as silly and absurd as it is to say, on the flights to budapest (when i wasnt passed
out because i didnt sleep the night before so i could make my 730am flight) i was thinking of a line from a bob hope movie, Louisiana Purchase, and his love interest (strangely enough he wins her in this movie) has a line, "there's no count of budapest" and pretty much thats the only thing i thought about budapest... i never really had a desire to come here, so i randomly decided last weekend when i was in st petersburg, that i'd come. actually, the idea of budapest was first put in my head in valencia when i was talking to this chick who is one of the editors at www.tangodiva.com was going to go there on her way to bucharest. so thats kinda where the idea to go to
budapest came from. plus my friend attila, well, he's a magyar, so i had that too. but i mean, i never really had any major desire to come here, no pull like vilnius, praha, or cities ive yet to see like dubrovnik and sofia.
budapest is apparently two cities, buda and pest, and theyre both cool. i stayed in pest with a view of buda. i stayed at the four seasons gresham palace here, with a room overlooking the danube (the topmost photo is the view from my room at night) it really is a lovely city. the parliament building is massive. (picture to the right) from what i read in my travel guide, this was an architect's design for the reichstag in berlin, but it didnt win the design competition there, so the guy brought it down to budapest and the austro-hungarian government said, go on and build it. so they did. and its grand. i did not go inside of it, but i walked all the way around it. i must confess, i did not spend enough time in budapest to do much, i had one day and a bit. which is never enough time to do justice to a place (unless that place is munich) but, the city of budapest is quite beautiful. the city is full of statues, all over the place monuments to historic hungarian figures like the politician/patriot Kossuth to priests, soldiers, and there's even still a monument to the liberation of budapest from the germans (except, the hungarians were fighting on the germans side, so can it really be a liberation? according to the soviets who built it, yes it can) these two statues in photos are two of my favourites, along the embankment of the danube, there
was this memorial or some sort of art thing of shoes spread out along all pointing to the river. i dont know what it comes from, or what it means, i made up a reason for it in my head, and that is probably terribly wrong, but here's my theory. its a memorial for people who drowned trying to cross the river to escape the soviet invasion in '45 or during soviet invasion of '56... so thats my take on it, it was either that or a holocaust memorial. i really havent the faintest idea. so i just made one up. one of my other favourite statues in budapest is next to the the palace up on castle hill in buda. magyars are famous for their horsemanship, on the wide hungarian plains they
developed traditions kinda like gouchos. and were famed throughout europe as light cavalrymen back in the 18th and 19th centuries... regiments of hungarians called Hussars started full of hungarians and then were as time elapsed replaced by regiments of hussars full of people native to the countries raising the regiments. so yeah, i liked this equestrian statue because it reminds me of some of the statues in houston, very action oriented, like the stampedin cattle ones. its a magyar dude probably breakin in a horse or something. i dunno, im not an equestrian.
so this first picture is from buda looking down on the chain bridge and in the distance the dome is the parliament building... you cant quite see my hotel in this photo, but its there. if you follow the chain bridge across to theright, it will be one of the buildings directly at the end of the bridge, and overlooking it. the last photo is of the major cathedral in pest. it's enormous and it kind of reminds me of the dom in berlin... it has a cool quote in latin, "ego sum via veritas et vita" which i think means "i am the way of truth and life" which would make sense, i wonder if its a catholic or lutheran church... i would guess catholic. but i dont know...
out because i didnt sleep the night before so i could make my 730am flight) i was thinking of a line from a bob hope movie, Louisiana Purchase, and his love interest (strangely enough he wins her in this movie) has a line, "there's no count of budapest" and pretty much thats the only thing i thought about budapest... i never really had a desire to come here, so i randomly decided last weekend when i was in st petersburg, that i'd come. actually, the idea of budapest was first put in my head in valencia when i was talking to this chick who is one of the editors at www.tangodiva.com was going to go there on her way to bucharest. so thats kinda where the idea to go to
budapest came from. plus my friend attila, well, he's a magyar, so i had that too. but i mean, i never really had any major desire to come here, no pull like vilnius, praha, or cities ive yet to see like dubrovnik and sofia.
budapest is apparently two cities, buda and pest, and theyre both cool. i stayed in pest with a view of buda. i stayed at the four seasons gresham palace here, with a room overlooking the danube (the topmost photo is the view from my room at night) it really is a lovely city. the parliament building is massive. (picture to the right) from what i read in my travel guide, this was an architect's design for the reichstag in berlin, but it didnt win the design competition there, so the guy brought it down to budapest and the austro-hungarian government said, go on and build it. so they did. and its grand. i did not go inside of it, but i walked all the way around it. i must confess, i did not spend enough time in budapest to do much, i had one day and a bit. which is never enough time to do justice to a place (unless that place is munich) but, the city of budapest is quite beautiful. the city is full of statues, all over the place monuments to historic hungarian figures like the politician/patriot Kossuth to priests, soldiers, and there's even still a monument to the liberation of budapest from the germans (except, the hungarians were fighting on the germans side, so can it really be a liberation? according to the soviets who built it, yes it can) these two statues in photos are two of my favourites, along the embankment of the danube, there 
was this memorial or some sort of art thing of shoes spread out along all pointing to the river. i dont know what it comes from, or what it means, i made up a reason for it in my head, and that is probably terribly wrong, but here's my theory. its a memorial for people who drowned trying to cross the river to escape the soviet invasion in '45 or during soviet invasion of '56... so thats my take on it, it was either that or a holocaust memorial. i really havent the faintest idea. so i just made one up. one of my other favourite statues in budapest is next to the the palace up on castle hill in buda. magyars are famous for their horsemanship, on the wide hungarian plains they
developed traditions kinda like gouchos. and were famed throughout europe as light cavalrymen back in the 18th and 19th centuries... regiments of hungarians called Hussars started full of hungarians and then were as time elapsed replaced by regiments of hussars full of people native to the countries raising the regiments. so yeah, i liked this equestrian statue because it reminds me of some of the statues in houston, very action oriented, like the stampedin cattle ones. its a magyar dude probably breakin in a horse or something. i dunno, im not an equestrian.
so this first picture is from buda looking down on the chain bridge and in the distance the dome is the parliament building... you cant quite see my hotel in this photo, but its there. if you follow the chain bridge across to theright, it will be one of the buildings directly at the end of the bridge, and overlooking it. the last photo is of the major cathedral in pest. it's enormous and it kind of reminds me of the dom in berlin... it has a cool quote in latin, "ego sum via veritas et vita" which i think means "i am the way of truth and life" which would make sense, i wonder if its a catholic or lutheran church... i would guess catholic. but i dont know...
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