Let it Rain; Budapest, Hungary August 2011

”Hungary is the best place in the world” she said.

“It has the most beautiful city; Budapest. It has the most beautiful language. It has the most beautiful music and the best culture of any place in the world”.

“Yes, but what about the weather”? I ask.

Maria is a proud Hungarian. Born in Slovakia, she is one of the 5 million Hungarians that found themselves outside of Hungary as a result of the carving up of Europe by the Allies and Russia after World War 11. Well, probably her grandparents, as Maria is in her late 20’s.

Maria is well travelled. She has studied in Milan as well as Hungary. She has a degree in Landscape Architecture and a passion for design.

But there are no jobs in Hungary for Landscape Architects.

Maria moved to Vienna to find work, but she got so homesick for her beloved Hungary she moved back to Budapest. Now she works for Tibor, who runs the suite of apartments that I am staying in, in downtown Pest.

It is an unfortunate fact of life that the country that has produced more Nobel Prize winners per capita than any other country has a massive underemployment problem.

Wages are low, taxes are high.

VAT is 25%, the highest in Europe. Income tax is 46%.

A doctor working in a hospital takes home around 600 Euros per month. Not much by other first world standards. Other workers average 350 Euros take home pay.

I decide to patronise the “free communist walk” of Budapest.

Our tour guide talks about having her two children in Hungary’s public hospital system.

“The first time, I think, I am not going to pay bribes to the Doctor and hospital staff to look after me with the hospital equipment I have paid taxes to buy. So, no one looks after me or comes to see me and I have terrible labour. The second time I decide to pay. Each visit to the gynaecologist I pay him an extra 40 Euros cash, and for the birth I pay him and the mid-wife an extra 200 Euros each, and I have the best of care and a very good labour”.

Low wages and lack of work have many effects here. The trained and educated work in other countries where they are paid very well compared to Hungary.

There is a large homeless problem here. People are sleeping in doorways out of the rain, or next to air-conditioning outlets which provide some heat. Luckily it is quite warm; it is the height of summer. I can’t imagine how you would survive outside during the harsh winter.

Every time the garbage bins are put out in the street for next-day collection, the street below my window is a constant night industry of rubbish rifling. One person will go through a bin then move to the next, and then another goes through the bin that has just been looked at, hoping something’s been missed.

There’s a paradox here though. Hungarians are a well dressed, sartorially splendid nation, from my observations. It’s actually a little unsettling when I walk outside my apartment to find a well-dressed and coiffed woman in her mid-30’s going through a bin. She is wearing heels and makeup and I can only deduce that Budapest has the best dressed homeless people going around.

You can still see bullet holes in some Budapest buildings from the Nazi occupation, the Soviet occupation and the 1956 uprising put down by the Soviets. This city is often used as a Word War II set for Hollywood films, and it is so cheap to film here. In fact, Brad Pitt is due here next month, my guide informs us.

The 50 years of Communism were the dark years in Hungary. The Terror Museum sets it all out in the actual building that was used as the headquarters of the ruling party, which includes prison cells, and torture or “information extraction rooms”. Neighbour spied on neighbour. You could be arrested and sent to a forced labour camp just because you were suspected of having thoughts that were anti-regime.

These years of suppression seem to be foremost on the minds of many Hungarians. Invariably, it is brought up in most conversations I have with them. But, one thing I know for sure; to move on you have to leave the past behind.

Never forget, but move on.

If you keep re-living the past, that is exactly what you do; relive it, and you can’t escape the misery that was wrought on Hungary in those years.

But Hungary is a young Democracy. The last Soviet soldier left Hungary in 1991. So, many of them categorise the nation as a “post-communist democracy”; meaning they haven’t quite got there yet.

Every day, I walk across the River Danube to the Buda side, across the green Franz Josef ll bridge, and climb the maze of interwoven paths on the steep Gellert Hill, keeping the arms of the Libertie Statue in view so I don’t get lost like many of the tourists who ask me for directions.

The view from the top is stunning. I can’t think of another city that has a view quite like this actually in the city. You can see a 270 degree panorama of Budapest from up here, and perhaps 100 kilometres into the distance. It’s no wonder their  Austrian Haspburg masters built a citadel here back in the 1500’s, which contained a garrison and a prison.  Now, it contains a restaurant and a museum, and some old Nazi artillery guns. The Soviets “donated” the Libertie statue to Hungary, and there used to be several other statues showing muscular women and men fighting the dirty proletariat and playing the roles of working-class heroes in factories and in the fields. However, as soon as the Soviets left, the Hungarians tore down the statues along with other Stalanistic reminders around the city. They now live in a tourist park somewhere outside Budapest; I can’t imagine there are many visitors to it.

Budapest is a low-rise city; there is not much over 10-12 stories high, and certainly no high-rise. It gives it the feeling of livability; high-rise may be practical but rarely is it a thing of beauty. It blocks out a sun that rarely shines in many places, and has a tendency to make humans feel insignificant.

It is my first Saturday night here, and, in between showers I walk the green bridge to the Buda side in search of some non-tourist nightlife. It is on Bela Bartok Utca, I enter a lounge bar and strike up a conversation with Ferenc and David. A lawyer and a teacher, they are waiting for Adam, an architect, and his girlfriend Vicki, an economist to join them. They are around their late 20’s to early 30’s. We drink beer and they introduce me to palinka, the fruit vodka-like rocket fuel that Hungarians chase down their beer with, and keep warm in winter with. They say you should wait for half an hour before having another shot, as the alcohol content varies from 50-75%, and two strong ones in quick succession may completely knock you out . I ask Ferenc his thoughts, as a lawyer, on Hungary.

“It is shit” he says. “There are no opportunities and there is very little work. The city is nice, but you go outside it and it is shit that the communists built.”

Vicki asks me why I have chosen Budapest to come to, “you don’t come for the sex, do you”? She says with an edge to her voice.

“Well, if I have I haven’t found any!” I reply.

She is referring to the reputation that Hungary has gained for porn movies and strip clubs. English and German men come here for weekend Bucks parties.....they wear t-shirts saying “The  Hungarian Triathalon; Eating, Drinking and Fucking”.

Adam asks me some deep and meaningful questions about my motivation for writing about my travels and what I am trying to achieve. But, it is too happy an evening, and all my answers are pretty shallow and not well formed; I blame the palinka.

We have a great time, a lot of laughs, a few drinks and I think “maybe Hungarians aren’t all that bad”. Most of the Hungarians I have met have had few good things to say about their fellow countrymen. “Hungarians are fucking rude!” is a sentiment I would get used to hearing during my month long stay.

David leaves first, as he has a young family at home. The rest of us stay till the bar staff kick us out at 2am. We resolve to meet up again. The guys want to take me cycling on road bikes. Ferenc is a little unsteady on his feet and his bike. They ride off into Buda, I walk off to Pest.

We never see each other again.

Travel can be like that.

A Note to the Reader

If you have enjoyed reading my blog, can you please take a moment and click on my sponsor's ads at the top of the page? It will give me some small income to cover the cost of running the blog, and even perhaps my travels.

The warmest thank-you's to You, and Best Wishes,

Grant