Friday 20.8.2010
Today in class we talked about Vienna art and architecture and the Jugendstil movement. Gustav Klimt and Otto Wagner and those blokes. We are to see more of them during our walking tour of the city on Monday. We also talked a bit more about Viennese coffee houses. They were sometimes referred to as “the penny university” because intellectual discourse was so frequent that one learned a great deal about a vast array of subjects in the coffee houses. Apparently Sidney and Diane have been hitting up all the historical coffee houses in Vienna without me. I need to get in on this, as that’s exactly what I’ve been trying to do.
After class we decided to go to Budapest. Martha and I decided to leave that afternoon to have more time in Budapest, so we went to the grocery store then home and made sandwiches and she booked the hostel. We caught the 15:50 from Westbahnhof to Budapest-Keleti. It was a 3-hour train ride, but we had beer and sandwiches, theological discourse, and fairly comfortable seats, so we weren’t too bored.
Once again (as in Bratislava) it was overcast when I arrived in this eastern European country, but I know not to judge the country by the sky (Bratislava proved delightful). On the way to our hostel, we exchanged some currency in a Best Western. However, sensing that we were not getting the best possible rate (there was an 8% commission) we exchanged only small amounts here so as to have some cash. I exchanged Euros but I should have followed Martha’s example and brought along U.S. currency, because as she said, you lose each time you exchange. Perhaps I’ll have a chance to follow her lead in Switzerland if I go. In any case our instinct proved useful; we found currency exchange booths all over Budapest (so near to the Eurozone). I think the best rate we saw was at a chain called Northline (highest rates and no commission). In the Northline booth we went to, the guy was playing some online game (possibly World of Warcraft?) on his laptop to pass the time. (Side note: I also saw an old man who looked like he may have been homeless reading on a sidewalk to pass the time. This encouraged me.)
Regarding Hungarian currency: the Forint is very inflated. 274 Ft. = €1, 214 Ft. = $1 USD. Wikipedia said the bills go up to 20.000, which is under $100 U.S. The smallest cash piece is 5 Ft. 1 Ft. pieces do not exist, and in commercial exchanged in Hungary they round up your bill to the nearest 5 Ft. The concept of a Forint cent is of course ridiculous, as it would be worth nothing. Even more than in Vienna and Bratislava, the storekeepers here are reluctant to make change. They frown when you pull out a bill for small purchases (the smallest banknote is 500 Ft.); the grocery store clerk asked me, “Cois, perhaps?” when I flashed a 1.000 Ft. note for water and coffee. So in that sense I get more excited about 100- and 200-Ft. coins than about 5.000 Ft. banknotes. The Hungarians are happier to see coins. In general things are pretty cheap in Budapest. The tourist shops have prices as high as Vienna, but it pays to shop around as everything can be had pretty cheaply; there are little stands everywhere. Lots of places sell bunches of paprika, an item traditionally associated with Hungary, it seems.
Martha and I were EXTREMELY fortunate to have decided to come Friday night rather than Saturday morning, like the others. After we checked in at our hostel (there were some complications with our online registration, but they were worked out), we went to the main street to see what was around. Dozens of people were walking on both sides of the street in the same direction. We joined the crowd to see where they were going. The farther we walked, the more people there were until literally hundreds of people, from the very old to little children, filled the street. Some people had set up tables and were selling giant pretzel-looking things, pastries, beer, water, and the like. Finally we followed the people to one of the several bridges stretching across the Danube to link Buda and Pest. There the people stopped. We soon discovered why; fireworks erupted over the river for a while! Clearly this was some sort of festival. After the pyrotechnical display, we followed the crowed in dispersing along the Danube, where dozens of little tables and stands offered snacks, beads, electrical light toys, etc. It was a sort of carnival; we saw ponies for children to ride and a couple fairground-type mechanical attractions. One sign outside a club answered our question: we had arrived, to our great delight, on St. Stephan’s Day. There were some very good live Hungarian bands, both electro-rock and acoustic folk. Eventually (after this awesome Hungarian cheesy street bread) we returned to the hostel. Budapest has many buskers and beggars.
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