat down and just laughed and told my friends of the curse.


The hostel receptionist was nice enough to at least find another hostel for us. Yet the problem with this hostel was that it was above the city and the only directions we had was, "Go up the hill and you'll find it."



Nevertheless, we did have an amazing view of the city. For those who do not know, Budapest is made up of two cities: Buda and Pest. Buda is on the west side of the Danube and Pest on the east. Buda is the hilly, beautiful side, and Pest is the side of buildings upon buildings.


Saturday morning we woke and made our way to the market where we ate some fresh Hungarian food and enjoyed some freshly squeezed orange juice. It definitely beat Minute Maid.



Afterwards, we walked up the castle hill to catch another view of the city. I never get tired of looking at castles.





















After crossing back into Pest, we found a number of shoes just laying by the riverside. Sonja explained that these are supposed to represent those who were taken during the Holocaust.



Hungary is known for its' spas. We all brought swimsuits and made our way to one of the famous spas in Buda. We sat in a pool of warm water for nearly two hours. During that time I remembered that my family (except my mother) was running in the Indianapolis Mini-Marathon. Their bodies were tired and worn. Mine was relaxed to the max. I'd prefer the spa to the run.


That evening I realized why they called the country Hungry. We went to a Hungarian restaurant and the waiter and waitress pestered for about ten minutes about what we wanted to eat. We ordered soups and a meal. The soups took 30 minutes to arrive and after that the meal took 45 minutes. Sitting at the table, waiting for our food, we realized anyone who visited the country must have continuously been saying, "I am so hungry!" It's true. Look it up on Wikipedia. Nevertheless the food was delicious and we even had live music. A violinist even placed his violin right next to my ear, thinking it might please me. Little did he know.


Sunday morning we walked around the city and found Heroes Square. Heroes Square is something like a mini St. Peter's Square.

Then we found a park where a festival was going on. At the festival, I found three things worth noting. The first is a t-shirt a woman was wearing. This woman's shirt should say, "Help me, I don't know my masculine and feminine forms of words very well!"

The second was the American hot dog stand. I love hot dogs but never in my life will I buy a hot dog in Europe. In Slovakia they call them "parky" and they are just about the most disgusting thing I've ever eaten. During our training this last fall, we were each served four on our plates for breakfast. This was the only meal I did not eat all of. Anyway, the American hot dog stand had an interesting umbrella. What flag is that next to the U.S.A. flag? Yes, the Civil War is over, and the South lost.

Last, and saddest, was this fake car accident and a wooden person we found by the car. This wooden man was wearing a sweatshirt that looks much like a shirt my roommate Larry owns. This was a rather sad sight. Poor Larry. Fortunately, when I returned to the apartment. Larry was still alive! and wearing this shirt (not really but it would have been funny).

Budapest is said to be one of the most beautiful cities in the world, and I will have to agree. On my top ten list of most beautiful cities, Budapest falls within the top ten. I only have about 7 cities on my top ten list, though. Seriously though, I did enjoy Budapest more than most cities, even Prague, especially because it wasn't as touristy as cities can become.

That's all for now. Thanks for reading. Thanks to Alison for the pictures.