Summer journey 2009 – Part 2 – Hungary & Poland

On the 4th of august, Vincent had to go home from Bratislava and when he took the plane back to Holland, I took a trainride to Budapest, Hungary to visit Denes Tozser, a friend I met during my 7 month stay in Turkey. Unfortunatly I wasn’t able to see a lot of Budapest (which simply means I have to go back there – but what I did see was great!), but because of the tiring 2,5 weeks in Slovakia (especially from the bus/trainrides and the hiking in the more remote areas) I was kind of happy we wouldn’t be staying in the crowded city for too long. Instead, we went to his hometown Szekesfehervar which is about 45 minutes out of Budapest. When we arrived at his house, traditionally we had to drink a shot of palinka (Denes, was it really a tradition?:P). And trust me; vodka is nothing compared to this!

We stayed a few days in Szekesfehervar and I met some of Denes his friends. We went out a few times to parties before we would go to Krakaw, Poland by train. We also visited a farm where people went horseback riding. Some of Denes his friends work here.

A hell of a trainride with two extremely smelling persons later that shared the same wagon as us, we arrived in Krakaw We called our wagon ‘the coffin’ because of the smell the other two men had. They farted all the time and for sure they hadn’t showered in a decade. They also tried to forbid us from opening the window.

In Krakaw we stayed in a nice hotel. We walked around the main square – which is really great – and drank Denes his ‘favourite beer in the world’ in the evening while listening to some life music (drank some vodkas too, though..).

The next day we went on to Lodz (pronounced as ‘Woodzj’), famous for it’s filmschool. Because of this school, the town is also known under the name ‘Hollylodz’.

Allthough I’m very interested in filmmaking and one day hope to make it my profession, we were here for yet another reason; to meet up with another friend who we got to know in Turkey as well. Agnieszka Kuckowska (Aga). During our stay in Turkey the three of us were hard to separate, so you can imagine how good it was seeing each other again. After a few interesting and fun days in Lodz, it was time to go back home. Aga went from Lodz to Warsawa airport because she was flying to her boyfriend in NYC. Denes and me went back to Krakaw. Saying goodbye in these cases is always a bit hard, so we said ‘see you’, instead.

Denes went from Krakow directly to Budapest (but I got a text message from him about 10 hours later that somehow his train had ‘missed’ Budapest) and I went back to Bratislava. The train connections from Krakow to Bratislawa were not that good either, but tired as (we all were) I was, managed to get back to Bratislava in one piece. I spent one more day there where I took a short hike up the castle and where I finished reading my book ‘The Historian’ from Elizabeth … in a quite place. Later back in the old part of town I enjoyed a perfect cappuccino in the lovely old town before flying home the next morning. All together, it was  journey never to forget. But ‘every journey ends the way back home’.