September 12, 2010: Wine Festival at Buda Castle Part 1

September 12, 2010: After my usual breakfast of grapefruit, eggs, bacon, toast, and tea, I had some time on my hands. I opened the magazine that Andi had given me to look at on Friday. The magazine contains in English, all the cultural and sports happenings in Budapest for the month of September. It was jam packed with all sorts of things I'd love to attend including the wine tasting at Buda Castle (which I'll be going to this afternoon with Andi – I think – she still hasn't called), jazz concerts, theater (in English), dance, art, fashions, restaurants, soccer, ice hockey, fine dining, and of course rock, hip hop, etc. It appears I won't have a lack of choices for the month of September at least. One jazz concert coming will feature Dresch Mihalyii who I think is from the Dresch Quartet, one of the players in the youtube clip I put on an earlier blog posting. It would be great to see what jazz is like here. And I'd like to attend some of the theater productions. In fact, it appears that next Saturday, there will be a theater festival on Andrassy ut using the same format as the music festival where there were tents placed apart with stages under them (see September 5^th blog posting about that). The stages will host various acting groups and I presume that one of the stages will be in English. There will also be a stage for puppet shows for the kids. As for theater, apparently there will be one English production per week starting in September.. There are also stand up comedians (in English) and many of the comedians are Hungarian; it will be fun to hear what Hungarians find humorous. There's also a production of the compilation of all (even the tragedies) of Shakespeare's plays in one play and it's supposed to be hilarious. I'll have to check this out further next week. That should make for a very busy Saturday if I go to the theater festival during the day and then to hear Dresch Mhalyii in the evening.

While waiting for Andi to call, I decided to walk the four bus stops to the shopping mall. I wasn't exactly sure where it was – only the general direction – but eventually I saw the Tesco sign and the McDonald's where I picked up dinner the other night. During the day time, I could see what facilities this McDonald's has for the children

Figure 12 Mc Donald's play area

Tesco is Hungary's answer to Costco – the store is enormous. Here's a picture of the checkout counters and I'm not even at the end of them!

Figure 13 Tesco, Hungary's answer to Costco

The store sells everything from groceries to car parts to clothes to housewares to you name it. The store was pretty crowded and I could see that Tesco provides small plastic carts (much like we get at Ralph's and Trader Joe's, but their carts have long handles and wheels on the bottom so they can be pulled through the aisles.

Figure 14 shopping cart at Tesco

I wandered the store encountering an interesting meat market.

Figure 15 Meat market at Tesco

After finding some eggs to buy (more expensive than at the downtown market and much smaller too!), I paid for my merchandise and exited Tesco. Beyond Tesco is the "rest" of the shopping mall. It stretched as far as my eyes could see.

Figure 16 beyond Tesco: the "rest" of the mall

Walking down the halls, I could find every kind of store imaginable (Ruth will probably spend at least one week shopping here!). Reaching what I thought was the end turned out to be a slight bend with just as many shops going beyond. The next section was finely decorated with a faux sky. A short way down the hall I found a bowling alley and a movie theater.

Figure 17 the "rest" of the "rest" of the mall

Figure 18 movie theater at mall

Going further, there was a food court in the middle of which was an ice skating rink.

Figure 19 Ice skating rink at mall in food court

A short ways further, there was a full scale bar in the middle of the mall. Boy, do the Hungarians love to drink!

Figure 20 full scale bar at mall

Needless to say, I won't have problems finding just about anything I need at this mall. Now if only I had the money to spend!

Well, I have to eat lunch. Andi just texted me and we're meeting at the Buda Castle at 3:00 so we can hear the gypsy folk music. All for now.

Later: To get to Buda Castle, I had to take bus 173 that goes directly from here to Firenciek Ter, my old haunting ground. Only problem is – you guessed it – I got on the bus going the wrong direction. The bus I got on went four stops to the very end of the line where the bus driver got off for a break. Good thing I added time into my schedule for just such mistakes! The bus driver returned and four stops later, I was where I had started. Meanwhile people were entering the bus in droves. The man across the aisle from me was reading an explicit girly magazine (He hid it in a binder of some sort so "no one" would see.) I was pleasantly surprised with how clean and efficiently run the bus was. Like the subway and tram, the driver is locked in his/her own compartment – not open to the public at all. And, the number of the bus, the next stop, and any other bus numbers, subways, trams, etc. stopping at the same stop are clearly telecast on a digital screen above (much like on the Hertz car rental buses at the airport). A taped lady's voice also announces each stop and tells us what the next stop will be. I was concerned that perhaps I wouldn't recognize where to get off, but all fears disappeared when I saw the names of the stops on the digital sign, so I knew exactly when to get off. On the way, the bus passed some very beautiful and exotic places. Major construction was underway to transform an enormously wide boulevard (Thokoly ut) from cobblestone to something more easy to drive on so much of the boulevard was closed to traffic. Shortly after that, we passed in front of one of Budapest's major train stations, Keletti Pauyaudvar. Very impressive as I looked inside.

Figure 21 Keletti Train Station

Shortly we were entering a far more cosmopolitan part of the city and I recognized my old haunt. I dismounted the bus and walked towards Buda Castle. I could already hear music from the castle even on the Pest side of the river. As I approached the Chain Bridge that goes from Pest to the Buda side of the river, I encountered a huge crowd seated on stands surrounding Roosevelt Ter obviously anticipating the finish of a race of some sort. There was loud rock music that entertained the crowd: "Alllll niiiight long, baby it's been allllll niiiiight long…"

Figure 22 finish gate of triathlon

The crowd extended on both sides of the Chain Bridge which was closed to traffic as were all the other surrounding streets. I crossed the bridge and finally figured out that this was the ending stretch of the bicycle leg of a triathlon. I could see helicopters in the distance obviously filming the front riders of the race and they were headed right toward me. I quickly got out my camera and joined the crowd in the excitement of the moment. Woosh woosh they passed by. Film crews were filming them standing on motorcycles that followed the front cyclists. This was an all women's triatholon and everyone clapped and yelled to encourage them on. Just another serendipity moment that I lucked out in seeing.

Figure 23 women's bicycle portion of triathlon

I watched the riders for a while and noticed that I had a voicemail message on my phone. I returned the call and it was the gentleman who wants me to tutor him starting next week. We talked a bit and we'll firm things up tomorrow.