2005-08-11 - 12:57 p.m.
Budapest, Hungary
As you know, Budapest is TWO cities in one! They told us the differences between Buda and Pest on the coach tour, but I was coming off the back of what felt like minus two hours sleep the night before thanks to insane flight times, so I missed it. Buda has hills and Pest has people with bushier eyebrows, I think, though maybe I dreamed that last bit.
It�s an international group of journalists, which is always fun. I have enough trouble memorising five UK names, let alone twenty five foreign ones�and then you have to remember which cities they�re from � is Bratislava in Slovakia? Kiev in Ukraine? Should I really be in travel journalism if I have to ask?
The official group language is English, which is great for me, though not so great for every other person�yesterday I found myself in the middle of a linguistic threeway, the Dutch, Japanese and Polish journalists having an involved conversation, mainly about how to pronounce each other�s names.
There�s a lot of stuff like this:
Me: I�m really Hungry.
Romanian girl: �Yes, I like it in Hungary.�
I feel really stupid compared to the rest of them, though. Imagine if the official group language was Russian.
Cute TV presenter from Moscow: (something basic in Russian)
Me: Uhhhhhh�.da? niet? Nazdrovia? Gregory Efimovich Rasputin?
It�s a logistical debacle as well, and many of the group are employing the tried and tested �I have some work to do at the hotel�, which translates in any language to �I�m way too hungover to come and see the interactive railway museum.� I�m pulling that one today to use what is possibly the most expensive internet connection I have ever come across. Honestly, what�s the point of these East European countries if they�re not going to be insultingly cheap? You�d think they wanted to pull themselves out of oppressive economic decline or something.
The focus of the trip is this huge music festival. I�ve heard of about two bands, but there�s a lot to see even beyond the Hungarian Coldplay. I was wandering around with the Dutch guy as a) he speaks Hungarian for some unknown reason so can order beer, and b) he is the least exhausting to talk to (I know that sounds cruel, but my �talking to foreigners� voice annoys even me after eight hours).
We passed a tent playing punk rock, and ducked our heads in. It took a few minutes to realise that the band were just singing �Hare Krishna, Hare Rama� at full, ear-drum shattering pelt, all shaved heads and shouty delivery but with black t-shirts instead of orange robes. They were still going two hours later when we went past again � someone told us they just go all day. It must be hypnotic, but it�s like the opposite of meditation.
Top of the loopy-fruit charts, though, were still to come. We heard some cheesy 80s synth pop (specifically, Land Down Under by Men at Work) and saw a big crowd, Straining over, we saw that it was a group of Orthodox Jews in full regalia, dancing their traditional dances whilst smoking and drinking, and trying to put skull caps on the audience. To the side, counsel from a rabbi was available for about 2p, and given the show, I imagine a fair bit of counselling was being sought.
Other highlights included seeing Yossu N�Dour perform to probably the whitest audience he has ever seen (there�s only one black person in the whole of Hungary), what looked like three piss-sodden old gypsies doing insanely fast movez on their fiddles, completely missing Morcheeba but mostly just knowing that we could go back to the hotel and not have to camp. Call me a crusty, backboneless old scrote whose guts turn to watery soup at the first sign of remedial discomfort, but festival camping is one chapter of my life that is unlikely to be reopened.
