Mmmm.... Im Hungary

It has been a while since I have updated this blog and I am sure you all are just dying to hear about my latest adventures over here in Europe, and thus I will dispense them upon you now. You see, over Easter weekend we got a few days off from our arduous class schedule and therefore were given a 4 day weekend. We first thought it would be a good idea to visit Barcelona. Well, the trains thought that would be a bad idea as they were all booked through France, and we therefore decided to go in the other direction. Hungary! Yup, we hopped on a train and traveled the 15 hours one way to visit the wonderful city of Budapest, Hungary.
Now, I will admit that I have had some preconceived ideas about Hungary. For one, I have always thought that countries in some way or another derived their name from their people or some other identifying marker. The United States are in same way or another united, the Netherlands means “low-lands” in pretty much every language, and Belgium I am sure has something to do with waffles. I therefore instinctively assumed that the people in this nation were hungry, and therefore thought this trip would be more like visiting a third world nation than anything else. It is with these thoughts in my head that I stepped onto the train from Zwolle, and began the journey with my 3 other companions to Budapest.
Now the train ride was relatively smooth as we had previously reserved the necessary seats (experience pays off in the long run as you only have to stand for a few hours before you learn your lesson and call in advance to make reservations!!) and we had a stopover in Vienna before hoping on a train to Budapest. We had a half hour so we quickly ran out of the train station before switching trains and touched Austrian soil. Yup, I have now been to Austria, what a wonderful land:-). We then entered the train station in search of our connecting train to Budapest and quickly found it at the proper platform, but this was unlike any train we had been on before. This was a dirty, old, and rather smelly vehicle. A striking difference from the posh ICE trains we have been taking around many of the countries thus far. To tell you the truth though, I was not that surprised, I just thought I would have seen camels or donkeys or something riding along with us being as anything that far east must naturally use such animals to get around and perform countless other tasks.
Anyway, 3 hours into our ride on this train we began to realize we still have not left this rickety old beast. We began to question ourselves as the schedule placed us in Budapest 10 minutes earlier and we were still sitting around staring out of the dark windows. We didn’t know what was going on. Did we sleep through the stop? Had we missed it somewhere, did this train split? We were confused, and with each passing minute our confusion began to increase in intensity as the worse scenarios began to pop into our heads as I imagined walking out of a train in an unknown city in the middle of a country where the people were so hungry they would probably hold me at gunpoint for the loaf of bread I had tied to the outside of my bag because it wouldn’t fit on the inside.
After an hour of these scenarios running through my head, we finally arrived at Budapest, I was overjoyed, and we then began our search for our hostile in this foreign city at midnight. We were told the hostel was close to the train station, and we were given the direct address so things were looking up. But quickly we found ourselves on a street where the 24-hour-buy-anything-shops with young groups of kids awkwardly staring at us backpack laden individuals gradually gave way to dark allies and shadows. We agreed that if our hostel was down that road we didn’t want it and therefore turned around. We read over the directions again and again, and could not find the hostel for the life of us. Finally, we navigated by the street numbers, and then in a small alleyway we found a ringer that had the name of our hostel on it. No other identifying marker was found, we rang the bell, the buzzer sounded, and we opened up the gated door to enter a dark courtyard. Slowly some stairway lights flickered on as we wondered what was going to happen to us next. They were mellow lights which flickered as if they wanted to go back to sleep, and I wondered if there was going to be a man with a giant chainsaw on the other side of the door. Thankfully I was wrong again, and we were greeted by a small, kind, messy haired man who looked like he just awoke from some peaceful slumber. He showed us to our beds and we quickly went to sleep in order to prepare for the next few days of adventure through this strange land.
Upon waking the sun was shining brightly. Now this is rare for me as I have probably seen the sun a total of 7 days since being in Holland. I was thrilled and promised myself that nothing would ruin such a day. I then walked outside and realized this jacket I was wearing was just to dang warm! I was super stoked and the remainder of the day I was comfortably roaming the city in a t-shirt which proudly exposed my white as ever skin. I was just thankful to be out of the rain for a change! Well, the first thing the light of the day showed us was that this city was in fact not that different from back home. I was amazed! I was figuring dirt paths, carts, and street vendors, but none of these expectations were met! In fact, their underground was one of the nicest undergrounds I have seen, not that large, but neat none the less. Still, the tram system was a little lacking, or perhaps we were just a little lacking as our first excursion got us lost in the middle of Budapest still wondering what the heck this city was about and why the buildings were beginning to look a little more run down. It also didn’t help when we crossed the railroad tracks and my mind began to discuss all the occasions when the other side of the tracks had come up in conversation. We needed help fast, and the heavy, bearded man pumping teenybopper music from his earphones just didn’t seem like the right option. We naturally turned to the grey head of hair carrying groceries on her lap naturally screaming “grandma” by the looks of her. She didn’t know much English, but enough to get us back on track and before we knew it we were on our way to explore this beautiful city.
We first went to Hero’s Square in this beautiful park and I sought frantically for any location I could possibly recognize from the episode of MacGyver “The Thief of Budapest,” and to my dismay I was unable to locate a single location. I then realized I had the movie along and quickly scanned the background to realize there were people walking around dressed as if they were from California in the 80’s. I should have known it wasn’t shot on location danget! How disappointing! Anyway, I pretended one of the statues was MacGyver, donated to the park for his heroic Macgyvernisms used to bring a poor gypsy family the freedom all people deserve. Next I saw a statue which supposedly will grant me some wicked awesome writing ability if I rub his pen. Therefore, I hope to see my prose improving over the course of my blogging, and have been told by some that wicked and awesome should probably be discontinued (some people just have no vision!) We then continued on our tour of the city with our next stop being the market. It was a bit disappointing being that it was inside, but it was cool and I had a traditional (I assume traditional because all of the Hungarians before me ordered it) sausage which looked horrible and black but actually tasted great.
Next was a church built in a cave which is now pretty much my dream, their statue of liberty, a walk by some other statues, a castle, a sweet church, and the fisherman’s bastion. Next we crossed the bridge linking the former cities of Buda and Pest and went to one of the coolest churches I have seen. It is rather new compared to the others, but the interior was absolutely stunning! Next was the parlament building, and to tell you the truth, the most impressive part about the parliament story is the fact that we witnessed a black cat leap upon a pigeon and take it away between his teeth with his head held high. It was a very intriguing sight, the parliament building was beautiful too, but it didn’t just jump on a pigeon! If the parliament building did that I assure you it would have more written about it than the last few sentences.
The next day we went in search of the English church we had found on the internet. Well apparently the people of Budapest believe that every building should be hidden in another building and signs should not be used, because just as our search for our hostel led to some difficulty this too led to problems. Only this time we were unable to find it and upon asking for directions at a local Lutheran church they invited us in because they also did not know where it was. The pastor talked to us and seemed like a very nice fellow, he explained that he church was in Hungarian, but we figured it was better than nothing and entered.
Now, if any of you have ever attended First CRC you will know that the pews are not the most comfortable things out there. I mean I have been to churches with nice padded seats which are a pleasure to be seated upon. Yet, this church in Hungary by far outdid my own church. These things were brutal, they had some wooden back thing that stuck right into you so that you couldn’t possibly fall asleep (although the woman next to me did seem to find a way as her snores erupted during what I can only assume was the congregational prayer) and my knees couldn’t comfortably fit in the area provided between pews. Thankfully the sermon was not too long, I am sure it was good though, he seemed like a really nice guy and all.
Anyway, after this we decided to test the metro, rail, and bus systems of Budapest in order to get to some caves in an outer part of the city. We were told that it could take over an hour if we don’t hit it just right, and we only had an hour to get there, but we were determined to do some serious spelunking that day and therefore took the gamble. Thankfully we made it on time, and were able to explore these crazy caves which at one time were filled with water. At some points you were able to see the shells still embedded in the rock, it was pretty cool. In the end, I absolutely loved the city; it was beautiful, and shattered all my expectations for what it would look and feel like. I highly recommend it to anyone looking for a cave church, a hero’s park, or a Hungarian statue of liberty. This is pretty much the place to be if such a place is your desire! The next entry will probably not be until Sunday evening or Monday as I am “Sick” this Friday and hoping on an early train to get to the beaches of Normandy! Stay tuned.