Woke up on our very modern Airbnb flat. That is I woke-up when Dennis said “It’s after 10 O’Clock do you want to get up?
Dennis had Google mapped the fastest route to walk to a transit center to buy a 15 day bus/tram pass. We got lost among the “Housing Estates”. The name for socialist era high rises. Not a bad walk because they have trees and the occasional park between building.
After a struggle to find the right tram to take back to our flat we recharged with granola bars and boarded a tram to see the still being built, rebuilt or perhaps even re-imagined, Castle District. Rebuilding the Castle District controversy
As I understand it, all the buildings are a recreation of the originals or better. The rebuilding started with Hauszmann in the 1900’s. The Castle District got shot up again in WWII when the Soviets took Budapest from the Germans.
Some dilapidated structures were razed in the early 70s and are now being rebuilt again looking very grand and new.
DAY 2
Still jet-lagged we didn’t get an early start. Sometime after 10:00am Dennis helped me map out a route to walk to the house where I had a small flat for five months, in 2008. I was teaching English at the Budapest Technical University, BME.
As we stared at the house, which looked a little more run-down than I remembered it, a woman opened a window and asked me something in Hungarian. I assumed she was asking why we were staring at her house. I replied with one of the few phrases I’ve mastered “Nem erte Maygar” I don’t understand Hungarian. I pointed to myself and the upstairs apartment I lived in and informed her in English that I had lived there. She shrugged and I’m sure told me she didn’t get it. She looked relieved as we left. We even exchanged happy good-byes.
In the afternoon we met my friend, teacher and mentor Zsuzsanna. We walked through the BME campus and toured building we taught in as well as the ancient original campus building.
Zsuzsa helped us find the bus up Gellert Hill. We all expected to see the beautiful view from Citadella a former military outlook. However access to the site was completely restricted by a remodeling project. It hasn’t taken us long to understand how much Victor Orban loves remodeling and rebuilding projects. This one is controversial because they have added a new religious element, a cross,to the former military site.
We were all disappointed because the viewpoint was blocked but Zsuzsa guided us downhill to the Garden of Philosophers which had a nice view of autumn color and less people.
We found a very good Hungarian restaurant in our neighborhood. It was almost 9pm by the time we got back to our flat and collapsed. Quite a full day.
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