Tuesday, April 21. 2009
Miskolc-Tapolca - Day 2
In the morning and after the classic panzió breakfast of coffee, rolls, Edam cheese, ham and winter salami we are off to downtown Miskolc to look around a bit before going to the baths.
I should mention that the town of Miskolc-Tapolca is different from plain old Miskolc. Miskolc is the city, Miskolc-Tapolca (or Miskolctapolca) is the small hamlet a few kilometers away that has the baths and tourist attractions.
I think I'm finally getting the point that Hungary is really a poor country. You can't stray far from the designer shops of the Andrássy without this point being driven home, but I'm a bit slow seeing it sometimes. Miskolc has an old town center, functional yet old-world and dignified; but the rest of the city and the people walking about it look really ghetto. Our friend Orrin calls this part of the country the "Hungarian Rust Belt".
But Miskolc is not without it charms. We see a pretty cathedral and slide on in...
They have a little tableau with religious icons and freshly cut flowers at the front. All these templom have different interior design, always worth a look-see.
Sometimes I find myself wondering if parish priests get bored with their relics and niche knick-knacks. Maybe some enterprising producer could start a reality show called Trading Templom where two cathedrals are redesigned by some hammy decorators from Hoboken using only materials from an OBI store. Be funny to see the look on the face of the bishop when he walks in the church for the first time to see the bones of St. János covered in sequins and poster paint as a "bold statement" from an extroverted designer looking for a bit of PR.
We toured the new town square which has been nicely restored. A small stream runs alongside some pre-secessionist buildings that have been restored and zoned for commercial use. The stream is walled be some modern brickwork and acts as a retaining border for a handsome promenade. Andi sat with some of the locals on a bench in this walking street and got acquainted.
We stroll past a monument to the martyrs of 1956. Now, the brief rebellion of '56 is a constant touchstone here that everybody wants to use as a metaphor for whatever their agenda happens to be. When it is used gratutiously, it can be obnoxious. But still, the memory of this noble event should never be forgotten - and not just by proud Hungarians. All the peoples of the world should meet all forms of tyranny with as much grit and fire as the Hungarians did when they confronted the Soviet menace in those dark days.
With a few hours to go before the Cave Baths, we stop into a pleasant cukraszda on the main drag of Király Utca and while away an hour or so watching the local kids piling into the place after school, spilling off the trams that run the length of the street on this busy main commercial artery of Miskolc.
Now it was on to the main event of Barlang-fürdő. Despite the desolate look of the surroundings, the baths were popular this day. We followed a group of about 18 Russian college students and a gaggle of Irish guys and girls through the turnstiles and into the locker rooms. Once inside, we saw that the baths are not true cave structures - you don't actually immerse yourself in water running through a cave. The pools are constructed like swimming pools inside the different chambers of a natural cave formation. 500w lights illuminate all of the tiled pools. Concrete paved walkways connect up the different rooms, all of which have their different attractions.
There is the main pool, which goes round in a loop and gives you access to stairways leading to the inner pool areas. Along the paths there is a shallow waterfall where people lay down on the floor and let the natural pressure of the water falling from a height massage their backs, legs or whatever parts are achy. There is a hot "wellness" pool for what seems to be purely medical applications.
Our favorite was the round room. This is a large circular room with a high domed ceiling, globe lights set into the beams. In the center is a hub of seating below the waterline. The seats are just big enough to hold two with a partition between so you can't see your neighbor. This creates a nice environment for boys an girls to spoon a bit. It's not private enough to get sleazy, but just discreet enough to cuddle and kiss a bit. I noticed this and exclaimed with my typical grasp of the obvious: "Mindenki puszi!" (Everyone's kissing!). Andi rolled her eyes and swam away just far enough to indicate that she was not with the hayseed Amerikai turista.
After the baths we are hungry as bears, having nothing but cake and coffee since breakfast, so we made a beeline for the Bástya Wellness Hotel again, craving some more of the good stuff we had the previous night. We could have made reservations at the Four Seasons, but as opulent as that option seemed to us we passed on it. This was prudent for, as you can see from the photo below ("Négy Evszak Kisvendéglö"), they were closed for the winter. Which kind of suggests the need for a name change for this place, don't you think?
Back at the Tölgyfa Panzió a.k.a. the Őrültkutya Hotel, the symphony of baying hounds has started with a fortissimo. But we didn't stay another night, opting to go back to Budapest on the night train. It's too bad as we were getting used to our canine pals. Hearing the Lolita Ya-Ya overdubbed with a load of Hungarian dogs baying at the moon is an experience not to be missed when in Miskolc-Tapolca.
I should mention that the town of Miskolc-Tapolca is different from plain old Miskolc. Miskolc is the city, Miskolc-Tapolca (or Miskolctapolca) is the small hamlet a few kilometers away that has the baths and tourist attractions.
I think I'm finally getting the point that Hungary is really a poor country. You can't stray far from the designer shops of the Andrássy without this point being driven home, but I'm a bit slow seeing it sometimes. Miskolc has an old town center, functional yet old-world and dignified; but the rest of the city and the people walking about it look really ghetto. Our friend Orrin calls this part of the country the "Hungarian Rust Belt".
But Miskolc is not without it charms. We see a pretty cathedral and slide on in...
They have a little tableau with religious icons and freshly cut flowers at the front. All these templom have different interior design, always worth a look-see.
Sometimes I find myself wondering if parish priests get bored with their relics and niche knick-knacks. Maybe some enterprising producer could start a reality show called Trading Templom where two cathedrals are redesigned by some hammy decorators from Hoboken using only materials from an OBI store. Be funny to see the look on the face of the bishop when he walks in the church for the first time to see the bones of St. János covered in sequins and poster paint as a "bold statement" from an extroverted designer looking for a bit of PR.
We toured the new town square which has been nicely restored. A small stream runs alongside some pre-secessionist buildings that have been restored and zoned for commercial use. The stream is walled be some modern brickwork and acts as a retaining border for a handsome promenade. Andi sat with some of the locals on a bench in this walking street and got acquainted.
We stroll past a monument to the martyrs of 1956. Now, the brief rebellion of '56 is a constant touchstone here that everybody wants to use as a metaphor for whatever their agenda happens to be. When it is used gratutiously, it can be obnoxious. But still, the memory of this noble event should never be forgotten - and not just by proud Hungarians. All the peoples of the world should meet all forms of tyranny with as much grit and fire as the Hungarians did when they confronted the Soviet menace in those dark days.
With a few hours to go before the Cave Baths, we stop into a pleasant cukraszda on the main drag of Király Utca and while away an hour or so watching the local kids piling into the place after school, spilling off the trams that run the length of the street on this busy main commercial artery of Miskolc.
Photo © miskolctapolca.net
There is the main pool, which goes round in a loop and gives you access to stairways leading to the inner pool areas. Along the paths there is a shallow waterfall where people lay down on the floor and let the natural pressure of the water falling from a height massage their backs, legs or whatever parts are achy. There is a hot "wellness" pool for what seems to be purely medical applications.
Our favorite was the round room. This is a large circular room with a high domed ceiling, globe lights set into the beams. In the center is a hub of seating below the waterline. The seats are just big enough to hold two with a partition between so you can't see your neighbor. This creates a nice environment for boys an girls to spoon a bit. It's not private enough to get sleazy, but just discreet enough to cuddle and kiss a bit. I noticed this and exclaimed with my typical grasp of the obvious: "Mindenki puszi!" (Everyone's kissing!). Andi rolled her eyes and swam away just far enough to indicate that she was not with the hayseed Amerikai turista.
After the baths we are hungry as bears, having nothing but cake and coffee since breakfast, so we made a beeline for the Bástya Wellness Hotel again, craving some more of the good stuff we had the previous night. We could have made reservations at the Four Seasons, but as opulent as that option seemed to us we passed on it. This was prudent for, as you can see from the photo below ("Négy Evszak Kisvendéglö"), they were closed for the winter. Which kind of suggests the need for a name change for this place, don't you think?
Back at the Tölgyfa Panzió a.k.a. the Őrültkutya Hotel, the symphony of baying hounds has started with a fortissimo. But we didn't stay another night, opting to go back to Budapest on the night train. It's too bad as we were getting used to our canine pals. Hearing the Lolita Ya-Ya overdubbed with a load of Hungarian dogs baying at the moon is an experience not to be missed when in Miskolc-Tapolca.
Monday, April 20. 2009
Miskolc-Tapolca - Day 1
In February, we took a two-day whirlwind trip to Miskolc-Tapolca. This is the third largest city in Hungary (behind Budapest and Debrecen) and is known as a destination for summertime tourists looking for bargains. It's even better for winter locals looking for bargains. And we are winter locals who like bargains. We also like, for some quirky reason, the added incongruity of seeing a spa town in the dead of winter. No telling how some people will get their kicks.
Miskolc-Tapolca is also the home of the attraction we are targeting, the Barlang-fürdő (Cave Baths). These are indoor and outdoor hot mineral baths that run through a network of caves. This sounds perfectly awesome.
The train to Miskolc leaves out of Keleti Station and we have a first class compartment to ourselves. We originally had second-class tix but at the last minute I remembered what that was like on the trip to Pécs last year and said to hell with all that. So Andi and I scurried down into the catacombs of Keleti to the International ticketing windows to upgrade us to a luxury compartment. Actually it's exactly the same compartment as second class, it's just that Hungarians are too cheap to pay the extra so you usually have all six seats to yourself.
Traveling east, the shantytowns and cardboard shacks of the gypsies that are staked out in the tree thickets along the rail line beds give way to open spaces. Small villages with their cathedral landmarks begin to appear, free of the usual socialist apartment blocks common to the big towns.
Once in Miskolc-Tapolca we get a taxi from the station to our digs at the Tölgyfa Panzió, nestled up in the yuppie hills of residential Miskolc. If there was any doubt about there being yuppies in them thar hills, the taxi driver dispelled them - proudly informing us us of the prices of real estate in the district, which he seemed to know right down to the water tax rates.
The room at the Tölgyfa Panzió is the standard tourist accommodation in Central Europe - comfortable, plain, aesthetically sterile, and outfitted stem to stern in Ikea's cheapest furnishings. However, the price was nice, and it had a cool bathroom with a slanted ceiling and large skylight - oh so perfect for Andi and her epic bath rituals that rival those of Cleopatra in their grandeur and luxuriant durations.
Not long after unpacking the bags and kicking our feet up we noticed something about the Tölgyfa Panzió that couldn't be ignored. When you have an inn or B&B in a residential neighborhood populated by the well-heeled, the neurotic dogs of the residents come with the territory. City dogs get used to being around people, so they can hang with strangers. But suburban dogs, accustomed to solitude and boredom, generally go absolutely berserk at any passing car or pedestrian. So as we sat in our room beside the window facing a gently sloping downhill chateau-lined street, we were treated to a chorus of snarling curs serenading each passing Volvo or Mercedes with a sound akin to Cerberus guarding the Gates of Hades.
Because of this (and because it seems that every Panzió Andi and I visit seems to merit a nickname), the Tölgyfa Panzió was referred to afterwards as the Őrültkutya Panzió (Crazy Dog Hotel).
With plenty of daylight left we had a nice walk through the surrounding neighborhood. Cozy little environs, dotted with lots of pretty houses under renovation and construction. The animals that seemed so large in voice from our room at the panzió turned out to be nothing but a load of ornery schnauzers and daschunds just begging to be stomped into a pulp with a pair of steel-toed Georgia Boots proudly made in the U.S.A.
Once in downtown Miskolc we found nothing doing - this is a summertime resort attraction for sure. Winter and it's dead as anything. Some clubs near the town center look amusing - though not nearly amusing enough to step inside. We knew what we would find... a bunch of unemployed masons and sheet rock hangers standing around the fruit machines drinking low-grade peach palinka with Celine Dion blaring from a boombox.
At almost 4pm it's starting to get dark, so we copped a quick gander at some of the sleepy businesses before doubling back and finding a restaurant across from the Barlang-fürdő. Chimpanzee paste-ups from some guerilla street artist shadowed us all the way back, as Lajos Kossuth pointed to the future.
Pitch dark already at 5:30, we had dinner at the Bástya Wellness Hotel's house restaurant. We were the only diners in this off-season evening, which was kind of romantic. They served us up some excellent csabaleves - a kind of chicken and dumplings and pea soup - and very good gyulas. We shared a crepe with meat sauce as main course, taking our time over the light meal as solicitous pincérek dimmed the lights to our satisfaction and generally treated us like royalty. Highly recommended, if you are ever in the area.
Back at the Őrültkutya Panzió, Cleopatra settled into the bath with the whirlpool on and Lolita came on some cable channel. I watched a bit, initially very impressed that they were showing an American movie that hadn't been dubbed in Hungarian until I saw that it was just TCM on a satellite feed.
Miskolc-Tapolca is also the home of the attraction we are targeting, the Barlang-fürdő (Cave Baths). These are indoor and outdoor hot mineral baths that run through a network of caves. This sounds perfectly awesome.
The train to Miskolc leaves out of Keleti Station and we have a first class compartment to ourselves. We originally had second-class tix but at the last minute I remembered what that was like on the trip to Pécs last year and said to hell with all that. So Andi and I scurried down into the catacombs of Keleti to the International ticketing windows to upgrade us to a luxury compartment. Actually it's exactly the same compartment as second class, it's just that Hungarians are too cheap to pay the extra so you usually have all six seats to yourself.
Traveling east, the shantytowns and cardboard shacks of the gypsies that are staked out in the tree thickets along the rail line beds give way to open spaces. Small villages with their cathedral landmarks begin to appear, free of the usual socialist apartment blocks common to the big towns.
Once in Miskolc-Tapolca we get a taxi from the station to our digs at the Tölgyfa Panzió, nestled up in the yuppie hills of residential Miskolc. If there was any doubt about there being yuppies in them thar hills, the taxi driver dispelled them - proudly informing us us of the prices of real estate in the district, which he seemed to know right down to the water tax rates.
The room at the Tölgyfa Panzió is the standard tourist accommodation in Central Europe - comfortable, plain, aesthetically sterile, and outfitted stem to stern in Ikea's cheapest furnishings. However, the price was nice, and it had a cool bathroom with a slanted ceiling and large skylight - oh so perfect for Andi and her epic bath rituals that rival those of Cleopatra in their grandeur and luxuriant durations.
Not long after unpacking the bags and kicking our feet up we noticed something about the Tölgyfa Panzió that couldn't be ignored. When you have an inn or B&B in a residential neighborhood populated by the well-heeled, the neurotic dogs of the residents come with the territory. City dogs get used to being around people, so they can hang with strangers. But suburban dogs, accustomed to solitude and boredom, generally go absolutely berserk at any passing car or pedestrian. So as we sat in our room beside the window facing a gently sloping downhill chateau-lined street, we were treated to a chorus of snarling curs serenading each passing Volvo or Mercedes with a sound akin to Cerberus guarding the Gates of Hades.
Because of this (and because it seems that every Panzió Andi and I visit seems to merit a nickname), the Tölgyfa Panzió was referred to afterwards as the Őrültkutya Panzió (Crazy Dog Hotel).
With plenty of daylight left we had a nice walk through the surrounding neighborhood. Cozy little environs, dotted with lots of pretty houses under renovation and construction. The animals that seemed so large in voice from our room at the panzió turned out to be nothing but a load of ornery schnauzers and daschunds just begging to be stomped into a pulp with a pair of steel-toed Georgia Boots proudly made in the U.S.A.
Once in downtown Miskolc we found nothing doing - this is a summertime resort attraction for sure. Winter and it's dead as anything. Some clubs near the town center look amusing - though not nearly amusing enough to step inside. We knew what we would find... a bunch of unemployed masons and sheet rock hangers standing around the fruit machines drinking low-grade peach palinka with Celine Dion blaring from a boombox.
At almost 4pm it's starting to get dark, so we copped a quick gander at some of the sleepy businesses before doubling back and finding a restaurant across from the Barlang-fürdő. Chimpanzee paste-ups from some guerilla street artist shadowed us all the way back, as Lajos Kossuth pointed to the future.
Pitch dark already at 5:30, we had dinner at the Bástya Wellness Hotel's house restaurant. We were the only diners in this off-season evening, which was kind of romantic. They served us up some excellent csabaleves - a kind of chicken and dumplings and pea soup - and very good gyulas. We shared a crepe with meat sauce as main course, taking our time over the light meal as solicitous pincérek dimmed the lights to our satisfaction and generally treated us like royalty. Highly recommended, if you are ever in the area.
Back at the Őrültkutya Panzió, Cleopatra settled into the bath with the whirlpool on and Lolita came on some cable channel. I watched a bit, initially very impressed that they were showing an American movie that hadn't been dubbed in Hungarian until I saw that it was just TCM on a satellite feed.
Thursday, December 18. 2008
Rail Strike in Hungary
Tuesday, December 16. 2008
Notes on Vienna
THE GOOD CITY
Vienna is very beautiful - this aspect of Vienna is understated by world travelers. The place is so painstakingly maintained, the historical buildings and monuments lovingly looked after, that just walking a few long blocks can infuse you with a sense of wonder. You have to love the Viennese for that. I've been here four times now and envy people who live here. The public transportation is great, the cultural life is first-rate, the infrastructure runs as smooth as can be.
In contrast to the buttoned-up personalities of rural Austrians, Vienna has has a fine old history of tolerance of Bohemian lifestyles, social freedom, and appreciation of ground-breaking artistic accomplishment. Beethoven, Schubert, Schoenberg, Egon Schiele, Gustav Klimt and the Secessionists all flourished here. You're reminded of this everywhere, and my intuition tells me that its influence extends beyond a tour guide's rap and still lives on in the general population.
Great street eats, too. Eat a bratwurst on the street with an Eidelweiss, it'll fix you right up.
THE BAD CITY
The old joke goes: Austrians will try to tell you that Beethoven was Austrian and Hitler was a German.
The outsized slip of Austrian haughtiness is always showing despite latent attempts to hide it. The place reeks of understated affluence. Touring the city, one constantly wonders where the money comes from.
When Andi, a lifetime Budapesti, got her first glimpse of the city she was a bit awed. "Where do the poor people live?," she asked. "Hungary," I answered.
Wednesday, November 19. 2008
Friends from London Coming
My British friends Dave and Rob show up tomorrow. Dave is an old friend who was mentioned in a previous post. Rob is a music writer in London. They met each other here two years ago when Dave came to visit me here in 2006, and both have come back for more hijinx. Dave's wife Britta will show up on Friday.To properly tell the tale of these days and nights with all the drama and detail they will merit, I will have to construct an epic poem. Even now, as I sit at my writing desk the morning previous, I feel a roiling in my blood and trembling at the anticipation of what will surely be the most dissolute of evenings.
This being the case, I did entertain the notion of penning 10,000 words in iambic pentameter and spreading our impending vale of ecstasy and tears over 5 days of endlessly scrolling posts.
But instead I'll probably just go all television on you and compress this profound 12-hour saga into a blur of superficial episodic piffle. Check in tomorrow.
Tuesday, November 18. 2008
Budapest Welcome Wagon
Tomorrow friends Dave, Britta and Rob arrive from London. I've got a load of destinations, restaurants, bars I've been planning to take them to.
This means that for the next six days I will be busier than a frog in a dynamite pond playing tourist guide and won't be able to update the blog until after their departure on Monday 11-24. However, if their last visit is any indication, should be tons of stuff to report on after they leave and I get a change to catch up.
Snow and freezing temps are on the weatherman's radar for this week too. I'll be back when the powder finally covers up our footprints. Stay tuned!
This means that for the next six days I will be busier than a frog in a dynamite pond playing tourist guide and won't be able to update the blog until after their departure on Monday 11-24. However, if their last visit is any indication, should be tons of stuff to report on after they leave and I get a change to catch up.
Snow and freezing temps are on the weatherman's radar for this week too. I'll be back when the powder finally covers up our footprints. Stay tuned!
Sunday, October 26. 2008
Debrecen - Saturday
The Némethy Panzio has an obscenely early check out time of 10 a.m. Though we were tardy, they allowed us to linger over breakfast. Not much to linger over, though. A buffet spread of salami, sliced ham product, Laughing Cow cheese wedgies, yogurt cups, rolls, Lipton tea and powdered coffee. Bon Appetit!
Despite my big push to see Hungarian cowboys, we find that the famous horse market isn't until tomorrow. Since we're leaving at 5 p.m. today, my big hunch is that there won't be any cowboys hanging around the Debrecen town square. Had to come up with plan B.
So instead of seeing puszta cowboys tear it up on the Hungarian plains, off we went to see the innards of the town square's templom, the Calvinist Great Church.
This building is the greatest monument to Debrecen's Protestant influence, so important was it to the establishment of Reformation principles in Hungary. Because of this history, Debrecen has been called the "Calvinist Rome".
Calvinist Rome... The term conjures up a rather depressing image. Sounds like a tour bus full of Jehovah's Witnesses in Vegas to me. But whatever.
The layout and design of this place is a departure from the other big churches of Central Europe. Most of these old joints are still laid out in high Catholic style, but this one is just as advertised - aggressively puritanical, and without any color to speak of. You could say it's dull, or you could appreciate it's clear sight lines and clean, no-nonsense fixtures for being less fruity that your average Catholic crib. It all depends which faith and/or art school you belong to.
A copy of Lajos Kossuth's document of Independence - the declaration drawn up in 1849 to serve notice that Hungary had had enough of the yoke of Austrian rule - is on display, as is his comfy chair.
You can go up in the bell tower, though the bell that Rákóczi Ferenc II installed in the early 17th century isn't functioning. They have it trussed up in a cage midway up the stairs. Not sure why it's decommissioned - it still rings. I know because I threw a 20 forint piece at it and got a nice big WONG.
But the trade-off of not having the bell installed is that now you get to have a great view of Debrecen. Everyone taking photos through the four windows, as I read the graffiti on all four walls. One notice from a couple of lovers is particularly sweet: "May our love last longer than these templom walls!"
While up in the belfry I looked down at the town square and noticed the Magda Szabó Kaveház' outdoor section filling up with people. So we clambored down the stairs in a hurry to get some non-powdered coffee and yum decadent desserts before the tables were all taken.
The coffee and csokik exceeded expectations; the service seriously displeased.
Then it was on to Modem, Debrecen's very good modern art gallery, for three count 'em THREE exhibitions.
The one I really wanted to see was Szocreál, the Socialist Realism art retrospective - paintings done by Hungarian artists in the Rákosi era to support the propaganda efforts of the fledgling Communist Party.
The second one was a gallery of Propaganda photos and posters from the Rákosi era. (See a pattern here? I just eat this stuff up).
The others were a Russian Contemporary Retrospective - works of all media types from the 70s to the present.
The first two were great, the Russian Contemporary was OK but a bit patchy. More detailed reports of these in posts to follow.
After three exhibits we had to hoof it fast to get the bags and back to the train station for the 5 p.m. to Budapest. Admired the wonderful station murals again while getting Hungarian-style hot dogs from a convenience stall for the 2-hour ride.
Our companions facing us in the 2nd class compartment this time were a 40-something weightlifting enthusiast and his zoftig wife. I know he was a weightlifting enthusiast because he had a copy of Muscular Development magazine in front of his head the whole trip. A nauseating spectacle - I had to try and look in any other direction than straight ahead for two solid hours to avoid seeing the stupid grimacing face of "Mike Liberatore, America's Top Amateur" on the cover.
Back in Budapest, hot dogs don't prove to be enough so we go an extra stop and eat at Via Luna. This place is nice if you want to have unpretentious Italian food for not too much penzt.
While eating Andi and I discussed the trip.
A: So, how did you like Debrecen?
S: sigh. I'm bummed. We didn't see any cowboys.
A: Well we were only there a kicsi time. Maybe there is a horse market in Buda you can see here.
S: Ah, Buda horse market, that's for rich people. Probably auction off Lipizzaners to expat Swedish telecom executives there.
A: Maybe in Szeged there will be your cowboys.
S: Hey yah. It's near the Serbian border too, a real frontier town. And maybe they have BBQs where they roast whole sheeps!
A: ...With the erös pista what you like so much, only the real kind - not from the jar.
S: Yah! OK so we make plans for Szeged tonight!
Stay tuned...
Despite my big push to see Hungarian cowboys, we find that the famous horse market isn't until tomorrow. Since we're leaving at 5 p.m. today, my big hunch is that there won't be any cowboys hanging around the Debrecen town square. Had to come up with plan B.
So instead of seeing puszta cowboys tear it up on the Hungarian plains, off we went to see the innards of the town square's templom, the Calvinist Great Church.
This building is the greatest monument to Debrecen's Protestant influence, so important was it to the establishment of Reformation principles in Hungary. Because of this history, Debrecen has been called the "Calvinist Rome".
Calvinist Rome... The term conjures up a rather depressing image. Sounds like a tour bus full of Jehovah's Witnesses in Vegas to me. But whatever.
The layout and design of this place is a departure from the other big churches of Central Europe. Most of these old joints are still laid out in high Catholic style, but this one is just as advertised - aggressively puritanical, and without any color to speak of. You could say it's dull, or you could appreciate it's clear sight lines and clean, no-nonsense fixtures for being less fruity that your average Catholic crib. It all depends which faith and/or art school you belong to.
A copy of Lajos Kossuth's document of Independence - the declaration drawn up in 1849 to serve notice that Hungary had had enough of the yoke of Austrian rule - is on display, as is his comfy chair.
You can go up in the bell tower, though the bell that Rákóczi Ferenc II installed in the early 17th century isn't functioning. They have it trussed up in a cage midway up the stairs. Not sure why it's decommissioned - it still rings. I know because I threw a 20 forint piece at it and got a nice big WONG.
But the trade-off of not having the bell installed is that now you get to have a great view of Debrecen. Everyone taking photos through the four windows, as I read the graffiti on all four walls. One notice from a couple of lovers is particularly sweet: "May our love last longer than these templom walls!"
While up in the belfry I looked down at the town square and noticed the Magda Szabó Kaveház' outdoor section filling up with people. So we clambored down the stairs in a hurry to get some non-powdered coffee and yum decadent desserts before the tables were all taken.
The coffee and csokik exceeded expectations; the service seriously displeased.
Then it was on to Modem, Debrecen's very good modern art gallery, for three count 'em THREE exhibitions.
The one I really wanted to see was Szocreál, the Socialist Realism art retrospective - paintings done by Hungarian artists in the Rákosi era to support the propaganda efforts of the fledgling Communist Party.
The second one was a gallery of Propaganda photos and posters from the Rákosi era. (See a pattern here? I just eat this stuff up).
The others were a Russian Contemporary Retrospective - works of all media types from the 70s to the present.
The first two were great, the Russian Contemporary was OK but a bit patchy. More detailed reports of these in posts to follow.
After three exhibits we had to hoof it fast to get the bags and back to the train station for the 5 p.m. to Budapest. Admired the wonderful station murals again while getting Hungarian-style hot dogs from a convenience stall for the 2-hour ride.
Our companions facing us in the 2nd class compartment this time were a 40-something weightlifting enthusiast and his zoftig wife. I know he was a weightlifting enthusiast because he had a copy of Muscular Development magazine in front of his head the whole trip. A nauseating spectacle - I had to try and look in any other direction than straight ahead for two solid hours to avoid seeing the stupid grimacing face of "Mike Liberatore, America's Top Amateur" on the cover.
Back in Budapest, hot dogs don't prove to be enough so we go an extra stop and eat at Via Luna. This place is nice if you want to have unpretentious Italian food for not too much penzt.
While eating Andi and I discussed the trip.
A: So, how did you like Debrecen?
S: sigh. I'm bummed. We didn't see any cowboys.
A: Well we were only there a kicsi time. Maybe there is a horse market in Buda you can see here.
S: Ah, Buda horse market, that's for rich people. Probably auction off Lipizzaners to expat Swedish telecom executives there.
A: Maybe in Szeged there will be your cowboys.
S: Hey yah. It's near the Serbian border too, a real frontier town. And maybe they have BBQs where they roast whole sheeps!
A: ...With the erös pista what you like so much, only the real kind - not from the jar.
S: Yah! OK so we make plans for Szeged tonight!
Stay tuned...
Saturday, October 25. 2008
Debrecen - Friday
Off to Nyugati Station this morning for Debrecen - the Eastern gateway to Hungary and cow town extrordanaire. Or so I've heard.
The train tickets are 2nd class, so I'm scared. Second class on Intercity routes are cramped, and you never know who you'll end up sharing space with by the luck of the draw.
When the train pulls out we are sitting facing a mother and son. The mother is about 55 and reading Lakás Föld ("Apartment World" magazine - a shelter porn rag for upwardly mobile Hungarians). Her 20-something son is dressed like a football thug and reading some Fidesz newspaper. I love the son's shirt... a mod-ish black polo with Magyar flag red-white-green trim around the sleeve hems and collar, and a map of Hungary where the Ben Sherman logo usually is. Just a couple of average Hungarian family members going home on the train. We share the tiny table between us and each side tries to ignore the other, lest we come off as rude by staring.
An hour into the trip I wander a bit and take pix of the countryside. As I've heard, it does look like the USA's great plains. You could mistake it for Kansas, except for these tiny houses that appear among the fields in flurries now and then. Dinky 1- or 2-room cottages about the size of a large Tuff Shed, except with taller ceilings. Workmen's houses?
Two hours after pulling out from Nyugati in Budapest we arrive at Debrecen and bop across the street for the tram. The station isn't very far from the main old town center, and makes a nice walk - but a tram is nicer if you have bags. The tall communist-era apartment building across the street from the railway station is hideous enough to give you bad dreams. It really is a monument to... something.
Piac Utca, the main street which bisects the town center, is a pleasant surprise. As you see with other cities of this size in the region, the center of Debrecen is an old town with restored cathedrals, commercial buildings that are hundreds of years old, and a colorful little tram line running the gauntlet.
We pass the big hotel in town, the Aranybika (the "Golden Bull"), a sprawling complex that dominates Kossuth Square. It's really the place to stay in town, but I found the rooms were too pricey and the corporate chain's website made the place look very cold.
Not far from the Golden Bull Aranybika is our place, the Némethy Panzió. Looks nice from the outside, but inside - well...
Our room got lots of natural light... because we got one on the ground floor on the street. Had lots of space... all the better to show off the stained, cigar-burned carpeting. And the staff was cheerful... mostly because for one reason or another none of our requests could be fulfilled, which left the staff well-rested and ready to greet us with serene smiles whenever we advanced upon the desk.
The place seemed eerily quiet too, which we couldn't figure out because they claimed they were booked solid. Because of this, and since we found this place to be a kind of anti-Aranybika, I immediately dubbed the place "The Lonely Bull". This USA pop culture joke was lost on Andi, and I had to explain that it was an old instrumental hit song. She learned the melody quickly enough though, as it was my wont to whistle it whenever the desk clerk answered our requests with a feeble excuse or a shrug of the shoulders.
But the Némethy is very inexpensive - just under US $50/night - so all things considered, it's not a bad place to stay on a budget.
Still in the early afternoon, we tripped into town to look around.
First thing was to search for an étterem where we could have a late lunch. The Flaska Vendéglö is supposed to be great, but we bypassed it on a hunch and went with another down-home restaurant, Lucullus. Turned out to be an excellent choice. This basement restaurant, tucked away in a small arcade, looks like a tourist clip joint from the outside but actually it is the hot place in town among the locals. You know a restaurant is good if you pack them in at 3 pm on a weekday for food. Chicken liver broth with vegetables, sirloin soup in bread, BBQ pork Lucullus style, chicken with smoked pigs knuckle and trappist cheese, all topped off with a Tuborg. Excellent.
We walked about a bit and saw some of the town center. Art nouveau architecture all over the place, mixed with the older classic style and a few socialist shoeboxes. Strange clubs called Cool Music and Dance Club and Club Silence. "Club Silence" - I'm speechless.
Stopped in at the top cukrászda in town, Gara, for coffee and édesség. Gara has very good selection of magyar-style pastries which I like better than the more hyped variety in Vienna. They are very similar, but to my palate the Austrians too often defile their amazing chocolate creations with layers of their funky jams and jellies. I think it's a government subsidy program to dispose of rejected fruit preserves by hiding them in layers of sachertorte and passing them off on unsuspecting tourists. But nobody ever complains, because the coffee in Austria rocks so hard.
In the early evening, it's off to the Aquaticum Wellness Hotel to try out the mineral baths. Just 4 tram stops down the line, it's not far and not too expensive.
The only challenge at Aquaticum is finding the actual bathing area. It looks completely dead from the outside. But following some cryptic arrows leads to a reception area on the mezzanine of the hotel complex.
The Aquaticum has tree large pools of different temperatures, plus two hot/cold side by side in the center of the room if you want the polar bear treatment. For an extra charge you can use the pools outside too. Despite the late hour, 7 p.m., the place is packed with folks of all ages. The water is natural mineral spring water, so it looks murky, and feels a tiny bit slippery. But it's supposed to be excellent for you. I guess 10 million Hungarians can't be wrong!
One funny thing about the men at Hungarian baths... the older and more barrel-chested guys are, the smaller they wear their swimsuit. And the younger and trimmer they are, the longer and sloppier they wear their boardshorts. One guy I saw here who looked like the ghost of Leonid Brezhnev had a belly the size of a Volkswagen beetle (the new version) and speedos the size of Mariah Carey's wedding night thong. All you can say is: nem bizony!
After a pleasant couple of hours hopping in and out of pools it's back to the hotel on the tram. Everybody on the tram and on the streets is under 25 and well into the beer. Some regional football rivalry is fueling the nuttiness. The non-stop kocsma down the street from the panzio that was full of old workers at 4 p.m. is now at 10 p.m. packed with young bucks and dollies full of face metal who are wishing the barkeep would put on some Kaiser Chiefs instead of the borzasztó classic rock now blasting out the open street windows - windows that double as seats now that every chair is taken.
Back at The Lonely Bull, nothing near as lively is going on. Doors to the empty rooms are now closed, filled with late arrivals, but the eerie silence remains. The night clerk looms up like Anthony Perkins and we ask him for an extra blanket. He returns his trademark zombie smile and says no dice - you're already using it. It serves as the mattress pad on your bed, and it's our only extra. Another whistled chorus of Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass echoes through the reception area.
The train tickets are 2nd class, so I'm scared. Second class on Intercity routes are cramped, and you never know who you'll end up sharing space with by the luck of the draw.
When the train pulls out we are sitting facing a mother and son. The mother is about 55 and reading Lakás Föld ("Apartment World" magazine - a shelter porn rag for upwardly mobile Hungarians). Her 20-something son is dressed like a football thug and reading some Fidesz newspaper. I love the son's shirt... a mod-ish black polo with Magyar flag red-white-green trim around the sleeve hems and collar, and a map of Hungary where the Ben Sherman logo usually is. Just a couple of average Hungarian family members going home on the train. We share the tiny table between us and each side tries to ignore the other, lest we come off as rude by staring.
An hour into the trip I wander a bit and take pix of the countryside. As I've heard, it does look like the USA's great plains. You could mistake it for Kansas, except for these tiny houses that appear among the fields in flurries now and then. Dinky 1- or 2-room cottages about the size of a large Tuff Shed, except with taller ceilings. Workmen's houses?
Two hours after pulling out from Nyugati in Budapest we arrive at Debrecen and bop across the street for the tram. The station isn't very far from the main old town center, and makes a nice walk - but a tram is nicer if you have bags. The tall communist-era apartment building across the street from the railway station is hideous enough to give you bad dreams. It really is a monument to... something.
Piac Utca, the main street which bisects the town center, is a pleasant surprise. As you see with other cities of this size in the region, the center of Debrecen is an old town with restored cathedrals, commercial buildings that are hundreds of years old, and a colorful little tram line running the gauntlet.
We pass the big hotel in town, the Aranybika (the "Golden Bull"), a sprawling complex that dominates Kossuth Square. It's really the place to stay in town, but I found the rooms were too pricey and the corporate chain's website made the place look very cold.
Not far from the Golden Bull Aranybika is our place, the Némethy Panzió. Looks nice from the outside, but inside - well...
Our room got lots of natural light... because we got one on the ground floor on the street. Had lots of space... all the better to show off the stained, cigar-burned carpeting. And the staff was cheerful... mostly because for one reason or another none of our requests could be fulfilled, which left the staff well-rested and ready to greet us with serene smiles whenever we advanced upon the desk.
The place seemed eerily quiet too, which we couldn't figure out because they claimed they were booked solid. Because of this, and since we found this place to be a kind of anti-Aranybika, I immediately dubbed the place "The Lonely Bull". This USA pop culture joke was lost on Andi, and I had to explain that it was an old instrumental hit song. She learned the melody quickly enough though, as it was my wont to whistle it whenever the desk clerk answered our requests with a feeble excuse or a shrug of the shoulders.
But the Némethy is very inexpensive - just under US $50/night - so all things considered, it's not a bad place to stay on a budget.
Still in the early afternoon, we tripped into town to look around.
First thing was to search for an étterem where we could have a late lunch. The Flaska Vendéglö is supposed to be great, but we bypassed it on a hunch and went with another down-home restaurant, Lucullus. Turned out to be an excellent choice. This basement restaurant, tucked away in a small arcade, looks like a tourist clip joint from the outside but actually it is the hot place in town among the locals. You know a restaurant is good if you pack them in at 3 pm on a weekday for food. Chicken liver broth with vegetables, sirloin soup in bread, BBQ pork Lucullus style, chicken with smoked pigs knuckle and trappist cheese, all topped off with a Tuborg. Excellent.
We walked about a bit and saw some of the town center. Art nouveau architecture all over the place, mixed with the older classic style and a few socialist shoeboxes. Strange clubs called Cool Music and Dance Club and Club Silence. "Club Silence" - I'm speechless.
Stopped in at the top cukrászda in town, Gara, for coffee and édesség. Gara has very good selection of magyar-style pastries which I like better than the more hyped variety in Vienna. They are very similar, but to my palate the Austrians too often defile their amazing chocolate creations with layers of their funky jams and jellies. I think it's a government subsidy program to dispose of rejected fruit preserves by hiding them in layers of sachertorte and passing them off on unsuspecting tourists. But nobody ever complains, because the coffee in Austria rocks so hard.
In the early evening, it's off to the Aquaticum Wellness Hotel to try out the mineral baths. Just 4 tram stops down the line, it's not far and not too expensive.
The only challenge at Aquaticum is finding the actual bathing area. It looks completely dead from the outside. But following some cryptic arrows leads to a reception area on the mezzanine of the hotel complex.
The Aquaticum has tree large pools of different temperatures, plus two hot/cold side by side in the center of the room if you want the polar bear treatment. For an extra charge you can use the pools outside too. Despite the late hour, 7 p.m., the place is packed with folks of all ages. The water is natural mineral spring water, so it looks murky, and feels a tiny bit slippery. But it's supposed to be excellent for you. I guess 10 million Hungarians can't be wrong!
One funny thing about the men at Hungarian baths... the older and more barrel-chested guys are, the smaller they wear their swimsuit. And the younger and trimmer they are, the longer and sloppier they wear their boardshorts. One guy I saw here who looked like the ghost of Leonid Brezhnev had a belly the size of a Volkswagen beetle (the new version) and speedos the size of Mariah Carey's wedding night thong. All you can say is: nem bizony!
After a pleasant couple of hours hopping in and out of pools it's back to the hotel on the tram. Everybody on the tram and on the streets is under 25 and well into the beer. Some regional football rivalry is fueling the nuttiness. The non-stop kocsma down the street from the panzio that was full of old workers at 4 p.m. is now at 10 p.m. packed with young bucks and dollies full of face metal who are wishing the barkeep would put on some Kaiser Chiefs instead of the borzasztó classic rock now blasting out the open street windows - windows that double as seats now that every chair is taken.
Back at The Lonely Bull, nothing near as lively is going on. Doors to the empty rooms are now closed, filled with late arrivals, but the eerie silence remains. The night clerk looms up like Anthony Perkins and we ask him for an extra blanket. He returns his trademark zombie smile and says no dice - you're already using it. It serves as the mattress pad on your bed, and it's our only extra. Another whistled chorus of Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass echoes through the reception area.
Wednesday, October 22. 2008
Planning for Debrecen
Thursday begins a 4-day weekend to commemorate Ötvenhat (1956 Memorial Day), and everybody in Budapest is leaving town for the holiday. Me too, though I am leaving not because of the weekend. Just a coincidence - I already had plans to go. To Debrecen!
Debrecen is the second biggest city in Hungary, located near the Romanian border. On Friday morning it's zip on out to Nyugati Palyaudvar station on the Metro and connect to an Intercity eastbound train to Hungary's Great Plains.
I should note that NOBODY goes to Debrecen for fun. It is known for being an agribusiness crossroads, a good place to be an exchange student... and not much else. Leaving Budapest for Debrecen is like fleeing Manhattan to have a hot time in Omaha.
Andi and I have already kicked this around some months ago via Skype:
A: So what you want to do specially when you are here?
S: I want to go to Debrecen!
A: DEBRECEN? Why you want to go there?
S: Um, because it looks cool. (I always say this about a large population center on a map)
A: I don't know, what could be there for you?
S: Well, it's like a big town, y'know. And there's cowboys!
A: Cowboys? Nem I don't think so.
S: No for real, cowboys, the ones that whey wear those white smock-y things and have old style mustaches and they're full-on macho.
A: I hate to have to say this to you to break your dream, but there are no cowboys here. I think this is something you have made up in your mind.
S: No really I saw pictures! Cowboys who totally ride these small horses 100 kph and do rope tricks and wrestle farm animals and stuff.
At that point Andi said "I-I-I-I-I dunnooooooooo" in this cute dubious way she does when she thinks I'm putting her on. Said that there is no such thing as a "magyar cowboy" and that it must have been a joke I misinterpreted. Like maybe it's a provincial slang term for the winos who ride the benches the metropolitan train station.
But I could not be convinced, so now it's 4 months later and we're really going. Trying to find other things to do there but all the tourism information websites that are dredged up by Google are typical of what you find for Central Europe. There appears to be a wealth of information in the native language on these portals, but when you click on the little British flag for the "English site", you are taken to another whole site with a fraction of the info, and targeted to moneyed tourists with the usual crap they think we Americans and Brits are interested in - real estate, prostitutes, and Dracula. I call it the "chump button".
No helpful hints to be found with the chump button. So we will wing it, follow our noses and see what there is to see... cowboys or no.
Debrecen is the second biggest city in Hungary, located near the Romanian border. On Friday morning it's zip on out to Nyugati Palyaudvar station on the Metro and connect to an Intercity eastbound train to Hungary's Great Plains.
I should note that NOBODY goes to Debrecen for fun. It is known for being an agribusiness crossroads, a good place to be an exchange student... and not much else. Leaving Budapest for Debrecen is like fleeing Manhattan to have a hot time in Omaha.
Andi and I have already kicked this around some months ago via Skype:
A: So what you want to do specially when you are here?
S: I want to go to Debrecen!
A: DEBRECEN? Why you want to go there?
S: Um, because it looks cool. (I always say this about a large population center on a map)
A: I don't know, what could be there for you?
S: Well, it's like a big town, y'know. And there's cowboys!
A: Cowboys? Nem I don't think so.
S: No for real, cowboys, the ones that whey wear those white smock-y things and have old style mustaches and they're full-on macho.
A: I hate to have to say this to you to break your dream, but there are no cowboys here. I think this is something you have made up in your mind.
S: No really I saw pictures! Cowboys who totally ride these small horses 100 kph and do rope tricks and wrestle farm animals and stuff.
A Hungarian Cowboy. Believe it.
But I could not be convinced, so now it's 4 months later and we're really going. Trying to find other things to do there but all the tourism information websites that are dredged up by Google are typical of what you find for Central Europe. There appears to be a wealth of information in the native language on these portals, but when you click on the little British flag for the "English site", you are taken to another whole site with a fraction of the info, and targeted to moneyed tourists with the usual crap they think we Americans and Brits are interested in - real estate, prostitutes, and Dracula. I call it the "chump button".
No helpful hints to be found with the chump button. So we will wing it, follow our noses and see what there is to see... cowboys or no.
