It’s been a year now of this liminal state, when walking in the bright sunshine of the deserted city feels like the odyssey of a vampire sneaking in the dark, alone with ghosts and shadows. The dark itself doesn’t even seem to exist anymore; we’re locked out of it by the night curfew. We’re locked…
Category: things to do in Budapest
Ode to a Muddy Stream- A Year of Walking by the Rákos-patak
It came in waves, like the sea, but the unpleasant sort, a cold sea with mud and plankton. Wave one, the paranoid days. Cases in Hungary were still low in spring, but as lockdown loomed, we stayed inside and, quite unnecessarily as per the latest studies, disinfected doorknobs and beer cans. Wave two, the second…
Complainer Meets Hope: Best of Budapest 2019
The year started in the cold corridors of the Adria Palace, its fading beauty on display in the eerily dazzling Blade Runner 2049, and now also to be glimpsed in the Black Widow trailer. Finally, a film where Budapest IS Budapest, not just a prop pretending to be some other random city, though I’m also…
A Story of Chalk and Crystal: Day Trip to Fox Mountain
Just when we thought we had finally run out of Budapest hills (or mountains, as per the local parlance) to summit, we were made aware of the existence of the poetically named Róka-hegy (Fox Mountain), situated very close to the city’s administrative border with Üröm. This seemingly extreme location is actually fairly easily reachable by…
The Budapest Saint Patrick’s Day Parade 2019
Last year I did the unthinkable and skipped the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade- my excuse would be that since it always takes place very close to the March 15th long weekend, one feels tempted to use the extra bank holiday for some sort of city break and I could not resist temptation. This year, though,…
Fainting Chairs and Russian Spies: The Villas of Mátyásföld
The best thing about going on a city walk with a historian is that they will enthusiastically convey anecdotes about the places you’re visiting, throwing in a couple of juicy details for good measure, and then, with a much more matter of fact tone, they will also inform you that your exciting trivia is just…
To Be Or Not To Be A (Wash)Bear: A Visit to the Budakeszi Wildlife Park
One of my favourite books as a child was a beautiful shiny orange hardcover by the Hungarian name of Mosó Masa Mosodája– its alliterative beauty will obviously be lost in a direct English translation, which would be Masha the Raccoon’s Laundrette, but one might alternatively undertake some linguistic acrobatics along the lines of Washy Wooshy’s…
Gardens and Recreation: A Day in Füvészkert
Writing about the cherry blossom festival held annually in ELTE’s Botanical Garden (or Füvészkert in Hungarian) is perhaps not particularly timely, as this year’s event was held on the previous two weekends of April but recommending it without the pictures is somewhat of a Catch 22 situation. Sure enough, we do have pictures from previous…
An Hour at the Museum: Visiting the Restored Romanesque Hall of the Budapest Museum of Fine Arts
In the past years I have occasionally complained to whoever was willing to listen (or not, it was not really their choice) that I miss visiting the El Grecos in the Museum of Fine Arts. The El Grecos, mind you, have not made any grand escape, it’s simply that the museum is closed for restoration,…
Welcome to the Spring-Summer of our Contentment- A Budapest Concert Calendar
Spending too much time in a corporate environment does many strange things to people, one of them being the fact that you only really trust data which comes in an Excel format, and you only truly respect it if there is a convoluted macro involved. Being myself a victim of this delusion, I decided to…
Pocket Diary Budapest 