Who said we were hungry in Hungary?

"...in this theatre, and she is still said to have the sweetest voice in the land. Sadly, the theatre was demolished to make room for the new metro station."
-- Hop-on Hop-off Bus Audio Tour

Robbie

Our trip to the great land north of Croatia began with a delayed train, however because of its tardiness we made friends with a Hungarian woman who works for Baumaxx shops all over Europe. Interesting chick! And her English was quite good too. Despite talking to her for several hours and her shouting us coffee at a stopover, we never got her name. We gave her the address to this blog, so if you read this, thank you!

We arrived later that Wednesday night with no idea of what to expect of the city. It was huge. We caught the underground from Deli Pu to Keleti. Our hotel was literally 50m from the train station, so convenient as this was the station we would use to go to Warszawa. Golden Park Hotel, we salute you. We picked up maps and bus tour info, like good little tourists. A short walk around showed us the local Arab quarter and just how dark and almost menacing the city is at night.

As part of the terrific Hop on Hop off tour tickets we got to go on a ferry tour of the Margaret Island in the Duna river. We arrived early and got some seats before the entire boat filled. By that stage in the afternoon we were ready for some hard napping and we took the opportunity and monotonous English and German translations and used them to rest after a hard day of sightseeing. I have to say that the Parliament building was by far one of the most impressive buildings I have ever seen. Pictures do not do it justice, I would highly recommend seeing it for real.

Me with Da Big Parli' Crib.

To be or not to be? That is the qsvestion.

One of our more interesting encounters we had on our last day in Budapest was with a group of dancing and singing Hare Krishna worshippers. I won't go into the complex and deep lyrics because the analysis would overwhelm the most practiced analytical mind... Needless to say, it went something like this:
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna
Hare Hare Krishna
Hare Rama
Rama Rama
Hare Hare
Hare Krishna Hare Krishna
(With an arrangement of vocals, drums, various hand percussion instruments and an accordion.)

I'll let you make up your mind as to it's meaning. As we were so taken by the various songs, we were conned into making a 'donation' for a CD. I will cherish it. It even had the lyrics included, thank you oh keen worshippers! I will surely live a sublime life.

 

Hare Krishna. Please bring me peace through your song and worship. Blessings to one and all.

 Drinking team Budapest.

The bus tours were more than fantastic and stimulating. The English voice left us wanting more. If we partook in riding an open top bus, we could even borrow dedicated hats. Now that's comprehensive service. Also, we will never forget the architectural styles of the city - Neogothic, Moorish, Oriental...and so on.

Nice hat, Brucie. Do they make them for men?

This city is definitely my kinda place. Especially this strip joint we found. In fact, whilst on directions to a main club and bar street we recieved from a helpful wait staff, one guy asked, "Hey, want to have a good time?" Brucie said sure thing. He said, "Okay, come to my club right here!" Sadly, it was a strip club and exactly not what we were looking for. I still haven't found what I'm looking for.

CARPE DIEM, MOFOS.

After lunch at the citadella we decided to walk down the hill and across the bridge. Like the unsuspecting tourists we were, we stumbled upon the statue of the bishop Gelert and pigeons chilling oh so close to the hand rail. The walk across the suspension bridge was impressive. Not considering width, the Narrows has nothing on the bridges connecting Buda and Pest.

Sweetastic view from the statue of the bishop who dared to convert the Hungarian pagans all those centuries ago. Sadly, he was put in a bareel of snakes and rolled off the hill into the river.

Unfortunately, the only thing lacking with our visit to such a big touristy city was the lack of a guide. Oh and NOT forgetting that people don't go out on a Thursday night because they have jobs and such.

All in all a good two nights spent in a spectacular city! It was very much worth the while.

Be ready for us SZ-TOWN. Get ready. Greddy.
Bready. Ouch.

Brucie

BOOM. Such a short time and we've found ourselves in Hungary. We began expecting some entertainment as soon as we saw this badass from the train at one of the stations. What a cool guy!

Don't wanna mess with this badass mofo!

We arrived at our hotel very safely, and deposited our belongings in a small room fit for Kings. Then the beasts inside us stirred and we ventured out into the world in search of food. It was great, using a map we found a convenience store, bought some beer and snacks, and then arrived at the kebab shop next to our hotel. Kebabilicious.

And so the next blistering hot day began with a hop-on hop-off tour, with many entertaining quotes, like the one above. A highlight for us was perhaps the Citadella, where we visited many momuments and featured an amazing lookout. See the pics below!

Man punching a three headed dragon whilst naked. Totally relevant to this story. (Top of Citadella)

This is all the money we had left at one point...the equivalent of about AU$0.82...

No Sven, this is not the Titanic.

Lunch involved a two course meal, with an entree of mozzarella discs with tomatoes, and a mains of a mozarella, sweet gorgonzola, mushrooms and ham pizza. See the problem here? Lots of cheese. We may or may not have had problems after this, and we unhappily renamed what we had at the restaurant the "Gorgon-stopper pizza", if you know what I mean... 

The Citadella also plays host to an amazing wax museum housed in an underground bunker, which detailed the Austro-Hungarian and Nazi influence throughout the Second World War. We were greeted with an amazing array of sometimes freakishly alive looking wax models. It was a sobering experience with all of the documented photographs (some quite graphic) with witness accounts and Nazi relics supplementing the tour. It was pretty cool to see the entire bunker fitted out with artefacts museum style!

Whoa, this one looked really life-like...look at those blue eyes!

Both expressions are priceless. ;)

At any rate, next stop, Warszawa, to start meeting up with my side of the family!

The Prodigal Son's Return to Croatia

Brucie

We’re finally in Croatia! After some hassles at the Serb-Croatian border, of course, travelling on seemingly out of place Australian passports on local public transport. We were greeted in Osijek by Matko, Sven’s cousin, who took us to our granny flat, and then gave us a bike tour of Osijek with a friend. Amazing sights! We then settled in the town square for a refreshing light beer laced with grapefruit.

That night we also watched the Poland-Czech Republic game, in a sports bar all to ourselves, with lots of highs and lows. It was disappointing to see Polska not make it to the quarter-finals, given that they are one of the countries hosting the cup. Sad face. At any rate, Sven and I will be in Poland to catch the remainder of whatever street parties there may be!

Again, Sven will probably write about everything from his homeland point of view, so I’ll let the camera talk and Sven blabber on... =)

 

Robbie

We took  a bus from Belgrade through Vukovar for Osijek, my hometown. You could see that this part of the land was quite affected by the war, 20 years earlier.

At the bus station we were picked up by Matko, my cousin, and we drove to his sister’s house in west Osijek. He wore a Deustche Rockt t-shirt because he ironically did not think that German was that good. Hearing this, we knew we’d have a good time here with him in Croatia.

We met my cousin Marija’s husband Igor and chilled by watching cable TV. I don’t even watch normal TV at home so naturally I felt lost with all the channels, and quickly learnt how to change channel to the VH1 classic music channel.  (Much to Marek’s disgust, but hey, I can’t help myself) We then had a bike ride to the river Drava and all along it to the city and old city with Matko and his friend Ana. We stopped in the old city and had radler beer with grapefruit, yummeh. Later that night we watched the game, and Poland lost, again much to Marek’s disgust. I personally wanted Poland to win, but I felt like I myself was maintaining all the disgust Marek was feeling that day, so it felt like a win nonetheless.

Sunday, we visited the local protected swampland otherwise known as Kopacki Rit, just outside of Osijek. The softly spoken tour guide left everything for the imagination and we entertained ourselves by taking photos of the surroundings and the signs saying “Do not pass here, there are mines”. Not something you see everyday in Australia! And swimming snakes, but we have those, bigger ones too. Later that day we had lunch with my cousin Silvester and his wife and their new baby in Osijek. Dayum it tasted good having a home cooked meal! Bring on the veggies after all that grilled meat.

Do NOT PASS - On this area is a high danger of mines

Matko (Sven's Cousin) and Marek enjoying the swampish sights.

That night we travelled for Saptinovci, where Matko’s dad has a farm. Monday we walked around the village, much to the interest of the locals and the local protestant priest. i.e. everyone stared at us as we walked the little ones, but it was as expected. When Matko got home from work he took us to a nearby town called Orahovica, which has an artificial lake at the bottom of an old ruined castle. The walk up worked our buns and calves and was very much worth the view from the lookout. I also uncovered the resident creature living there –

The local creature of the cavities!

HUGS TIME, LOVE TIME.

The swim was exactly what we needed as each day in the Balkans has been exceptionally hot. Besides the single bout of rain in Belgrade, we have had nothing but sunshine – it would really suck being in Perth right now.

We travelled back to Osijek for the Croatia-Spain game. Ice cream and the outdoors called so we watched the game from the promenade along the river Drava. Sneaky Aussie boys shifted some couches to face the game. Marek demanded popcorn so I went and bought some from a local. Not realizing the size differences in paper bags, I bought two of the biggest size. These were not finished but the Marek beast was satisfied with Osjecko beer in hand…for a while.

So much corn of Pop.

Tuesday. We visited my grandma, who is quite old and set in her ways. The poor woman was not expecting three strapping young gentlemen and was quite lost, but convinced that Marek’s name was in fact Marko. Matko drove us to the old city and we checked out the local museum. To our delight it had only a few artifacts and was mostly  covered in photos of Osijek’s inhabitants from the early 20^th century.  The faces we observed were priceless, and were worthy of their places on the walls.

Dinner was with the Mraks in Antunovac, a small village just outside of Osijek. Not only did we enjoy my auntie’s awesome cooking but got to hear almost the entire Yugoslav history in summary from my uncle. (Naturally spiced with a good variety of heavy swearing) I could only understand a fair proportion of it and I was struggling, but poor Marek was close to falling asleep. the entire time. What a character my uncle is.

Tickets and a bag were bought for Budapest.  Brucie and Robbie were happy and in love. Peace out O-town, hometown, YO-town.

I See-Saw what you did there!

Walking the young ones, getting stares through the village. Bloody foreigners.

"It is healthy behaviour of young men to want to explore cavities" - Matko Andric

Cool photo, added for zest and with extra zing.

Belgrade: A Tale of Two Lost Suitcases

Robbie
Fast forward: We picked up our bags Friday afternoon. Relief! Konačno su prtjlage došli.

Back to the future: Arriving in Belgrade, we asked the Lost and Found people where our suitcases were. (My first slightly awkward speaking of Serbo-Croatian.) They had been delayed as we were but were to arrive later in the week. Our realisation: I had one pair of socks and two pairs of underwear; Marek had two pairs of socks and one pair of underwear. I'll let you decide who wins in this chapter.

So, not letting anything stop the tourist rampage, we successfully met with my grandfather and went for a stroll through Novi Beograd. We supported the local economy by buying some shorts and a shirt from a small street side clothes shop for over 5000 dinars. What a rip! That night we got settled then went out for dinner to the local tavern. Yummy čevaps and fresh white onion with fries and Jelen pivo. Not the best pivo, but it did the trick. Meal for two and two pints each: 1240 dinars. As the waiter approached, I awkwardly asked: Can we eat? He looked at me puzzled and said, of course. Marek just laughed at me, and we began eating our first round of grilled meats...the first of many to cause more than a few funny but true toilet jokes. Let's leave it at that. On a side note, a pack of twenty cigarettes is about 120 dinars.

After dinner, we had a walk around the Studentski Grad (student city) and found that in the main square between the student apartments was a small concert. Pretty cool! For me anyway. But then it started raining and legged it home.

Thursday, we met with my cousin Nikola. He told us we'd meet at the local Mac and that he'd be wearing a bright blue shirt. Suddenly, we were seeing bright blue shirts everywhere. He took us to the old city and we saw Kalemegdan, the old Belgrade fort, Knjez Mihajlović the main shopping street, and Skadarlija, the old cobblestoned alleyway with many restaurants and cafes...

Skadarlija

Later that night we met up with my other cousin Ana, who met us at the Narodnog Povorište in the old city and took us to an awesome restaurant called Stepenice were we ate pizza and drank cocktails overlooking the river Sava. She took us to another cafe bar (loving Europe for them) and we had blueberry beer and shots of honey and rockmelon brandy. Soy good. Got into a taxi with a dirty looking driver (let's not be gypsies and name races). He misunderstood me and dropped us off a few kms from the apartment. We asked many people on the street how to get back to our place, and got there eventually, but it remained a walk of shame and a lesson learned for all involved: 800 dinars for the wrong place is not worth sitting in a dirty taxi. Character building!

On Friday, my auntie Ljilja kindly booked a double decker bus tour for us through Belgrade. Really good and easy going drive through the city meant we saw so much for minimal walking, brilliant! Audio tour gave us the low down on B-town and its history. Later that day we spent over 16000 dinars each in Zara Man and picked up the infamous suitcases, happily changing our underwears. That night we hung out with Nikola and Petar, Ljilja's son and had an awesome dinner. More meat, more street. That's how we roll.

The bus to Osijek left Saturday morning. Silly Australians put their baggage under the bus without telling the bus driver, how could they not know that you had to pay extra for that! A lovely old lady I'd helped earlier ended up paying for us. I believe in karma, after all. On to Croatia!

Brucie

Next stop: Belgrade, Serbia. Of course, our baggage remained in Bangkok while we were whisked away on the rapid transfers, and when we landed in Belgrade we were wearing trackies in the sweltering heat. Nice.

The exchange rate was 9001din to AU$100, (ie OVER 9000!!!), so we had many thousands of dinars to use. Food and drink came very cheap. I’ll cut out the first afternoon we stayed, as it was filled with “great” Serbian music videos. The second day we met up with one of Sven’s cousins, Nikola, who was absolutely awesome in showing us around the “old city” part of Belgrade. Of course, we did find a lot of stuff that tickled our fancy, check out the photos below.

Sven’s written a bit about the Belgrade chapter at any rate, so I’ll let my camera do the talking ;)

Graphic

Robbie

Ražnjice

FYI, this is Nikola here with Sven (Sven's cousin). He was really nice to show us around. Top bloke!

At dinner/cocktails with Ana, Sven's other cousin. Called Stepenice (Steps) off the steps near the port. Awesome pizza and terrific view.

Graffiti: ''Radioaktivna Zona''

Stay tuned people!

Vodkan I say?

Robbie

Sipping blended scotch and soda while Marek drinks a dirty vodka orange on our replacement flight was rather enjoyable. Due to flight delays we missed our connection to Paris, however the Thai hosts were very accommodating and placed us on an immediate flight to Zurich.
Hopefully leaving us zuricher of character than poorer (or so we hope).

Flight to Bangkok was long; I managed to watch 3 movies in total. Underworld awakening proved to be the Hollywood we were expecting with painful plot twists. Action scenes were decent of course. Following that, Moonstruck was a surprisingly enjoyable 80s romance with Cher and Nicolas Cage. Sassy Italian American humour with a firm emphasis on accepting true love and Cherishing family values made every scene engaging. A definite must see. Feeling a little musically deprived, I stepped into the western blues and rock n roll world of Johnny Cash in Walk The Line. This was an intense watch but not painful and very well crafted. New inspiration found in blues and singer/guitar combo found in John. Realising that we had over an hour left, I went to the audio.section and checked out The Travelling Wilburys, Boston, The Animals, Jeff Beck's rock n roll party, Paul McCartney & the Wings and Buddy Holly. A solid mix out of quite a few artists.

Brucie

Round number three of that storm that was forecast to hit Perth? Yeah, we escaped that. The delay caused us to miss our Parisian flight, so we were literally sprinted through security (I was pinged for a water bottle of course) and onto the next flight to Zurich in less than 7 minutes in Bangkok airport. 7 minutes was all we needed to see the bogan variety that makes its pilgrimage to Bangkok. Irritable red faced middle aged women with peroxide hair swearing at all the attendants because they didn’t pay attention to their boarding pass. Clearly not going with the flow like we were, and in their words, they were going through a “fucking nightmare”. Babe, grow a pair.

But I guess that smoothly brings me to my point on the Australian sugar industry. If you have shares in there, I’d suggest reinvesting in Thai sugar shares, because business is booming. So much so that the size of their sugar sachets on board is the equivalent of about 4 teaspoons of sugar. (I learnt that the hard way with my coffee). 

Our humble abode consisted of two seats, where we quickly learnt how to perform the most intricate forms of yoga simply to lie down from exhaustion. Oh, and Sven and I had curry twice in a row. Go figure what’s happening right now with my other half while I was typing this paragraph, haha.

So we’re in Zurich. Not quite so sure how that happened. We’ve cleared customs, no idea where our bags are, but quite confident we’ll end up somewhere because everyone here is so damn jolly and friendly! (Maybe I’ve become too accustomed to Perth). We sat in some fast food place, that prides itself on being fresh and organic (and expensive). 

More to come later!

Our beginnings betray our ends...or some shit like that.

I have a confession to make.

Marek doesn't know about this blog yet. Or the fact that I am going to celebrate the much loved and hated former President of Jugoslavia, Josip Broz Tito by including an old photo of him in this post. He may be dead, but he's still my mate, orright? He also strangely looks a little like my grandfather... Speaking of which our first stop in Europe will be Belgrade, the capital of Serbia, to visit my grandfather and other relatives there. (A segue Marek would be proud of)

Unimportant odds and ends must be completed before tomorrow afternoon, like packing bags and buying travel insurance. At least I got this blog set up for us! Priorities.

And here's a picture of the area my grandfather lives in, Novi Beograd, just south of the old city (centre in this photo). Excite.

Our flight is leaving 1645 tomorrow FYIWTFBBQ(No Sven, just no). But first, dinner with the crew so they can finally get rid of us.

Bok.