Boring You With Budapest, Pt 2

I need to get on this - I'm starting to forget what some of this stuff was!

Budapest Castle (Or Is It Castle Budapest?) and the Chain Bridge

I should mention that Budapest is really two cities. Pest (pronounced "pesht" by the locals) is on the Eastern(?) side of the Danube, which is where the plains (or is it steppes? I don't know) start. So it's flat, and seems to be where the commerce, housing, squalor, etc. is. That's where we spent most of our time - and there's lots of modern shopping and public art and stuff like that in Pest. However, Buda's on the other side of the river, is hilly, has nicer architecture, and cooler "touristy" things to do (that is, unless you consider shopping as the be-all-end-all of a vacation, in which case, stay in Pest). We didn't really know this until late into our stay. The Chain Bridge is a neat looking bridge that a lot of people use to get from one side to the other.

This is looking from the Eastern side of the Chain Bridge (I really liked the kick ass lions...the gypsy beggars that were literally underfoot - as in I had to step over the woman - not so much).

This was at the base of the funicular - which as it turns out is NOT a slang term for a girl's naughty parts - that you could ride up to the castle. We opted for the stairs.

This peasant woman selling her embroidery was probably the most authentic thing we saw during the entire stay. And I have no doubt that she took breaks to run back the the beemer and check her text messages in between hawking quilts.

Is this an eagle? A vulture? What does it mean? Do I want a replica in my bedroom? Yes.

This is a giant fountain that depicts many scenes of hunting and manliness. Kick ass.

This was the second monk, of a second variety, that we spotted.

The chain bridge, at night, from some ritzy hotel where we attended a gala that had little food and too much drink. Not that I'm complaining, but you should see the other pictures I tried to take that night!

Heroes' Square

Heroes' Square is a great big monument in the middle of Pest that has bronze statues of...heroes. I really can't explain much more than that as there weren't any plaques around - even in Magyar - that explained any of it. Just statues of a lot of guys - all of whom were the proud bearers of fantastic mustaches - that I'm guessing you probably wouldn't want to piss off if you were to travel back in time and meet. They all looked pretty hard core. Here's pictures of a few of them.

Why no, sir, I do not wish to engage in fisticuffs with you or your horse. That is a mighty fine looking mustache, however. Might I touch it?

Here's the first monk, of the first variety that we spotted. Wily wife jumped out into foot traffic so I could pretend like I was taking a picture of her as he approached, but I think he was wise to our scheme, as he scowled after I took this.

Here's the whole of Heroe's Square. Wish I knew what it all meant.

These two guys are definitely hard core. Pay close attention to the guy on the right...

...It's one thing to make yourself badass, but if you're so badass that you need to make your horse harder by STRAPPING ANTLERS TO ITS DAMN FACE then my hat is off to you, sir.

I was going to save this one for my final, hopefully funny, entry about Budapest, but I just couldn't pass up the opportunity to throw in this statue of our guy here, proudly dsiplaying his baby-dick.

Bryan, tell me what's going on here...

...Because I thought it was a battle or something (there's probably a dozen or so of these reliefs) but after I saw this one, I'm not so sure...

The Citadel

The Citadella was also on the Buda side of the Danube. I think that, aside from the castle, it was the only other thing we visited on that side of the river. It's way up on top of a hill, so you get a nice view of the whole city, you can see the Danube and all of the bridges (by the way, whoever wrote "Blue Danube" is full of shit - that thing was brown and nasty looking), there's sort of a cool authentic curio shop dealing with used artifacts from the soviet era, and there are some more unexplained statues. Also, tour buses like to drop people off up here and then take three to four hours to return and pick them up.

Here's the Danube, Chain Bridge, etc. taken from up top.

Probably my favorite statue that I saw. I have no idea who it is, what it means (I'm guessing it's a holdover from the soviet occupation) but I do know that it's A GIANT NAKED GUY COMING CORRECT ON A DRAGON!

Some dapper looking man molested my wife while we awaited the return of the bus.

But she can take care of herself.

TV In Budapest

I just had to share this. Since Budapest is so close to Austria, many of the TV channels are German programming. What does this mean? We watched lots of German MTV (more on this in a minute), and late night programming - which was when we were in the hotel the most - was the most insane thing I've ever seen. There was a show on one channel that lasted hours that consisted of nothing but a puppet pound cake, front and center, nattering on and on. There was another channel that had a game show that had a woman (and sometimes a man) that would take phone calls...and get progressively more and more naked. And not in an Ooh-La-La striptease kind of way, more like "thanks for the bid, and now I happen to be topless" kind of way. And there was hard core porn on basic cable.

But my favorite was when MTV Germany let this guy take over the airways:

Check out "Augen Auf" if you want the highlight reel to continue - It may even be a better showing than this video.

At first it seemed kind of cool - some dude from Berlin in a metal skull mask rapping about his block. Until he takes the mask off and it's some skeevy looking man-child underneath. He don't look like he could kick my grandma's ass...

The Answer To Bryan's Question

Yes, I did find myself to be more...hungry whilst in Hungary. That's because when we could find food, it was usually in small portions (and I'm no fan of overly large, American restaurant portions) and it usually sucked. Although we did get fed a huge, strange breakfast every morning by the hotel. I got to start the day with pâté.