Budapest is a gorgeous city – some of the most unique architecture that we’ve seen yet. Hungary also has a long history of being conquered and occupied (the Romans, the Mongolians, the Turks, the Hapsburgs, the Nazis, the Soviets). It also has the most depressed economy that we have experienced – 85% of Hungary lives below the poverty line. While the other cities that we have seen have mostly been reconstructed since WWII, Budapest still has many buildings with bullet holes and a century’s worth of dirt/soot on the facades. The effects of Communism are still very apparent in many ways.
On a brighter note, let’s start with the central Market, which was built in the 1890's – it's a bustling place for locals and tourists - business and capitalism are alive & well here.
Exterior of Market
Interior of Market
Hungary’s biggest church is St Stephan’s Basilica, named after the first king of Hungary (around 1000 A.D.), but built much later in the late 1800's. He converted the country to Christrianity. It is one of the most opulent churches we have seen - red marble, gold, and priceless art.
Exterior of the Church
- Note the people (for scale of how huge it is), and the Communist building on the left - they made their point. (Their point apparently being that they can make really big buildings too - but big ugly buildings - and put them wherever they pleased, even in the historic square).
Interior
Communism:
First we saw the Terror House, regarded by locals as one of the country’s most important museums.
It shows the very dark side of communism – the communist rule was most brutal during the first 10 years or so (until the late 50’s), and the museum highlights this period - the torture, the mistreatment & persecution of peasants and farmers, suppression of all religion and jail/torture of priests, etc. The numbers are staggering – 1 in 3 adults during this period was interrogated, jailed or put to trial. Trials were “show trials” since the verdicts were usually prepared before the trial, and there was a presumption of guilt, not innocence. 700,000 Hungarians were sent to work/concentration camps, and 300,000 of these died in the camps.
Then there was the Revolution of 1956, when students (and later many others) demonstrated against the communist occupation. At first the demonstration was non-violent, but when the Soviets responded with heavy fire (tanks rolled in), the demonstrators armed themselves – the conflict lasted for several weeks. It was unsuccessful for the demonstrators, because they did not have artillery or anti-tank weapons. 20,000 civilians were killed or jailed during the uprising, and 200,000 Hungarians fled the country.
This is a memorial to Imre Nagy, the prime minister during the uprising, who was later executed. He is looking toward the parliament building – he hoped for democracy in Hungary.
After this uprising, the Soviets loosened up on the oppressive rule quite a bit to avoid the instability of more uprisings – the 70’s and 80’s were a time of “Communism Light.” We took a walking tour of communism and learned all about this period – both of our guides were in their 40’s and shared their personal experiences with us. During the “Communism Light” period, the government made everything cheap to bribe/placate people – they subsidized food, housing, and completely covered medical care. There was an underground system of bribery to get better medical care, etc. It was interesting to learn that the government did not want anyone to over-achieve, and didn’t want anyone doing more than “just the plan.” There was a lot of drinking before/during work, on all levels. Since wages were set, and low, everyone did the bare minimum – some of these characteristics are still alive and well today.
This is the last communist memorial in the city – the rest have been moved outside of the city to Memento Park.
These are views of Pest taken from the opposite side of the river:
Parliament Building
View of Pest
The Castle Complex
The rest of this blog is about Buda, the west side of the river – it’s the older part of the city, lots of green hills – and the castle.
This might have been our best day yet – a Wine festival in the castle complex. There was wine, a palace, medieval castle walls, amazing food, live folk music, and sunshine – and wine. Great day.
This is the Fisherman’s Bastion, built in the last century - the 7 towers represent the 7 Magyer tribes that settled here in 896 A.D.– it’s beautiful.
In the foreground is the Statue of St. Stephan (first king), and on the right is St. Matthias church.
Close-up of roof tiles –
We explored the Labyrinth that runs beneath the city – it was originally formed by the hot springs that still run under Budapest, and there is some evidence that pre-historic people inhabited the caves. The labyrinth has been built up and utilized by many regimes – as torture chambers, jails, secret passage-ways. It even has a secret hospital that was used for soldiers during WWII – the hospital room can house 10,000 patients, and was kept secret until 1990. 
The food… ah, the food. Lots of stew – beef stew, lamb stew, catfish goulash, goulash soup, sausage & kale stew. Eastern Europeans make great soups and stews… This is us at our nicest dinner out, with our new friends Elya & Ryan (remember them from Krakow)? They are tandem biking through Europe. (you read that right). We hope to cross paths with them again before our travels are over.
Last, but not least – thermal spas! There are Turkish and Roman baths around the city – very relaxing. We went three times, couldn’t help ourselves – good for a traveler’s sore body. This one had a swimming-pool size hot tub outdoors, and lots of pools indoors with different temperatures/minerals.
One night at the baths, we randomly ran into a friend named Pasha from Vince’s MBA program – he just happened to be in Budapest the same time as us, and just happened to be at the same bath house at the same time as us. Love running into a familiar face!
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