Vienna, Two New Friends and a Free Eye Exam

On Tuesday morning I got up early (by my standards) and headed to the bus station to head to Vienna, Austria. Sadly, the bus was an hour late, but no harm not foul. I enjoyed a calm 3 hour ride to Vienna. Now, the odd thing is the drive looks almost exactly like driving through Kansas. It was just agriculture all the way with some occasional large hills. The only real difference was wind farms EVERYWHERE. I mean as far as the eye can see in all directions. Now, if you drive down I-70 these days, you will some some wind turbines going, but not like this. And honestly, I like it. People complain they are an eyesore, but there is something really cool about seeing them all over the place. It is just flat country, not really a site worthy of a trip to see anyway, this is at least adds some practicality and excitement to the view.

I finally get in around 1pm to Vienna. Now, I know roughly I am on one side of the city and need to get to the other for my hostel. This is always the fun part of visiting a new city, figuring out how it works. I go to the metro right away, figure out the rough plan for the system and then decide what metros I need to hop on and off of and where to get to my desired location. After about 20-minutes a good guessing I arrive at my hostel.

This time around I have gone with the cheap option, a 10-person room. Turns out alright. You just have to be prepared to be woken up by noise a little at night and in the morning, but worth the savings. People in hostels are pretty courteous of other travelers when people are sleeping.

This hostel, unlike my others, is pretty awesome. Good sized, had great reviews, has a kitchen, laundry room and full bar. I drop my stuff off, scope out the place and head into the city to wander.

I went into the central downtown area and walked around for awhile seeing the main sites. The beautiful St. Stephens Cathedral, the Parliament building designed after the temple of Athena, some awesome looking museums and some amazing parks. This is my first solo travel and I end up feeling a little lonely. Things are less exciting by your self, but still really cool.

As evening rolls in I go down to the bar for "happy hour" which is a pretty good deal. 2 Euros for a liter of good beer. I don't like beer back in the states, but I do like beer in Europe so far. Go figure. Feeling kind of lonely, I realize I just need to start striking up conversations with out guests and accept I will strike out some and win other times.

I sit next to two ladies (look around my age) who are speaking English with a native tone and strike up a conversation. We start chit chatting about where we have been, seen, etc. One, Alison, is from Ohio but lives in NYC and the other, Audrey, is from Emerton, Canada. I find out that they are both optometrists and met in school and stay in touch. They just went to Octoberfest, then onto Vienna, Buchurist and then Budapest and home.

Somewhere in our conversation I end up asking eye questions. Now, I have never seen an eye doctor in my life. My vision is great and never had a need, so I start firing away and they have a blast with it. They are lucky people who enjoy their work. I turn into research for them, as I explain about having migraines with visual auras and how it affects my sight, etc. I let them know they can now right this trip off as a business expense with my exam.

After a while more of chatting about our backgrounds they eventually ask me my plans for the next day (don't have any) and invite me to join them in renting bikes and riding around the city seeing the typical tourist sights. Happy to not go solo, I try to cooly accept, but I probably sounded like a kid being asked if he wants to open Christmas presents early. Not to mention, from the hour or so of chatting I can tell both Alison and Audrey are about as cool as they come. Both have great senses of humor, intelligent and just excited about life. I think its a friendship that will last.

We eventually ditch the bar for food. The liquid diet of beer is starting to catch up to all of us. We go across the street to a typical Austrian restaurant and decide to try some Austrian delicacies. I order the Weiner Snitchel (I spelled that wrong for sure). We also decide to try a European thing, beer mixed with coke. Thinking it is going to be nasty, I am quite surprised. It tasted pretty good. The first sip was weird, but each one got better. It tasted somewhere in-between beer and flat coke, which sounds bad, but really isn't.

After our joyous dinner, we get some austrian pastries up the street and call it a night. The plan is to meet up with my new friends - well, my new doctors, as I keep referring to them as - at 10am the next day for some biking. I walk away thinking I have met some really cool people and will enjoy sight seeing tomorrow. I have a small twinge of fear that maybe they are being polite and I will show up at 10am tomorrow to disappointed, but I highly doubt it as I got a good vibe from both of my two new doctors.

Matt and I Find a Water Park

So Sunday is a pretty calm. I spend a lot of it applying for jobs, relaxing and planning my up coming trips. I decide to go to a Catholic church service with Edit and Matt. Let me tell you, it is hard to understand what is going on when the service is in Hungarian, but it was still pretty cool. After this Matt and Edit have pre-marriage "prep" with their priest, so I decide to wander the city some. After awhile I get bored and head home. A quite Sunday, but a nice one. I enjoy being in a foreign city and not feel the pressure to see or do things. It is calm, just like living at home, but you are somewhere completely different.

Monday is a lot more of the same. I go downtown to buy my bus ticket to Vienna, but past that don't do much until Matt gets home and that is when the fun starts.

So Matt and I wanted to go to a hot spring, but couldn't find a good one nearby, but what we did find - and by we I mean Edit was searching for us because she is awesome - is a kind of hot spring place at a Ramada Inn near us. It also has a water slide or too. Sounds good and only costs like $10 for a hours.

Matt and I head there by bus, which is an adventure because we are not 100% sure where we are going. After trying to communicate with a non-english speaking bus driver we get about 1/2 there. This bus driver was just the friendliest guy. He knew we were on the wrong bus and even though we couldn't understand each other did a great job conveying which bus we need. Shortly after on the next bus we pass him and he sees us and waves. Meeting people like that makes my day.

After a little journey we finally get to the hotel with water park. We get inside to find it is a full on indoor water park. We are talking 6 full water slides, a wave pool, a flush (water slide that then flushes you down in the middle), a diving pool, some smaller water slides, a few hot tubs and some larger pools for chilling that go in and outside (heated).

This place is awesome. Matt and I go from mid-20-year-olds to 10-year-olds in a heart beat. We can't decide what to do first. We are literally running from one slide to the other. Most of the big water slides involve tubes you sit in to go down. Matt and I find a double tube and like kids start riding them all together. At one point Matt turns around and I become Luke Skywalker and he becomes Porky as we take down the Deathstar.

A personal favorite moment, more for Matt than me, was when I was going down the big non-tube slide. I was making fake excited screaming noises knowing Matt could hear me and then it got real fast. The slide (its pitch dark in there fyi) just drops out of nowhere, I am going about 3 times faster and feel like I am straight up falling. My screams of sarcasm turn to legitimate screams of excitement and terror. This is very apparent to Matt, who is at the bottom waiting. When I get out I have a blank stare on my face at what just happened and Matt is rolling around laughing. He explains that could hear the change from a joke to absolute surprise in my screams. Maybe it was a moment you just had to be there for, but it gave us a good laugh and my quite a surprise.

At around 10pm we decide we should pack it up and figure out how to get home. But we know one thing for sure, we will be back and it probably won't be long until we come back.

Another Day in Budapest

After an exciting Friday night out with my new Hungarian friends, my Saturday was a little more relaxed, but no less fun.

Finally since it is the weekend Matt and I can hang out during the day and see the city. We decide to go on a bike ride around the city, seeing some new sights and hopefully go on a tour of the parliament building.

One of the best things about Budapest is that Pest is completely flat and I mean completely. Biking around the city is as easy as possible. Not to mention that they have bike paths or lanes running almost everywhere. Often it can be faster to bike than to drive or use public transportation.

We bike from the apartment (in the North) down along the river side to (blank) island. Now this island is Budapest's equivalent to New York's Central Park. It divides the Danube, is about 2 kilometers long and 1/2 kilometer wide or so. The parks inside of it are just beautiful. they have places for sports, picnics, they have gorgeous gardens, a petting zoo and some restaurants. We bike the length of the park just taking it in.

After our ride through the island, we stop on the Buda side at a cafe for a quick lunch. Again, I just order something that sounds okay. Turns out to be a really good beef wrap. Not sure what the sauce they used in it was, but I really liked it.

We bike back across the river with the intent of going on a parliament tour only to get there and find out they are sold out. We discover that they usually sell out for tours around 8:30am every morning and you cannot buy tickets in advance, they have to be same day. This, I think is stupid, but at the same time it makes me only want to the tour more!

After our disappointment starts to subside we continue to bike through the city. I stop at a lovely bring to plank (cannot pass up the opportunity). We then get into one of the nicest parts of the city. We are in a small park across from the US Embassy, the Hungarian National Bank and some other important buildings. We stop in the park, have some drinks and just relax. Matt and I spend a good amount of time talking about business ideas. We are both have a desire to start and run a small business, with the hopes that it gets bigger than just small. We have a lot of okay ideas, but both of us currently lack a great one.

After a good amount of rest we start our slow journey back to the apartment, with a leisurely pace and a mildly longer, but more beautiful path. We cut back across the park, the river and are finally home. We enjoy a quite evening with a few beers, some of my new favorite hungarian wine and our friends at the apartment. All and all, quite a good day.

I will say that I love being able to ride a bike through a city. In KC it just isn't feasible. Too many hills. It is a great work out, but it isn't practical as a mode of transportation. In Budapest and many European cities it is not only feasible, but one of the most logical forms of transportation.

Budapest Chapter Three

After plenty of adventure across this new city, the next few days are a little calmer. I take this free time to start applying for jobs. I really want to stay in Europe for at least a year, if not more. I want to gain some international work experience, travel more and find a kind, yet beautiful European princess that always dreamed of marrying an American.

On Thursday I decide to navigate the city by my self for the first time. I go get a cell phone (pay-as-you-go) and then wander the city a bit. The city is large and a little more confusing than others because it is completely flat on that Pest site. Hard to tell where you are. Luckily, the trams, buses and metro make it extremely easy to navigate.

I have to meet Matt outside his work at 5pm across the river. While I am on my way there I realize that I never wrote down the address and I have no clue how addresses work here anyway. I know the general area, but I also don't know the name of his company. Great job, Tom, 0/2. I just decide to wing it, head the direction I think is correct and sure enough I find some buildings that look like the match of what I saw when I looked at his work building in a Google Map overview for 5 seconds. Sure enough 5pm roles around and out walks Matt. Boom, nailed it.

The reason I am meeting Matt, is that we are getting an apartment together here in Budapest for the next three months. This will be somewhere for me to store my stuff and recharge between trips. Our new apartment is just across the street and we need to go meet the landlord to do paperwork. Now, I don't have to do any paper work, I am just staying there unofficially, but I wanted to go anyway. Our apartment is right across from Matt's work, on the Buda side (the more expensive side) and about 1/2 block from the river and guess the cost of our rent. If you guessed $225/month you are correct. I love Budapest. Rent is cheap! This is for a nice place in a nice building too, we didn't go for the cheap.

On Friday I spend the day cranking out some job applications and planning/booking my next two trips. 3 days in Vienna (27-29) and Sweden on Oct. 1st. That night Bobbi has invited Matt and I to go to a pub downtown where one of his friends is having a going away party. The friend is studying in Germany for the next 6 months or so. This was a great time. There was about 20 people there, all around my age +/- 2 years and the best part is, almost all of them are working on their masters in history. (Now if you go to college in Hungary you almost always get your masters, its closer to an undergraduate degree in the states because so many people have bachelor degrees in Hungary. A fault of free education).

I get into a great conversation with two of Bobbi's friends about the difference of perspective in learning American history. They also explain how the political system works in Hungary, what is going on with the current parties, etc. This is just right up my alley. Both of these guys also like to focus on WW2 history, so the conversations are just endless.

Finally, one of them asks me if I would be willing to present my senior history thesis to a group of them. I was confused at first because I haven't mentioned that in this conversation. They go onto to explain that Bobbi talked to them about what I wrote my thesis on (why Japan lost the naval war in the Pacific during WW2 even though they were the bigger power). Kind of thrown back, I ask more about the group I would be presenting to, the format, etc. So they have a formal organization at their University of history students that get together and bring in speakers to present different topics of history. They expect the presentation will be to about 30-40 master students.

While I accept the offer to present I am thinking (where is my thesis...what computer did I save it on.....what were my main points.....crap). Luckily after jogging my brain for a minute it all started coming back. So yes, I came to Budapest and somehow ended up being asked to present my senior thesis to 30-40 history students. Awesome, just awesome. I love this adventure. But I need to refresh myself on my research and put it into a power point presentation.

After reaching a comfortable point drinking beers I decide it is time to catch one of the last trains back to my area and call it a night. I have research to do!

Budapest Part Two!

Let me tell you, a real bed in a private room does wonders for regaining your energy. For day 3 in Budapest, Bobbi is ready to really show me the sites.

We start off visiting Heroes Square. This is a square decided to the heroes of Hungarian history. The place is pretty awesome. Very beautiful and hearing the history behind each statue makes it 10x better. I am very lucky to have a personal tour guide who just happens to be working on his masters in history. One interesting fact, the square was built during a time while the Hasburgs still ruled, so the statues on the far right were of the king and queen during that time. After their fall, they were torn down and replaced with two statues of famous rebel leaders who fought against the Hasburgs.

After this we took the metro downtown. Now the metro we took was a little different. It was the first one ever built in Europe; making it the oldest metro in Europe. The funny story behind it is that when they built it, they weren't thinking this whole metro thing would be big. It was just an experiment. So the built it right at the end of Heroes Square and then under one of the most trafficked roads in Budapest, now known as Embassy Row, since most foreign Embassy's are on this street. They tore up the road, built the tunnel and then just built the road right back over it. Part of the lack of planning was, how do you ever get the train out if you need to repair or replace it? Well, that eventually happened. They couldn't exactly tear up this now historic street, so they had to do it the hard way. The dissembled the entire train piece by piece and carried it out by hand. Then they rebuilt a new one back below.

After getting to the city square we visit Bobbi's University. It is a very beautiful part of the city. It is in one of the older, more historical areas. Its great to see old homes/villas just converted into useful buildings, like schools. The courtyard for his school was given a glass ceiling and turned into a library and let me say, I wish it was my library in college. We also grab lunch at the University (tasty and cheap!).

We leave his school and wander around eventually finding our way across the city back to the Palace. I wanted to get some great pictures of the city during the day. It is such an incredible view. I honestly think it is the best part of the city. We wander over to St. Mathews Cathedral next. This place is just amazing. On the hillside above the river and city, it seems closer to a fairy tale castle than a church. I swear they got the idea for Hogwarts from some of the structures around this castle.

After getting my fill of photos, we decide to pack it in, both tired from 4 or 5 hours of walking around a good sized, but beautiful city. The rest of the night is fairly calm. Home cooked meal and I get a chance to get to know Rozi, the other roommate more.

Now Rozi is from Debrecen, the second largest city in Hungary with a population of 200,000. (Budapest has 2 million and Hungary only has 10 million total).

Now Rozi is a fascinating person. In my last post I mention she is fluent in 5 languages, Hungarian, English, Spanish, French and Italian. Oh, and she is learning German. I struggle with English alone.... I ask how she keeps up with it and she explains that she speaks any when she can, reads books in the different languages, reads foreign newspapers and for her work she provides IT customer support in Italian and French (I think those are the two..I mean she speaks 5, don't hold it against me if I am wrong on which two). She also comes from a family of 12 (2 parents, 10 kids). 5 sons and 5 daughters. Already Rozi has made most of my life accomplishments look like the drawings a 5-year-old demands to be put on the fridge. Top it all off, her brothers are big gamers (video gamers for the fans out there). So not only did she know the incredibly nerdy games I referenced that my brothers and I spent arguably too much time playing, she admitted to playing them her self with her brothers. This pretty much solidified that Rozi is my new Hungarian BFF.

Now the next few days are a little calmer, but that is another post.

The Best Place I Have Eaten So Far

After a good long day of sight seeing Budapest with my personal tour guide, Bobbi, we meet up with Matt for dinner. Since I am the guest the choice is mine, but we are in Budapest, I have no clue where to go. My request, somewhere unique to the area. Matt and Bobbi both agree MARIKA NÉNI.

I ask what this place is and this is how it was described by Matt, "So after the fall of Communism in 1989 Marika (70+ year old woman) wanted to open up a hamburger stand, like in America, but the problem is, she doesn't know how to cook hamburgers...at all, so pretty much she just puts anything on there, pork chops, beef, chicken, any sauces or vegetables. In fact, she doesn't have a real menu, you just go in there and ask for whatever you want on a bun and she will do it. Her menu is just a collection of things people have ordered. Oh, yeah and everything is on a bun about the size of a square foot...not kidding."

So I ask what the price is. Matt's response, "Marika will just tell you to pay what you think it was worth, but it averages around $5-7."

So I get a huge burger with whatever I want on it for around $6, yes, I want that.

We get there and sure enough this 70-year-old-woman is cooking behind a counter. I order a burger with beef, chicken, sausage, lettuce, eggs, ketchup and I think that is it. Marika chastises me in Hungarian for my lack of vegetables on there and spends some time trying to convince me, in Hungarian, to add more.

Matt was going to order a similar burger but she told him, "You want the Peace Burger, it is on special, I make that for you instead." Matt knows better than to argue with her and accepts this unknown burger.

We get our huge burgers and they exceed my expectations. Huge and though a giant mess of random foods just thrown in with hardly any order. And it was great! It was a daunting process trying to eat it, but worth it.

I decided that I want to open a hamburger stand back in Lawrence when I get home. I don't know how to cook, so it is perfect. People just come in and say things they want on it and boom, I add it. If they don't know what they want, I can just make it up!

Needless to say, if you come to Budapest, this is a must visit restaurant.

My Adventure in Budapest So Far

So, my avid readers (Mom and Martie for sure - Mrs. Jantsch gets credit too for comments) might be thinking "where is an update on Hungary," so here it finally is!

I got into Hungary around 8pm on Monday. I walked off the plane expecting to see my good friend Matt Shaw, who was picking me up and so no one. I thought to my self "oh crap, Matt forgot....he completely forgot...I am now in a foreign city, with no cell phone, no internet, at night, no knowledge of the city, no phone number for my friends or address where they live....crap." Matt is a great guy, but this is just one of those things I could see him sitting at home and going "hum...its Monday night....Monday night.....OH CRAP." Luckily for me I was wrong, Matt just had his own adventure getting to the airport (apparently they built a mall on top of the last bus station leaving him confused on how to get to the airport).

Matt and I ride the bus and then metro back to his fiances (Edit - pronounced ee-dit)place where I will be crashing (he is living in their living room until his apartment is ready). I get there, expecting a couch to sleep on and instead Edit's brother (a roommate) has gone to stay with his other brother and given me his room. This is way to generous, but they refused to let me decline for the couch. I have planning to do on how to repay them. I also get to meet one of Edit's close friends and other roommate, Rozi. She speaks English very well, but is kind of a slacker because she is only fluent in 5 languages (English, Hungarian, French, Italian and Spanish). I mean, anyone can do that right?

We chat, have dinner and call it an early night. Matt and Edit had work the next day. Edit's brother is a history student as a University in Budapest and will be giving me the tour of the city the next day.

I wake up around 10am and meet Edit's brother, Bobbi, only to realize we met in Kansas when he visited Edit there. We both had completely forgotten until we met again. This made the intro much easier as him and I had talked a lot about our passion for military history (his study) when we first met.

We start by taking the metro into the central station and just decided to walk around the city and get a feel for it. Budapest is an interesting city. The building designs are very, very similar to Paris. Additionally, battle after battle have been fought in the city (Turkish Invasion, Revolt against the Habsburgs, WW2, revolt against Russia, etc), leaving a random mix at times of architectural styles showing the era that building was rebuilt in. Additionally, you can still see the damage done to plenty of buildings by gun fire, artillery or tanks rolling through the streets over the past 100 years. You may see a 300 year old building and attached to it is a 60 year old one, because the previous building was bombed and destroyed in WW2.

While wondering, we stumble across and incredible cathedral, St. Steven's Church. St. Steven was the founder of Hungary and father to the first king. This place is just gorgeous, even though I have seen about a dozen churches in the last week. You can even see St. Steven's right hand, persevered in a box inside. They have a strict no high-fiving policy as I found out with a few awkward stares...okay not really, but I thought about it.

We moved on from the church to walk down the Danube river which divides the city. There used to be two cities Buda and Pest, now one Budapest. Buda is traditionally the more wealthy part, home to the old palace (from days of kings). It is also on a hill, making it safer than the Danube floods every so often. Pest is completely flat, letting it get fully flooded more than a few times in the last few hundred years. Bobbi is a great tour guide, as he speaks English very well and knows so much about the history of the city and country. He is explaining the history from start to present, while also talking about the culture. And I am loving it. One of my favorite quotes is "In American you mark your turning points by great victories, but in Hungary we mark them by great disasters." Hungary has not been so lucky...in about any war.

After our stroll we meet up with Matt getting off work and decide to go eat at a local favorite, MARIKA NÉNI (pretty much means Aunt Marika's). I will have an entirely separate post on this. I loved the place. One of the craziest, best places I have ever eaten. Edit joins us there and we decide to cross the Danube post work and go to the Palace for an amazing view of the city at night. Budapest is so crazy because half of it is so high up on a hill and the other completely flat, but it was amazing. I had to go back the next day to take daytime photos.

We finally roll home and I somehow convince everyone we should watch one of my all time favorite movies, Sphere. I don't know how it came up or why we started watching it but we did. After a quick torrent (no repercussions for downloading copyrighted material in Hungary) we enjoyed a great film. I will explain the copyright policy in another post.

Finally, worn out, we decide to hit the hay and call it a night. Tomorrow I see more sights!