Hey there...a few non-sequiturs for today.
Had second semester parent teacher conferences for Carolyn yesterday. I know I've said it a few times before but really love all of the teachers at that place. Would much prefer to hang out with them than the parents, but I understand why they are reluctant to engage the parent community on a social level. Takes some huevos to come halfway around the world to this place to teach. And I know that they don't go after crappy teachers that are just looking for a paycheck and free airplane ticket, so what you get are almost exclusively interesting people that are excited to teach. I do feel bad for the single females though...and there are quite a few. I don't think they get much action as the local dudes aren't really appealing to them for the most part. The local girls do have an attraction for the single male teachers, so that pool of possible mates is shallower than they would like. These ladies don't come on to me obviously, but I have heard them lamenting this aspect of the overseas life several times.
Had good talks with all of Carolyn's teachers...they all feel she is smart, that she asks questions in class (which is unsual in this environment apparently) and they all think she has a positive personality. There was room for improvement in all cases of course, but their criticisms were mild compared to others that I heard. The conferences are set-up in the gym and each teacher has a table and you have 5-10 minutes to chat. If he is engaged with a parent/student, you sit in chairs behind them and wait, but you can easily hear what the teacher is saying. You are allowed to bring your kid if you want, but I prefer not to so the teacher talks to me, and not the kid, which is what happens every time the kid is there. The teachers don't pull any punches either...I heard the math guy, who is fairly aggressive in a nice way, talking to this kid and was saying, "if you don't understand what is going on in class, why are you not asking questions?". Pretty sure the kid gave the 'I dunno' shrug, cause the teacher then said, "Are you afraid of me?...You shouldn't be afraid of me but you obviously are." Yikes...the mom is looking at the kid and while I couldn't see her face, the poor kid must have been horrified. I was.
There is always a line-up at the core class teachers tables, and usually no one at the fun ones, like PE or Art, so I end up chatting with those teachers while I wait for lines to die down. The art teacher is a personal friend by this point, having had both kids, so I was telling him about the field trip he led that the entire 6th grade took a couple weeks back to some ceramic making district. I asked Carolyn how it was that night, and she said it was a little bit boring, but still fun, and that she was completely annoyed by one of her friends. I would consider the school to be affluent. Certainly more so than Seattle Public or any school I went to. A bunch of her chums all have chaufers, multiple nannies, planes, exotic cars, houses around the world, you name it. While I think we lead a pretty rich life, I pray that I am keeping my kids humble. I related to the teacher that Carolyn said that one of the classmates was bitching about how 'boring' the field trip was, and how she was disgusted when the friend said that she was going to call her driver to come pick her up and take her home. This is a 12 year old right out of some bad reality show. I told the teacher that if this was the only lesson Carolyn learned on the trip, then it was totally worth while.
Have railed on the long pinky nail before I'm sure. I understand that it is a symbol of the Chinese that indicates you are wealthy and don't have to do manual labor (and not the only indicator by the way) The fact that they (and this goes for anyone in any culture, cause there is plenty of that shit everywhere) feel it important to signify openly that they are somehow superior to those that have to work in the fields for their livelihood, and that they are somehow better because of it, gives me weltschmerz. (Great word weltschhmerz...think we all are feeling a lot of it these days) You are not only NOT better than the manual laborer that has the dark skin or fingers worn to the bone, you are the opposite of not not better than.
Now if you are using that nail for purely body grooming reasons, ewww. In either case, let's just agree that I won't touch anything that you have touched ever and that I will cease to have any interaction with you going forward. I was in line at the 7-11 the other day and saw the dude behind the counter open an envelope with his nasty colored (I wouldn't call it coffee colored, but it looked like coffee after you have poured in the milk but before it is stirred...kinda swirly) pinky nail. I thought, great use of his Chinese Army Knife and walked out before making my purchase. Could have sworn that I have heard people refer to the pinky nail as a Chinese Army Knife before, but a web search shows no such usage, so I claim coinage of that term. Think I'll put it on a t-shirt.
Have been to a lot of places last few years, and an experiment that I do in each of them is, when they tell me how much something is in the local currency, I ask them how much is that in real money. With the exception of countries that use the Euro, it is always assumed to mean US dollars and the answer is given in USD without hesitation or annoyance. Don't really have a comment or gag for this one, just an observation.
Something that confuses me in Taipei are handicapped people. I should say that Taiwan has National Health for all, that it is rated as one of the best in the world and that my experience (both personally and by word of mouth) is that it is exceptional. If any of my American friends think ACA/Obamacare is a socialist conspiracy, or whatever it is that makes people see red about it, I would love to have a conversation with you. You are obviously cool in that you are reading this, so have hopes that you have a rational mind and have simply been misinformed.
Anyhoo, the type of handicapped you see here is so different that what I grew up seeing in the States. I have never seen a deaf or blind person...not one in 2.5 years. We live around the corner from a place that treats kids with severe Down Syndrome and see them being wheeled around quite a bit. But other than them, I rarely see any other handicapped anywhere, with one exception...club footed people. See them everywhere all day long...people walking around with huge limps and one foot/leg turned at a 90 degree angle from their body. Young adults to old people...but never kids, which is why I don't think they have real club feet and suspect that 99% have been crippled in scooter accidents. This realization hit me when I saw one of these 90 degree-ers walking with a Chinese "little person" the other day. This was the first "little person" Chinese I have ever seen in my life...have you ever seen one? No, cause they are extremely rare, and I have a feeling that those that do get rounded up and sent to the Kingdom of the Little People.
Here's another one. Chinese people don't use tampons. This was not on my radar, but the other day, an acquaintance that knows where Betty works asks me if Costco could please start selling tampons. While I appreciated that she felt comfortable enough in our relationship to be able to ask this question, my reply was, "they don't". I then received a lesson from this group of ladies that they do not sell tampons in Taiwan (or China) period. That was really bad...sorry. Obviously a cultural thing...in researching it, can find no definitive answer as to why, but the reasons given range from that it is considered unhygienic to that it causes you to lose your virginity. These expat broads all said they end up bringing a suitcase full of them back from the States whenever they go. Delightful...glad I'm a dude.
Finally, and apologies in advance cause it usually ends up here, but saw some show the other day that demonstrated how astronauts poop in space. I could have guessed that there is some sort of suction that made sure the feces made it out of the spacecraft, so was not surprised by that. Nor was it unusual to note that they have to practice using the special toilet...what I did find interesting is how they have to practice. It is important to align your sphincter up to the suction tube perfectly, but how can you do that if you can't see either? With a camera and display obviously. Science is so great.
In related news recently, one of the rovers on Mars found an essential building block for life...methane. NASA is pretty sure it originated from Uranus.
Saturday, February 28, 2015
Friday, February 27, 2015
February 27th, 2015
Hiya...and Happy New Year Chinese style. On New Years Day, you typically say Congratulations and Prosperity. "Congratulations" for making it through New Year's Eve without being killed by the monster, and "Prosperity" cause everyone wants that. In my mind, it is pronounced Gon She Fat Chai, but I have never seen it spelled in English the same way twice. Gong Xi Fat Choi, Gung He Fa Cai, etc. etc. etc... I don't care how rich they get, whether they become the world's superpower, or if we all end up having Asian blood someday, they will never truly be able to rule this planet until they ditch this ridiculous language. 50,000 different characters is impossible to learn...I know many people than can speak it fine, but can only read a few characters.
If that isn't bad enough, read this article in Science Magazine the other day. They studied languages and measured the frequency of positive and negative words used. Spanish came out on top in the 'positive' category. Bet you know who came up as the most negative. When I saw my Argentine brother after 28 years, it was all how seeing each other filled his heart with love and within seconds, I felt like the greatest person in the world. Whenever I see Chinese acquaintances, I am met with "have you gained weight?", and if I have just dropped 20 pounds..."you're hair is getting much grayer".
The country shuts down for a week on Chinese New Year and we usually stay home to avoid being caught up in what is called the largest annual human migration. This year, some friends emailed us a couple months back saying they were organizing a CNY trip to Palau and asked if we wanted in. After we looked up what a Palau is, we were in. Located in the middle of the Pacific in what I learned in school as Micronesia, 1300 kms from Guam and 1500 kms from the Philippines, it is certainly what you would call 'out of the way'. Made up of 200 islands (only 8 of which are permanently inhabited) that are limestone pushed up from the sea millions of years ago. None of them have beaches that make you go wow...most have no beach whatsoever. This wasn't on our radar as we aren't scuba divers, but it is a haven for them as the coral and marine life are rich and have yet to be decimated by humans.
Have been talking about the trip to friends here and they are curious. My advice to them is to definitely go, but get yourself dive certified first as I felt we missed an important part by not being able to go deep. The stories our diver friends told after their trips were hard to believe, but seeing their snaps made me a believer.
Rays, turtles, sharks...was very jealous. We had two days dedicated to snorkeling planned and it was completely awesome. We stopped at one spot that had a sunken Japanese ship.
At one of our stops, there was white sandy clay at the bottom of a shallow bay that was said to have regenerative properties. We all indulged. I must say that my psoriasis was a lot better afterwards, so will have to look up the magic ingredient.
One of the snorkel spots was a place called Jellyfish Lake. Effectively cut off from the ocean 12,000 years ago, a particular type of jellyfish evolved and flourished in the lake. With no predators, they lost their stingers. You have to make a steep hike up and down to get there, but once you are in, you are surrounded by millions of these creamsicle colored jellyfish. Very unique and amazing experience.
Snorkeling is fun
We also went night fishing...we were kinda beat and those that did go were reluctant to do so, but it was tons of fun and of course, got the competitive juices flowing.
They sashimied and souped up some of our catch...more fun that it should have been.
Since we were excluded on dive day, Imbros decided to take in some local history. One of the islands, Peleliu, was the scene of the bloodiest battle in the Pacific during WWII. We booked a trip to the island to see what we could see, and it was super interesting to a history buff like me. As we would drive along, our guide would stop at the side of the road and we would go through some trees and find these rusting remnants...like this American landing craft
or Japanese tank
complete with lovely tropical flowers growing inside.
And zero pieces galore.
The battle was fierce as the Japanese had set up in caves. They knew they had no chance at victory and the plan was to inflict as much pain for every yard of ground. In the caves are hundreds of bottle of Japanese beer and sake...wanted to take one but they are protected and one would be arrested if they found it in the luggage.
Of the 10,000 Japanese troops on the islands, 9,500 died. 463 of the survivors were Korean and Chinese slaves that were used to build the cave network. 37 Japanese hid out in the jungle for an additional 2 years, occasionally launching guerrilla attacks, until they were convinced the war was over by the Japanese Emperor in 1947.
That is a tree growing from inside the car. A really interesting day...only touched on the horror that both sides must have felt. A great part of the day was the boat ride out. As we were the only losers that weren't diving, we were also the only ones on the tour. To get anywhere in Palau, you need to take a boat, and the rides are usually between 30 minutes to an hour. The ride to Peleliu was about 45 minutes. I found all of the boat rides so relaxing...warm, but not too hot, mostly calm seas due to the coral reefs, but still the occasional swell that would splash mist on your body, and sublime landscape to watch pass by. Having the boat to ourselves this time allowed for some deep relaxation and introspection.
And having a ton of people on the boats was also great fun too.
We learned a couple of months ago that the Tattersfields are moving to the states this summer. We just started to get to know them and are sad to see them go. They are moving to Portland, so hopefully, our paths will cross again.
I learned a bit about the history of the islands. Obviously, inhabited for millennia by Pacific Islanders, their colonial history started with Spanish occupation (the Philippines are right next door). As their power waned in the 1800's, the Germans took over as they were close by in New Caledonia. One of the islands was rich in phosphates that the Germans mined, and they brought monkeys to the island to use to detect noxious gasses (like the canary in a coalmine). That island now has 50 people and 5,000 monkeys. During WWI, the Japanese aligned themselves with France and England iin order to claim the German possessions in the Pacific at war's end. I mentioned above that the US then took over forcibly in WWII, and Palau became a US protectorate until 1994, when it achieved independence. One of the more unusual foreign policy aspects of Palau is it is one of only 8 countries in the world that recognizes Taiwan as an independent country...they get a ton of cash and perks for that. A result is that there is a healthy influence of Taiwanese on the island running hotels and tour groups.
Our tour obviously originated in Taiwan, and we booked a package through a Taiwanese company. As many of our party spoke Chinese, was not a problem dealing with the guides, and they organized a ton of fun stuff for us (like the night fishing/snorkeling), and did a great job. The one thing that we did diverge from the plan on was the food. Three of the dinners were prearranged, and the first night, we were taken to a place that must be what the Chinese love, but did not fit with our decidedly Western tastes. I won't bore you with yet another diatribe as to how shitty I think Taiwanese Chinese food is, but this meal hit all the beats as to why I can't stand it. Complete with the ultra-bizarre dish that only Chinese people and humans cut off from civilization would ever think about eating. Fruit Bat Soup.
Look at that thing. I hope that it makes you live 10 years longer or makes your pecker-ooo 10 millimeters longer. We were pretty much horrified but will say that in our group of 13 that night, only Paul, Betty and I tried it (and no, my junk did not get larger unfortunately). Not sure what to say it tasted like...if the taste of licking a 9 volt battery were in liquid form? Something like that. Anyway, the Chinese at the table next to us slurped away at theirs happily.
We decided to eschew the next two scheduled meals and ended up having some decent Italian one night, and some spicy Thai another, served by one of the biggest Lady Boys I've ever seen.
All in all, loved Palau and feel fortunate to not only have had the chance to visit, but to meet and hang with a bunch of new and cool people.
If that isn't bad enough, read this article in Science Magazine the other day. They studied languages and measured the frequency of positive and negative words used. Spanish came out on top in the 'positive' category. Bet you know who came up as the most negative. When I saw my Argentine brother after 28 years, it was all how seeing each other filled his heart with love and within seconds, I felt like the greatest person in the world. Whenever I see Chinese acquaintances, I am met with "have you gained weight?", and if I have just dropped 20 pounds..."you're hair is getting much grayer".
The country shuts down for a week on Chinese New Year and we usually stay home to avoid being caught up in what is called the largest annual human migration. This year, some friends emailed us a couple months back saying they were organizing a CNY trip to Palau and asked if we wanted in. After we looked up what a Palau is, we were in. Located in the middle of the Pacific in what I learned in school as Micronesia, 1300 kms from Guam and 1500 kms from the Philippines, it is certainly what you would call 'out of the way'. Made up of 200 islands (only 8 of which are permanently inhabited) that are limestone pushed up from the sea millions of years ago. None of them have beaches that make you go wow...most have no beach whatsoever. This wasn't on our radar as we aren't scuba divers, but it is a haven for them as the coral and marine life are rich and have yet to be decimated by humans.
Have been talking about the trip to friends here and they are curious. My advice to them is to definitely go, but get yourself dive certified first as I felt we missed an important part by not being able to go deep. The stories our diver friends told after their trips were hard to believe, but seeing their snaps made me a believer.
We have hundreds of underwater snaps and none of them capture the colors...every shade of everything in both the fish and coral.
Machine gun nest
Old Japanese HQ
Only 500 people live on Peleliu today...not enough to clear the island of all the rusty WWII relics, but we did see groups of people in the jungle still actively clearing unexploded munitions and mines, so it is still not safe to go outside the lines. They not only don't clear the WWII stuff, but modern technology is also left to rust away. We saw abandoned cars like this everywhere.
This was a good trip for all of us as it wasn't just us. There were four families with kids ranging from 2 to 18 years old. The Tattersfields have two kids the same ages as ours...we actually met them as Paul and their daughter are in the same debate/MUN teams, so we became friendly and ended up here. Our kids were inseparable for the week.
and the parents enjoyed having adult time.
I learned a bit about the history of the islands. Obviously, inhabited for millennia by Pacific Islanders, their colonial history started with Spanish occupation (the Philippines are right next door). As their power waned in the 1800's, the Germans took over as they were close by in New Caledonia. One of the islands was rich in phosphates that the Germans mined, and they brought monkeys to the island to use to detect noxious gasses (like the canary in a coalmine). That island now has 50 people and 5,000 monkeys. During WWI, the Japanese aligned themselves with France and England iin order to claim the German possessions in the Pacific at war's end. I mentioned above that the US then took over forcibly in WWII, and Palau became a US protectorate until 1994, when it achieved independence. One of the more unusual foreign policy aspects of Palau is it is one of only 8 countries in the world that recognizes Taiwan as an independent country...they get a ton of cash and perks for that. A result is that there is a healthy influence of Taiwanese on the island running hotels and tour groups.
Our tour obviously originated in Taiwan, and we booked a package through a Taiwanese company. As many of our party spoke Chinese, was not a problem dealing with the guides, and they organized a ton of fun stuff for us (like the night fishing/snorkeling), and did a great job. The one thing that we did diverge from the plan on was the food. Three of the dinners were prearranged, and the first night, we were taken to a place that must be what the Chinese love, but did not fit with our decidedly Western tastes. I won't bore you with yet another diatribe as to how shitty I think Taiwanese Chinese food is, but this meal hit all the beats as to why I can't stand it. Complete with the ultra-bizarre dish that only Chinese people and humans cut off from civilization would ever think about eating. Fruit Bat Soup.
Look at that thing. I hope that it makes you live 10 years longer or makes your pecker-ooo 10 millimeters longer. We were pretty much horrified but will say that in our group of 13 that night, only Paul, Betty and I tried it (and no, my junk did not get larger unfortunately). Not sure what to say it tasted like...if the taste of licking a 9 volt battery were in liquid form? Something like that. Anyway, the Chinese at the table next to us slurped away at theirs happily.
We decided to eschew the next two scheduled meals and ended up having some decent Italian one night, and some spicy Thai another, served by one of the biggest Lady Boys I've ever seen.
All in all, loved Palau and feel fortunate to not only have had the chance to visit, but to meet and hang with a bunch of new and cool people.
Monday, February 9, 2015
February 9th, 2015
Will finish off the travelogue next time, but it's been a while since I shared anything Taiwan. During the time when this site was acting up and I couldn't get any posts down, there was a pretty big election here. Or as Argentine President Cristina Fernandez would say, erection. Not going to say I understood all the dynamics of this one, but I do know that it was a choice between the KMT, who favor stronger economic ties with the mainland, and the DPP, which advocates for independence from the it. The current national government is KMT, but the premier and his party are hugely unpopular for many a corruption scandal and their pro-China policy.
We can't vote obviously, but we did enjoy all of the propaganda. On every available space around town, banners touting candidates sprouted up about a month before the contest. As we couldn't read them, our choices came down to the aesthetics of their advertising.
I immediately threw out any candidate that went with the clenched fist...and there were a lot.
The woman on top there must have had a huge advertising budget as she was everywhere. Billboards, scooters, trucks.
Pretty cute, but as my momma told me...never trust a cute politician. #5 seemed studious enough and appears to be able to speak into a microphone
This #5 chose to evoke the ancients in his campaign, but his chef outfit always made me hungry for some local fast food.
We had a lot of theories on what message this lady was sending with her billboard...
Either she is touting herself as the "family" candidate, or her work with special needs kids. I narrowed my vote down to two candidates...the Asian Fred Armisen
And this guy...
Pretty mild mannered looking for sure, but if you look at the rest of his billboard,
That is him as Taiwanese Iron Man on the left. How could this guy not win? He's got my vote.
Ultimately, the DPP routed the KMT's island wide, which does not bode well for the KMT holding onto power when Presidential elections happen in 2016. The older people that feel reunification is inevitable are giving way to the younger Taiwanese that were born here and feel a sense of national pride. With the shit that went down in Hong Kong and the realization that the one country/two system thing was a pipe dream at best, can't see as I blame them. China dumped a lot of cash into this election to help the KMT and still came up with nothing.
The dude who won the Taipei mayoral race, Ko Wen-je, is a total character. An outsider that still takes taxis and the metro. If you have a few minutes, check out this interview with him from Foreign Policy magazine. My favorite line of his was about Asian history and colonization...
"For the [world’s] four Chinese-speaking regions — Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Mainland China — the longer the colonization, the more advanced a place is. It’s rather embarrassing. Singapore is better than Hong Kong; Hong Kong is better than Taiwan; Taiwan is better than the mainland. I’m speaking in terms of culture. I’ve been to Vietnam and mainland China. Even though the Vietnamese are seemingly poor, they always stop in front of red traffic lights and walk in front of green ones. Even though mainland China’s GDP is higher than that of Vietnam, if you ask me about culture, the Vietnamese culture is superior."
I said 'Wow" out loud when I read that one. I can't think of any conspiracy theories where the Chinese have taken out a foreigner by assassination attempt, but this guy is looking for it. And totally like how he put Taiwan #3 and didn't puff up his chest about the island's place in the world.
Speaking of taxi's, when I pulled up to Betty's office this morning to drop her off, a taxi was parked in the loading zone in front of us. The driver (complete with the 3rd season Brady perm), gets out and opens his trunk, and it is a hoarder's paradise...newspapers, tissue boxes, etc.
Betty gets out and the dude starts fumbling with his pants. She now has a better angle on the dude and I yell out to her asking if he's taking a piss. I wish I had a picture of her face, but picture her with mouth agape in horror. She yells back at me, "he's wiping off his dick with a tissue!" If he understood English, us catching him in the act didn't deter his cleaning regimen as he was working that thing over.
As soon as I pull out, I get behind this truck.
And just to finish off this theme, across the street from our place is a big sports college, and on Sunday's they hold church/temple services in their gymnasium. Not sure what religion it is, but have been previously told that it's Buddhist. All of the parishioners wear these purple t-shirts with this logo emblazoned on them.
What else is going on here? The kids are doing well. Paul's softball season starts up this week, he was chosen to be on the schools debate team that is to travel to Manila in March, and his debate club is still alive and in the round of 32 for the International Public Policy Forum (if they make it again into the Elite 8, they get to go to NYC again for the finals like they did last year). And he is still playing his annoying video games and screams with his buddies on line late into the night.
Carolyn has turned her math grade around and seems invested in getting good grades...is proud to show off her scores. She also has never burped in her life. None of us have ever heard it and she can't remember ever doing it. Is that weird and should we be concerned? She is also continuing with gymnastics (can do an aerial and contort her body in unnatural ways), and soccer. Her game is improving quite nicely and she could be a factor someday if she can get past playing nicely. She is as fast as they make 'em, has a decent leg and is the teams best at throw-ins, and if she ever learns it's OK to run someone over and take the ball away, she may be able to play on the school team.
She is playing currently on the Taipei Heartbreakers, which is a parent run club. We hire in coaches, but all of the administration landed in my lap a few months ago as the lady that was doing the bulk of the work got fed up and resigned. Some of the things are kind of a hassle, but I find the benefits outweigh those. Getting to interact with the parents is a nice social activity for the most part and yesterday, I got to coach them in their first ever time playing full field 11 v 11 game. Not a soccer guy and have no idea what to do at practices, but I love being on the sideline and working on game tactics. Some of the best days of my life was coaching Paul's recreational Seattle team for 3 years...the 360's. We were awesome and I loved channeling the spirit, humor and aggression of those boys into a team that was loathed but respected city wide. Yesterday's game was even played in low 50's weather, dark and grey skies, with rain spitting sideways in a constant wind. Pretty much all of the parents and players were whining about the weather, but to me, it felt like home.
We practice again tonight, and the head of our corresponding boys team, which is new this year, emailed to ask me if we were going to practice in the inclement weather and included this from the National Weather Bureau...
10 - 13 Celsius is Extremely Cold -Cold. That's 50 - 55 degrees Fahrenheit. I know I am a total wuss when it comes to the stinky humid heat, but that is ridiculous.
And Betty seems good. We are filling out our taxes and one of the criteria in paying local ones is the amount of days she spends in Taiwan or on the road. In 2014, she was on the road for 193 of them. Brutal. She does get to see a lot of things (the Taj Mahal and African safari last year with Machu Pichu coming up, but that is still a brutal amount. We do get to go on the odd family trip too and have a 6 day jaunt to Palau for Chinese New Year.
As for me...still recovering from that brutal Super Bowl ending and looking forward to pitchers and catchers reporting in less than two weeks. And the Aussie Rules season kicks off the end of March. Doing the volunteer thing at school, the Community Center and with the soccer club keeps me kinda busy, and working on our fabulous trips helps too. I forgot to mention in the Budapest post a conversation we had with our guide Judit. We were walking on the street and she turns to me and ask what I do for a living. Without skipping a beat, I point to Paul and Carolyn and say, I do volunteer work with special need kids. They were not amused.
We can't vote obviously, but we did enjoy all of the propaganda. On every available space around town, banners touting candidates sprouted up about a month before the contest. As we couldn't read them, our choices came down to the aesthetics of their advertising.
Ultimately, the DPP routed the KMT's island wide, which does not bode well for the KMT holding onto power when Presidential elections happen in 2016. The older people that feel reunification is inevitable are giving way to the younger Taiwanese that were born here and feel a sense of national pride. With the shit that went down in Hong Kong and the realization that the one country/two system thing was a pipe dream at best, can't see as I blame them. China dumped a lot of cash into this election to help the KMT and still came up with nothing.
The dude who won the Taipei mayoral race, Ko Wen-je, is a total character. An outsider that still takes taxis and the metro. If you have a few minutes, check out this interview with him from Foreign Policy magazine. My favorite line of his was about Asian history and colonization...
"For the [world’s] four Chinese-speaking regions — Taiwan, Singapore, Hong Kong, and Mainland China — the longer the colonization, the more advanced a place is. It’s rather embarrassing. Singapore is better than Hong Kong; Hong Kong is better than Taiwan; Taiwan is better than the mainland. I’m speaking in terms of culture. I’ve been to Vietnam and mainland China. Even though the Vietnamese are seemingly poor, they always stop in front of red traffic lights and walk in front of green ones. Even though mainland China’s GDP is higher than that of Vietnam, if you ask me about culture, the Vietnamese culture is superior."
I said 'Wow" out loud when I read that one. I can't think of any conspiracy theories where the Chinese have taken out a foreigner by assassination attempt, but this guy is looking for it. And totally like how he put Taiwan #3 and didn't puff up his chest about the island's place in the world.
Speaking of taxi's, when I pulled up to Betty's office this morning to drop her off, a taxi was parked in the loading zone in front of us. The driver (complete with the 3rd season Brady perm), gets out and opens his trunk, and it is a hoarder's paradise...newspapers, tissue boxes, etc.
Betty gets out and the dude starts fumbling with his pants. She now has a better angle on the dude and I yell out to her asking if he's taking a piss. I wish I had a picture of her face, but picture her with mouth agape in horror. She yells back at me, "he's wiping off his dick with a tissue!" If he understood English, us catching him in the act didn't deter his cleaning regimen as he was working that thing over.
As soon as I pull out, I get behind this truck.
Carolyn has turned her math grade around and seems invested in getting good grades...is proud to show off her scores. She also has never burped in her life. None of us have ever heard it and she can't remember ever doing it. Is that weird and should we be concerned? She is also continuing with gymnastics (can do an aerial and contort her body in unnatural ways), and soccer. Her game is improving quite nicely and she could be a factor someday if she can get past playing nicely. She is as fast as they make 'em, has a decent leg and is the teams best at throw-ins, and if she ever learns it's OK to run someone over and take the ball away, she may be able to play on the school team.
She is playing currently on the Taipei Heartbreakers, which is a parent run club. We hire in coaches, but all of the administration landed in my lap a few months ago as the lady that was doing the bulk of the work got fed up and resigned. Some of the things are kind of a hassle, but I find the benefits outweigh those. Getting to interact with the parents is a nice social activity for the most part and yesterday, I got to coach them in their first ever time playing full field 11 v 11 game. Not a soccer guy and have no idea what to do at practices, but I love being on the sideline and working on game tactics. Some of the best days of my life was coaching Paul's recreational Seattle team for 3 years...the 360's. We were awesome and I loved channeling the spirit, humor and aggression of those boys into a team that was loathed but respected city wide. Yesterday's game was even played in low 50's weather, dark and grey skies, with rain spitting sideways in a constant wind. Pretty much all of the parents and players were whining about the weather, but to me, it felt like home.
We practice again tonight, and the head of our corresponding boys team, which is new this year, emailed to ask me if we were going to practice in the inclement weather and included this from the National Weather Bureau...
10 - 13 Celsius is Extremely Cold -Cold. That's 50 - 55 degrees Fahrenheit. I know I am a total wuss when it comes to the stinky humid heat, but that is ridiculous.
And Betty seems good. We are filling out our taxes and one of the criteria in paying local ones is the amount of days she spends in Taiwan or on the road. In 2014, she was on the road for 193 of them. Brutal. She does get to see a lot of things (the Taj Mahal and African safari last year with Machu Pichu coming up, but that is still a brutal amount. We do get to go on the odd family trip too and have a 6 day jaunt to Palau for Chinese New Year.
As for me...still recovering from that brutal Super Bowl ending and looking forward to pitchers and catchers reporting in less than two weeks. And the Aussie Rules season kicks off the end of March. Doing the volunteer thing at school, the Community Center and with the soccer club keeps me kinda busy, and working on our fabulous trips helps too. I forgot to mention in the Budapest post a conversation we had with our guide Judit. We were walking on the street and she turns to me and ask what I do for a living. Without skipping a beat, I point to Paul and Carolyn and say, I do volunteer work with special need kids. They were not amused.
Saturday, February 7, 2015
February 7th, 2015
Two quick things before we dive in deep. I have become addicted to Trivia Crack. The first step in overcoming an addiction is admitting you have one. Have always shown contempt to the Candy Crush types and the only game I've ever played on my phone has been the solitaire that came with it, but a couple of our nieces were in town last week and they were playing it. They kept asking me the sports questions and once they saw I could answer all of them, started asking me the other categories. As a trivia nut and life long Jeopardy watcher, they were incredulous as to how many I could answer and reluctantly said how smart I was. Being vain, had to look into it myself and now can't wait for my rival to miss a question, putting it back into my hands. I was so pissed when I got beat yesterday after winning 23 games in a row as winning 25 gets you the genius coin. I hadn't heard about this game before, but apparently, it is huge. Paul called me a 14 year-old girl for playing it as all the girls at school run around asking each other questions to pool their knowledge and answer correctly. Am crushing many an opponent but suspect that they are 14 year old girls that don't know anything that dates before they received their cell phones. I guess what I'm saying is, if you play this, let's become friends and play each other.
The second thing is a follow-up on our coffee maker. Have detailed a couple of times what a piece of shit it is, specifically, the design of the poring mechanism and how it is impossible not to drip some on the (Tea Party White) counter, and to occasionally have the whole damn lid come off and stain everything. This had been going on for two years, but never thought about buying a new one as it makes a decent cup and I'm "thrifty". Am happy to report that I solved this problem in a low tech way.
A plain, coffee colored placemat right in front. My sister in law went to grab a cup and experienced the horror that is the Kitchen Aid, having the lid pop off and coffee spill everywhere. Luckily, the ol' placemat was there to take the brunt of the abuse. As I was patting myself on the back, had the realization that it took two years to realize the obvious.
OK...last time I made the statement that Budapest might possibly be my favorite city and now is the time to convince you to put it high on your places to go list. We took the 3 hour train from Vienna to Prague and this is where I made the biggest gaffe in our travel plans. First, had purchased all our train tix well in advance, and as I was organizing them a week or so before we left, realized that I had input the wrong destination (Praha instead...to be fair, I didn't know that Prague is written as Praha in Czech and thought Praha was the Budapest train station). I must have accidentally scrolled on something on the damn website and they have a "policy" that once tickets are purchased, there is zero refund. I was otherwise happy with OBB, but repeated attempts to convince them to exchange or refund us were resisted, so had to eat that money. Was able to buy tickets for the correct journey two weeks before departure fortunately, but purchased unreserved seats for whatever reason. After having ample room on our previous Salzburg/Vienna trips, didn't have any worries about this trip, but as we got on, the train was jammed with nary a seat open or slot for our luggage to be stored. We all had to stand over people in the aisles for the 3 hour ride and lean on any space available. The girls fought their way into the middle of the car while Paul and I hung at the doorway. I wouldn't even make eye contact with the women as I knew they were pissed and I was disappointed in myself for botching this. Note to future self, always pay the extra for the reserved seat as you never know.
Fortunately, our crowd wasn't too upset at the situation and wisely considered it an experience for the most part. Think it's good for the kids to "rough" it a bit so they don't think the world is all cushioned seats and chocolate covered pretzel doughnuts. Before we cross the border, think it is important to mention B.O. Everyone is capable of getting it, but find that different cultures have their own particular scent. Indians are famous for smelling like curry and laughed/understood when we asked one of them what English people smelled like and they replied with dairy. Hadn't really thought about Germans for a while, but it hit me (both mentally and aromatically) that Germans have some of the most unique and pungent of the B.O. Was transported back in time to my younger travels, when the budget was much lower and the transportation and accommodations were less deluxe. As Germans are avid travelers, I remember meeting up with many of them and catching a whiff of them and their backpacks after a few days on the road and without proper bathing facilities. Had smelled BO at times around Austria, but on this train ride, which originated in Frankfurt, that same German BO smell permeated the air and sent me back to those backpacker days. If I was to describe it like a wine connoisseur...tangy and earthy, with hints of vinegar and mayonnaise.
We rolled into Budapest station around 6pm, and after the 'eat off the floor' cleanliness of the Austrian train stations, stepping into the cold and dark one in Hungary bumped us a bit, and first impressions were that we were stepping back in time. We successfully navigated some currency exchange and two subways to arrive at our hotel, K+K Hotel Opera. Really nice and modern, with perhaps the best hotel breakfast buffet I've ever had, and exquisitely located steps from the Opera House, a subway stop, and 15 minute walk from anything. We were kinda gassed and asked the hotel for a restaurant recommendation that was casual. 5 minutes walk from the hotel was the Chagall Café. This was the first of many meals we had in Budapest that was not only excellent, but transcendent. The young girls had nice pastas while Betty, Paul and I shared the Bacon-wrapped duck fillet, served with pear puree with chilli & ginger and potato doughnuts, Chicken breast fillet with grilled goose liver and star anise-honey sauce, wine-braised pear and mashed potatoes, and the
And this exact same scenario was repeated with every meal. Everything was familiar, but were all spiced uniquely and tasted delicious. I can't remember one thing that we had that I would consider the best in my life (like the Stone House in Istanbul or Taco Lita in Arcadia), but the consistency of excellence and friendly ambiance was remarkable. I think you would be really unlucky or on a mission to find a bad meal in that town. And the street food all looked enticing too...we all particularly liked these funnel cakes that were grilling all over the place...you could pick from vanilla, chocolate and (our fave) cinnamon.
I mentioned the meats and veggies...all so good. I learned a ton about Hungary and one of the things I didn't know was that it is a breadbasket of Central Europe. With ample plains of volcanic soil, they grow a wide variety of things. On our last morning there, we got up early for a trip to The Grand Market Hall to see what we could see. In reading about it, sounded similar to Pike Place Market, but it blew that dump out of the water.
Beautiful building and immaculately clean. And it smelled so good, with pastries being baked on-site.
Look at those huge, colorful, and shiny peppers. The first floor is all food while the second offers arts and crafts and has some cafes to grab a bite. We had something that tasted like a beingnet and a huge sausage with a side of chili (unusual but still fabulous) on the side. If I lived there, I would go every day.
I don't take a lot of food pictures but did take this of my club sandwich at Cafe Gerbeaud
Deluxe...just the bread alone (that it wasn't on some limp white bread) made it special. We had just finished a long four hour morning walking tour on a very cold day and dove in here for some lunch and coffee. The reason we picked this place was total kismet. A buddy of mine from college, one that I don't speak to much unfortunately, but am friends with on Facebook, happened to post something that morning. He doesn't post a lot, but shared a link about his mother. Her name was Clara Ambrus, and as a medical student in 1944 Hungary, managed to save the lives of many Jews. Click on that link and read about her...a true hero. Amazingly small world that he would post this on the first day we were in Budapest. I asked my buddy if I could honor her in some way while we were there and he said that her favorite thing to do in town was to enjoy an espresso and Dobos torte at the Café Gerbeaud...his memory of her was that he could still see the smile on her face when she was there. How could I not honor that memory.
Damn good piece of cake. Being able to share the story of my friend's mom was a great opportunity for us to talk about Hungarian history with the kids. Am fascinated by history and knew the big picture about Hungary, but being there allowed for a deeper dive. Very briefly...since before Christ, it was inhabited/ruled by Romans, Huns, Ostrogoths, Lombards...pretty much a who's who of nomadic conquerors. The Hungarian people trace their roots to Slavs that came from east of the Ural mountains and settled in the fertile plains. In 895, these tribes unified and the country was born. 100 years later, King Stephen converted the country to Christianity and became a Saint 100 years after that. They did well for a few hundred years until internal instability and religious division weakened them to the point where after 150 years of war, much of Hungary, including Budapest, fell to the Ottomans in 1541. Occupied for by the Turks for a 100 plus years more, Budapest was "liberated" by the Hapsburg led Holy league in 1686.
Hungary's liberation was more of it becoming a vassal state of the Austrians. The Hungarians rebelled in the mid-1800's, and while they did not achieve independence, they were given autonomy over their internal affairs while still paying tribute to Austria. It was during this period between 1850 and WWI when Budapest exploded with construction, and that is mainly attributed to the benevolence of the Hapsburg Queen Elizabeth (you remember her as Sissi from the Vienna post...). She loved Hungary. In reading more about her recently, she was a bizarre character. She was not born into royalty, but the Austrian Emperor Josef fell in love and married her. She never acclimated to royal life and went kinda nuts after her son (who she was not allowed to raise) committed suicide. Her vanity was something of legend...devotion to maintaining her slim figure, she was bulimic before that ever became a thing. Eating chicken and salad for dinner, then eating an entire cake before purging it later. She was a workout junkie, with gyms built in her bedrooms. Getting her hair ready to go out took three hours and was so heavy that it's weight would give her headaches. And she was devoted to keeping her skin milky white, using crushed strawberries or raw veal in her leather sleeping mask, showering in cold water in the morning, and taking a bath in olive oil every night. Oh yeah, she was also a chain smoker.
But she loved Hungary (and is rumored she loved a Hungarian prince even more) and helped negotiate Hungarians relative independence and helped orchestrate the building of modern Budapest in the neoclassical style (more on that later).
As they were bound to the Austrians in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, they were on the losing team in WWI. We all know how the Treaty of Versailles ended WWI and helped lead to WWII by crippling Germany, but we learned about the Treaty of Trianon which officially ended that war between the allies and Hungary in 1920. That treaty stripped Hungary of 72% of its land and 64% of its population, giving large chunks to it neighbors.
Between the wars, the Germans "helped" Hungary reclaim some of its territory, so they were then obligated to throw down with them in WWII (Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria are all defined as "affiliate states" of the Axis powers).. While not major participants in the German Army, they did send some troops to assist in the invasion of the Soviet Union. Their major contribution to the war effort was by providing food and weaponry. Due to their friendship with the Germans, Hungary, and notably its Jewish population, was left relatively (if you count 40,000 "deported") alone.
Budapest had always had a large Jewish population. The second largest synagogue in the world (first is in NYC) was, and is in Budapest. They had a thriving population there for centuries and the city was lovingly referred to as Jewdapest. Towards the end of WWII, the Hungarians could see that the Germans were going to lose, so the government began looking for ways to flip sides. The Germans caught wind of this treachery, and knowing they could not lose this key land to their east without a fight, occupied Hungary. With the occupation came the extermination of 400,000 Jews with most being sent to Auschwitz within a three month period in 1944. It would have been even worse had the Soviets not advanced and began the Battle of Budapest.
An extremely long, bloody and destructive battle, the city was laid to waste. The Soviets, seeing the Hungarians as fighting along side the Nazi's, were in no mood for largess, and they proceeded to ransack the country and rape the population.
We all know that they in turn occupied and installed a delightful communist regime that lasted until 1989. In the 2 1/2 decades since, the Hungarians have been democratic, with power wavering between socialist and right wing parties. Not as left/right as the two predecessors, but enough to keep the flames of those two ideologies alive.
The first thing you notice about the buildings in Budapest is that they all seem to be from a similar time. Primarily built between 1850 and 1911, the neo-classical style made me feel as if I were in Paris.
The Parliament building majestic...wherever you go, the locals always like to tout they have the biggest this or the longest that. Our guide pointed out this Parliament building was the largest governmental one in Continental Europe. Apparently, the British one is bigger, and technically, the one in Bulgaria is also larger, but it is not all used as a governmental building, so they can still lay claim to largest Parliament bldg. 'Fill in the blank' is the 'add descriptive word' in Continental Europe became a running gag.
Budapest is split in two by the Danube River...Buda on one side, and Pest on the other. This creates some amazing views and we were lucky to get on top of a hill overlooking the city one evening.
Photos do not do it justice. The most famous bridge crossing the Danube is the Chain Bridge, but they all have a charm that puts you back in time.
Everything looked well maintained, which is amazing considering that all the bridges and 90% of the city was reduced to rubble in 1944, and that the intervening decades were controlled by a Soviet regime whose Socialist Realism school of architecture was aesthetically boring That they were able to rebuild the town in its Neo-classical style felt impressive.
With a past embedded in all of the tides of European (and Ottoman) history, there are nods to those times as you stroll about. This monument is the newest and most controversial.
Erected in July of 2014, it was to commemorate "all of the victims" of German occupation and shows the German Imperial Eagle descending on Hungary, represented by the Archangel Gabriel. What the Jews and much of the population oppose is that it shows Hungary as just a victim and does not recognize that a large portion of the Hungarian population sided with the Nazi's and had active roles in the extermination of gypsies, communists and Jews and conveniently absolves the Hungarians of those atrocities. It was criticized while still in design and the government had to erect it in the middle of the night to evade protest. It has since become a rallying place for those that will not allow the past to be forgotten.
At the banks of the Danube, there is this...
The Nazi's and their local affiliate, the Arrow Cross, would find Jews on the street and walk them to the banks of the river where they would execute them and let their bodies float away, and these brass shoes are there to remember that time. Our guide told us about a woman she met who as a child was marched down there with her mother, and as they were about to be shot, the "soldiers" became distracted by another group of Jews and left to confront them. Impactful.
In 1956, the Hungarians rose up against the Soviets during the time when Khrushchev internally censored the Stalinist purges. They effectively threw out the Communist regime for 10 days, before Soviet tanks rolled in to restore power. Many people died in the square outside of Parliament and that event is remembered by these iron markers showing the bullet holes the building took during those days.
In the same square as the "victims" memorial above, is the only remaining monument standing that was left by the Soviets.
Unlike the rest of the countries behind the Iron Curtain, the Hungarians did not topple all of the Soviet statues, but moved them to a park a few miles outside of Budapest. Really wanted to go to that, but time prevented. This one commemorates the Soviet solders that died in the Battle of Budapest, and while most Hungarians are "not fond" of it, the government negotiated to leave it there so as to not totally anger the Russians. They realize that to totally piss them off could have negative ramifications...as the Ukrainians are finding out first hand.
Not coincidentally, right next to this statue is this one of our old friend, Ronald Reagan, who is seen as the man who tore down that wall.
Had read in our travel book about the Terror Museum, and thought it might be something that the kids would like to see. It's not Disneyland, but kids tend to be interested in the macabre. It was going to be a thing to do if we ran out of things to do, but our guide said it was a must see.
That stenciled roof projects the word terror in shadow onto the building when the sun is shining. The House of Terror details the atrocities of both Nazi and Soviet regimes in a building that was an interrogation center, prison and execution site for both. They pull no punches here and you get the feel for the scope of what horrors humans are capable of.
With such a rich history of horrible things, one would think that the people would be morose, but found that the opposite was true. They are open and frank about these things, and their historical role in them. From recognizing that Hungarians killed Hungarians, or that they "chose poorly" when siding with the Nazi's or cooperating with the Soviets, the frank and honest assessment of themselves, instead of just blaming the forces at work was refreshing. And while they do not forget the past, they do not seem bound to it, and felt a sense of fun everywhere. All around town, you saw spontaneous signs of whimsy.
There was a dusting of snow overnight, and as we walked the streets the next morning, the amount of notes written on car windows was copious...and all in English for some reason. There were quite a few love notes.
And even more of your edgier sentiments...
Walking around other city centers in Europe, I get a feeling that are not like they used to be and have become museums of the past that cater to the tourist. Every shop is full of tacky souvenirs and restaurants catering to foreigners. Central Budapest did not feel that way at all...there were hipster clothing stores and funky furniture places all over. A favorite were the Ruin Pubs. Not all of Budapest was reconstructed from the wars uniformly, and in the time since the Soviet empire collapsed, there were still many buildings that were bombed out shells. Some entrepreneurs took over these buildings and created funky bars. These pix are from one our guide took us to.
The kids are sitting at a table that is in the middle of the room that is in a hallowed out Trabant, which is the old East German piece of crap auto maker. She said this is the most sought after table in the place. This bar was so unbelievable cool...
I should mention here that we had the greatest guide. Judit Farkas (translated...Judy Wolf), she not only brought a great sense of history to our walks, but was also young and fun. Her boyfriend is from Ohio and is a big Steelers fan. She is now a friend on Facebook and saw her cheering on the Seahawks at a Super Bowl party We hooked up with her through a friend here...we were planning our trip last October and randomly sat next to a lady at a charity auction. She had just returned that morning from the exact same trip we were planning and said she met Judith at this very pub and told her she would pass along her name should the occasion arise. Talk about small world. Judit is on the right.
As we were communicating on our itinerary with Judit, I wanted to arrange to see some music. Finding the Opera was sold out, I asked her if there were any other options, and she said they had concerts at St Stephen's Basilica. Not having a way to purchase tix on line for that, she even went and got them for us...so nice. Gorgeous church...it houses the right arm of St. Stephen himself. Another night of classical greatest hits, the main instrument was the church organ which was variously accompanied by horns or violins, and a tenor or soprano. Kind of torturous for me from a music standpoint, but beautifully done and quite surreal.
Great food, pretty city, interesting history, hip population...what more do you want? Reasonably priced? It was. Not dirt cheap like a Vietnam, but compared to other European cities in western Europe, all the pricing seemed very fair. As we were on the road for two weeks, being able to do laundry at some point is key for every one's well being. The hotel's prices were pretty outrageous, but they did say there was a laundromat a few minutes walk away. They didn't know the details, so we budgeted a few hours to do the coin-op thing. Turned out it was a drop off place where they washed, dried, fluffed and folded your stuff. We did two huge loads and it cost 12 bucks. We didn't have to sit there for a couple hours watching the cycles do their thing, nor hassle with change and soap. Dropped it off one morning, picked it up the next, and everything smelled fresh and was lovingly folded. I was always jealous of my buddy Howie who used to do the drop off thing in NYC years ago, and having now experienced it first hand, can say it is probably one of the greatest luxuries ever.
You ready to go yet? As you can probably tell, I freaking loved this place. I didn't even go into a bunch of other things, like walking around the Pest Castle, and learning about the Jewish quarter (complete with a delicious bowl of matzo ball soup). If I was an unattached twenty something, I might not have left. Before I close this post, I have to tell you about the best thing we did...visit the Szechenyi Baths.
Our train out of town was at 6PM and we did not have any tours planned. In the morning, we got up early and went to the Grand Market (above) for breakfast. Went back to the hotel to pack up/check out, then took the subway 6 stops to the baths.
Oh yeah...I forgot, the second oldest subway line (and oldest in Continental Europe) is located in Budapest and our hotel was on one of the stops. It linked to the 4 other lines as well as a well maintained and interconnected series of buses and trams that made any part of the city reachable in minutes. Not only was the old subway line extremely cool, but have to add great transportation as another plus in the Budapest column.
Budapest is over a thermal hot spot, so there are many sources of hot water springs. The Turks didn't miss the opportunity and set up a series of bath houses around town that survive to this day. Being fans of those, we were looking for one to visit, but kept reading about the Szechenyi ones as being unique, so decided on those.
Set up in Roman style, there are three huge outdoor pools with water temps between 36 and 38 degrees Celsius (96 - 100 degrees Fahrenheit). As the air temperature was freezing, the pools had a constant covering of steam. And the town comes out to these as the pools were full, but didn't feel packed in any way....the layer of steam gave a kind of anonymity. We were enjoying the outside pools and kept seeing people go into a large building opposite the entrance/locker rooms, so we investigated. Inside were at least a dozen other smaller pools with varying temperatures...from cold to 38 C (100 F). Many of those were labeled as mineral baths...Judit told us that you can get a prescription to go to the baths from your doctor for certain ailments. There were also wet and dry saunas inside. Spectacular time. Wasn't able to take photos, but go to that link above and you will see what I'm talking about. I did get this one of the outside in my après bath euphoric state
After a couple/three hours, we were all relaxed and happy. Time for one final delicious meal and away we went. The odds of getting back there for me are probably pretty slim, but I really hope to one day. The least I can do is to sing its praises in hopes of convincing just one of you to add it to your itinerary some day.
The second thing is a follow-up on our coffee maker. Have detailed a couple of times what a piece of shit it is, specifically, the design of the poring mechanism and how it is impossible not to drip some on the (Tea Party White) counter, and to occasionally have the whole damn lid come off and stain everything. This had been going on for two years, but never thought about buying a new one as it makes a decent cup and I'm "thrifty". Am happy to report that I solved this problem in a low tech way.
A plain, coffee colored placemat right in front. My sister in law went to grab a cup and experienced the horror that is the Kitchen Aid, having the lid pop off and coffee spill everywhere. Luckily, the ol' placemat was there to take the brunt of the abuse. As I was patting myself on the back, had the realization that it took two years to realize the obvious.
OK...last time I made the statement that Budapest might possibly be my favorite city and now is the time to convince you to put it high on your places to go list. We took the 3 hour train from Vienna to Prague and this is where I made the biggest gaffe in our travel plans. First, had purchased all our train tix well in advance, and as I was organizing them a week or so before we left, realized that I had input the wrong destination (Praha instead...to be fair, I didn't know that Prague is written as Praha in Czech and thought Praha was the Budapest train station). I must have accidentally scrolled on something on the damn website and they have a "policy" that once tickets are purchased, there is zero refund. I was otherwise happy with OBB, but repeated attempts to convince them to exchange or refund us were resisted, so had to eat that money. Was able to buy tickets for the correct journey two weeks before departure fortunately, but purchased unreserved seats for whatever reason. After having ample room on our previous Salzburg/Vienna trips, didn't have any worries about this trip, but as we got on, the train was jammed with nary a seat open or slot for our luggage to be stored. We all had to stand over people in the aisles for the 3 hour ride and lean on any space available. The girls fought their way into the middle of the car while Paul and I hung at the doorway. I wouldn't even make eye contact with the women as I knew they were pissed and I was disappointed in myself for botching this. Note to future self, always pay the extra for the reserved seat as you never know.
Fortunately, our crowd wasn't too upset at the situation and wisely considered it an experience for the most part. Think it's good for the kids to "rough" it a bit so they don't think the world is all cushioned seats and chocolate covered pretzel doughnuts. Before we cross the border, think it is important to mention B.O. Everyone is capable of getting it, but find that different cultures have their own particular scent. Indians are famous for smelling like curry and laughed/understood when we asked one of them what English people smelled like and they replied with dairy. Hadn't really thought about Germans for a while, but it hit me (both mentally and aromatically) that Germans have some of the most unique and pungent of the B.O. Was transported back in time to my younger travels, when the budget was much lower and the transportation and accommodations were less deluxe. As Germans are avid travelers, I remember meeting up with many of them and catching a whiff of them and their backpacks after a few days on the road and without proper bathing facilities. Had smelled BO at times around Austria, but on this train ride, which originated in Frankfurt, that same German BO smell permeated the air and sent me back to those backpacker days. If I was to describe it like a wine connoisseur...tangy and earthy, with hints of vinegar and mayonnaise.
We rolled into Budapest station around 6pm, and after the 'eat off the floor' cleanliness of the Austrian train stations, stepping into the cold and dark one in Hungary bumped us a bit, and first impressions were that we were stepping back in time. We successfully navigated some currency exchange and two subways to arrive at our hotel, K+K Hotel Opera. Really nice and modern, with perhaps the best hotel breakfast buffet I've ever had, and exquisitely located steps from the Opera House, a subway stop, and 15 minute walk from anything. We were kinda gassed and asked the hotel for a restaurant recommendation that was casual. 5 minutes walk from the hotel was the Chagall Café. This was the first of many meals we had in Budapest that was not only excellent, but transcendent. The young girls had nice pastas while Betty, Paul and I shared the Bacon-wrapped duck fillet, served with pear puree with chilli & ginger and potato doughnuts, Chicken breast fillet with grilled goose liver and star anise-honey sauce, wine-braised pear and mashed potatoes, and the
Hungarian platter: sausage, salami, Liptauer, cold duck liver, cheese with fresh bread and vegetables. So good. And the fact we saw vegetables...fresh and beautiful green and red ones, was such a welcome change from the potato and mayo that Austria offered. We shared a bottle of wine (they are one of the oldest wine producers in the world, whose industry collapsed under the Soviets, but is making a comeback and they offer unique varieties that I found 'bold') and the dude assumed Paul was of age and served him a healthy pour. Casual atmosphere, attentive and friendly servers and a lively crowd that filled the place. After sharing a couple of lovely desserts (Chocolate souffle with vanilla sauce and Ginger carrot cake with orange mascarpone), we were full and buzzed and feeling fine.
And this exact same scenario was repeated with every meal. Everything was familiar, but were all spiced uniquely and tasted delicious. I can't remember one thing that we had that I would consider the best in my life (like the Stone House in Istanbul or Taco Lita in Arcadia), but the consistency of excellence and friendly ambiance was remarkable. I think you would be really unlucky or on a mission to find a bad meal in that town. And the street food all looked enticing too...we all particularly liked these funnel cakes that were grilling all over the place...you could pick from vanilla, chocolate and (our fave) cinnamon.
I mentioned the meats and veggies...all so good. I learned a ton about Hungary and one of the things I didn't know was that it is a breadbasket of Central Europe. With ample plains of volcanic soil, they grow a wide variety of things. On our last morning there, we got up early for a trip to The Grand Market Hall to see what we could see. In reading about it, sounded similar to Pike Place Market, but it blew that dump out of the water.
I don't take a lot of food pictures but did take this of my club sandwich at Cafe Gerbeaud
Deluxe...just the bread alone (that it wasn't on some limp white bread) made it special. We had just finished a long four hour morning walking tour on a very cold day and dove in here for some lunch and coffee. The reason we picked this place was total kismet. A buddy of mine from college, one that I don't speak to much unfortunately, but am friends with on Facebook, happened to post something that morning. He doesn't post a lot, but shared a link about his mother. Her name was Clara Ambrus, and as a medical student in 1944 Hungary, managed to save the lives of many Jews. Click on that link and read about her...a true hero. Amazingly small world that he would post this on the first day we were in Budapest. I asked my buddy if I could honor her in some way while we were there and he said that her favorite thing to do in town was to enjoy an espresso and Dobos torte at the Café Gerbeaud...his memory of her was that he could still see the smile on her face when she was there. How could I not honor that memory.
Hungary's liberation was more of it becoming a vassal state of the Austrians. The Hungarians rebelled in the mid-1800's, and while they did not achieve independence, they were given autonomy over their internal affairs while still paying tribute to Austria. It was during this period between 1850 and WWI when Budapest exploded with construction, and that is mainly attributed to the benevolence of the Hapsburg Queen Elizabeth (you remember her as Sissi from the Vienna post...). She loved Hungary. In reading more about her recently, she was a bizarre character. She was not born into royalty, but the Austrian Emperor Josef fell in love and married her. She never acclimated to royal life and went kinda nuts after her son (who she was not allowed to raise) committed suicide. Her vanity was something of legend...devotion to maintaining her slim figure, she was bulimic before that ever became a thing. Eating chicken and salad for dinner, then eating an entire cake before purging it later. She was a workout junkie, with gyms built in her bedrooms. Getting her hair ready to go out took three hours and was so heavy that it's weight would give her headaches. And she was devoted to keeping her skin milky white, using crushed strawberries or raw veal in her leather sleeping mask, showering in cold water in the morning, and taking a bath in olive oil every night. Oh yeah, she was also a chain smoker.
But she loved Hungary (and is rumored she loved a Hungarian prince even more) and helped negotiate Hungarians relative independence and helped orchestrate the building of modern Budapest in the neoclassical style (more on that later).
As they were bound to the Austrians in the Austro-Hungarian Empire, they were on the losing team in WWI. We all know how the Treaty of Versailles ended WWI and helped lead to WWII by crippling Germany, but we learned about the Treaty of Trianon which officially ended that war between the allies and Hungary in 1920. That treaty stripped Hungary of 72% of its land and 64% of its population, giving large chunks to it neighbors.
Between the wars, the Germans "helped" Hungary reclaim some of its territory, so they were then obligated to throw down with them in WWII (Hungary, Romania and Bulgaria are all defined as "affiliate states" of the Axis powers).. While not major participants in the German Army, they did send some troops to assist in the invasion of the Soviet Union. Their major contribution to the war effort was by providing food and weaponry. Due to their friendship with the Germans, Hungary, and notably its Jewish population, was left relatively (if you count 40,000 "deported") alone.
Budapest had always had a large Jewish population. The second largest synagogue in the world (first is in NYC) was, and is in Budapest. They had a thriving population there for centuries and the city was lovingly referred to as Jewdapest. Towards the end of WWII, the Hungarians could see that the Germans were going to lose, so the government began looking for ways to flip sides. The Germans caught wind of this treachery, and knowing they could not lose this key land to their east without a fight, occupied Hungary. With the occupation came the extermination of 400,000 Jews with most being sent to Auschwitz within a three month period in 1944. It would have been even worse had the Soviets not advanced and began the Battle of Budapest.
An extremely long, bloody and destructive battle, the city was laid to waste. The Soviets, seeing the Hungarians as fighting along side the Nazi's, were in no mood for largess, and they proceeded to ransack the country and rape the population.
We all know that they in turn occupied and installed a delightful communist regime that lasted until 1989. In the 2 1/2 decades since, the Hungarians have been democratic, with power wavering between socialist and right wing parties. Not as left/right as the two predecessors, but enough to keep the flames of those two ideologies alive.
The first thing you notice about the buildings in Budapest is that they all seem to be from a similar time. Primarily built between 1850 and 1911, the neo-classical style made me feel as if I were in Paris.
With a past embedded in all of the tides of European (and Ottoman) history, there are nods to those times as you stroll about. This monument is the newest and most controversial.
At the banks of the Danube, there is this...
In 1956, the Hungarians rose up against the Soviets during the time when Khrushchev internally censored the Stalinist purges. They effectively threw out the Communist regime for 10 days, before Soviet tanks rolled in to restore power. Many people died in the square outside of Parliament and that event is remembered by these iron markers showing the bullet holes the building took during those days.
Not coincidentally, right next to this statue is this one of our old friend, Ronald Reagan, who is seen as the man who tore down that wall.
With such a rich history of horrible things, one would think that the people would be morose, but found that the opposite was true. They are open and frank about these things, and their historical role in them. From recognizing that Hungarians killed Hungarians, or that they "chose poorly" when siding with the Nazi's or cooperating with the Soviets, the frank and honest assessment of themselves, instead of just blaming the forces at work was refreshing. And while they do not forget the past, they do not seem bound to it, and felt a sense of fun everywhere. All around town, you saw spontaneous signs of whimsy.
Walking around other city centers in Europe, I get a feeling that are not like they used to be and have become museums of the past that cater to the tourist. Every shop is full of tacky souvenirs and restaurants catering to foreigners. Central Budapest did not feel that way at all...there were hipster clothing stores and funky furniture places all over. A favorite were the Ruin Pubs. Not all of Budapest was reconstructed from the wars uniformly, and in the time since the Soviet empire collapsed, there were still many buildings that were bombed out shells. Some entrepreneurs took over these buildings and created funky bars. These pix are from one our guide took us to.
The kids are sitting at a table that is in the middle of the room that is in a hallowed out Trabant, which is the old East German piece of crap auto maker. She said this is the most sought after table in the place. This bar was so unbelievable cool...
I should mention here that we had the greatest guide. Judit Farkas (translated...Judy Wolf), she not only brought a great sense of history to our walks, but was also young and fun. Her boyfriend is from Ohio and is a big Steelers fan. She is now a friend on Facebook and saw her cheering on the Seahawks at a Super Bowl party We hooked up with her through a friend here...we were planning our trip last October and randomly sat next to a lady at a charity auction. She had just returned that morning from the exact same trip we were planning and said she met Judith at this very pub and told her she would pass along her name should the occasion arise. Talk about small world. Judit is on the right.
You ready to go yet? As you can probably tell, I freaking loved this place. I didn't even go into a bunch of other things, like walking around the Pest Castle, and learning about the Jewish quarter (complete with a delicious bowl of matzo ball soup). If I was an unattached twenty something, I might not have left. Before I close this post, I have to tell you about the best thing we did...visit the Szechenyi Baths.
Our train out of town was at 6PM and we did not have any tours planned. In the morning, we got up early and went to the Grand Market (above) for breakfast. Went back to the hotel to pack up/check out, then took the subway 6 stops to the baths.
Budapest is over a thermal hot spot, so there are many sources of hot water springs. The Turks didn't miss the opportunity and set up a series of bath houses around town that survive to this day. Being fans of those, we were looking for one to visit, but kept reading about the Szechenyi ones as being unique, so decided on those.
Set up in Roman style, there are three huge outdoor pools with water temps between 36 and 38 degrees Celsius (96 - 100 degrees Fahrenheit). As the air temperature was freezing, the pools had a constant covering of steam. And the town comes out to these as the pools were full, but didn't feel packed in any way....the layer of steam gave a kind of anonymity. We were enjoying the outside pools and kept seeing people go into a large building opposite the entrance/locker rooms, so we investigated. Inside were at least a dozen other smaller pools with varying temperatures...from cold to 38 C (100 F). Many of those were labeled as mineral baths...Judit told us that you can get a prescription to go to the baths from your doctor for certain ailments. There were also wet and dry saunas inside. Spectacular time. Wasn't able to take photos, but go to that link above and you will see what I'm talking about. I did get this one of the outside in my après bath euphoric state
After a couple/three hours, we were all relaxed and happy. Time for one final delicious meal and away we went. The odds of getting back there for me are probably pretty slim, but I really hope to one day. The least I can do is to sing its praises in hopes of convincing just one of you to add it to your itinerary some day.
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