The Other Side of the Curtain

We've been in Eastern Europe for the last couple of weeks, starting in Bulgaria, moving to Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, The Czech Republic, and now we're in Poland.

Jess has been blogging loads, and in another vain attempt to catch up, I thought I'd try to sum up some of the things we've seen, learnt and experienced.

Things we have seen

When we were in India - particularly Rajasthan - we joked that everywhere we visited had a city palace (with displays of musical instruments) and a giant fort just outside town (with a formidable display of weapons).

We've had a similar experience in our travels in European cities - from Sofia to Bratislava, Budapest to Prague - everywhere seems to have had a beautiful old town, with market square, complete with Christmas market. Outside the town (over a river, often the Danube) is a castle on a hill.

This has been great to see - there's something really nice about walking around a cobbled square with a glass of hot wine, eating a sausage. Also, the cities so far have had the highest concentration of pretendable-statues I've ever seen. We have taken a boat-load of pictures pretending to be statues. For enthusiasts, Bratislava is really good for this. Punching above its weight.

Things we have learnt

I'll be honest, my knowledge of the history of some places we've visited, particularly Bulgaria and Romania, was patchy at best before we went there. It has been really interesting to learn about the sometimes painful history of countries I couldn't reliably point out on a map 6 months ago. We've been going to plenty of museums to learn about the places we're visiting - I'd particularly recommend the Museum of the Romanian Peasant in Bucharest (really, really good) and the Regional Ethnographic Museum  in Plovdiv (small and quirky). I feel like we've discovered the Ethnographic Museum since we started travelling. It is really interesting to see what everyday life was like throughout history in different countries, and notice the similarities and differences.

Things we have experienced

Jess has already blogged about her experience of visiting the Auschwitz Museum; I haven't much to add to her thoughts. But that was definitely an experience, and I thought the feeling I got walking around will stay with me more than the particular information we learnt as we visited the exhibitions. We've visited a few museums and places in cities dedicated to previous atrocities: the mass grave behind the Great Synagogue in Budapest, the Museum of Communism in Prague, and numerous monuments to wars past. Before our trip is out I'm sure we'll experience more of this kind of thing - visiting Checkpoint Charlie in Berlin, or the Anne Frank House in Amsterdam for example.

Next week we will have left Eastern Europe behind, and will be in Berlin for five or so days. I know we won't have left behind the experiences of visiting some truly harrowing places, and being reminded of the some of the worst things humans have ever done to each other.

All that said, we've had a really nice time in Eastern Europe. Strolling through the beginnings of Christmas markets, visiting some great museums, and eaten some fantastic food (sausages) : )

Two days in Budapest

Wow, when you do a quick tour of Europe it means A LOT of blogging! I hope someone's still reading...

So our time in Budapest has all but come to an end. We were joined by our friend Ben from home (everybody say hi! He's an old friend from Martyn's uni and it was pretty much a given he'd join us at some point), which has changed the dynamic of the trip, it's been so long that it's just been the two of us planning to the point we don't really need to ask what each other wants to do as we already know! How weird to articulate your thoughts verbally now...

So, to Budapest. It was the first European city we've been to that actually felt "European" we got off the metro and nearly got run over by a red double decker bus, overlooked by a lot of tall buildings, next to a large river with a Parliament building looking out. Sound familiar?

As all three of us had travelled a long way we decided to relax for the afternoon. Relaxing in Budapest means one thing, baths. Thankfully it was no way near as naked or awkward as Turkey, the baths were actually pools that you could go in, rather than to clean yourself. It was an amazing experience, there were three outdoor baths that were heated to 38 degrees. You could see the steam rising over the walls of the building, it was bliss in the freezing weather. Indoors there were over 15 pools that you could have a dip in. Ranging from a balmy 36 degrees, to an exercise pool at 34 degrees, a sulphurous pool that had a rather dubious whff and even, for the not so faint-hearted, a plunge pool (20 degrees!). It was very easy to just relax in one corner of a pool and forget about your troubles.

I didn't realise before we got here that Budapest is actually split into two parts, Buda and Pest. 

We started the morning in Pest, and visited the Jewish Quarter. I've never been in a Synagogue and was surprised at how much it felt like a Christian church. Probably just in comparison to all the Hindu, Sikh and Muslim holy places we've visited. It was coupled with a museum that gave a brief introduction to Judaism, listing all the different rites of passage and religious holidays, and a section showing the pain and murder of Jews in the Second World War. It was obviously very sobering and unfortunately only the beginning of many things we'll have the opportunity to see throughout Europe. The garden of the synagogue had an absolutely beautiful memorial, a silver weeping willow sculpture with names of families and individuals engraved into each leaf.

Leaving Pest, we crossed the Danube into Buda to the 'Citadel', a viewpoint that was occupied during the second world war and rebuilt as a memorial and finally handed to the Tourist board in the 70s. It gave a spectacular view of the whole city, from both sides of the river.

Strolling further along the river we came to the Castle. I know nothing about this castle apart from there is even more of an old town with cobbled streets around. It was far to cold to stop and look at things. A few photos taken and we trudged back across the river with the intention of going to see the 'Horror House'; a memorial of the atrocities commited against the Jewish people during WWII. Personally, I couldn't have coped. It was freezing cold, putting us into a low mood as it was and we'd happened across the Christmas Market! A place of happiness and mulled wine! Yes, not the best reason in the world to avoid remembering victims of a terrible crime, but we justified it by acknowledging we are going to Auschwitz in Poland too...

Following a rather large glass of mulled wine and strolling through the interesting stalls and pretty lights we headed back to the warmth of the hostel for a cup of tea and out into the night for dinner.

Tomorrow morning we're off to Bratislava on a 6.30am bus, we hope it's worth it!