We attended 8:30 mass in this cave-like church in the side of the mountain beneath the leaf-lady. The mass was in Hungarian and I am not Catholic, but it was an interesting church. Though it was in a mountain, it was clear that the walls had artificially been made to look cave-like. Martha told us that one little corner was dedicated to Poles (the writing, saints, and symbols were all Polish). After mass we found a bakery and bought espresso and pastries. I do not recommend the poppy seed strudel. The girls got postcards and scarves. In general, Hungarians are much friendlier than Viennese. We returned to the hostel. Three of the girls went to the baths. I (idiotically) failed to bring a bathing suit. Feeling that they would not appreciate staring at my penis for four hours, I did not accompany them. Martha and I went to a place advertising “more than 100 different types of beer!” Though it had a bit less than that, the selection was good, and I had a good Czech and then a Hungarian beer. Martha went to get a haircut (it was the equivalent of about $15 U.S. and she was pleased) and I stayed to write the last few pages on paper, with a pencil. I’m about to pay and leave, and then I think I’ll try to find St. Stephan’s for a look at the inside. Martha complemented me on my cursive handwriting! I’m to meet Sidney, Christina, and Sheena at the spy museum at 4:00 p.m. Then we’ll probably try to catch the 5:10 or 6:10 train back to Vienna.
Czech beer.
St. Stephen’s turned out to be quite beautiful. I really enjoyed the red marble and the Francis of Assisi things. He’s got that animal thing going on. I just think he’s a cool bloke, haven’t really researched him though. They also had something called “The Chapel of the Holy Right Hand” or something like that. It is the right hand of King Saint Stephen, an early ruler of Budapest and later canonized. They’ve got his right hand in there as a relic. They make you pay 200 Ft. to light it up though. That’s about $1 U.S., but I didn’t have the right types of coins and don’t really like the idea of paying to see a relic. Anyway there were pictures of it. There were also signs everywhere saying “Tourist stop!” where they didn’t want to you go. Apparently the most troublesome tourists speak English.
I really liked this marble.
I think went to the spy museum (a number they’ve dubbed The House of Terror) but the girls didn’t show, so I looked at the map and walked up the street to this castle. It was this sort of public park with some museums I didn’t enter, a monumental square dedicated to Hungarian military heroes and with lots of statues, a lake, and this castle-like area that was charming. Being ignorant of Hungarian, I do not know the full story, but I saw a restaurant and some other stuff named after one “Anonymus.” There was also a statue of that title depicted a cloaked, hooded figure sitting in a chair. Children were climbing all over it, so I didn’t get a good look, but it was very cloak-and-dagger and awesome. I’ll bet there’s a really cool Hungarian folk story about a heroic stranger behind it. Okay, I just looked him/her up on Wikipedia, and apparently it refers to the anonymous author of The Deeds of the Hungarians (an historical chronicle) around 1200. This explains why the statue was holding a pen. So a badass writer. Awesome.
Anyway I headed to the train station hoping for the 18:10 one, but the signs were confusing and I didn’t find the info desk and ended up just missing it. So I went to a nearby sports bar to wait for the next train to Vienna (in an hour), where I drank some really light beer and read Ruth Klüger while a few Hungarians yelled at a football game between I know not which teams. I think it ended up being a tie. The dude charged me 350 forints, and the manner in which he said it made me think he ripped me off because I was wearing a backpack and didn’t speak Hungarian (therefore clearly a tourist), but in any case 350 forints is really not much money (much cheaper than a beer in Vienna or the States) and I used his bathroom (the train station charged 100 forints) so I’m not bitter about it.
I caught the 19:05, but they have this interesting system where a bunch of the seats are reserved, so I ended up waiting in the hallway (there were little 6-seat rooms with closing doors, Hogwarts-style, with a hallway running down one side) sitting on the floor. This proved to be fortuitous, however, as I met some really cool people. There was this English guy from Essex who’d just finished his studies in history (he was telling me about a Caucasian minority tribe in Japan, with an odd role-reversal situation in which the Asians ended up forcing the Caucasians to adapt to Western culture) and was interrailing. His next stop was Croatia by way of Salzburg (apparently he couldn’t get a very direct route). He had “teamed up with some Germans” who were cool and friendly and fluent in English. Eventually we decided to find some empty seats, and ended up sitting across from three Americans from Kansas, who had spent a couple months in Vienna for a language-intensive German program and were about to go to Germany for a year to study architecture (in German). They were also very nice. Got to Vienna without problems and went home.
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