Semana Santa 1: BUDABUDA, Vienner, Prahahahah

AH finally I have some time to sit down and bloggggg. This was my first priority after this hellish week of paper after project after paper due. Next on my list? Shower. For the first time this week. (jk. [maybe]).

Budapest!

April 23-30. (3 weeks ago already, dang)

Semana Santa was an eastern European adventure!! First Budapest, Hungary, then Vienna, Austria, and finally Prague, Czech Republic! These weren’t necessarily places I would have thought I would want to visit in Europe but there were all dang pretty and different from the Europe I’ve seen so far, so I’m glad we went! I went on this adventure with Molly and Becca (EEEEE Bexxx missed her so muchhh), and later Shivani joined us in Vienna. 

We flew into Budapest (I forget if it was Buda or Pest. Did you know they are different cities right next to each other? Hence people just call it Budapest!) and got to the hostel without a problem. It was fun but also a pain in the butt to start using new currency: the Hungarian forint. Exchange rate: 1 euro= 264 forint = $1.48. So each meal cost about 1500 forint and I always felt like I spending a crapload of money when really the conversion was just messin with my head!!!! Hungary in general was super cheap, actually. 

Oh, might I add, I had my first experience sleeping in an airport the night before we arrived in Budapest. Literally. Most. Miserable. Night. Of. My. Life. Tried sleeping on a chair with my feet up on a suitcase and my scarf wrapped around my head to keep the light out. My head was bent back so far I thought for sure it’d snap right off while I was sleeping.  I desperately sought out somewhere to lie down, and eventually had to settle for a bench that might as well have been made of rock. The only perk that this bench had over the floor was that it was elevated… but hey I finally got some sleep on it. Anyway. Moral of the story: I am too high maintenance to sleep on rock. Sue me.

Back to BudaBuda! We 3 set out on our own the first day to explore the city on our own. Immediately noticed that Budapest has a lot of interesting and important looking buildings, but none of them seem to be important at all by reading their descriptions. Apparently the baths are all the rage in Budapest, so we went to the Szechenyi Furdo in hopes of getting our relax on in a mud bath. We literally had to circle around the entire building and go to the 2 different entrances and talk to about 3 or 4 different people until we were finally told that the mud baths are only for people with doctor’s permission. Well ef. After deciding that we were too good for anything less than mud baths we left and explored some more. In hindsight I wish we would have done the normal baths anyway. Literally, every tourist and local Hungarian we talked to, EVERY SINGLE ONE, said we MUST do the baths. Darn. 

Well it was Saturday night, so that means, time to PARTY!!!!!!!!!!!......

I was the only one in this mindset though so we didn’t go out. Becca and Molly know how bitter I am about this, especially after hearing from a million people after we left about how Budapest’s nightlife is supposed to be the craziest in Europe. BAHHH. Well looks like I’ll be returning!

The next day we got a free tour of the city (Buda) by this cute lady with the thickest of accents. Lotsa pretty buildings and cathedrals, and more Jewish history than I would have imagined. Hungary is in bad, BAD economical condition, and it sounds like they’ll be stuck that way for awhile based on how their government is currently run...We followed that right up with a tour of Pest which included the beautiful castle! The thing that impressed me most about the Hungarian buildings was that a few of them had really cool roofs that looked like a quilt or patchwork of some sort. Never seen anything like it! Here are some other sights from the tour:

Opera House!

Pretty design on unimportant building lol

**ANSWER: it means "I am the way, the truth, and the life" in latin! Inscription from a pretty cathedral.**

View from Pest To Buda..or vice versa...?

Pretty ceilings!

Ceilings everywhere!

We ended the tour at this closet-sized bakery where we ate these DELECTABLE APPLE STREUDELS. I immediately bought a 2^nd one after consuming the first at record speed.

That night we finally went out!!! Turns out, everyone in Budapest must be so exhausted from drinking their lives away on Saturday night that they retire for weekend immediately after. Hahaaha it was a Sunday night, not busy whatsoever, but we made the most out of it that’s for sure. We hit up a ruin bar which was super cool, I wish I would have taken a picture. Basically it’s a house that they knock down some of the interior walls, add a bar, and call it a pub. There’s still windows and staircases and a bathtub. Good stuff. Let me see if I can find a decent picture online…

Example of a ruin pub, I don't know that it is the one we went to...

So at that ruin bar we met up with other people from our Hostel who were French. ( c: ).  Super fun! I learned some more French (of course) as they patiently taught me. You know I think I’m starting to like the French…lol.  Seriously though, I AM learning French. Already signed up at Grinnell. Come back in a year and ask me if I can speak French yet, and I’ll respond “oui”, put my beret back on then take a puff of my cigarette. (dang it I miss France. Also, that was a harsh harsh generalization).

Anyway. Slowly our group widdled down to just 4 of us who went to the only pub in town that was still open, and in the end there were just 3 of us…pretty much with a dance floor to ourselves. Oh, that is, except for THE NUMEROUS MALE BREAK DANCERS. Seriously, I couldn’t stop laughing, I hadn’t seen this stuff since High School. Or Friday Live. (Where my STC people at ahahahahaha) HILARIOUS. At one point I swear they all got in perfect lines and performed some choreography they had prepared the night before. Ahhh fun night. Ended it with a delicious ass panini then passed outttt.

Parliament

Day 3 was our last and pretty chill. We woke up and found the local market (I have become a HUGE fan of markets ever since experiencing a bunch of different ones here in Europe) where I searched and searched for the perfect gift for my sissy Erica. :D Guess you’ll have to wait to see what it is!!! We walked to the Parliament building afterwards just because it is so dang pretty:

We walked along the Danube River to get there, and on the way we passed this Jewish memorial which was just a bunch of shoes lying out on the bank. Apparently this was a spot during the Holocaust that many Jews got pushed into the Danube and to their death. 

So as to not end on a poor note, I’ll say add that we went and had some delicious local Hungarian food! Mine was chicken and liver in rice covered with some sort of paprika sauce. I liked it all except the mushy consistency of the liver is not for me!

We made our way to the bus station for our bus to Wien (Vienna) where I spent every last (coin) of my Hungarian forints on mini apple streudels so as to not have any more of that currency…and maybe also because the streudels were scrumptious. Either way. Budapest was grand and I enjoyed it more than I would have imagined. I’ll be back for that bath and crazy nightlife, dang it!