Budapest

I don't have my notes on me, so this will be a summary of what I can remember the most from the past two days.

The train ride from Bratislava to Budapest was amazing. The train travelled along the Danube for about 60% of the trip and it was BEAUTIFUL! I also had a 6 seat car to myself, so I had no problems with rolling down the window and hanging my camera outside the window. My only issue was trying to figure out when my stop was going to happen, because the train I was on was actually going all the way to Beograd (I had a moment of panic when I first arrived at the station - I wasn't sure where my train was because nothing was listed with "Budapest" as its final destination!). Every time the train slowed down (there were multiple stops at small Slovakian and Hungary villages on the way) I had a panic attacking, thinking that it was my stop and that I would miss it.

The only issue I had in finding my hostel was that the damned metro had about 16 gazillion exits so I kept going through the wrong ones. I finally did make it to my hostel (after again getting lost in the interconnecting hallways) and checked in. This hostel, Tiger Tim's, is by far the "homiest" hostel I've been in. They sat me down with a map and pointed out all the most interesting sights, etc. I actually had to ask them when I could pay for the room (but this is part of Tiger Tim's appeal).

Anyways, since I was starving - I had only eaten the free apple and croissant given by my Bratislavan hostel, they also pointed me out to a couple of nearby restaurants. I ended up grabbing a ridiculously delicious pita from The Hummus Bar. Can I import that chain to Canada? Mau highly approves of it.

I originally intended to walk to the famous Andrassy Street, but I caught sight of an interesting building further down a side street and ended up investigating. Lo and behold, I found Hungary's parliament buildings! They're small, but beautiful - they're very reminiscent of gothic churches and apparently that was done on purpose. Also, the building is only 96ft (or 96 meters?) which is, by law, the tallest a building can be in Budapest. (96 or 896 is a very important number for the Magyars - it has to do with when they became a country, etc.)

Since Parliament is located on the Danube, I walked along that for awhile. I came across a bunch of cast iron shoe statues along the edge of the water - I could guess that they were memorials of some kind, but I wasn't sure for what. (At dinner that night, I asked the other hostellers about them, and I found out that yes, they're a memorial for the Jews who were lined up during the holocaust and shot into the Danube. Great dinner conversation.)

I was going to walk across the river but then my camera battery died and I discovered that I left spare in the hostel, so I had to go back and fetch it. After grabbing it, I ended up going up to Heroe's Square/Park, hanging out a bit, and then grabbing the metro back to the Danube. From there I decided that it would be a brilliant idea to walk across the Danube afterall and climb Gellert Hill so I could get a view of the city. Great ideas for me though often result in exhaustion. The view was fantastic, but it did take awhile to gather the will to go back down and walk back to the hostel.

At the hostel I ended up just hanging around with the other patrons - we also had a homemade hungarian meal (which needed a lot of salt in my opinion). We chatted for a bit and then most people started watching a movie.

As some of you may have seen on my Facebook status, it was at this point that I tried to befriend the Nigerian guy staying at my hostel. I'm going to assume now that his attempts to ask me about my age, state of marriage, whether I had a boyfriend, and his need to tell me his own age, were just his culture's conversation starters. At least that's what I'm telling myself, and I won't let you tell me different.

Today I rolled outta bed by 8:30 and ended up having a European breakfast (aka a pastry or roll - in my case a pastry with a ham and cheese substance) and started on my day of museums. I actually went to St. Stephen's Basilica first just because it was on the way.

The basilica was very pretty - I think it's probably one of the top 3 basilicas I've seen with regards to opulence. It was like a mini-St. Peter's Cathedral from Rome. Gorgeous, but not very inspiring. (My all time fave church remains the duomo in Siena, Italy.)

I then went to the House of Terror. Wow. This memorial/museum is probably the best combination of artistry and information I've seen. Considering it's subject material, I hesitate to call it "cool" but that's the first word that comes to mind. The only downside is that most of the information (if you don't invest in an audioguide) is presented on 8x11 sheets of papers, so you end up standing in a dimly lit room reading a small novel.

The House of Terror was originally known as the House of Loyalty. It was first used by the Nazis to torture and kill anti-fascists and all potential "enemies" of the regime. Later, the Soviets took over and used it for the same purposes. As mentioned, the place is now a memorial/museum, so not only did they provide the information, but it was presented in representations and artistic manners. E.g. In one room they had fake election booths with TVs showing news broadcasts of the times. The information presented in that room was about the electoral fraud that broad the communists to power. Behind the election area was a "hidden" backroom that represented the machinations used to enact these changes. And, when you finally took the elevator down to the former torture chambers, the elevator moved very slowly and played a video of a man describing the process they used for hanging. It was a very powerful display.

The only part of the museum that truely disturbed me was the final hallway before the exit. They had pictures and the names of all the Victimizers of both regimes along with the dates of birth and deaths (or blanks if they were still alive). I don't know how to describe it, but I found it very disturbing to see these pictures and to know that some of them still existed on Earth. Not that I want them dead, but seeing the blank dates of death made it feel like the Hungarians were just waiting for them to perish. I didn't even walk through the whole section - I backtracked and made straight for the exit.

One of the things that I never realized until I was done with this memorial was how, shall I say, naive I was. In Canada we tend to learn our history as being, "Yay, the holocaust is over. Now we just have to defeat the ideals of these pesky communists!" But here in Eastern Europe, they had the holocaust and then they were all placed into the suffering under the Communists. It was never ending for them.

To continue on my fun filled day I decided to go to the Budapest Holocaust Museum next. It was mostly stuff I knew before, but presented from a Hungarian point of view, so that was very interesting. They had very sad and sobering displays, more than I've ever seen before. Also, all their videos had English subtitles and they relied a lot on personal testimonies, so you'd see a lot of posters telling the stories of individuals victims or survivors. It was amazing. One thing they placed more focus on than I've seen before was the medical experiments that went on, including experiments on twins.

After the museum I was going to walk along the Danube again, but my legs protested too much. I think I strained my thigh muscles or hamstrings - they're not painful, but each step is a bit sore. I made a conscious effort to know go gallivanting around like I normally do. And, mom will also be pleased to hear, I also had 2 meals today, and bought food to make my third. Yahoo!

Anyways, I'm pretty tired so I shall leave off here. I haven't got a clue what I'm up to tomorrow, but I'll figure it out by tonight. Cheerio!