Postcard from Pest

[jigsawpig]

In pursuance of my strategy of making visits at random to major European capitals, and as previously trailed in this very weblog, I decided to spend New Year in Budapest, which is in fact where I now find myself, propping up the bar in a suitably dark and smoky outlet of the Gosser Brauerei. Much to my gratification, the two people opposite me are

Comments

Weird holiday

[perthman]

It's good to have a proper Pig-content post again! Sex (well, nice legs anyway), shadowy figures in smoky bars, intrigue and explosives all in an exotic climate. Who needs 007 when JP is abroad?

Re: Weird holiday

[jigsawpig]

I would be happy to increase the 'exotic foreign holiday' component of my weblog, subject of course to the provision of appropriate funding.

[anonymous]

I am glad you mentally apologised to Ian, as this blog was as much use as the song in the travel guide department!
Did you see anything of Buda or Pest, apart from long legged ladies, circus acta and fireworks? I hear there is a river that runs between the two cities as well.

[jigsawpig]

There is indeed, the Duna (or Danube as we know it). I can report that it is both grey, and wide, and is crossed by several bridges, all of them extremely unprepossessing. I did in fact see a great deal of both Buda and Pest, it being my habit to spend my days wandering aimlessly for hours around the cities I visit, purposely eschewing such fatuous suggestions for things to admire as the guide books might provide, and instead seeking out the areas where normal people actually live and work.

Budapest is OK, I suppose, not somewhere I would choose to live myself, but probably tolerable, particularly if you are Hungarian. Those few buildings which survived the bombing and shelling during WW2 are surprisingly elegant, and their facades often quite prettily decorated, although mostly obscured by tramline cables, various pieces of street furniture, and advertising hoardings. It is very similar to Vienna, if that is any help.

[jigsawpig]

Actually, it occurs to me that I have some actual images of Budapest, snapped with my handy phone. Here is the Royal Palace in Buda, as seen from Pest, across the Danube. I have no idea who the small boy is, or what he is doing there, or why he is wearing such a hat, none of the guide books mentioned him at all.

It's a Girl

[chessiegirl]

Found this after a bit of research

[number1son]

Your description of the fireworks reminds me of Guy Fawke's night when I was little, and the fiestas in Malta when I was only a little less littler. You were actually part of the fireworks display, and not some unwelcome tourist needing to be kept behind netting with the message "do not feed the Catherine wheels" tacked all over the place. The sparks and thunder surrounding you is an experience denied today's young'uns, and that, I think, is a pity.

Do you choose your destination randomly? Have you been to the colder climes and spent some time in, for example, Denmark, Norway or (less adventurously) Holland?

[jigsawpig]

Yes, it is a shame, nowadays young people have to go to Iraq to get that sort of experience.

Fairly randomly, I do tend to go south in the summer, and east in the winter, though. Holland (or at least Amsterdam, which I'm informed Dutch people don't accept as being in Holland at all) I've visited a couple of times, and my New Year in Copenhagen was described here. Norway is on my list for the future.

Night and Day

[anonymous]

And there was me thinking that 'Night and Day' was a song by Gerry Rafferty,

very disappointed when I realised you were probably talking about something else

SJ

Re: Night and Day

[jigsawpig]

Yes, she was singing the Cole Porter song, I'm afraid, although I do actually prefer the Gerry Rafferty one. My all-time favourite GR song, though, is 'The Right Moment', which I still vividly remember hearing for the first time, and being reduced to shamed self-recognition by.

Re: Night and Day

[anonymous]

And the Gerry Rafferty song isn't even called 'Night and Day', although it should be cos he says it often enough.

I don't think I know 'The Right Moment' I have only got Baker Street and the next one some years later.

SJ

Re: Night and Day

[jigsawpig]

You are right, it is in fact called "Whatever's Written in Your Heart", shows that even good songwriters make mistakes occasionally when deciding what name to give their creations.

Here is The Right Moment, ripped from a cassette I'm afraid, so a bit hissy. Just like me.

[anonymous]

Never a better description of Budapest was ever penned. There's something Irving-esque about it, which just works.... lekker.