Triptease: Hungary for more

I shivered as I walked across the Chain Bridge. The four formidable lions guarding it served as a grim reminder of the fate of the artist who had created them. Legend has it that he committed suicide by jumping into the icy waters of the Danube after a little boy pointed out a grave error in the otherwise perfect design: The lions had no tongues! I peered into the open mouth of one of the lions. No tongue indeed! The Chain Bridge is one of several road bridges connecting the twin cities of Buda and Pest that together form Budapest, the capital of Hungary and one of the most beautiful locations in Europe. A landlocked country in the heart of Europe, Hungary shares common borders with Romania, Austria, Ukraine, Serbia and Montenegro, Slovakia, Slovenia and Croatia.

Tourist attractions
The forerunner of Budapest was Aquincum, a Roman city with plumbing, sewers, steam baths and two amphitheatres. Hungary has over a thousand thermal springs and several of them have been in use for over two thousand years. But lucky for us who travel today, because Budapest is a tourist’s dream with thermal baths, spectacular museums, pubs and casinos.

Szentendre, a quaint artists’ village on the Danube, north of Budapest, threw up myriad surprises including exquisite wine-glasses, pottery and porcelain dolls. The Parliament building, caves in the Buda hills, Buda castle and the funicular railway are major attractions here. To the southwest lies Lake Balaton, the largest freshwater lake in Central Europe. A train journey around the lake was an exciting experience as several buildings decorated with red paprika came into view.

Food and people The local food is somewhat spicy. The world-renowned Tokaji wine, a sweet and heady concoction from the Tokaj wine region in northeastern Hungary, was described by Louis X1V of France as “king of wines, wine of kings.” The Russian czars were obsessed with it too.

Getting to know locals from a region adds an interesting aspect to any trip and when it came to Hungarians, there’s an interesting mix. Hungary has an ageing population, a laid-back lifestyle and a relatively closed economy. Fear and suspicion of foreigners is curiously blended with an eagerness to interact. The language barrier, however, effectively pre-empts this possibility.

Hungarian is the world’s second most difficult language — second only to Mandarin Chinese. The script is readable but unpronounceable. I struggled in vain with ‘Jo napot kivanok’ (good day), ‘igen, igen, igen igen’ (yes, yes, yes, yes), ‘nem, nem, nem, nem, nem’ (no, no, no, no, no) and ‘kozonom’ (thank you), and finally decided to settle for the more primitive sign language. From the beginning of the second millennium Latin became the official language and was in use until the mid-19th century. Today, the name Attila is very common and I came across several persons proudly flaunting that name.

It is obvious that the country had seen more prosperous times because there were trams on the streets of Budapest from 1887, a funicular railway from 1870, and Europe’s first underground Metro from 1896.    

Historic relevance
The history of Hungary is a long saga of invasion and occupation. In the first century when the Romans gained control of this region they called it Pannonia and it remained part of their mighty empire for four long centuries. Later, the Huns, eastern Goths, Avars and others settled here. When the Mongols arrived in the mid-13th century they wiped out half of the population. Then during World War II, Budapest was occupied by Nazi forces and bombed by the allies. When the war ended, the fleeing Nazis blew up the bridges and the era of Soviet occupation began immediately. It was only very recently, in 1990, that Hungary finally became independent.

Pushpa is an author bitten by the travel bug