Try the Wine in Hungary

I went to Budapest looking for hummus. And wine. Lots of wine.

Basically, being entirely uninformed about the world and lacking every form of culture, when I travel, I talk to people who have travelled before me and ask them "where should I go?" and more importantly, " what should I do there?"
The result of this is a very long and jumbled list written by many hands on many scraps of paper found in various pockets and purses. My list has things on it along the lines of:
"Check out the Black Forest near Heidleberg in Germany."
"See the Avenue de Massena in Nice, France."
"Figure out how to pronounce Llanfairpwllgwyngyllgogerychwyndrobwllllantysiliogogogoch if you go to Wales."
"Try currywurst in Berlin."
And
"Try the wine in Hungary."

Well, I'm hoping to check out Heidleberg in a few days. I saw ALL of Nice thanks to my wonderful cousin, Leila. I am, unfortunately, not going to Great Britain, though I keep asking everyone who says they are from or have been there whether or not they can say that town's name- I haven't given up yet!- And I tried currywurst in Berlin. And it was incredible. So good. So so good.
So naturally, when I realized I'd be in the vicinity of Hungary, I thought to myself, 'Self, this is a wonderful time to try the wine.'
So really I went to Budapest looking for wine.

On the train ride to Budapest from Prague (it feels so weird to type that sentence in non-fictional first person...) I was seated in a booth with five other people. I passed out almost immediately from my sleepless Prague-adventures, and woke some hours later to a nearly empty cabin. I apologized to everyone left in case I had made a fool of myself, drooling, snoring, whathaveyou. The boy and the girl smiled and assured me I was a perfect lady while I slept. Thank goodness for that.
The girl was very nice, though very quiet. She told us finally that she was from the Czech Republic and was off to visit her boyfriend in his town for the first time. They'd been dating for a few months at school, but she'd never visited him at home before. She was nervous. I told her she'd be fine and wished her well. She left at the next stop.
The boy left in the cabin with me had just turned twenty and was born in Australia, but had been living in California for the last ten years. He told me he was named after Elvis Costello. "So your name is Elvis?" "No, Declan," he said. "Elvis Costello's real name is Declan." "Gotcha. Wouldn't have guessed that. I have a friend named after Dylan Thomas... his name is Dylan Thomas..." Needless to say we got along very well. We talked the whole rest of the ride. He was off to Budapest as a little vacation from Prague, where he was studying for the year. He talked about how vicious koalas are and that he likes sometimes to tell people he used to ride his pet kangaroo to school when he was a boy. "Just like I tell everyone about my pet beaver and how he gnawed through every single wooden house we made for him!" "Exactly!"

The point of all of this (oh yes, there is a point) is that it was Declan who told me about the hummus. He said to me that there was a bar, called the Hummus Bar, where they served all sorts of reasonably priced and fantastically delicious hummus. Suddenly I was craving mashed up chickpeas with a consuming passion. (I hadn't eaten since the day before... I should probably mention that.) He had a little sketchy map he took from his pocket with the Hummus Bar starred. It was one of his must-go places while in Budapest. I suddenly and viciously agreed with him and snapped a picture of his map so that I would have a copy to follow. Hours later when we got to the hot and sticky station which smelt of spices and bread and sweat (Welcome to Central Europe!) we exchanged hugs and encouragement to keep in touch and we parted ways. I went first to exchange some money, then to find out when the train to Krakow left that night. I was very excited to be in Hungary, but I did NOT want to spend the night there by myself. The train to Poland left at 20.05 and would go all through the night and drop me at the Krakow station at around 7am. The reservation ticket was 3€. What? Done! I had my reservation, I had just over four hours, and I had all of Hungary's wine and hummus calling out to me from the horizon!
I just had to find it.
Now, remember this and never forget my dedication, I hadn't eaten since the day before and it was now closing in on four in the afternoon. I was on a mission, though. A hummus-finding mission. So when I got lost- did I stop and eat at one of the hundreds of delicious smelling cafes along my road? Nope. When the temperature broke 96*F and I sweated out my entire body's weight twice a minute lugging my fifty seven pound backpack an unspeakably heavy guitar, did I give up and eat at some lesser, non-hummus-selling competitor? (For surely they must all be competitors, such was the grandeur I'd allotted to this mythical bar of hummus) No. I pressed on and sucked down my gallon of convenience store water. Dedication, I tell you!

So I got lost. Well, that's not entirely accurate. I went to the little star on my Aussie friend's map. It took me over an hour to get there with no breaks. I went right to where it specified. I found no hummus. Nothing. I sat on a stoop, sweaty and half-delirious from exhaustion and could have cried. In a last ditch effort (which I realize now should definitely have been an effort before ditches were even discussed) I checked my book about Europe which I have downloaded on my handy dandy iPod. I looked under the section called Hungary, the chapter called Budapest, and the heading called Food and found, to my squealing delight that the Hummus Bar and its address were listed. It was only a few blocks from where I was (a few looooong blocks... and by a few I definitely mean many). I'd gone so far already. Might as well. I was gross and I was puffing, but I was determined! It would be hummus or it would be DEATH!

I eventually found the corner where the bar should have been. NOTICE HERE HOW I WROTE THE WORDS "SHOULD HAVE BEEN"
I found a Starbucks. I found a Violin Pub- oh how freaking spiffy. But no hummus. Not a single chickpea rolling like a tiny tumbleweed down the pavement.
I walked down the street. Just to the end, I thought, and if it's not there then it was an elaborate hoax devised by the Let's Go Europe travel writers and my new terrible friend Declan and all of the rest of Australia as well. I was walking down the sidewalk, desperate, when a voice called out behind me "Play us a song!"

That happens ALL the time, wherever I am, because of the guitar. Normally I keep walking, but something, probably delirium, made me swing around. I found the source of the call. He was an amiable looking middle aged man in a group of other jovial middle aged men.
"Buy me a drink!" I called back.
"Well... What do you want to drink?"
"WINE!" I replied, hustling over. I dropped my things by their table. "Buy me wine..." I collapsed breathless into the stool they'd pulled over for me. They laughed and ordered me a glass of sweet red. I guzzled half in one go. Then we cheered together and I went at the second half.
Oh
My
Goodness
Hungarian wine is... It's like... It's like...
I'm sorry, I can't go on. It's too beautiful.

So as I caught my breath and pulled out my guitar and while I tuned it up I learned more about them. They were all German ("Well except him over there. He's Swiss. We don't talk about him..." motioning to a quiet guy in the corner laughing) and in town for a Stag Party. I gave the bachelor a hearty kiss on the cheek as a sending off gift. The boys roared with laughter and he got beet red in the face and chuckled along. I played for them. Somewhere after the second song they asked for a sing-along. I started "Good Riddance (Time of your Life)" by Green Day. Most of the guys were clueless, but one of them, my music connoisseur, started mumbling along through the first verse and caught on for the chorus. Soon everyone was joining in. We had a jolly good shout in the side-street making everyone slightly annoyed, but also slightly jealous, I'm sure, of the drunks at that table. I think this was the point when they bought me a second glass of wine and the waiter started taking videos of our antics, thoroughly enjoying himself. I realized partway through the last few choruses that my right hand was bleeding. I'd caught a hangnail and my strings were getting sticky. 'Heck yeah!' I told the guys when we'd finished the song. 'Now I'm freaking hardcore!'

The wine (Oh that Hungarian wine!) went straight to my head. Remember that not having eaten bit? Also remember that dedication I told you never to forget? Well that dedication ends the moment someone says the words "We'll buy" and I am not part of that we.
My connoisseur friend offered first, and everyone else shouted in agreement (and pointed to the Swiss friend) saying "We" (point point) "will buy you something to eat! Pick anything!" I grabbed for a menu and suddenly realized I was far too exhausted to actually read any of the words on it. I passed it to my pretty friend to my left and told him to pick something that looks Hungarian. "I don't think anything on this menu is Hungarian..." he said, flipping the pages. "Hamburger it is!" I replied. Oh! Those Hungarian hamburgers!
I ate mine with gusto, a little bit tipsy, and I tried to be a lady, but it's hard when your burger is slowly disintegrating in your hands and pushing itself out of various gaps you hadn't noticed in the bun... While I Zoidberg'd my burger, my connoisseur friend fiddled with the guitar, playing a heartfelt German song that got everyone to laughing hysterics, and then some American songs. 'God Bless Texas' got everyone singing along, although my drunk friend to my right wasn't so much going for singing the words and screaming them in a garbled attempt at a southern accent.
I played a few more after the burger, including my favourite performance of 'Fly Away' to date. They were all singing along with me- it was so wonderful. I said to them "Okay boys, the chorus goes 'fly away'- you'll get it, are you ready?!" then I played enthusiastically and at the end we had some people harmonizing, others attempting to harmonize, and still other just yelling 'fly away!' at the tips of their lungs. It was beautiful.

The waiter brought us papers with the name of their pub and its domain name on Facebook, saying he'd post his photos for us on there. I got some pictures of the wine and then we took some fantastic group shots (you can see my drunk friend having problems with gravity in some of them, I think). I had to leave to start my long walk back to the station to catch my train, and the boys had to do a lot of stripper related things, but I entrusted my most responsible friend with my card so we could stalk each other on Facebook, and then, with lots of hugs and cheek kisses, we parted ways. How gloriously unexpected.

When I finally got back to the station (after stopping for ice cream since I hadn't spent any money on dinner) I got into my little bunk on the train thoroughly dizzy with wine, laughter, sugar, dehydration, and exhaustion. And that, my friends, is exactly the way you should go to bed while on vacation.


(I find myself craving hummus after writing this... oh dear)



And for posterity, in no particular order or reference to any one group photo:
My music connoisseur friend: White button up shirt
My pretty friend: white polo with thin horizontal stripes
My drunk friend: fighting with gravity in khaki shorts
My soon-to-be-groom friend: brown t-shirt with a yellow circle in the middle
My Swiss friend: long sleeved shirt with thin stripes black and white
And finally, My most responsible friend: hiding in the back row, tall with glasses
The others did not sing loud enough to earn typed classifications. : ) Just kidding. They are all my smiley friends.