Exploring Eger and Exploding Emotions

After months of imagining the first draft of my dissertation being completed by the end of September, I finally got down to business planning out how I will, in reality, achieve this. Needless to say, the process of devising my work-plan/strategy for the next nine months lit a small fire under my ass and I have become a well-oiled, disciplined work machine! And it feels GOOD to be reminded how committing to my work in an effective and efficient way is actually a form of self-care. When I work hard within the context of a balanced life, I'm happier, more confident, and optimistic about the future... well not the future for American women (including Melania T) or, like, the health of the planet, or Syria... okay I guess I really just mean MY future.

For me right now, a balanced life is looking like a mix of work, dinners and wine (but not too much!) with new friends, going to open mics (but not too often or too late!), practicing guitar and Hungarian, yoga, reading Hungarian classic literature, a cigarette here and there,Vikings on Netflix, soaking in thermal baths (as much as possible..'doctor's orders), and discovering more beautiful spaces and places in and around Budapest (but only on Saturdays and Sundays!).

Dear god, make me a bird, so I can fly far, far far away (Buda Castle).

A Sunday excursion to the village of Pannonhalma which hosts this old monastery-cum-boys school...(yes I used the letters c-u-m in the same sentence as 'monastery' and 'boys school'...'cum' on people! It's Latin!)

Timi zee German and me in Pannonhalma....Germans, while sticklers for plans and schedules, can still be surprisingly fun company!

And I finally moved into what will be my permanent home here in Budapest for the next year. The following is a little photo tour of what you can get in downtown Budapest, one street up from the Danube for about 750 dollars per month (apologies for the extensive amount of pictures here):

Streets of my new hood

More streets in my hood

Ferenciek Ter, the site of one of my hood's metro lines

My neighbourhood coffeehouse

My apartment building

My apartment building's courtyard

My front door

Entrance way looking into little kitchen

Kitchen

Laundry room

My clothes dryer, rigged up on a pulley to dry clothes as close to the ceiling as possible where all the hot air hides

Bathroom

Bathrrom

Living room

Living room

Great high and deep Euro windows

My desk

Sleeping quarters

Sleeping quarters

Room for wine and palinka storage

Aaaahhhh to be settling in a bit. Sweet sweet relief.

Another great motivator to get my ass in gear re writing my dissertation is planning weekend excursions outside of Budapest and not having the incapacitating weight of guilt and shame for slacking during the week on your shoulders. It is impossible to enjoy moments in the present when all you can think about is all the work you didn't do in the past and all the work you must do in the future. A-A-U-U-U-M-M-M-M. Write that down.

As part of my next goal, to begin exploring more of this strange little alien nation outside of Budapest, this past weekend I ventured to Eger, a small city of about 55,000 people in the Northeast of Hungary:

One twelve dollar train ticket, one drunk middle-aged couple necking in the seats across from me, a two hour winter-y fast train ride and I was there.

Wait what? Saskatchewan? What're you doing here????

Eger boasts a long history of wine-making and fightin' off the old skool Muslims of the Ottoman empire...both of which are still reflected in the structures of the town. It is also supposed a be a university town but I'll be damned if I sensed, for a moment, an ounce of university night-life vibrancy that usually accompanies mass populations of college-aged kids.

I arrived at around 3 pm on Friday and was going to simply walk to my hotel, only to find it seems the town of Eger does not believe in clearing snow from sidewalks, making rolling luggage impossible while at the same time providing a boon to the taxi industry...even if it is a six minute drive.

Upon arrival at my no-nonsense hotel in the city center that doubles as hospitality training facility, I was greeted by MANY keen 20 year old trainees to the point of over service. I dropped my items and went chasing the last bits of daylight to take some photos and see some of the town while sliding all over the uncleared icy snowy sidewalks.

Cathedral Basilica of St. John the Apostle, Eger

St Bernat Roman Catholic Church, Eger

Streets of Eger, with 'just the tips' of the Minorite Church of Eger poking up past the rooftops

Streets of Eger, the Eger Castle in the background

I managed to stumble upon this very very cool historically significant structure:

Eger minaret surrounded by an overcompensation of Christian churches... a tall religious structure pissing contest. Boy things sure have changed since the 1500s!

This minaret, erected in the 1600s, is both a) the northern most minaret erected within the Ottoman Empire and b) the last standing minaret of the Ottoman Empire (so I was told...but this might be an alternative truth).

On the internet I read that Eger has become a popular tourist destination in recent years. I think they (oh no I just called the internet a 'they') mean in summer. This town was deads-ville even on a Friday night. I even had trouble finding a good place to have dinner. But alas I did and tried a couple different Egri Bikavers (the rich and dry and thick and meaty blend of reds that this area is known for, appropriately translates as "Bull's Blood"), ate some guylas and a beautiful beef dish dressed with a creamy mushroom paprikas sauce:

I slip 'n' slided through the snow and ice back to my hotel for an early bedtime, with big plans for site-seeing the next day.

The next morning, after an early wake up, some hotel room yoga, and an amazing hotel breakfast of bread, salamis, cheeses, sliced peppers, cucumbers, tomatoes and brilliant coffee, I made my way to the Eger castle, a short jaunt from the hotel.

The walk was, again, slippy and slide-y as all hell but it was a beautiful bluebird sunny morning, with a romantic yet chilly ice fog lingering over this sleepy town:

Sun coming up over Eger creek

And I wound my way past various defense bastions up the hill atop which the castle sits, overlooking the town:

The Minorite Church of Eger seen from the walk up to the castle entrance

One of the castle entrances, overlooking the town

WARNING!! HISTORY LESSON: Eger castle was the site of a major siege attempt by the Turks in 1552. Prior to this, it had been really just a large house for some aristocrat. Once it became clear that the Turks were settling in in other parts of Hungary and Europe, a massive project commenced to build-up the castle's defenses. On September 11th, 1552 (see America, your 9-11 is not the ONLY 9-11 there ever was or will be), about 40-some thousand Turks set up camp outside the castle and hunkered down for a long siege. But an early winter, starvation, and disease coupled with some explosive pummeling from inside the castle ended the siege only 38-ish days later. The defense of the castle was headed up by the great hero of Eger, Dobo Istvan. This siege story, and that of it's telling in a wonderful, beloved adventure historical fiction written in 1902 by Geza Gardonyi, Eclipse of the Crescent Moon, has allegedly led to a cult-like status for this castle.

Once inside the castle complex, there are a number of different attractions to visit, including the Dobo Istvan Museum (the history of the castle), a museum with exhibits of bronze and iron age artifacts found in archaeological digs from this area and of an amazing collection of old weaponry which,much to my surprise, I enjoyed immensely. And then there's the castle's cellar system that was used for storing weaponry:

Entrance to the cellar system of the Eger castle

Inside the cellar system

More cellar system

My cellar tour guide dressed as Dobo Istvan, I believe

But of course the Turks returned in 1592-ish, bringing with them what was likely an overkill amount of 100,000 troops and they finally managed to take hold of the region and remain occupiers until the end of the 1600s.

At the gift shop, I picked up a copy of Geza Gardonyi's epic story of Eger Castle translated into English and headed down (or rather slid down) to Szépasszonyvölgy, or, in English, 'the Valley of Beautiful Women' (so yeah, naturally I fit right in):

The view of the valley of the beautiful women from the road above

The road down to the valley of the beautiful women

Here I rounded up some more fiery, hearty Hungarian food and thick rich Bikaver and dove into my adventure story:

A beautiful glass of Egri Bikaver and a great Hungarian classic adventure tale; castles, sieges, capturing slaves, evil Turkish antagonists poised against Hungarian heroes... May the Christians prevail!!!

Szépasszonyvölgy is home to a multitude of wine cellars in close proximity making it easy to 'wine cellar crawl'.

Row upon row of wine storage cellars ready to host tasters

More cellars

I left my cozy, touristy restaurant and began my own solo wine cellar crawl. How to pick from one of 30 or 40 cellars...hmmmm. So I chose this one:

Molnar Pinceszet

...because it has the same name as the street I live on. Obviously I used a VERY stringent tasting criteria. 

I sat here and partook in a bit of reflective writing, drinking my beautiful Bikaver, in utter silence, the cellar seemingly soundproofed by the thick layer of mold that co-exists with the wine as it ages:

Enjoying some Molnar Egri Bikaver 2013..mmmm good year.

After snagging a bottle to go, I went in search of another cellar to try a taste and stumbled upon a cool, yet simple, looking cellar belonging to Csabai Sandor, a Hungarian of Russian descent from a long line of wine-making men:

Sandor's cellar

Inside Sandor's cellar...note the essential black organism coating the ceiling and walls.

Here there actually were other people! A really friendly Sandor and a really friendly and kooky family who invited me over to their 'extreme' party kitchen for a little hazi buli (house party) and I keenly accepted:

Extreme kitchen part with the lovely Barta family!

Dorelli (the daughter) and her boyfriend, Gabor, eventually drove me safe and sound back to my hotel. I ordered a pizza pie and beer and passed out.

Sunday morning, with a bit of a Bikaver hangover, I checked out of my hotel and went to check out the Varos a Varos alatt (the city under the city), an old underground system of wine cellars built in the early 1700s by the Clergy.

The entrance to the cellar

It is a massive network of tunnels that is a prime example of the unintended impacts of policy.

AARGH!! MORE HISTORY!!:So the structure was originally made of rhyolite, some sort of soft volcanic stone. Now, as I have talked about before, when wine is stored in the cellars, it co-exists symbiotically with a thick layer of mold that lines the walls and boroughs it's fungal tentacles into the structure, essentially making the material really strong. 

Prior to WWII, private storage of wine occurred here. Wine making was nationalised in 1947 by the 'goddamn pinkos' and all the private wine was removed from the cellar. The mold cannot exist without the presence of wine. As it all began to die off the volcanic stone not only became unstable but also could no longer fully absorb the ground water which, prior to, the mold dealt with. Bad things happen when an extensive system of underground tunnels begin to degrade...just ask the city of Paris (albeit they did devise a wonderfully creative solution to their little sink hole problem).

So the tunnels have since mostly been reinforced with concrete and are slowly being converted into a museum. 

AND NOW BACK TO ME:The rest of Sunday consisted of hitting up a 'meh' Turkish bath (now I'm Budapest bath-snobby), eating more Hungarian food, and trying to find a coffee shop to sit at for a couple hours to read and write and wait for my train. Nope. No success. No coffee shops open. Just churches.

While it was a really wonderful weekend getaway, I was there about 4 hours too long. I suspect it is much more bumpin' in summer and during wine season but in the humid Hungarian deep-freeze of winter, two days was sufficient to see the important sites.

I was exhausted as I boarded my early Sunday evening train back to Budapest. Settling into my seat, I pulled out my ticket and put it on the table in preparation for the train ticket checker. I had purchased the return ticket online and had printed them out in Budapest before I left (or so I thought). An hour into the trip, in the middle of rural Hungary, the guy comes along and I confidently hand him my ticket to check. He hands it back to me and says stuff to me in Hungarian I don't understand. A nice young man across the aisle begins helping me 'deal'. Apparently I didn't have the right ticket and instead I would have to purchase the ticket on board as well as pay a fine for not having a ticket. I tried to show him the email with the ticket on my phone...but NOPE. NOT GOOD ENOUGH. YOU HAVE TO PRINT IT! I emptied out my wallet of 5600 forints (about 25 dollars). And then, unexpectedly and strangely, I just began to cry. I cried for an hour. I burned through a whole tiny travel package of kleenex. I don't know why. Maybe it was the stress of the idea of being tossed out on some Hungarian village train platform in the middle of winter at night. Or maybe it was just the fatigue and lingering hangover from my Bikaver tasting. Surely it wasn't the financial stress and frustration of being out what amounts to basically the cost of two glasses of wine in a Vancouver restaurant? Maybe it was the shame of still not being able to deal with officious stuff with men in uniforms in the native language. Or maybe, just maybe, for the first time since I arrived, in the stress of the moment, I felt really far from home. 

Finally I was back in Budapest, making my way to my NEW home through the bustling streets of downtown, and I was tickled pink to see people out and about in the city and eating in restaurants that were open on a Sunday night....and I smiled and had a good laugh at myself about my explosion of emotion en route from Eger.

**Due to technical issues, I had to change my blog website. If you'd like to read earlier posts from my time here in Europe this past year it's all here: http://blogs.ubc.ca/magyaradventure/

Well, December was a write-off: Christmas in Slovakia and my return to routine

December, much to my delight, was jam packed with companionship; the entire month turned into a festive adventure, made even more foggy and fun by regular hot wine (and other amazing drinks) stops along the way.

After my friend Lisa left in early December, two other friends from Vancouver arrived as part of their three B holiday: Berlin, Budapest, and Brussels. And again I had the great pleasure of seeing more touristy things I had yet to do in Budapest, including a very frigid wintery visit to Momento Park which houses a ton of old communist era statues that were transferred here after the cold war:

The glorious proletariat!

The Hungarian worker thanking the Russian soldier for 'liberating' them...yes I'm sure that's how it happened.

The old commie Trabant

Here I discovered Stalin (and all world war II Russian soldiers) and I are boot twins:

What's left of a giant statue of Stalin that was sledgehammered apart during the days of the short-lived yet violent Hungarian revolution... 

My boots...Roots boots...actually called Russian vamp boots- they actually, when on my person, look exactly like the boots on the statues of Russians.

I also finally had the opportunity to do a tour of the grand Budapest Opera House which, while smaller than the Grand Palais in Paris, does indeed hold its own when it comes to elegant details and, allegedly, acoustics:

Fresco in the opera house by Károly Lotz

And finally, I dragged my friends out to an open mic I had been wanting to check out since my arrival here which led to yet other "fun adventures" with some new friends.

Rockin' ooouuuutttt at one of the many open mics in Budapest.

Between touristing days with my Vancouver friends, I also went for a pre-Christmas brunch at my soon-to-be landlady’s house with the family…I’m very proud of this as it was my first true Hungarian invitation to a Hungarian home that I received on my own, without the help of another expat :-D

The final leg of an all day brunch at my landlady and landlord's place-- sütémény (cake) and port...the first of what would be a whole holiday with non-stop sütémény... If I learned anything Hungarian this holiday it was the cult of the holiday sütémény.  

Just two days after my Vancouver friends left, I was whisked off to a small town in Slovakia:

The frosty hills of Hungary travelling Northeast to Slovakia.

...to spend the holiday with my Brasilian friend Dani (whom I met in my Hungarian class) and her husband (Tomi, a Hungarian-speaking Slovakian) and his family, none of whom speak a lick of English (which is fine of course, we’re not in an English country so I never expect it). The three of us were the only ones that speak English. But somehow communication is always relatively successful in these situations AND it was a great Hungarian language learning opportunity... And oh how the mega tons of sütémény (baked sweets) were offered and consumed, along with much meat and other animal products, deliciously prepared... the hazi palinka (homemade palinka, Hungary's traditional fruit brandy) came out often along with, because we were only 3 kms from the Tokaj region of Hungary, goblets of Tokaji white wine.

The view from my lovely host family's balcony in Sena

The town of Sena, Slovakia has 2000 inhabitants, of which between 8 and 12 members of Tomi’s family lives on the same street, making for an easy exchange of the dozen different varieties of sütémény baked by each of the households of the family; each woman of the family bakes three or four different varieties in mass quantities and then the exchange of baking occurs over some drinks on the days leading up to Christmas.

Sena, Slovakia-- approximately 18 km south of Kosice (Kassa, in Hungarian)

Sena street scene

Dani and I, in a futile attempt to work off the the sütémény, headed out for a stroll to explore the town—we came across the town cemetery. Now, in the winter in central Europe, when the sunshine is hidden behind thick ice clouds, the world can look a little like a black and white. But here, in the cemetery, is where Slovakia hides all its colour in the form of an almost comical amount of fake (and maybe some real) flowers lying across every granite coffin:

Sena Christian cemetery

Lanterns at every sarcophagus

In contrast to the slightly less conspicuous neighbouring Jewish cemetery:

Dani relayed to me that making the tombstones like "a circus"(her words, not mine) is super important for the reputation of the family; if the tomb looks like it isn’t being looked after (ie. lanterns out and lit and a constant stock of flowers) people begin to 'talk'. The perception of how good a family is is reflected in how they look after the deathbeds of their dearly departed family members.

That evening we were to go on an excursion to fetch Tomi’s hazi palinka from an old family cabin across the border in Hungary. Here, he stows his precious homemade palinka (so far the best I've tried here in Hungary) from which he replenishes his palinka stock in Budapest. But first, Tomi also has a connection with a local Tokaji wine maker, Laci, who owns 12 hectares of vineyard (from what I understand) and has been making Tokaji wine for 40 some years (again from what I understand..could’ve been 25 years but it has eluded me now—regardless—long time). Tomi and his cousin loaded the van up with large plastic jugs that were to be filled by Laci the winemaker directly at the location where the wine is fermented, a small warehouse nestled in behind an old synagogue. The plan was that we would stop at Laci's and pick up our jugs of wine before grabbing the hazi palinka from the family cabin. After this, we planned a quiet night of pizza and beer. But nope. If traveling teaches you anything it is that sometimes you just have to go with the flow.

We (Me, Dani, Tomi, Tomi’s cousin Juszi and his wife Petra) walked into the wine fermentation warehouse and were greeted by Laci and three other older Hungarian men sitting around an electric fireplace, soaking up its heat and drinking bottles of Tokaji wine.

We were of course immediately offered wine from the fermenting barrels and yes we sat and had our first drink while I tried to talk with these old Magyar men (with much success, surprisingly!)… and then they brought out the good stuff and continued to fill our glasses to the brim. In this place, I received the best service I've yet received in Hungary where, if my glass was half empty, they would refill it back up to the brim. These non-stop glasses of wine were even more exciting given it was Tokaji Aszu wine, allegedly the wine of kings.

Tokaji Aszu, sweet wine-  'the best wine in the world'- local man, Bela, owner of 12 horses who went to the market that day at 9 am and had yet to go home.

Zsigmond Moricz, one of Hungary's literary masters, wrote about this specific Hungarian wine in the early 20th century:

"Our family owns a bit of a vineyard...and there a wine is produced of which no one in the world has so much as the slightest conception...those wines can't be bought or sold. To tell the truth they don't cover the cost of cultivating the land, because it produces such a luxury item that for ordinary mortals it's so dear that there are no takers. Only emperors and kings can drink it... for example, there's that little 64 litre barrel. If it were to be weighed in pure gold even that wouldn't pay for it..." - From Very Merry, Zsigmond Moricz, 1928

Googling it, it looks like it goes for around 80 CAD a bottle. So yeah, not something I'd usually buy to make a potato and leek soup with.

One of the men then invited us all to the restaurant he owned down the street and fed us more Tokaji aszu wine and some homemade pizza pocket type things and more hazi palinka.

And finally, the grand finale of the evening, we were taken to Laci’s wine cellar, where he stores all of his barrels of wine as they age. This was perhaps the most special event I have ever experienced as a foreigner in a place. It was simply a 400 year old wine cave, down the road from the restaurant in this little Hungarian Tokaji village, nestled between family homes and apartment buildings:

The entrance to Laci's wine cellar

We entered in and made our way carefully down the stairs into the cellar, or cave really.

The stairway to heaven

Rows of barrels containing the delicately ageing wine lined the walls of the cellar.

The walls draped with a three inch thick spongy-fluffy black fungus that hung like thick curtains.

This, I was told, was the canary in the coal mine for Laci; that this fungus, and it’s health, was how Laci determined the health of the aging process in the barrels. A beautiful, elegant, miraculous feat of nature and display of ecosystem magic.

And of course here we were given more wonderfully sweet Tokaji wine to drink—no tourists, just us and Laci’s crew, and the Tokaji eukaryotic fungal universe. Magical.

We had set out pretty early on this excursion so we, after all these hours and drinks, were able to be home by about 8:30 or 9 pm…I loves me some early drinking.

We spent a quiet Christmas eve and Christmas day decorating the tree, eating Tomi’s mother’s delicious cooking and sütémény—oh god the sütémény!-- and watching made-for-tv-movies of old Czech and Slovakian fairy tales.

Trouble with the tree stand--a universal phenomenon in the x-mas celebrating world

A quiet Christmas eve dinner with the family--including Tomi's 89 year old grandmother who had just spent two days baking the shit out of sütémény, much to the chagrin of the family.

And my last night in town was spent going to the town ‘buli’… or the town party. Held in a local town hall kind of building, everyone pays a couple euros, gets a table for themselves and their friends and family, brings their own booze and food and dances the night away to a live band.

The gang-a-lang

Petra and Juszi, Tomi's cousin and wife

Not sure but these may have been the best sandwiches ever that Tomi's mother made for us to take--and it appeared that open-face sandwiches are all the rage for these types of events.

My friends, Tomi and Dani

Dancing the night away in Sena

After a late night of many fröccs, palinka, and shots of a Slovakian liquor called Borovicka...

Central Europe, they love their shots.

....I woke up the next day and prepared to head back to Budapest on the evening train, only about a 3 hour ride (train rides are never long enough, truly..well India can be a bit… “much”, I guess). There is something surreal about travelling in the dark, sitting in your own train cabin, chugging along through central Europe, something romantic, something old and sad and serious, like a Russian novel. One feels transported back in time. Eventually a well-dressed Hungarian business man joined me in the cabin and proceeded to help me with my luggage upon arrival in Budapest…yes, definitely transported back in time.

Arriving back in Budapest, I was happy to be alone again, after all the wonderful company that December provided. I am still an introvert afterall. Not to mention I am a highly routinized human being (which December did not provide space for). I cringe at the sound of the word 'routinized' but without my routines, my discipline disintegrates and all chances of dragging my ass off the couch, away from Netflix or other reruns of my favourite shows, falls away. I have too much love for doing nothing and everything so routine and discipline are absolutely necessary for me. I’m talking robotic, focused routine. If I think too much about my task-list for the day I will just plop down and watch another episode of Game of Thrones…and then another…and then another (a show I’ve watched a million times). I transform into a couch potato mostly to avoid uncomfortable feelings of uncertainty about life which are evoked, often times, by thinking about my research stuff.

Basically things got, admittedly, out of hand in December (and arguable November) when it comes to my major priorities: health and dissertation. Now, as I move into my permanent apartment this week, it is time to finally settle into this frigid Budapest winter and get down to the business of destroying my dissertation.