Puszi Puszi from Hungary

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After a quick three hour bus ride from Vienna, we arrived in Budapest and proceeded to find our way to our next host.

We had struggled to find anywhere to stay in Budapest but at the last minute, Moni, fom Couchsurfing, came to our rescue and offered us a couch and a very comfy beanbag for a couple of nights. The first night a few of her friends came around and they cooked us some delicious Hungarian food accomponied by a couple of shots of Palinka ( a traditional Hungarian Spirit) which had been made by her mother. After a good sleep in the next morning we headed out for a wander around Budapest to find a Langos and Catch up with Janos, a friend of Erics.

Budapest is really very stunning. The Danube is Huge and each bridge crossing it is completely different. There is the Buda side, which is very hilly and visually very beautiful and the Pest side which has all the clubs, pubs and shopping areas. Janos kindly showed us the must see places and we forced ourselves to walk up the hill to the castle where we got to see an amazing view of the city. Our last night in Budapest we stayed with Janko and Marco , Other host from C.S., and they took us to see Szimplakert, one of the Ruin Bars. ( The Ruin bars are what used to be old apartment buildings or factories and at the begginging of the 21st centuary were turned into complexes full of little bars, places to hang out and places to eat. You can spend a long time climbing the stairs and exploring all the rooms).

Previously, in Vienna, we had started to worry we were not going to find anywhere to wwoof in Hungary. The snow did not seem to be melting and we were receiving a lot of no's from places that had no work for us. Whilst browsing on couchsurfing, thinking we would have to keep moving from couch to couch, a notice suddenly popped up asking if anyone wanted to volunteer at an eco village two hours north of Budapest. We quickly wrote back to say we were very interested but maybe we could have a little more information about the place. Two days later we got an email back saying we could come for 1-2 weeks and an attachment to a website we could semi translate. We discovered we would be sleeping in a yurt but not much else.--

A few days later we were picked up from Eger Train Station by Magdi, the owner of the property, and Simon, a volunteer from France who is making a bike tour of Europe. After stopping to pick up wine and milk from various neighbors we made our way to the yurt. When we couldn't see anymore houses and were surrounded by forest we were told we would need to leave the car and walk the rest of the way, as it was to muddy to drive. At this point we started to worry that we may have been kidnapped by the gypsies we had been warned about but Magdi and Simons friendly smiles quickly diminished any fears we had had about coming and soon we could see horses and goats roaming the fields and the smoke billowing from the yurts.

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After three days trying to see as much as we could of Budapest it was nice to be back somewhere we could get our hands dirty. Yurt life was very simple. We woke up when the sun rose and went to bed when it got dark. If it wasn't raining or snowing we would find something to do outside, from making an outdoor eco shower to preparing a home for the chickens that would be arriving later in the week. On the few days it was snowing we stayed in the yurt making bread and preparing meals for the coming weeks. On really cold days we would even have a shot of palinka with breakfast to get us outside. Because there was no running water or electricity we only managed to wash twice whilst we were there but it was very lovely to hear the water boiling on the wood heated stove, then throw snow into the pots to adjust the temperature before splashing around in the miniature plastic tub.

On our last two nights we were even left to run the farm alone while Magdi went to visit family in Budapest and the other volunteers had moved on. On the last evening we set out to collect the eggs from the new chickens only, to our horror, find four of the chickens had escaped. We quickly spotted them happily pecking away in the forest but it took a good hour and a lot of swearing at each other to round them up and get them back in their pen. After all the chicken excitement we finally headed off to milk the goats and sadly found georgette, the oldest of the sheep had passed away. That night we had a couple more shots of Palinka to pay our respects to Georgette, a lovely sheep, and to toast the end of a fantastic two weeks with Magdi, Arpie and the kids, Simon, Mickey Gabor and all the friendly animals

Next stop. Romania!

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Photos

The Boys
The boys with Goban and Gombotts

Forgotten shoes.
Low key Holcaust memorial.

Langos!
Unfortunately not as good as the ones at Womad

Eric and Janos
Climbing the hill up to the castle.

Making Bread.
Hiding from the snow.

Comments

[georgina]

Fantastic!
I am enjoying this adventure so much. Live for the blog.