impressions of Budapest

This post has a rather literary title to cover up the fact that I arrived at Budapest in the dark and spent too little time here to really get a good picture of the place. As usual, this report will be partial, ill-informed, and shamelessly subjective. You have been warned. 🙂

I was put up (thanks a million, Andrew and Gabor!) in a downtown apartment that was reached through a short passage into the heart of the block. I was a bit startled by the entrance foyer:

And the staircase was rather good too:

Turns out it was built by a king, or something, but my hosts were very pooh-pooh about the whole thing. The district had the narrowest roads and the most magnificent buildings:

The air was dirty, thanks to the narrow streets and heavy traffic, and perhaps these two-stroke East Bloc stalwarts – they were everywhere – were doing more than their fair share:

Budapest is huge, and is home to almost 2 million (20%) of the country’s inhabitants. It’s the centre of everything. There were imposing buildings everywhere:

I wanted to go to one of Budapest’s famous hot baths, but my mates were on a mission. They steered me on up the hill to the castle. They knew a back way that led through some tiny streets high on the hill…

…and past the pockmarked walls that marked where the Russians had liberated Budapest at the end of WWII…

…and right into the castle domain itself, thanks to a cool tip: if the car is there for less than 10 minutes you incur no charge. So we had a lightning-quick tour – the courtyard

with the bloke on a horse (this is Europe, there’s always a bloke on a horse)

Oh all right, all right, this is (Saint) Stephen I, the first king of Hungary (1001-1038) and founder of the state of Hungary, and the statue is by Alajos Stróbl, 1906.

The battlements gave fab views over the enormous city, as one would expect:

But we had no time to gawk, the clock was ticking. We crawled (well, obviously we didn’t actually crawl, I just drove the DS very slowly) through the castle district, soaking up the atmosphere: fab old doors…

…beautiful statuary…

and this touching portrait of the love between a shepherd and his flock:

Our time was up! It was off to the baths. We drove through town, which was block after block of huge neo-classical buildings – shops downstairs, apartments above – and which therefore felt very much like Paris, except for the unbelievably aggressive drivers. I mean, seriously, guys, you have an attitude problem there. (Perhaps it’s having to pay off all those policemen). But it’s grand all right. Here’s a random square:

And this is why Amsterdam will never be grand until it devotes at least one large space to people (no cars or trams, flat paving slabs, proper benches) and to expensive expressions of civic pride (big statues, nice fountains, and no cheap tack).

a criminal in Budapest

Nothing had prepared me for Hungarian…

And the 200 km of apparently abandoned countryside between the border and Budapest – no house lights, almost no streetlights – were pretty unnerving too. But I met a friend of a friend in a downtown eatery and then everything was OK again.

Except… I bribed the police.

Now as an Englishman born and bred I am still amazed that this event took place at all. But it happened, I promise. I took a left turn where it wasn’t allowed and within ten seconds I had a police car after me. I stopped, he came over, asked to see my papers, and in a mixture of broken German and all but entirely demolished English he explained that he would write me out a ticket; I would have to go to the police station and pay a 10,000 crown fine (about 40 euros) the next day.

I begged his forgiveness, citing my ignorance of the city’s traffic rules, and after a little toing and froing he bent forward and said “ticket, receipt; pay me now, no receipt”. It was the only clear sentence he had spoken so far. And then he went back to Hungarian. It was all very confusing.

At a given moment he suddenly put away the ticket book and said “OK, no ticket”. I thanked him effusively, took back my passport and driving licence, and only then realized that he was still just standing there. What was he waiting for? No, he wasn’t waiting – he was looking hard at the 20-euro bills in my wallet.

We exchanged a look, a very thoughtful and interesting look. He took a step closer to the car. He looked to the left and right. And I reasoned that he was giving me a break – that if I didn’t do this, he would definitely write the fucking ticket anyway. As if in a dream I pulled out a 20 and showed it to him. “Is this OK?” He nodded, plucked it out of my fingers and palmed it in a single, clearly practiced move. The man could have been a magician. “OK.” And then he was gone.

So there you are: Budapest is different.

images of Slovenia

Tomorrow I leave Slovenia and head for Budapest. I will miss this funny, forgotten little country, whose beautiful landscapes, talented people and mad language I have become inordinately fond of. Here is a small slew of random photos which I think might say something useful about Slovenia…

Cities with unaffected art, open spaces,

and lovely odd things in unexpected places:

Some beautiful vernacular architecture (take care of this stuff, guys):

Good, hot, cheap animal protein on every corner;

Real men, passionately and devotedly in love with their cars:

People building their dream homes as fast as the money and the law allows (and often rather faster):

Totally non-planned, ghastly commercial crapscape that thinks it’s cool and modern:

Jože Plečnik, the architect and designer who deserves more fame:

and the amiable drunkards who occasionally grace his gorgeous buildings (and others, of course):

Delicious liqeur, dried fruit, and even drier biscuits:

Real snow on real mountains, 24/7:

So even an old fart like me can learn to snowboard:

And when all’s said and done you really can go swimming in the Med and skiing in the Alps on the same day, which for those of us who get excited about swimming and snowboarding is pretty cool.

So thanks for everything, Slovenia. Se vidimo! 🙂

Srečno novo leto!

A Happy New Year to you.

By all accounts Ljubljana was a riot, with hours’ worth of fireworks and dozens of happy people dragging strangers out of cars and buses to kiss them. I was in Kočna, a tiny village in the foothills of the Julian Alps, with Maja, Tomaš and a bunch of other actors and dancers, eating potica (“poteetsa”) and lots of other Slovenian cakey stuff,

watching the village let off an improbably large number of fireworks, and playing music with Maja so everyone could sing:

Thanks for inviting me!

Santa Father Granpa Frosty Christmas Claus

Slovenia, geographically located in the middle of the European continent, politically located somewhere between the ‘East’ and the ‘West’ (whatever they are), historically located at the crossroads of feudalism, socialism and capitalism, has not one but three Grand Old Men of the winter solstice:

– Miklavž (“Meek-lauwsh”), the Catholic version, the equivalent of our Saint Nicholas, Holland’s Sinter Klaas, and the American Santa Claus; he brings presents on December 6

– Dedek Mraz (‘Grandpa Frost’), the pagan version first banned and later appropriated by the Soviet Communists and popular in all the Slavic countries; he is usually a bit slimmer, and wears a grey, fur-inside decorated-outside leather coat and a round fur cap. He is active throughout December and may bring presents on January 1

– Božiček (“Bozhi-check”), the equivalent of our pagan/puritan/marketing confection Father Christmas, who brings presents at Christmas Eve but sells them from October on

Remarkably, all three seem to be on the best of terms.

All Slovenian children expect their good behaviour to be rewarded by all three, and fair play to them. 🙂

Venice (warning: this post is off-topic and way too long)

I went to Venice for Christmas. 🙂

And it completely knocked me out. Venice is ridiculously, improbably, insanely beautiful. Fantastically impressive, and improbably old. A 100m x 100m square taken at random from any part of the island probably contains more exquisite and original C14th – C16th architecture than all of Amsterdam, for instance.

Now I could show you all the photos I made of these beautiful buildings, canals, bridges, gondoliers – but I decided not to.
I have decided instead to give you the side of Venice the guide books don’t show you: the dogshit and the pigeonshit, the filthy water, the grafitti, the touts, the Long Dong Michelangelo’s David apron stalls, the toothless Romanian beggar women, the countless hordes of Japanese tourists, the interminable building sites…

….OK, just kidding. But if I posted everything my blog would be full up, so this is just the edited highlights.

Venice’s front door (the campanile, the Doge’s palace, and the two columns) is just the most spectacular visiting card you will ever see:

Nothing speaks more eloquently of the fact that Venice was a world power for four hundred years, using superior ships and weapons to control the worlds’ trading routes, just as Amsterdam did later in the 1600s. Walking between these enormous, exquisite buildings and into the huge Piazzo San Marco is a breathtaking experience and one which you must have at some point in your life. So, book it now, before Venice rots away into the rising seas. And go at Christmas, when it’s warm and sunny and nobody’s there. 🙂

The sinuous Canal Grande, the one navigable route through the city, is naturally where the richest merchants and princes vied to build the largest, grandest and most beautiful palaces. There are countless images of these stunning buildings online so here are just a couple:

With side streets

and alleyways

giving tantalizing glimpses of the inner city. And yes, I know that ‘tantalizing’ is a stupid tourist guidebook word. The fact is that Venice reduces you to a quivering mess of these sorts of clichés. Sorry, but it can’t be helped. Anyway….

The natural climax to this orgiastic display of civic pride and wealth is the Rialto Bridge, for many years the only crossing over the Canal Grande and therefore the natural site for a market. The stone, non-lifting version was built in 1570:

Oh, and by the way, it’s fucking huge too:

But what really beggars belief is the level of exquisite detailing in combination with the scale of the buildings and the whole city. Can there really be this much beautiful ornament and detail in a single city? No wonder it got Ruskin‘s rocks off. Here’s a random corner.

And here’s a random bit of wall with a gallery behind it.

But what do the inhabitants actually do all day? It turns out that since the decline of Venice’s military and naval might in the 16th century they have spent most of their time perfecting the art of window dressing. Two little examples out of literally thousands of tourist-tempting displays:

Well, alright, here’s a third, for Ella – yes, that’s a full-size Harley Davidson in wood:

Hey, nobody said it had to be tasteful – it just has to sell to the Japanese.

Right, on to the gondolas. These look so at home:

And the gondolieri are a cheerful lot:

But historically it’s a dying trade; there are only 401 gondolieri today, when there were at least 10,000 in the 1600s. Well, what do they expect, at €75 a throw? No wonder the only customers are Japanese, and even they invariably look glum.

Venice is only one island out of lots that are dotted round about. It’s well worth taking a 2-minute ferry to the island of San Giorgio Maggiore, whose Palladio-designed church of the same name has a belltower you can go up (in a lift, they blocked the stairs) for €3…

…and enjoy a wonderful view of the whole of Venice, with the incredible Piazza di San Marco, columns, belltower and Doge’s palace seen from yet another stunning vantage point:

It’s worth remembering that much of Venice’s fabulous wealth came out of the barrel of a gun. From 1400 onward its Arsenale

(derived from the Arabic word Dar al Sina’a, ‘dockyard’, and which gives English the word ‘arsenal’) was the world’s most important shipyard, eventually employing 16,000 men and assembly-line techniques to turn out a ship a day (!) and to invent and produce new, state-of-the-art warships and weapons. Like Holland in later centuries, Venice simply saw war as a logical extension of commerce.

The 1934 Ponte degli Scalzi, “barefoot bridge”, is great:

Calatrava is supposed to be building a fourth bridge somewhere, apparently, but I saw no sign of it.

After a hard day’s walking about doing nothing but gawk openmouthed at stuff, it was time to head off to one of the parks to snooze in style. I wasn’t alone:

OK, that’s enough ordered exposition. Here are a bunch of unconnected photos. The mouseovers should tell you all you need to know…

And here are my tips for those of you planning a visit:

– park the car on the mainland at Mestre. Buses and trains will take you cheaply right into town. The convenience of the car park at Tronchetto doesn’t really outweigh its €20/day rate.

– nobody ever checked my €20 ticket on the ferries. Not once.

– there’s a COOP supermarket conveniently sited between the bus station and the train station. Essentials (like tomatoes, mozzarella cheese, olive oil and ham – duh!) are all cheaper than in Amsterdam. Stock up there rather than pay the restaurants’ mad prices.

– bring along a nice bag to take the supermarket stuff in, rather than toting plastic COOP bags all day looking like a cheapskate dork like I did.

– and a knife and spoon. Jesus, I’m way too old to be learning this kind of stuff now…

a musical evening in Ljubljana

Maja invited me to a music evening at the local community theatre, at which her accordion group would also be playing. It looked like this:

Very polite and proper. After the show we were invited to a crypt under the building, where a table had been laid with food and drink. A couple of accordions came with us, and soon the real performance had started:

And for those of you who know Maja, just to prove that she really does play accordion:

religion in Slovenia

I’ve mentioned this before but it’s worth touching on again: religious life is actually meaningful here.

Slovenia is Catholic – or rather, compared to Holland it is overwhelmingly, enthusiastically and publicly Catholic. The young might scoff, but calendars always list the Saint’s Days; every house has a Mary, a Jesus or a cross on the wall; practically all 30-year-olds are baptized; votive candles burn at all hours in all the churches; and everyone, young and old, seems to know the prayers and the Rosary.

Roadside shrines are often better lit and maintained than the roads whose fatal accidents they commemorate:

The cemetaries deserve special mention. Here are some snaps from žale, Ljubljiana’s principal cemetary.

Naturally, fervent Catholic and golden boy Jože Plečnik built loads of it:

Get this: an automatic candle/flower dispenser. Your grave-visiting needs are met 24/7:

No expense has been spared to provide superb monuments:

And the graves are lovingly maintained both by day

and by night…

The hundreds of candles around the chapel presumably commemorate those who died – or were buried – elsewhere:

Krvavec; (try Kruh-váh-vits)

Wednesday we had fantastic weather and I was going stir crazy in town, so I jumped into the car and headed for the hills to see whether I could feel some snow and stretch the sunshine hours. And I got such a treat…

The Alps loomed praeternaturally above the flood plains of the Sava. For some reason you never see this in Holland:

I followed my nose and then the signs to a ‘gondel’ – and at the very foot of the mountain, there it was, a cable car…

Mock me if you will, but this was my first ever cable car trip, so for the whole journey my heart was in my throat, I was staring in all directions and shouting ‘Fuck! Fuck!‘ again and again, while snapping photos like a man possessed. OK, I know you all felt the same way the first time you rode a cable car, admit it.

Finally the car stopped climbing and I emerged, blinking, into another world:

Which wasn’t the top, but it nearly was, and that was fine. The air was fresh, the snow was a foot deep, and the views were incredible.

This was good. But to my amazement I was the only one there. And I had no idea what to do or where to go. I had never been to a ski resort before so I had no idea what any of the buildings were. I felt lost and disoriented.

A noise broke the stillness and a guy appeared out of nowhere on a skidoo, with a trailer full of trash bags. I’d never seen a skidoo before so I took his picture.

The passenger got off and the driver made to leave. There was only one thing for it. I asked him for a ride. “Where are you going?” “Anywhere, I just want to have some fun. I can help with the trash bags.” “OK, jump on!” And we were off…

Christ, those things are fast – we were doing about 80kmh…

but the views were soooo beautiful…

and as night fell everything got dreamy… we seemed to be going even faster… through a sort of motorized Narnia… hey, I’ll never ski, but I could use one of these skidoos.

I was the last one down on the very last cable car. High above the snowy trees, in the deep red and purple of a gorgeous sunset, and in utter silence, the pod floated gently down the mountain. It seemed to take for ever.

I wonder how often people get up to no good on these things?

Roasted chestnuts

They are a roadside staple here in the autumn months: ‘kostanj’, roasted chestnuts. The sweet, slightly acrid smell of the smoke is everywhere. Some of the sellers have licenses granted by Maria Theresa, C18th Empress of Austria (and therefore also of Slovenia). But there can’t be much of a living in it: a small bag costs about 1 euro:

Mmm, yummy!