From workaholic to world traveler

Budapest is an old-school city with beautiful, old-school architecture and tons of ornate statues.

To be honest, I don’t think that I had enough time to capture the essence of the city, so I’ll have difficulty rating it on the whole. That said, I did a bunch of cool things there, so I’ll give it a whirl.

Firstly, for those guys that intend to visit here, you should be aware of a common scam. In certain areas, pretty girls will approach you for directions or something and ask you to go for a drink at some local bar. Before you know it, they will run up an outrageous bar tab that you will be responsible for. Not that they will drink a lot, but the bar will charge exponentially more than market rate for their drinks. If you hold your ground, expect nefarious characters to try and intimidate you. That said, I have two takeaways. First, pay for each of your drinks in cash as you order them. Second, if approached by a girl that is clearly out of your league, be cautious. Not saying that you should shun them though – may be worth the risk for some.

Apparently, prior to the Holocaust, Hungary was nearly 25% Jewish. It goes without saying, but that number has diminished significantly since. That said, while the number of Jews have diminished, there is still a Jewish Quarter that attracts a lot of tourism. I found the top rated restaurant, Rosenstein, and went there for my first meal. While clearly a fine dining establishment, nothing about the restaurant rang Jewish to me. They serve pork and I didn’t obviously spot a single member of the tribe anywhere….and I looked hard.

Non withstanding the lack of fellow Hebes, I had a voracious appetite and I was prepared to order anything and everything that I thought that my great grandparents may have ordered. Sadly, they only served chulent on the weekends, so that was a non-starter. I ultimately ordered a veritable smorgasbord of delicacies, including but not limited to:

Soup: Beef broth with matzoh ball (really good)

Appetizers: Bone marrow and egg salad (solid)

Main: Weiner Schnitzel (decent)

Desert: Trifle w/ chocolate sauce and mint tea (delicious)

During dinner, another patron’s (a refined-looking older gentleman) phone rang and I was amused that his ring tone was “You Really Got Me”, by The Kinks. Made me chuckle for a second.

Overall, I’d say that it was a solid fine-dining experience, but it didn’t strike the nostalgia chord that I was looking for. The meal cost me 16,885 of their local currency.

A quick note about their silly currency, the Hungarian Forint (HUF). 3 HUF is equivalent to less than a single penny USD. Being worth a grand total of $3,581 would technically make you a millionaire here. If 100 units of your currency can’t buy a pack of gum, something needs to change. They should just give up this confetti that they call money and adopt the Euro, like most of the other nations in the EU.

The following morning I went to a food market called Great Market Hall for breakfast. It was a huge, cool looking market with tons of vendors selling fresh produce, restaurants and tourist shops. I’m told that their national spice is Paprika, a very underwhelming spice in my opinion. In the souvenir shops everyone was selling commemorative paprika packages. I had initially considered buying one as a souvenir, but I just imaged what I’d think if someone gave me paprika as a souvenir and thought better of it. Had a delicious cottage cheese strudel and cappuccino.

Next I visited one of the most popular attractions in the city, the Szechenyi Baths. For those of you that know me, I love outdoor hot tubs in freezing temps, so I really dug this spot. They have 3 *huge* outdoor pools heated by natural hot springs. Each of the pools had different temperatures and served different functions. They also had saunas inside and a spa facility. I wish that they had something like this back home.

The baths worked up quite an appetite, so I decided that I wanted a do-over on my Jewish food experience, and this one hit the spot. This joint specialized in Chulent, and they didn’t fuck around. For those of you that are unfamiliar with chulent, it’s a slow-cooked bean stew with potatoes and meat. It’s traditionally served on Saturday afternoons in orthodox Jewish households. I may have thrown away most of the religion, but I will always have an affinity for the food.

For my final night, I was to take a river cruise with dinner on the Danube river. This is probably one of the most touristy things that you can do in Budapest. I didn’t find it to be particularly interesting, but at least it gave me the opportunity to drink. Whatever wine you didn’t finish on the boat, you were able to take with you. Fortunately the other people on my table weren’t drinking and left all of it for me.

After the cruise I was pretty lit and feeling generous, so I invited an exceedingly nice couple that I’d become friends with to an opulent desert at the New York Cafe. This place tends to have long lines, so in an attempt to get seated quickly I jokingly flashed my NY drivers license. The joke fell flat and I got nothing but crickets. While we weren’t on the same page from a humor perspective, those guys put out a serious spread for desert. We ordered a tea service that included tea (of course) as well as sandwiches, pastries and such.

The hotel’s exit wasn’t easy to find, so while trying to find the exit, we accidentally stumbled upon on a really nice piano bar area. We made friends with Joseph (he kept repeating his name) that had a bottle of bubbly by the piano that seemed to be an important customer. In addition to sharing his excellent champagne with us, the pianist was taking requests and played an amazing version of Leonard Cohen’s Hallelujah as well as New York, New York by Sinatra. Our new friend was exceedingly nice, and while I didn’t understand most of what he was saying, I really liked him and enjoyed the experience immensely. I tipped the pianist well.

It seems like more and more people have started to read this blog, and knowing that it was to be my last night in Budapest, I felt that I didn’t have enough material to come up with something enthralling. So even though I was drunk and full, I ventured out to the top rated ‘Ruin Bars’. These bars are essentially converted factory/industrial space. I had hoped to get myself caught in a honey trap and gotten a photo with the girl, prior to her attempting to scam me of course, but it seems that everyone that I met were super nice. Had my first hookah in a while and people seemed to enjoy the smoke rings that I blew.

I happily stumbled back to the hotel, and I think that I closed my Budapest trip strongly. In my humble opinion, Budapest is a beautiful city and great to visit, but I couldn’t live there.

Off to Vienna!!