Budapest I

After the wet day in the Tatras, we left the following day and the weather improved again. I might have stayed longer, but there were so few English speaking people around at that time I thought it wouldn't be fun to stay. And I was enjoying the company of my new-found friends.
So we travelled to Kosice (in Slovakia), then to Miskolc (in Hungary). Both are now in the European Union, but the difference between the two was quite marked. The train got a better engine as we crossed the border, and the farms looked neater and more organised.

Hungarian is not an Indo-European language, unlike the others I had come across on this trip. I had been OK in the Slavic countries, because I had done Russian at school for some weeks and a lot of the words are common across the countries. But here was a language that was very alien to me.

We arrived in Budapest in the evening. However, my English friends from Nottingham university were meeting up with 2 others and they had organised a hostel for all 8 of us. I was struck by how much more expensive the hostel was than Slovakia, on a par with Italian prices. After some difficulty finding a restaurant that evening, I split off from the others for an earlier night's sleep.

In the morning we discovered the hostel and double booked and we were out on the street (so to speak). We found another hostel on the other side of the river (Budapest is actually two cities, Buda and Pest, and we crossed over to the older one, Buda). It was quite an interesting hostel - they were burning incense in front of little statues and the various rooms had themes - the four guys in our group were in one which had a painted picture of a red-indian lurking among some plants. Despite having reservations about the spiritual emphasis of the place, it was generally a really nice place with great people and a relaxed homely feel.

Budapest is a great city! I really enjoyed it. It reminds me a lot of London, with it's spread out streets, cosmopolitan feel and lovely big parks. I felt quite at home there in fact. Being September there were fewer tourists and this helped a lot as well.

As a group we went to the Turkish-style baths. They are great! There are hot tubs, cold tubs, whirl pools (that actually spin you around - good fun), steam rooms, sauna, fountains, outdoor and indoor pools. And there is chess. Some of the men sit in the outside hot tub for hours (near the sign advising people to stay in no longer than 20 minutes because of the heat). One of the English guys, James, somehow managed to find a chessboard free and we had a couple of games too.

I had a good look around the castle area with another Brit (not part of our group), and whilst in one church had a good conversation about the reality of God; I was able to tell her how God was real and that I had experienced Him in my life - I hope she has started to see things differently now.

Other highlights were seeing the parliament building and other beautiful building and watching the sunset from the Citadel high above the city.

I liked the city so much that I parted company from the students as they headed on to Balaton, because I wanted to see more of Budapest.