Am feeling a bit better now, still low energy though. It's like a minor sinus thing or flu thing - it's a thing is all I know!
Budapest is known (or they've done a great job marketing themselves as) the "Paris of eastern Europe". I've been to Paris once and from that perspective I can see why. It's very cosmopolitan, very European.
The Journey:Our friend Paula drove us to Manchester airport and we flew Jet2.com. It IS as "bargain basement" as you can get. It was fine that we would have to pay for any refreshments (any and everything had a price on the flight) but they were constantly coming on the speaker throughout the 2 1/2 hour flight with some type of sale. They had a perfume cart - just like a drinks cart but with perfumes (talk about a headache - the combined odors!), they had all types of knick-knacks they were offering - it was quite intrusive and a tad obnoxious, I have to admit! As usual I slept through take-off and woke up about 30 minutes into the flight. No movie and no free refreshments, we just read and looked forward to Budapest! We landed, sailed through immigration (yay to Hungary being in the EU) and got a taxi and off we went. The weather was very mild and we checked into the hotel at around 7.30 local time (only one hour ahead of UK).
Accommodation:Hmmm. Our hotel was centrally located. It was a 4 star hotel and I would say it's a 4-star hotel in eastern Europe as opposed to, say, the U.S. In other words it was fine, but not luxurious. We had two tiny beds but at least they were soft. There was cable TV and we had 3 English speaking channels we could watch (well 2 actually): BBC, CNN and VH1 (only music, no speaking).
It was the kind of place that looked like it had once been luxurious but then had a little bit less going for it of late. For example, the bathroom was really nice, but the towels were old and rough. There was also an awful odor coming up from the drains, I think. We had to keep the bathroom door closed it was so awful in there (let alone if we had USED it, if you know what I mean!)
There was no phone or coffee making facilities in the room, which is not a complaint but just an observation. A buffet breakfast was included and each morning we joined the other Americans (Nebraskans), Germans and others at the smorgasbord.
Food:So the breakfast buffet had cereal, canned fruit, sausage, eggs, tomatoes and cucumbers (yeah, vegetables at breakfast!), lots of bread, cheese, juice and thankfully reallllllly good coffee!
I was thinking about our main meals (lunch usually was a coffee and panini or something) and here's what we had:
Lesley Beef Stroganoff
Beef fajitas
Lasagna
Valerie Stuffed pancake (omelet basically)
Greek Salad
Caesar Salad
Not exactly big changes but we seemed to be full most of the time!
Culture:WELL! We got used to walking down the Andrassy, which is akin to (according to the receptionist) the Champs d'Ellyses in Paris. And we could see why, to be honest. It was a wide street with really wide sidewalks with lots of chic cafes and high end shops. It's like an artery through the center of the city and at the far end is a Memorial Park (no Arc de Triumphe but they DO have a monolith).
We did two museums. One was the
Hungarian National Museum (we got through it in about 20 minutes, very few of the plaques etc. were in English) and the
Terror Museum. This was something Lesley had seen ahead of time and wanted to go to. It was fascinating. It was a museum in the building where terrible, terrorizing events had happened during WWII and also during the first several years of the Communist occupation. We were truly moved as we started through. However, we agreed that about 3/4 of the museum was kind of a disappointment because it wasn't in English so we couldn't understand what we were seeing. Still, we'd recommend it.
Our money didn't stretch as far I had hoped. We did fine with our combined kitty to cover costs, but it was tight as we got to the end of the trip. We enjoyed stopping at cafes, we did some shopping (Lesley shopped, I was the "consultant"), we spent a day in the Castle District which was beautiful. It was a lovely city and one I'm glad I've seen. It was a good city break.
We don't have another city yet planned. First things first - like I need to find a new job! But we travelled well together and had a lovely time. The last day we were both really tired (I now believe we were coming down with this bug I've mentioned) so it ended up feeling like the longest day ever - but it was great and after getting back, I picked up Abby who had been really happy with her "dogparents" Mel & Simon and...well...that is that!
...interrupting whale hunting, public disturbances at nuclear facilities...these were my answers when asked today on the streets of Manchester how familiar I was with Greenpeace. I also remembered that I did have a Greenpeace bumper-sticker on my car (which was a Chevy Cavalier, my first car) - it was either that bumper-sticker or one that said "Meat is Murder" - what can I say, I was in my emphatic "there are no gray areas" phase.
No use in double-blogging and why re-create the wheel? My sister wrote a touching and funny post on her BLOG about our grandmother whom we called "Nan" who died a few years ago after living to 98! Gosh, I hope I have those genes. The only thing I can add to the post is that we can all thank Nan I'm such a fan of red lipstick - even when nothing else (looks-wise) is working out! There's always a place for bright red lips!
At laaaaast! A movie I can be totally excited about. The Film Team (there were 6 of us tonight), went to see Tropic Thunder tonight. I laughed so hard my Budapest Bug came back full force by the end of it!These are the other movies I've seen since I moved here in the order of preference, Tropic Thunder is WAY on top though (does anyone have a side of hugs to go?):
