Whenever I go up to Normafa, I feel a bit like one of the Bagginses setting out on an adventure. As the bus or the cogwheel train makes its unhurried way up the hillside, I am slowly surrounded by names that would not sound out of place in a Tolkien story- or Winnie the Pooh’s…
Tag: Budapest
Budapest in the Fog
Since we’re still waiting for that elusive snow-and by the looks of it, we might very well wait forever and then some, this year’s moody Budapest winter tries to compensate with other phenomena, such as this weekend’s insistent fog. And it looks quite spectacular too, especially as it hovers over the Danube, filtering the rays…
Just a Bit of Frozen Planning
Every now and then I get linguistic crushes: I grow very affectionate of expressions in a certain language, and often suffer when I find they are nigh untranslatable. That’s probably their charm in the first place- finding them I feel I discovered a way of saying something I hadn’t known before. Such is the French…
River of Ice- A Walk along the Wintry Danube
To quote Blur (and it’s very nice to start a post by quoting your favourite Britpop band), modern life is rubbish. These days, instead of going out onto my balcony to investigate whether I feel mildly cold, just plain old cold, or hideously cold, I constantly refresh the alpha and omega of all Hungarian weather…
Best of 2016- Budapest
So since last year I started a tradition (though I don’t know if you can already call it that after only one iteration) of listing some things which I found particularly nice about Budapest in the previous twelve months, I will try to continue it this year, with new ones, and perhaps see how many…
The Budapest Christmas Market Roundup
December is neatly divided into two phases, which follow each other abruptly and without any form of transition. Phase one is the oh Christmas is still ages away, I will take my time and enjoy this bit, when you cheerily look at a shop window or two and passingly check out a Christmas market with…
Barlove: Wild Flower Bar
Update September 2019: The Wild Flower has now moved and changed its name, it is called Plante and you can find it at Madách Imre út 8. When you’re a child you imagine many many wonderful and ultimately impossible things about your brilliant future, and for me one of these was gaining the dexterity which…
Barlove: London Coffee Society
I must confess to being immune to most modern diet fads- and am proud of it too. Just the other day, when a creative cook sneaked super healthy broccoli onto my otherwise excellent ravioli I felt as happy as a T-Rex ogling the horizon to discover a giant ball of hell’s fire headed straight for…
Transition Random- from Summer to Autumn
One day I will probably make peace with the fact that I always run out of schedule with the monthly randoms, but until then I can pretend that at least this time I actually meant the stuff to run over two months, and therefore cover the transition from summer to autumn and such. No, of…
Time for Those Foggy Mornings
Every year people complain that winter comes suddenly: there’s Indian summer and then the freezing winds of the Arctic, and you can’t ever really wear your autumn jacket because you’re either too hot or too cold in it. I am coming to think that the famous transition period- probably should be October-never really existed. It’s…
Pocket Diary Budapest 