Hello :)
I'm finally getting around to my Budapest post – more than a month late. Lately I haven't been up to much more than my internship (which I've also been copying and pasting from the journal my university requires me to do) and I therefore haven't been doing a lot of writing about my life.
Last weekend I went to Bad Urach to go swimming in the thermal pools there, which was a really nice day to spend a freezing cold Saturday. There has hardly been much snow at all here, buy as you can see in my previous post, it's been cold enough for the Neckar River to freeze over – which apparently hasn't happened for quite awhile. In addition to my internship, this past week has been filled with trip planning, as my mom is coming to visit in a few weeks, as are two of my friends from Valparaiso. We plan on traveling a little through the area together and seeing some local sites before heading off to Dublin to celebrate St. Patrick's Day in Ireland! (We'll see how that turns out – as a gluten-intolerant in the country home to Guiness on St. Patrick's Day...) Then I'm off to Sweden, back to Germany to see my sister who will be here for a week, and then at the beginning of April I'm going to southern France. It's possible that I'll be able to squeeze a few small weekend / day trips in between, but so far that's my plan for the next two months – and it's taken a lot of time to plan everything!
As the semester comes to a close, a lot of friends I made in our five-week "Deutsch Kompakt Kurs" are soon going home, or have already left, so I've of course been trying to spend as much time with them as I can too. If everything works out alright, it looks like I might have the chance to visit two of them in Belgium with the other Valparaiso students in April!
Other than that, my life has been much better since the end of my final exams! They all, surprisingly, went pretty well with the exception of my Marketing Exam, which was kind of a verbal-exam nightmare. Verbal exams are quite common in Europe, although I had never had one before. I felt that I was pretty prepared, but some of the questions were very obscure and dealt with content they told us as international students not to learn. So, that could have gone better, but it's not the end of the world. Theology went surprisingly well, and my two courses at the German as a Foreign Language center were very good too.
SO, that's my update, here's my Budapest photo blog! I was way too busy when I got back to do a daily play-by-play of everything we did and saw (and we accomplished quite a lot in six days) but here's my attempt at getting something recorded so that I can read about it 20 years from now. Some of my pictures aren't all that great – it was cold and gray most of the time we were in Budapest, but I included some of them just for the sake of trying to have one for every letter of the alphabet. (Click photos to enlarge.)
A is for Andrássy Avenue - A trendy shopping and commercial district, as well as a UNESCO World Heritage Site. We spent a couple days exploring the historical sites along this street, as well as the excellent restaurants and beautiful scenery.
B is for Bridges - Budapest, situated along the Danube, is famous for its eight bridges. All of these bridges connecting "Buda" and "Pest" have been rebuilt within the last century due to the mass destruction the city has seen during decades of war and oppressive governments it has endured. The Chain Bridge (shown above) is probably the most well-known, and in my opinion, the most beautiful.
And for Baths – I didn't bring my camera to go swimming, but Budapest is famous for its thermal, hot springs where the water is said to cure a ridiculous amount of ailments. It was very relaxing to sit outside in a hot, steaming pool, but getting out and walking barefoot on the cold, concrete ground was torture. (I didn't think to bring sandals...) Budapest has many "Baths," but we went to the ones in City Park, which are the most well-known and the largest.
C is for Castle - Overlooking the city is Buda Castle, a building that much like the rest of the city, bears an illustrious past. It was for many years home to Hungarian Kings and royal families, and today houses numerous museums. It is deceptively large, and it amazes me that it is in such perfect condition. Budapest is honestly the most beautiful city I have ever seen, but it is amazing that it was even able to be reconstructed after the war at all. Check out this link for a picture of the Chain Bridge with Buda Castle in the background following World War II:
And for Cave Church - Located on Gellert Hill, the Cave Church has a significant history and meaning for the Catholic Church in Hungary (where the national religion is Catholicism). This entrance to the within Gellert Hill was built by Pauline Monks in the early 1920's, who returned to the church in 1992 after it was reopened. During World War II, It was used by the Nazis as a field hospital, but after the war it was barricaded by the communist government with a two-feet-thick concrete wall that sealed the cave church from visitors until 1989.
D is for the Danube River that divides the former cities of "Buda" and "Pest."
E is for Eternal Escalator – the escalators down into the subway went on forever. The subway lines ran under the Danube, so I can only imagine how deep that must be in reality. It was sometimes a little scary to look down the fast-moving escalators and see how far you would fall if you tripped on something...
F is for Forint – the Hungarian currency that is worth less than the Euro AND the Dollar. We had dessert at every meal, and still came home with extra money. That was a much-welcomed change after 5 months in the Eurozone. :)
F is for Fisherman's Bastion – In medieval times, each guild of tradesmen was given a part of the city of "Pest" that they were responsible for protecting. The Fishermen were responsible for protecting the part of the city where the Fisherman's Bastion currently stands. The large, castle-looking structure is a monument to the Fisherman's Guild with excellent views of the city.
G is for Gellert Hill – Home of the Cave Church, as well as the Hungarian "Statue of Liberty" seen above. It's a great place to take pictures of the city and all of it's bridges spanning the Danube.
And for Grand Hostel where we stayed. Friendly staff, and nice rooms :)
And for GermanWings an airline that everybody in the Stuttgart (and Köln!) area should know about! They have great deals on flights, and good service too. Try the Blind Booking if you're up for a surprise!
H is for House of Terror – a museum dedicated to telling the history of Hungary's Nazi, Communist, and Fascist governments. It was as interesting as it was sickening, and included a part of the underground concentration camp that the communist government kept under this entire block along Andrássy Avenue. I didn't take this picture (it wasn't this sunny and green when we were there) but it is copyright free – I checked! http://www.terrorhaza.hu/index_1.html
And for Hungarian Cuisine – which was amazing. Here are Rachel and Harry with their dinners at the restaurant we were recommended by the hostel staff. Hungarian food is known throughout Europe for being spicy (which it truly is) and every tourist shop in Budapest sells hot-pepper shaped souvenirs with "Hungary" written on them.
And for Heroes' Square – An open plaza with monuments dedicated to historical figures of Hungary's past and in honor of its current democracy. Looking towards the obelisk, there are museums on either side of the square, and City Park is directly behind.
I is for International Speed Skating Competition – While we were in Budapest, there was a Speed Skating competition being held in City Park. Rachel, the Winter Olympics expert, explained it all to us and we got to watch a couple races. Fans from Norway, the Czech Republic, and of course the Netherlands were prominently in attendance!
J is for Jewish Museum and Europe's largest Synagogue – This was for me, one of the most interesting parts of the trip. I had actually never been in a Synagogue before, and this one was absolutely stunning to see. We couldn't take pictures inside, and I unfortunately couldn't really get a good shot of the outside. I thought it was really sad that we had to go through a metal detector before we could go inside and buy our ticket to the Synagogue and museum – never have I seen a Christian Church that actually requires security guards and a metal detector to protect it from such violent and hateful people, even in 2012...
Here's a photo of the cemetery form the outside behind the Synagogue. Thousands of Holocaust victims are buried here in mass graves – many remain unidentified today.
K is for Köztársasági Elnöki Hivatal – Which apparently means "Office of the President of the Republic of Hungary." Here's another picture of the building below.
L is for [Trabant] Limousine – Even as a former communist country, there were surprising amount of Trabants still on the streets. I think it must have taken at least four to create this Limo?
M is for Metro that reminded me of Communist-Era Moscow – I was, of course, never there (during that time period anyway, but I hope to visit soon!) but these old subways look like they're straight out of the Soviet Union, which I'm quite sure they are.
And, a link to my favorite German 80's song, just for good measure. It's what came into my head every time our subway pulled up to the platform.
N is for National History Museum – Housed inside of Buda castle
And for National Museum – Not housed inside of Buda castle
O is for the Budapest State Opera House – Where we saw a performance of The Nutcracker.
P is for [Hungarian National] Parliament Building – Probably the most beautiful building I've ever seen (along with the Sydney Opera House) along the banks of the Danube. Nighttime picture below.
Q is for Queen Elisabeth of the Austro-Hungarian Empire – for whom the Elisabeth Bridge (pictured above and below) was named.
R is for Rendörség – The Hungarian Police
And for Royal Hungarian Crown – Which is located in the Hungarian Parliament Building, and guarded at all times by real, live, Hungarian Soldiers. (Just because it's been stolen a couple times in the past...) They have swords.
S is for St. Stephans Basilica – Which looks like an ordinary European church on the outside, but is an amazing sight to see from the inside. It is decorated absolutely everywhere. I think we spent more than an hour inside just looking around. We actually found it by accident while looking for the Synagogue, which I thought it was at first (the map made it seem so) but the Christ-references in Latin written above the door soon proved us wrong, as did the crosses... Duh. It was on our list of things to see anyway, so it was good we found it!
And for Széll Kálmán tér – The square we took the tram to every day before switching to the Metro to get into the city. Until recently, it was called "Moskova tér" (Moscow Square) but since communism in Hungary has been over and done with for more than a decade, they decided to change the name.
T is for Tram – Which was also delightfully, nostalgically Soviet-era-esque. (See the picture above – it's the only one I have!)
U is for Underground in the Labyrinth of Budapest – Much of the city sits on top of a massive underground cave system caused by the hot, thermal, mineral water that Budapest is today so famous for in Europe. It is known as the "Spa City." We explored the caves for a couple hours, including some dark rooms where there were absolutely no lights at all. Good thing our cell phones here have flashlights built into them!
V is for Vajdahunyad Castle – Built as a temporary exhibit for some sort of fair/event (I forget what exactly). Vajdahunyad Castle is located on an island in City Park and is a fusion of multiple architectural styles from all around europe. Most prevalent, however, are the cues it takes from castles in Transylvania, Romania. The people of Budapest liked it so much that it was rebuilt to last. When you're up close, you can barely tell that the styles on each of the sides don't match up.
W is for World's Largest Hour Glass – Located in City Park. The last grains of sand run through at exactly midnight on New Year's Eve.
X is for nothing starts with X. – Not even the titles of the places we visited in Hungarian.
Y is for Yellow railings along this bridge we crossed with the tram on the last day – The metro we needed to take to get into the city, to take another metro to the airport was conveniently closed. We had no way of knowing ahead of time – we showed up expecting to get on the subway like we had been doing every day. There were signs on every door in Hungarian, and masses of people looking confused and frustrated. We finally located the English sign stating that the Metro was closed that day. After a couple minutes of panic, we found a tram to get us to the metro that took us to the bus that took us to the airport. (We have become experts at public transportation. Budapest was a true test of our map-reading and public-transportation-navigating skills!) It's too bad that we never got the chance to walk across this bridge, because I would have loved to take some pictures. I managed to snap this one of the Parliament building, the river, and the castle all in the same frame. It was a nice way to say goodbye to Budapest!
Z is for Zach – Because we didn't see any Zebras. Here are some wonderful, less-than-flattering pictures of me.
