"My Passport Says 'HAHA'"

I know I keep only updating about my adventures outside of Istanbul and I am indeed sorry for this fact. It’s nothing against Istanbul, just writing about Istanbul makes me sad.

I remain so very appreciative for the time I’ve had here and the opportunities that studying abroad have afforded me, but my flight back to North Carolina is in a month and I just don’t want all of this to end. Going back and working at the grocery store is nice and all, but nothing will ever really compare to the view of another continent I get from my window every morning. If home is where the heart is, Istanbul is truly home.

That being said, I headed out of Istanbul again this past weekend to Budapest. Well, we intended it to be only Budapest, but I’ll get to that.

We flew out early Friday morning and got into Budapest mid-morning. I was super excited about the Hungarian currency (they’re in the EU but not on the Euro…thank God). The Hungarian forint is pretty cool but also very confusing. I’ve never carried around a 10,000 bill of anything before so having thousands of forints was somewhat amusing.

Anyways, after making our way from the airport, we (Emily and I, surprise, surprise) headed to our hostel and checked in. It was very nice and spacious with no bunk beds at a really reasonable price. I think my standards for places to sleep may have entirely dropped on this entire 5-month excursion I’ve been on, but this truly was a nice hostel.

We decided to head over the Danube to Buda (the city is actually split by the river into two cities-Buda and Pest) to explore Castle Hill. On the way we stopped to take many a photo of Parliament, the second largest in Europe in neo-Gothic style. Very pretty. We ended up walking around Castle Hill for a little bit before walking across the Chain Bridge to get dinner (and gelato) and calling it a night after being up since 5am.

The next morning we got up early and went to Parliament to get our tickets for the afternoon tour. You’re only allowed to tour Parliament under guided tour in French or English, but the opportunity to get in is one you should definitely take if ever in Budapest. By this time it was only about 9am so most things were not open. We stopped by a small coffee shop where Emily got a pastry and I stole their free internet to look up options for going to Bratislava, Slovakia the next day. Okay, I know what you’re thinking. Slovakia, why would you want to go there? Well, there was a poster in our hostel that advertised Bratislava and Emily and I just decided to have the one spontaneous moment in each of our lives occur in making the decision to go.

After checking visa restrictions (yay for the Schengen agreement) and cementing our decision on Slovakia, we walked around for a while until the church opened. St Stephen’s Basilica is the largest in the city and he is considered the founder of the state. The basilica was very pretty of course could not compare to that of St. Peter’s. On a creepy side note, you can pay money to see St. Stephen’s hand in the basilica but I was just not down for that.

We decided to go to the local market afterwards, which was full of different levels of producers. By that, I mean that the top floor was all handcrafts and souvenirs, the middle floor was produce, white meat, and some red meat, and the bottom floor was fish and game. I love the institution of a fresh food market (you know, especially with my grocery store background) and wish that people would embrace it more in the US. I like the idea of buying what you need only for the day so things are fresh, but I also understand the reasons why people come in with $800 grocery carts at work every week (hint: sarcasm).

We decided to then buy our tickets to Bratislava for the next day ($25 round trip…what) before getting necessary pastries for the next morning as well. We headed back to St. Stephen’s to climb to the top of the dome, one of the highest points in the city (and trust me, my legs would agree with you) before getting lunch and heading to Parliament for our tour.

While our access was fairly limited to one wing inside of Parliament, it was a very cool experience and piqued my polisci-nerd curiosity. My history-nerd curiosity was piqued by the mention of a WWII memorial on the shore of the Danube near the Parliament. This was honestly one of my favorite moments of the trip. The monument just looks like a bunch of shoes (metal) sitting on the shore, but it’s actually really powerful if you know the back story. The shoes represent Hungarian Jews killed assassination-style by Nazi forces as the Nazis entered the city. The bodies fell into the Danube and it’s overall just a pretty powerful thing. We actually saw these on the way to meet up for a Communist-themed walking tour, which segways into more recent Hungarian history.

Several people who grew up under communism in Hungary led the walking tour and hearing their personal stories about all different aspects of life was really an experience. We walked by random buildings that they pointed out for their communist-style architecture or importance to the regime at the time. As well, they pointed out a bunker (opposite the Vatican Embassy, randomly) that at one time served as an escape route for all the important communist leaders and their families. Afterwards we headed to Heroes’ Square and the castle nearby before heading to dinner.

Dinner consisted of two different crepe-style things (Hungarians call them pancakes) at a place run by Turkish people. We started laughing when they relayed the order to each other in Turkish and awkward conversations ensued. Nevertheless, my ham, mushroom, and cheese crepe was delicious, but not as delicious as the cinnamon-sugar, chocolate-sauce-covered one I had after it. All for under $3. Did I mention how much I love the forint?

The next morning we woke up and caught our train to Bratislava, seeing GORGEOUS Slovakian/Hungarian countryside on the way. Once in Bratislava, people of all different nationalities who were there for the International Hockey Championships greeted us. Completely random. We then headed in to the center of Bratislava to wander around for a little while. We ended up seeing St. Elizabeth’s church (CAROLINA BLUE, nonetheless), all the random little sculptures in the old city, and then ended up going to get really amazing goulash. I’m so serious. It was amazing and delicious but oh-so-filling. Never fear, it wasn’t filling enough to prevent me from getting chocolate mousse-cake. We wandered around the old city a little more, stopping to see this extremely narrow house/building/whatever, St. Michael’s gate, and a cool dial that listed the distances from important world cities from that very spot. No Chapel Hill, NC listed unfortunately. Afterwards, we caught our train back to Budapest, going through gorgeous countryside again on the way back. All in all, totally worth the $25 splurge to see Slovakia.

Unfortunately we had to get up at 3 am (…) the next morning to catch our 4am train to the airport for our 6am flight. However, the best part of the day occurred when my passport was stamped. Both of my Hungary stamps sit next to my Austria stamps. You know what that means? HAHA. Okay, so maybe only I get a kick out of that but oh well (I was also hoping for a stamp in Slovakia to go next to my Italy one-Si, si!).

All in all, Budapest and Bratislava were great cities and one that I would be really interested in going back to in the future to see how they’ve changed. Yet again, this trip just cemented how much I love living in Istanbul. It was just nice to come home here.

My parents will be here for the next week and a few days. We’re going to Bodrum and hopefully Rhodes this weekend with some friends for what will hopefully be a very relaxed weekend in the sun. I’ve done my fair share of traveling but have not really had a single day of just vacationing and I think I’m just due for one.

Anyways, you can check out my pictures here:https://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.1428007185454.2036642.1391040260&l=5f7459aa10

Starting the count down for Emily and I’s visit to London, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dublin, Madrid, and Barcelona (18 days)! Not starting the count down for my return to North Carolina ):