"Waiter-There's a Pest in my Buda!"
"Hello communism, how are you today," my partner in crime, Alisha announces far into our trip on the Hogwarts Express. The train cars are freezing, then sweltering saunas and then unbearable not to mention the screeching sounds of the tracks which really just sound like nails on a chalkboard. They don't announce destinations or stops, so even eight hours to go we can't fall asleep. What if we end up in Bucharest?! Even though we shut off the overheard lights, the flashing lights permeate through our closed eyelids (Kanye don' know nothing fellas).
She naps briefly and wakes up. She had a dream. "Dad how do you get to Croatia from NJ? Just drive!"
It amuses us for a sufficiently long amount of time.
So does this. "Communism was here" "If communism was a picture, what would it be?" GOULASH! X ON MONEY! ANGRY MEN! "The sun never rises on communism" "Post communism is the buzz word excuse in this area. Bad customer service? PC! Unfriendly people? PC! Food? PC man! Boys? POST COMMUNISM!!
This is why sleep deprivation is NEVER a good idea...
Budapest was actually amazing. I think I might have even liked it better than Vienna- but its a differnet type of city. I love the Turkish influence- it creates a really interesting East/West dichotomy and blending in the architecture and food. They LOVE paprika. And goulash, obviously. Buda has a really pretty castle and chain bridge, but there's nothing much to do over there during the hours we were there (although they have a fabulous Budapest Historical Wine Society because Hungarian wines are excellent historically-its just WW2 and the Russians basically crippled it-but its coming back!!!!)
The Hungarians are such lovely and nice people. And they even like Americans (unheard of-I know). When we were lost at the Spas (Im an idiot-I forgot the bikini- BRING YOUR BATHING SUIT AND GO TO THE SPAS!!!!) Some are indoor, so it doesnt matter if walking around for two minutes you literally lose all feeling (not joking)-we couldn't find the metro so we went into this little building and this old Hungarian woman cradled our faces in her hands and tried to explain it in broken English. They really go out of thier way to be nice. When we were out to dinner- our lovely waiter (who though I was British-WOOOOT)- was asking us all about America and where we were from and how he had a friend in Jersey, and I asked how to say thanks in Hungarian and he was so thrilled he went and wrote it down on a napkin and went over pronunication. It was adorable.
Random fact that I remember- hero's square looks oodly like Piccadilly-or is it Trafalgar?
People like to stare at my Wellies--which are great for long distance on ground not CONCRETE.
So I made another stupid mistake in Budapest-Life Lesson # 781-Good Ticket = Validated, Bad Ticket = Not
ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS CHECK FIVE TIMES AND ASK LOCALS IF YOU DON"T SEE A VALIDATION MACHINE IN EUROPE. Buying a ticket is not enough! I got slapped with a 6000HUF FINE!!!!!! Evil ladies, one was really nice and might've let us go-tourists-first time on metro- WITH TICKETS. And they made us run around every station to try to find an atm cuz obviously you don't carry around that much cash. DUR.
BREATHES. Well, not going to dwell on the bad. I will take a note from Metro Meditation Man. Bad ass Buda and Pest were amazing. You should go-before they get the euro in a few years.
On the way back-bongin' the yogurt.
She naps briefly and wakes up. She had a dream. "Dad how do you get to Croatia from NJ? Just drive!"
It amuses us for a sufficiently long amount of time.
So does this. "Communism was here" "If communism was a picture, what would it be?" GOULASH! X ON MONEY! ANGRY MEN! "The sun never rises on communism" "Post communism is the buzz word excuse in this area. Bad customer service? PC! Unfriendly people? PC! Food? PC man! Boys? POST COMMUNISM!!
This is why sleep deprivation is NEVER a good idea...
Budapest was actually amazing. I think I might have even liked it better than Vienna- but its a differnet type of city. I love the Turkish influence- it creates a really interesting East/West dichotomy and blending in the architecture and food. They LOVE paprika. And goulash, obviously. Buda has a really pretty castle and chain bridge, but there's nothing much to do over there during the hours we were there (although they have a fabulous Budapest Historical Wine Society because Hungarian wines are excellent historically-its just WW2 and the Russians basically crippled it-but its coming back!!!!)
The Hungarians are such lovely and nice people. And they even like Americans (unheard of-I know). When we were lost at the Spas (Im an idiot-I forgot the bikini- BRING YOUR BATHING SUIT AND GO TO THE SPAS!!!!) Some are indoor, so it doesnt matter if walking around for two minutes you literally lose all feeling (not joking)-we couldn't find the metro so we went into this little building and this old Hungarian woman cradled our faces in her hands and tried to explain it in broken English. They really go out of thier way to be nice. When we were out to dinner- our lovely waiter (who though I was British-WOOOOT)- was asking us all about America and where we were from and how he had a friend in Jersey, and I asked how to say thanks in Hungarian and he was so thrilled he went and wrote it down on a napkin and went over pronunication. It was adorable.
Random fact that I remember- hero's square looks oodly like Piccadilly-or is it Trafalgar?
People like to stare at my Wellies--which are great for long distance on ground not CONCRETE.
So I made another stupid mistake in Budapest-Life Lesson # 781-Good Ticket = Validated, Bad Ticket = Not
ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS CHECK FIVE TIMES AND ASK LOCALS IF YOU DON"T SEE A VALIDATION MACHINE IN EUROPE. Buying a ticket is not enough! I got slapped with a 6000HUF FINE!!!!!! Evil ladies, one was really nice and might've let us go-tourists-first time on metro- WITH TICKETS. And they made us run around every station to try to find an atm cuz obviously you don't carry around that much cash. DUR.
BREATHES. Well, not going to dwell on the bad. I will take a note from Metro Meditation Man. Bad ass Buda and Pest were amazing. You should go-before they get the euro in a few years.
On the way back-bongin' the yogurt.