IT WAS THE BUDAPEST OF TIMES, IT WAS THE BUDAWORST OF TIMES

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Interesting Hungary fact: It was not actually the Budaworst of times. Interestingly, "budaworst" is a Hungarian word that directly translates into English as "the moment you lovingly stop a dying daffodil from being torn apart at the hands of an enraged man wearing a pink leotard". It is used with surprising regularity.

Gem, Jim, Matt, Matt, Matt, 'n' Will

After psyching ourselves up with our usual ritual (me writing a needlessly long blog whilst Matt sits around practising the ancient art of fuck-all), we bid farewell to our Kraking hostel and set off for the night train with dreams of Budapest and Harry Potter (Matt often dreams of Harry Potter running around the streets of Budapest crying "Matt? Come to me, Matt! Why won't you hold me any more?" It is a touchy subject we rarely speak of).

On the way we met some friendly Oxfordians (including a couple of medics, who had apparently overcome the intolerance to natural light that is prevalent amongst their kind) who were travelling on the same train as us. The train turned out to be the sweetest deal since the word "sweet" and several bon-bons were sold to the English language by an alien race known as the 'Rockians' for a mere 12 pounds 50 and half a goat: we had proper beds with sheets, blankets, pillows, and even a couple of Chinese guys! Wandering around the train, we managed to break our own record for awesome first-impressions by falsetto-singing the line "I love it when you make me soup" from the Gay Bum smash hit 'Big Face' just as some girls from Leeds passed by - a mistake the explanation "It's from gay bum, big face" apparently can't redeem.

Judged, we started talking to the people furthest from this incident, who happened to be some cool guys from Manchester called Jim and Matt. We talked about everything from prog rock to their many drug-induced adventures (thinking aboot it, that doesn't actually leave much scope for the conversation at all...), and before long a girl called Gem joined in. Now, this would've been fine if she wasn't also travelling with a guy called Matt - I ended up feeling incredibly left out of the "Gem, Jim, Matt, Matt, and Matt" name-combination conspiracy that seemed to be going on, and the whole night, nay! the whole TRIP was ruined. Still, I'm not one to hold a grudge. At least, I'm not one to hold a grudge once all their family and friends have been killed. For the meanwhile, however, we all just agreed to hit the Turkish baths (the Hungarian Turkish baths?) together the next day.

Sweet Suite

At stupid o'clock the next day (a time closely related to ridiculous o'clock), we arrived in Budapest. Things got off to a good start when the conductor, who had insisted on looking after our interrail passes overnight, returned mine, but not Matt's. Sadly, I was sleeping at the time and thus missed this opportunity to escape. Matt stepped up to the conductor, gave him a quick couple of backhands, and insisted that the conductor get his interrail back, and then gave him another backhand for good measure. The idiot then proceeded to wander around the train asking EVERYONE if they had Matt's railpass. Columbo would've been proud. Eventually, the pass was found, in exactly the same way that the conductor's body never will be.

After getting off the train, we managed to lose our new=found 'friends' within seconds after a series of events we have chosen to view as accidental. So, we trudged off to find our hostel - the Suite Hostel - which thankfully only took us about 5 hours. The cheap Chinese place next door more than made the place worth the wait, though - the drunken Irishman who greeted us was just an added bonus. The hostel also turned out to be two stories above the hostel the girls from Leeds were staying in, which we found disconcerting, given Matt's history of being stalked (he has over 300 restraining orders against various people, mostly nature programs).

Bedraggled, tired, and smelling of sweet roses, we stumbled into our hostel to the greetings of some cool American dude and the aforementioned Irishman, named Shaun. We asked Shaun why he was drinking at 8.30am. It was a stupid question really. He explained tht he had been out all night and hadn't been to bed yet. He advised us that the best way to get over a mixture of sleep deprivation and severe hangover was beer. Now, whilst this advice may not have been all that surprising (there is still no recorded case in history of an Irishman giving advice that didn't involve drinking beer) or, perhaps, wise, it was advice we took to heart and still live by to this day. So, after Matt had lost his coffee virginity to a milkless horror, we stocked up on 80p beers and started the day in style. The hostel turned out to be AMAZING - it put the 'Buda' in 'Budapest' (that is to say, it was big and very happy, and everyone got wasted in the evenings. Did Buddha get wasted in the evenings? He probably got wasted in the evenings.) After meeting the rest of the surprisingly English-dominated hostel, we headed out to the city, which is somewhat glorious just to walk around. Highlights included cheap meals and whiskeys at a blues bar with a MASSIVE face on the wall, jumping over a sprinkler in the grounds of the national museum, and curing AIDS.*

Face Control, Dress Code

Once back at the hostel, the drinking began good and proper. Hundreds (well, 20) gathered, including the random girls from Leeds (I had to restrain Matt from running and jumping out of the window), and Matt and I introduced to the Aussie 'game' we learned in Krakow that we've affectionately, if unimaginatively, named "Pick a card and drink". A couple of Freight Trains (apparently also known - for reasons that go way beyond the reasonable boundries of both logic and the physical abilities of the human body - as Fuck The Bus) and a Ring Of Fire later we were ready to rock. And by that I mean: we were ready to get kicked out of the hostel for breaking a glass. Either way, we headed out onto the street and started taking part in an age-old tradition known in Hungary as "Taming the Flying Walrus", and in England as "Taking photos of everyone jumping in the air". Surprisingly enough, the formula of:

Masses of alcohol + people unable to afford much food + attempts to get locals involved

Didn't turn out to be a formula for much success on this front, but I do say! we all had jolly good fun, what what.

Eventually we wound up at a bar called Buddha Beach. I'd be lying if I said I could remember anything of what happened at this point.

I can remember everything of what happened at this point, and what that was was mostly taking advantage of cheap drinks and seats at the club that we heard described by an American the next day as "retarded dead". At precisely 12.43, I pulled my infamous disappearing act. I remember absolutely nothing of the journey home - which is disconcerting, seeing as I didn't know the way - but, judging by the lack of injuries, significant losses in money, and anal pains, it can't have gone too badly. Meanwhile, the others made the weird decision that staying out and partying would be more fun than going home alone, and went on to a club called Rio. Never one to miss an opportunity to take advice from Iron Maiden, Matt proceeded to Rock In Rio. The following details are what scientists have managed to extract from his warped and fragmented mind:

Moments after entering the club, the entire place erupted into a riot that shall be known throughout the annals of time as the "Massive Fucking Riot of '08". Over 200 people lost their lives, and over 20 more are thought to have been fighting so fiercely that they spontaneously combusted. In a moment of insight, Matt managed to prevent the whole thing from becoming an international disaster through the use of interpretive dance. Soon, everybody was dancing, and Matt is now hailed as a national hero, with a national holiday in his honour called, for no apparent reason, "German Pancake Day".

Another scientist has given the alternative interpretation that a small scuffle broke out between a couple of our friends and some Hungarians after a small misunderstanding, but things were soon resolved and everybody ended up dancing. As dancing is the common result of these stories, we can assume that a good night was had by all, and to all a good night.

Back at the hostel, Matt and I reunited in a moment that has since been described as "nothing special".

Fuck your money bitch nigga

The next day, we went through the prepatory routine of collapsing out of bed, screaming in agony in a freezing shower, and a breakfast of beer (thanks, Shaun) that we always go through to get ourselves ready for a day of serious sightseeing.

We set out with a Londoner named Jono to the Buda side of Budapest (that's right, there's a Buda side of Budapest. That means there's also a Pest side. Sucks to be them). Our first stop of the day was up the citadel, which gave awesome views of the whole city. The real highlight came at the top of the citadel in the form of 3 statues: firstly, there was some guy holding what appeared to be a sock on a stick in an 'En Guard!' position. Then there was a MASSIVE woman whowas holding a leaf that was, despite her already gigantic size, still disproportionately big. For reasons that were incredibly clear at the time, but have become somewhat blurred with the sands of time, we figured that the statue had laser eyes that it used to defend the city in times of war. The real gem, however, came with the 3rd statue. Such a gem it was, we're going to have to new paragraph this bitch up some!

The statue was of a guy. And this guy was... PUNCHING A HYDRA. Ok, ok, wait, let's take this in here: he'd taken a multiheaded beast down... was standing over it... and he was punching it. Motherfucking HERCULES needed a torch and a sword to take out one of these bad boys, but this guy... He was punching a hydra!

Alright, I guess that's that point hammered home. So, afterchilling on some randomly placed guns (that's right, on. They were big guns. Even Stallone would've broken a sweat weilding these guys) we strolled along the promenade beside the Danube before heading to Magarit island, where we sat next to a massive fountain that swelled and... deswelled... in intensity with the classical music that was playing nearby. As you can tell, all of this was incredibly manly and in no way homoerotic. Not at all. Na-ah. Not one bit. Noooooooooo way.

Another highlight of the island was an old guy in speedos with a yellow bucket who went aroung trying to claim that other people's food was his, and attempting to fish in the fountain using an empty beer bottle. Hmm...

Fuelled by Satan

That night we got drinking with some French guys and a Swedish man named Goge, with whom we spent most of the night discussing metal, which is strange, because Swedish people don't tend to like metal. After a fair few dirt cheap beers (literally - dirt has become a valuable commodity in Hungary ever since the infamous campaign to destroy dirt that gained inexplicable support in Hungary during the mid-80s. The craze was eventually stopped when Isaac the Wise asked "Wait... what are we doing?", at which point everyone realised that they were idiots, put down their 'Dirt Destroyer Mac III's, and went back to work. But I digress) we headed to a bar that, essentially, was an old bombed-out building from World War II that someone had chucked some tables and chairs in. It was pretty damn cool, to say the least.

Sufficiently drunk, we meandered our way back to the hostel, where we overjoyed to find Hungarian South Park on TV! Well, "overjoyed" may be an exaggeration. Underjoyed may be more accurate.

The next day we journeyed to Croatia. The Great Extravaganza, as of then, remained elusive.

*One of these three did not happen. Text your answer to 8898898888888888888888 or email it to [e-mail] You could win a bike!**

**No, you couldn't.

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Comments

[Lord Of The Dance (said he...and by that I mean "said I"... so .]

A HYDRA?!!!111112call0800-1563-734 or reverse dial 0800-quuuuuuuueee??
I don't like to do this, for I feel that the best of things are things that come from experiences had and experiences lost...but I might have to steal your statue of hydra-punching experience and convert it into a song. But one of you, or both, will have to play bass, to add authenticity. Needless to say, I am practically weeping with jealousy. In fact, the only reason that I am NOT weeping with jealousy is that I am also practically weeping with laughter (the on-going War Of The Tears leaves room for neither compromise nor victory). Perhaps if I remain thus then sooner or later one eye will weep for joy and one in pain...which will give me quite the cool look. So jealous am I that I actually looked up flights to Istambul for Tuesday to Saturday. Sadly they are £140 and, since I have £7, I think this means that I cannot come, though my math isn't great so I'll consult...McMaths. Or some other such undergod. To be totally honest, I'm not sure HOW I was expecting to find flights for under £7...especially since I need £5.10 to get out of Manchester...and £3 to first get INTO Manchester, from where I can then proceed to get out... But yes, the tangent takes a hold so strong. I shall leave this place now and be glad that your fun will be over soon. Ha!