Michael Smith
Editors’ Note: Michael Smith’s early-90s Eastern Bloc adventures began in 1991 in Russia (Moscow and Leningrad), and continued, in 1992, in Prague (erstwhile Czechoslovakia). Michael goes deeper into Eastern Europe, with Budapest (Hungary), followed by Vienna (Austria).
Day 4
We left the hotel at 08:15 to travel from Prague to Budapest. Just after crossing into Hungary we stopped at Mosonmagyaróvár (because the petrol was cheaper). Here we exchanged currency from our German Deutschmarks and any spare Czech Korunas and Halerus into the Hungarian Forints and Fillérs (I’m not making this up). The tour company had warned us also that Hungarian Forints did not change back very well, so we shouldn’t bother changing too much.
Eventually, we arrived at probably the best accommodation of the tour—Hotel Platanus. It was situated close to the Ferencváros football ground, where, judging by the floodlights, a match was already underway. This was the near 30,000 capacity Üllői úti Stadion but renamed in 2007 the Stadion Albert Flórián, after a former Ferencváros icon. Ferencváros were the current cup holders, and would become Hungarian champions a month or two after our visit; not as impressive though as their 1931–32 season, when they won all 22 league matches (still a record in Hungary). They are also the only Hungarian team to win a European trophy, the 1965 Inter-Cities Fairs Cup, beating Juventus 1-0 in Turin.
Once again rooms were allocated and, after unpacking, our evening meal was accompanied by a string quartet playing Hungarian folk music, with a violinist who visited each table (hoping, no doubt, for a tip).
Day 5
The city of Budapest, sometimes referred to back then as the Paris of Eastern Europe, was formed from three separate towns straddling the Danube—Buda, Pest and Obuda. Buda contains most of the historical monuments, especially in the Castle District (Várhegy), while Pest is the commercial district.
In the morning we visited Pest, starting with Vajdahunyad, an architectural museum (a strange mixture of replicas of actual buildings, mainly Romanian, built in 1896). Next was the Millenium Memorial in Heroes’ Square, followed by the Parliament Buildings built in 1904 (based, architecturally, on the British Houses of Parliament), and the Chain Bridge.
This was followed by a visit to Buda, the other half of the Hungarian Capital. Here we saw the Castle Palace (Várpalota), Matthias Church and the Fisherman’s Bastion. Directly opposite the Fisherman’s Bastion is the Budapest Hilton, whose strangely tinted windows reflect the Bastion in a grotesque, fairground manner. Once again we were unwittingly following in the footsteps of Korean film-makers Shin and Choi. It was in a room in the Budapest Hilton in 1983 that they secretly met a Japanese contact who could help them defect to the West. But more of that later.
In the afternoon, with unseasonably warm weather and under a beautiful clear, blue sky, we returned to Pest for lunch on the banks of the Danube. Our packed lunches here were similar to those we received in Prague. But the napkins, rather than the plain Czech off-white, were chequered in red, white and pink, as if to emphasise that Budapest was indeed, as their envious Easter Bloc neighbours thought, “the land of milk and honey.”
A group leader should always be on the look-out for unplanned extras that can be slotted into the itinerary. Such an opportunity presented itself via a poster positioned across the road from our hotel. In the evening, following dinner, we walked over the road from the hotel to a planetarium situated in the middle of Népliget (People’s Park). Here we were to witness a laser show set to the music of Pink Floyd.
Day 6
In more fine weather we headed north to the Danube Bend, a sharp curve in the river as it breaks through the Piles and Pozsony mountains. Here, medieval kings once ruled Hungary from majestic palaces overlooking the river at Esztergom and Visegrád. In getting there we first passed an excavation of the Roman fort town of Aquincum situated in the third and, so far for us at least, unvisited part of Budapest, Obuda.
Next we stopped for a couple of hours at Szentendre (St. Andrews) which is 20 km north of Budapest. It was founded in the 17th century by Serbian merchants fleeing from the advancing Turks. One member of our party was Turkish, and our tour guide took the opportunity to demonstrate that, perhaps, in the intervening three centuries, not all had been forgiven. For most of the last century the town was a centre for painters and sculptors, which explained the plethora of art galleries and gift shops clustered around the saintly column in the town square.
From there we drove to Visegrád, a 14th-century Royal Palace, destroyed in the 17th century by those Turks. For the two centuries prior to this, Hungarian kings ruled from here and Buda. More destruction ensued in 1702, when the Hapsburgs blew up the 13th-century citadel, the ruins of which were not discovered until 1934.
Our final stop was at Esztergom. Stephen the First, founder of the Hungarian state, was born and crowned here, and it remained capital of Hungary from 10th to 13th century. After the king moved to Buda, Esztergom became, and remained, an ecclesiastical centre, complete with cathedral. After visiting Esztergom Cathedral, the largest church in Hungary (including the very cold crypt), we looked across to the Danube to see the so-called “Bridge of Friendship” between Hungary and Czechoslovakia. Our guide explained that this bridge symbolised the true relations between the two countries—it was destroyed, broken into the icy waters, and never repaired.
In the past year, Michael Smith’s fiction has appeared in Fabula Argentea, Witcraft, Literally Stories, Heimat Review, The Hooghly Review, Little Old Lady Comedy and many other online literary journals. To date, he has self-published Gruseltal, a humorous novel, and two collections of short stories, Fonts, then Songs, all available from online bookstores.
Website: https://frucht-schleifen.weebly.com/
