Misadventure in Budapest
The cab driver is furious. He's rabid. I'm afraid he'll bite me and I'll need shots. For NEW subscribers, a 5- minute journey
A comedy of errors to brighten your day. Guaranteed 100% *schadenfreude from the travel archive of June 2023. Especially for my NEW SUBSCRIBERS.
The handsome waiter has dark hair and the melancholy eyes of a poet – deep, black, intelligent eyes with smudges of dark shadows around them. He looks like he’s been up all night pleasuring women. His subtle, but intense gaze almost makes me regret his reserved politeness. Snap out of it! He is waiting to take your order. Oh...right…let’s see…where was I?
Everything on the menu at this once-grande Belle Epoch hotel restaurant is a ticket on the coronary express: over-cooked vegetables, mega-doses of salt, fatty stewed pork, fried everything. All main dishes seem to be served under a layer of liquid red grease, heavily spiced and topped with sour cream and bacon. I order The Heartburn Special.
I assure you I am not a fussy eater. I am not averse to trying exotic foods, however my dietary restrictions often overshadow my desire for culinary adventure. Health concerns aside, meals in this comfortable, palatial, but now slightly seedy, spa-hotel are served with copious amounts of pleasant condescension by a large cadre of impeccable, formal waiters attired in smart blue jackets. Ten waiters for 15 tables stand against the wall, subtly watching the diners to anticipate our every need. This legion of liveried servers, the heavy white and gold china, crystal glasses, and mountains of over-sized silverware all attest to the prosperous, more opulent days of the 1890s.
The Magyar language seems to have zero correlation with English or with any other language I have learned to travel in. Aside from “telefon” and “posta”, all I get from staring at a sign is a head ache. I mean if you saw a sign that said,
Ne lépjen be ezen az ajtón
would you have a clue? I think not. I face words like “dohanyzas tilos” and “erkézés” and come up empty. I am not exactly dying of language deficiency, but am sorely wounded. It is all due, of course, to my lack of preparation, but Hungarian looks like Klingon to me, or the language of Mordor. I get through four days with only 7 emergency phrases in Magyar:
Yes (Igen) No (Nem) Sorry (Elnézést) Please (Kérlek)
Thanks (Köszönöm) Toilet (WC) Cheers! (Egészségére!)
Of course, you would be more prepared than I, with your sissy little electronic translators and menu scanners. Sure! Let them do the talking for you! I was, apparently, over-confident.
~~~
I am an experienced traveler, and I’ve always traveled alone, but I have to admit Budapest has been challenging, and today, upon leaving this city, I committed what could only be described as one of the worst gaffes ever perpetrated by a tourist. Or at least by me.
My suitcase was on the sidewalk as the taxi arrived. In my arms was a sturdy small open tote bag with travel snacks, a book, a sweater, and a re-corked half bottle of Tokay. The taxi driver picked up my suitcase and lobbed it into the trunk. When he tried to grab my tote bag, I shook my head and told him in careful English, “No, I want to hold my bag. I don’t want it to spill.” He growled and snatched it from me and overhanded it into the trunk. He yelled what could only have meant, “Hurry up and get in, you old bat.”
In the frantic drive to the station, swerving in and out of traffic with a driver who apparently had little to live for, the tote bag fell over and, as I feared, wine spilled onto the carpet of his trunk. Wine everywhere. He was furious. He was rabid. I feared he would bite me and I would need shots. Of course I could not explain to him that that was why I wanted to hold my bag in the first place. He called me a few severely insulting names. I didn’t need to know the language to understand what he thought about Americans and, in particular, about this one.
He was on the verge of striking me, but curious onlookers had crowded around, so instead he demanded HUF3,000! “Three thousand forint!” he yelled, shaking his fist. Actually, I think he may have been over-reacting just a bit, but what could I do? I meekly took out my wallet and counted out 3,000 forints from my wallet and mumbled apologies in five different languages, none of which he was even remotely interested in. He snatched the money out of my hand with a snort and tossed out a couple extra expletives for good measure, slammed the trunk closed and roared off. My knees were trembling so bad that I had to sit down for a minute. I was mortified by the scene I’d caused, and avoided eye-contact with anyone. The crowd dispersed, and I scuttled off to find my train car, lugging my wine-soaked bags, and making the apologetic noises of a town drunk.
Now, settled into my second-class seat, watching Budapest slowly fade behind me in the distance, I come to realize with both shame and gratitude that though my error caused me a lot of mortification and embarrassment, the fine was equivalent to only $9.
~~~
“I wanted real adventure to happen to myself,” said James Joyce. “but real adventure does not happen to people who remain at home. They must be sought abroad.”
What is this real adventure of which he speaks? For some, a real adventure might be a trek across an African desert, a journey up the Amazon by canoe, or diving in the Great Barrier Reef. For me it might be a possible dalliance with a handsome waiter ( wouldn’t be the first time, I admit), an entire menu of food I cannot digest, a language code that I cannot crack, or a narrow escape from the wrath of a (possibly) deranged cabbie.
All hearts don’t necessarily require a safari or a balloon ride to skip a few beats. Sometimes merely surviving a city — and getting to a train that carries one safely off to somewhere else, is adventure enough.
**Schadenfreude is the experience of pleasure, joy, or self-satisfaction that comes from witnessing the troubles, failures, or humiliation of someone else.
If this story of my Hungarian humiliation entertained you, you will definitely revel in my personal psychic pain in ZORKA AND THE BUDAPEST SPA
"meals in this comfortable, palatial, but now slightly seedy, spa-hotel are served with copious amounts of pleasant condescension by a large cadre of impeccable, formal waiters attired in smart blue jackets."
This really sets the tone. I admire you for your solo travels. Really enjoyed reading this one again, Sharron.
A wonderful experience. My fear is that one day Uber will truly take over the world and end the gut-wrenching excitement of getting in a foreign cab. They are little badges of honor, better than passport stamps. I got scammed in Naples and learned. Avoided throwing up from car sickness in Beijing. Got left on the highway in Paris by a driver who got lost. All fun stories, like this one. I hope your bag was able to be cleaned :)