https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Template:hu-sz-v-stem_verbs
Olyan, bementem Szerbiába… So, I went to Serbia…
6. Összevissza - pudexiM
Ripped down constructivist slap ups
Színes puzzle ház
Gardens grow in skull wall
André Kertész if Rococo
Police outside of Dohány utcai Zsinagóga
the largest synagogue in Europe
Churches, apartments, hotels
The moon at 5pm
Hold on,
Az Andrássy utcában sétálva
House of Terror
Firkákat és Apró Kutyákat (Scribbles and Tiny Dogs)
Ez nem a szép - This is not nice
Meal from that hogyományos étterem. It was a baked white bean stew, kind of…with chicken nuggets for some reason? Honestly, I just asked for the daily meal and didn’t look at what it was.
As much as I thought this was going to be a grimy bar with kitsch domestic appliance decor called ‘Wash Point’ it was in fact just a laundromat. I was one part surprised, to two parts disawashpointed.
Man crosses road,
Photographer takes opportunity,
The sun shines regardless.
5. Királytás
Last Thursday afternoon was rooftop hangs at David and Bea’s (beh-oh) apartment, which is an old bank converted into an apartment. I met them at a movie night the week before, and they are cool peeps with a rad place, and have nice friends.
Anyways, here’s the view form the roof top:
Itt Vagyok. I’m Here
(Photo by David)
For context, this is right in the middle of Budapest. (you can click on any of the photos on this blog and they will open up in a ‘viewing gallery’). Okay, so there may in fact be castles in some of these images, but probably just churches or libraries. Honestly, your guess is as good as mine. The picture of the telephone is a ‘still working’ intercom system to buzz people in from the from door. We are about 5/6 levels up and there is no working elevator. Step step step step step step.
Királytás (the title of this post) is a clever portmanteau David came up with to describe the rooftop lookout. Király - slang for ‘awesome’ (but actually means ‘king’) + Kilátás - lookout (ki- out, látás- seeing)… Királytás - awesome lookout. Sorry to Hungarian readers if I spelt this horribly wrong, I’ve only heard this being using in conversation!
Photographer’s note: You would think a wide would be the go, but honestly a tele would have been just as useful, mainly to compress the perspective distance between all the buildings into a flatter plane. The last shot is a punched in digital zoom from my iPhone that really shows this. Will bring the 24-70 next time?
Bea és David own a boutique backpack (hátizsák hah-tiz-sh-ah-k) company called HELIX. They would totally go off in Australia I reckon:
@helixgoods
https://helixgoods.com
More Belváros
Below are some photos from walking around belvárso (downtown). Again, this is a very nice part of town, but still just ‘buildings’. Even with my 16mm wide angle lens I struggled to fit everything in. Will have to do more comps? Also, I feel I should show places that a less grand and on cloudy days. But honestly… it’s kinda gorgeous. I love in the last photo how kids are just casually skating in front of buildings like that.
Yes I know perspective tilt exists in post, but yolo, it’s my blog.
Pano stich with help from Adobe Lightroom. Look, yes I’m going to keep the cloning errors in, because yolo it’s my bolg and well, you all know I Iike cooked things.
Hagyományos Étterem?
Tip: If you go to a country like Hungary and you see a restaurant (étterem) with the main sign saying “Hungarian Food” in English + Helvetica Neau, it’s definitely not going to be ‘magyar ételek’.
THIS is where you will find ‘traditional Hungarian food’ (hagyományos magyar ételek). If you don’t know the language and you can’t read the menu, it’s a good sign. You know this is gonna be my go to for this week ;) As my housemates dad (who is also strangely named Attila…) said when I show him this picture: ‘It may not be the best, but it will be authentic’.
There is also a place at, Rákóczi (Rah-k-or-ts-zi) tér, near where I will be staying next that is legit. I will eat the menű. Stay tuned.
Photo by David
Hungarian Revolution of 1848
On Friday 15th March, I went the celebration of the 1848 Hungarian revolution. In 1848 it was about gaining independence from the Austrian empire, but now it gets weaponized by the far right government for nationalist hype. It was a whole thing, I’ll post about separately. I got to see and hear Orbán in all his swine growling glory.
4. Galleries and Google
Műcsarnok a Magyar Művészeti Akadémia intézménye
I went to my first photo exhibition of the trip on the weekend. It was a ‘premiere of Imre Benkő’s five-decade-long photography oeuvre’ at The Hungarian Academy of Arts (Műcsarnok a Magyar Művészeti Akadémia intézménye). An exciting display of black and white street photos and series of twin portraits.
Whilst I was there there was a contemporary dance performance in response to the photo. Which as per usual, was a bunch of fit young people rolling around the floor for 45mins. But they did it well.
The gallery is next to Heroes Square (Hősök tere)
I’ll come back to this place later when it’s warmer and the weather is nice, but I’ll just leave this here for now.
Szabó Ervin Könyvtár
Castle? No, Library. Szabó Ervin Könyvtár (Honestly, just look up photos of it) I became a member for 400ft (like $2)! I would have taken more photos, but it was sooo quite and people/students were genuinely studying. But now I can go back and work/read any time. It’s a 10min walk from my place!
Google Struggles
This is from a children’s book (I’ve screen shot the Google Camera translated text) My Hungarian teacher sent me as a practice text. The whole book is about different ways this child disappoints his family members, and as a result he learns what gladness is by it difference. I asked if this was a typical Hungarian children’s book…Yes. Honestly, this explains a lot.
Google Camera translate struggles with the thick magyar nyelv on the back of a peanut butter jar.
Language app (Hellotalk) wants to know my blood type… (no I’m not a Virgo)
Coming up next week: Inner city rooftop guitar jams, Experimental improvised library choir, Traditional restaurants, Revolution Parades (Ft Orbán maybe?!?!)
3. First Week Down
Magyar Iskola (Hungarian School)
Last week was my first week at Magyar Iskola (moh-dy-or ish-koh-loh)! In short, my teacher is friendly, the building is old, and I’m pretty happy with how the lessons are going. One on one, twice a week (on Monday and Thursday hétfõn és csütörtöken). I now have a list of the ~200 questions that might be asked of me during my citizenship interview. Feels a bit like having the, very long, keys to the cuffs.
However, stepping just out of the metro you are faced with this (still not castles):
Magyar Iskola is in Belváros (downtown), so it is a pretty fancy part of town. You know, if you fancy a $400AU umbrella…
I wanted to tell the owner of this cabin car that I set my AIR CON back home to 24ºC to COOL the room down.
Sunset, behind the middle of Budapest. They have a custom built modern skate park right behind where I was standing. There’s also a much more grimey skate park under a bridge down along the river.
This one is for the camera nerds. I started talking to this guy, because I was interested in his lens, but also just to practice talking to random strangers, ha.
Séta Erzsébetváros (Elizabethtown)
Walking around Erzsébetváros
the West End of Budapest
Budapest vegans get straight to the point
dirty car graffiti is the same all over the world
cafe library arranged by colour
backstreet murals
Wilde in Pest
Fausto always with me
going loopy for Fruit Loops
This shop sells and makes only brushes. That’s it. It has been in the same family for four generations. I asked them they were busy, “oh yes, very busy”. This is a photo of the current generation's owner’s grandfather (A nagyapja).
Jobb Időjárás
I will take more photos of buildings and the streets when the weather (időjárás) is more sunny, the last week has be a bit cloudy and ‘rainy’ (what they call rain we call spitting). I was asked if I needed an umbrella and I was most confused…
2. Round The Pest
On Sunday, Varsárnap (marketday) the weather was nagyon szép! So I went out exploring. It’s amazing, the sun is shining, and you don’t melt, UV index 2, not 12, 14ºC, no screen of sun needed, wild.
Basically every back street in the downtown (belváros) area looks like this. However, I image the further out I go the less grandiose things become.
Castle? Nope, Nyugati train station (Nyugati pályaudvar)
Traveling to a new city always sparks joy in my street photography bones. Like there is always something more/new to see.
I found a strange little pop up art installation. Basically it is two hallways the look like toilet cubicles. But each one has a different hyper pop art installation in it, all by the same artist. And yes they are completely functional…
I can’t believe Tool are playing in Budapest two weeks after I leave…
Castle? Nope, Parliament house.
Fun fact: one of my favorite Hungarian words is ‘hajó’ which means boat. But it’s pronounced ‘hi-yo!!!’ (kind of…a little bit)
My first day of Magyar nyelvű iskola (Hungarian language school) is today!
1. Here I Go
So apparently this is me for three months.
After 16hrs I arrived in Doha, Hamad Int. Airport. It’s really quite difficult to express just how enormous this place is. There is a garden in the middle of a shopping mall in the airport. People were doing yoga. I did not yoga.
Yeah, I don’t understand the bear lamp thing either.
During the flight to Budapest, we flew over the Afghan mountains. The view was like this for about half an hour. It was honestly astonishing, and probably more so in my jet lagged state.
By a strange stroke of luck, I found myself sitting next to a Hungarian Ministry Head of a Department, and we got chatting, albeit in very broke Hungarian and English. I was honestly just excited to practice some speaking, and he was patient enough to to listen and help me with my words, before switching back and forth to English.
He gave me his card, I gave him mine (ha!), we swapped numbers, and he invited me to his place in April with his family. He has friends, and this might bode well in the future.
(He was returning to Budapest on a personal holiday, hence not in business class)
Made it to Budapest
By comparison to Hamad, the arrivals ‘area’ at Budapest Internal Airport (Budapest Liszt Ferenc Nemzetközi Repülőtér) felt akin to the to loading dock of an up market ALDI. I imagine the departures is quite nice. We’ll see in three months.
Sajnos, nincs fotó…
Graffiti on the wall of the transfer from the bus to the Metro from the Airport (Repülõtér -flyingsquare). Apparently shout out to Umberto Eco?
Graffiti on the wall outside where I am staying “I have another stencil also”.
My room for the next few weeks. I’m basically in a new place each month, but this is me for now, it's small but in a good location.
“Social Sciences” I wonder if sign writers make a lot of money in Hungary…
When I went up to a store person to ask about a book I was met with “Fontos?” ‘Is it important?’
Propaganda posters by FIDESZ/Orbán’s mono-government. Basically is says 99% of Ukraine’s wheat in genetically modified and Hungary wont support Brussels/EU’s attemp to help them out. They are all over Bp and a lot have been ripped/defaced/redacted by, I assume, the public.
Even the currency is harrrrrd :(