Hungary, 2011

"...Armed with intricate directions as to how to use the bus system in Budapest to get to my hostel, I exchanged my zloty's for forint's and decided that during my time in Hungary I would not be able to make sense of either the currency system or the language. Most cryptic locale of the vacation by far. 

Not knowing anything about Budapest, and again being subject to the world’s most heinous-to-learn language, I was late and missed the departure of the free tour. Unscathed by my failure, I was able to pop into a local Starbucks (thank you, globalization) and roamed the internet for another valid sightseeing option. I hopped on a bus tour, of which I was the only initial rider because it was below freezing and currently snowing. Nonetheless, I insisted on sitting in the open air second floor with my personal tour guide. He couldn't have been older than 30, and we sat on the top floor of the double decker bus enjoy roughly 30 minutes of unabridged, personalized Budapest socializing and sightseeing. Eventually a Chinese man hopped on our bus and had more talking points than the original two of us combined and thus dominated the remainder of the tour. He took my picture as we stood at the top of Castle Hill in Buda, overlooking the Danube River, and he bought a candy bar and shared it with me to “keep upwards my level of energy as we trail blaze urban Hungary,” (direct quote). And I thought I had gumption.

Running on virtually no sleep, I reluctantly decided to grab some fruit and bread at a supermarket and go to bed early that night. I wanted to see the infamous “baths” of Budapest the next day, and I had a bus to catch at 1 pm. As I was settling into my 6-person hostel room, I met a 28 year old traveler from Melbourne, Australia. He was traveling with two friends, who were sleeping off hangovers a few rooms down, and he invited me to join them on a night-out that evening with whoever from the hostel dared to join. I politely declined, looking forward to much-needed R&R, and he returned with, “Come on. When will you ever be a single woman, alone, on a Friday night in Budapest ever again?” Never, phrase-that-is-most-likely-to-terrify-my-parents; never.

I went out with the Australians, a guy from Rome, and a random Hawaiian-born Korean who was raised in Texas who was also staying at our hostel (commence chanting “USA! USA!” upon discovering another American-born), and interestingly enough, one of the Australians and the Hawaiian-Korean-Texan both spoke fluent Korean. As such we were all subject to ear-piercing secret conversations spoken in Korean randomly throughout the night. We stopped at a bar adorned with pastel and glitter covered animal heads mounted on chandeliers and ordered rounds of beers. Eventually, we decided to be a little bit more culturally correct and ordered the drink of choice for Budapesti locals: becherovka, a liquor that resembles a cinnamon-infused vodka. 

We continued to casually barhop around the Pest side of Budapest, stopping at a hookah bar and a beer garden where, among other things, I learned what Australian colloquialism sounds like and how to open & light an old-fashioned flip lighter in one fell swoop off of my jeans. More significantly, I was again reminded of how intricately lives are weaved; I can and did find "my people" no matter where I went. The people I went out with that night in Budapest, in the snow, on a whim, rapidly became slap-happy buddies that I felt like I had known for years. People that understood me, and vice versa. Life gives you what you need, even when what you need isn't the same as what you want. I wanted a nice night in for some R&R; I got a handful of foreigners that paid for my cinnamon vodka all night and reassured me that no matter what, I can go anywhere in the world and still find people that will look out for me. That I'm never really going to be alone. 

Much to the surprise of concerned parents everywhere, we all made it back to the hostel all in one piece, no one worse for the wear, no one abducted or roofied, and soundly to bed by 4 AM. The one caveat to the night, where I exposed my inner Midwestern American girl, was when I had a heck of a time explaining what the “champagne of beers” was to my Australian counterparts at a 24-hour gyro shack we found at 2 AM. 1200 forints and many grimaces later, I shamed American brewing to a pack of Australians. Apparently if THAT was the champagne of beers, American brewing is “complete bloody rubbish”."