Budapest, Hungary
I've come to the conclusion that people in the Eastern Block of Europe are somewhat emotionally depressed on a societal level. People in Hungary were definately more friendly than those in The Czech Republic. Czechs seem to be introverts, somewhat scared of outsiders, where Hungarians are more open...but still not super warm.
The warmths comes from two things (and it may sound quite material and I'm sure simply untrue but this is my tourist perspective): food and baths.
The food, well, I should say, the desserts are awesome. Almost all of them contain some kind of rich cream, rum and a delicate sponge cake and chocolate. I've developed a serious eating problem being in Hungary for a week because these over the top deserts were CHEAP...I'm talking a buck fifty. The Turkish baths are amazing. I met up with Carolyne, my pal from CESTA, and we went to the Kiraly baths(traditional Turkish, sulpher baths) and Gellert baths (Also Turkish, non sulphur, but super ritzy in a posh hotel). I got a massage at both and realized this is what would make living in a cold, gothic/dismal place, quite enjoyable, though, I didn't get the sense that the average working class Hungarian did this kind of thing regularly. In fact, the woman massaging me had obviously been doing it for probably going on 5 hours and she talked to the other therapists full voice while listening to a loud Hungarian cover song of American Disco (I think it was Gloria Gaynor). I was quite happy to get slapped with baby powder for fifteen bucks. It was great.
I spent about 4 days in Budapest, mostly walking around, exploring with Carolyne the Gothic architecture, cave churches, lion bridge, communist statues etc. Hungarians, like the Czech's seem to be deeply wounded from the 20th century's totalitarian regimes. The day I arrived, they were celebrating the anniversary of the 1956 uprising against the communists, where ultimately 20,000 people perished. The parliament had a monument to a massacre that occurred there during the uprising which was quite beautiful. It was covered in candles with the Hungarian flag bearing a hole in it (in the center, the hammer an sickel was placed, and as a result, was symbolically removed).
Carolyne and I also made it to the surreal and creepy "museum of terror". This museum is a house on Andrassy Utca which was rented by the communist regime after the 1956 rebellion, to torture and kill people in. When you enter, there is a foreboding black monument with intense Stephen Spielberg "the sadness of pain" kind of music which continued throughout much of the exhibit. It was somewhat of a sensational experience, (with beautiful creepy installations) though I have to say, the basement where the torture and death chambers remained in tact, left my entire body feeling sick. It was deeply ironic how us tourists are drawn to the history of pain and death. It's kind of like those tourists who head to Iraq or Palestine just to kind of check out the scene (maybe to help, but really to be close to some kind of sensational violence), not realising till you are there what it really entails. I couldn't help but feel like I didn't belong there and I wanted to leave. It felt like the spirits in that building were trapped, and we were walking through them, thousands of tourists at a time, disturbing them with our steps and gaze.
That said, I do believe that museum really reflects the psyche of those Eastern Block countries who lived under totalitarianism for much of the 20th century. It has become so much a part of their identity. On my last day I had the pleasure of visiting "statue park". This was by far the most surreal thing I've ever experienced in my life. The "park" is a large piece of land, beside a freeway, in the suburbs, outside of Budapest that contain dozens of giant Communist statues. Basically, a bus drives you in, drops you off for 45 minutes, leaves you to wander around with a tour guide who gives no real context to the statues outside of giving a collective emotional history of how the people felt about them, like "this statue, many people thought looked silly" or "this statue, got graffitti on it", or "this statue, the soldiers in it look fat so people laughed at it". I'd be curious to see a communist give the same tour. I've come to learn that many of these "communist" tour sites (like the communist museum in Prague and the museum of Terror in Budapest) are fairly right wing, and rewrite history themselves. It's interesting to see how one political persuasion portrays "propaganda" through its own "propaganda". I almost wish several histories, varying politicized tour guides and pamphlets were readily available, so that we could perhaps read between the lines.
I am now in Athens, just arrived, and walked around the Acropolis and sat on a marble mountain overlooking the city at night. The Greeks are warm and friendly, quite a relief to the coldness of Eastern Europe. I kind of want to go sit on an island for a while and watch sheep (or goats..either will do). The baclavas are huge, goeey and cheap. Ohhhhhh, here we go again!!!!!
That's all for now.
The warmths comes from two things (and it may sound quite material and I'm sure simply untrue but this is my tourist perspective): food and baths.
The food, well, I should say, the desserts are awesome. Almost all of them contain some kind of rich cream, rum and a delicate sponge cake and chocolate. I've developed a serious eating problem being in Hungary for a week because these over the top deserts were CHEAP...I'm talking a buck fifty. The Turkish baths are amazing. I met up with Carolyne, my pal from CESTA, and we went to the Kiraly baths(traditional Turkish, sulpher baths) and Gellert baths (Also Turkish, non sulphur, but super ritzy in a posh hotel). I got a massage at both and realized this is what would make living in a cold, gothic/dismal place, quite enjoyable, though, I didn't get the sense that the average working class Hungarian did this kind of thing regularly. In fact, the woman massaging me had obviously been doing it for probably going on 5 hours and she talked to the other therapists full voice while listening to a loud Hungarian cover song of American Disco (I think it was Gloria Gaynor). I was quite happy to get slapped with baby powder for fifteen bucks. It was great.
I spent about 4 days in Budapest, mostly walking around, exploring with Carolyne the Gothic architecture, cave churches, lion bridge, communist statues etc. Hungarians, like the Czech's seem to be deeply wounded from the 20th century's totalitarian regimes. The day I arrived, they were celebrating the anniversary of the 1956 uprising against the communists, where ultimately 20,000 people perished. The parliament had a monument to a massacre that occurred there during the uprising which was quite beautiful. It was covered in candles with the Hungarian flag bearing a hole in it (in the center, the hammer an sickel was placed, and as a result, was symbolically removed).
Carolyne and I also made it to the surreal and creepy "museum of terror". This museum is a house on Andrassy Utca which was rented by the communist regime after the 1956 rebellion, to torture and kill people in. When you enter, there is a foreboding black monument with intense Stephen Spielberg "the sadness of pain" kind of music which continued throughout much of the exhibit. It was somewhat of a sensational experience, (with beautiful creepy installations) though I have to say, the basement where the torture and death chambers remained in tact, left my entire body feeling sick. It was deeply ironic how us tourists are drawn to the history of pain and death. It's kind of like those tourists who head to Iraq or Palestine just to kind of check out the scene (maybe to help, but really to be close to some kind of sensational violence), not realising till you are there what it really entails. I couldn't help but feel like I didn't belong there and I wanted to leave. It felt like the spirits in that building were trapped, and we were walking through them, thousands of tourists at a time, disturbing them with our steps and gaze.
That said, I do believe that museum really reflects the psyche of those Eastern Block countries who lived under totalitarianism for much of the 20th century. It has become so much a part of their identity. On my last day I had the pleasure of visiting "statue park". This was by far the most surreal thing I've ever experienced in my life. The "park" is a large piece of land, beside a freeway, in the suburbs, outside of Budapest that contain dozens of giant Communist statues. Basically, a bus drives you in, drops you off for 45 minutes, leaves you to wander around with a tour guide who gives no real context to the statues outside of giving a collective emotional history of how the people felt about them, like "this statue, many people thought looked silly" or "this statue, got graffitti on it", or "this statue, the soldiers in it look fat so people laughed at it". I'd be curious to see a communist give the same tour. I've come to learn that many of these "communist" tour sites (like the communist museum in Prague and the museum of Terror in Budapest) are fairly right wing, and rewrite history themselves. It's interesting to see how one political persuasion portrays "propaganda" through its own "propaganda". I almost wish several histories, varying politicized tour guides and pamphlets were readily available, so that we could perhaps read between the lines.
I am now in Athens, just arrived, and walked around the Acropolis and sat on a marble mountain overlooking the city at night. The Greeks are warm and friendly, quite a relief to the coldness of Eastern Europe. I kind of want to go sit on an island for a while and watch sheep (or goats..either will do). The baclavas are huge, goeey and cheap. Ohhhhhh, here we go again!!!!!
That's all for now.
posted by Mr. Sophie at 10:39 AM
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