Way OT - anybody here familiar with Budapest?

[Notes_Norton]

Hi y'all,

 

This is very off-topic, so please don't clutter the board with responses but e-mail me directly. There is an e-mail link on my website http://www.nortonmusic.com under the "Home" or "About & Contact Norton Music" (sorry, the e-mail link on my website is spam-bot protected and I don't want to post the address here).

 

Leilani and I are planning to take my mother-in-law to the city of her ancestors, Budapest for her 80th birthday. We will spend a week in the city and want to make it a special experience for her.

 

She has mentioned a mineral bath and folk music, especially gypsy music. She remembers her grandfather mentioning these things.

 

Leilani and I are more travelers than tourists, but we want to do a few tourist things with her mom because we think that will make the trip better for her.

 

So any advice on where to go and what to do in the city would be welcomed.

 

Thanks,

Notes

[Notes_Norton]

Hey Notes heres a thought since you are a world traveler from other posts bring a instrument' date=' get a small gig and do I hear "TAX DEDUCTION". [/quote']

Thanks. I thought of that, and my sisters are both CPAs so I consulted them about possible tax deductions.

 

But to get any deduction at all would require a lot of time on my part, and a lot of documentation which would take time off from my mother-in-law's sightseeing.

 

Normally Leilani and I don't do all the normal tourist things, but her mom is going to be 80, and has Parkinson's disease, so our joy will be to make a nice vacation for her. It's her first and probably her only chance to visit the land of her ancestors.

 

So as much as I would like to, we won't be visiting music stores, attending a classical music concert (a nice orchestral piece by Bartok or Kodaly would be great) and traveling without much of a plan (ad-libbing it). Instead we want to take her to a mineral bath, churches, museums, folk music/dance performances, and things like that.

 

I'll have to save the tax deduction for another trip.

 

Notes ?

[Robin Nahum]

Hi Bob - or szervusz Rowbairt,

 

I just thought I would post here to say a bit but can follow up with PM/email.

 

My wife and I - also more travellers than tourists, visited Budapest in 2005. It is a beautiful city. You are very lucky.

 

Folk Music and Dance

 

We both enjoy Hungarian folk music and dancing, and there is a great band in Sydney that plays this music - the Transylvaniacs, and a dance group, Kengugro that does village dances. The pace of the dance group is a bit lively for us so we have lessons with a group of older folk.

 

In the warmer months, Sally, the bracha player in the Transylvaniacs takes small groups to Transylvania, now part of Romania, which is where traditional Hungarian folk culture tends to survive - although it is under pressure from other musics and cultures. Sally organises stays with families in villages and you get to hear a lot of traditional music and learn lots of dances.

 

www.carpathiantours.com.au

 

You also get to drink pahlinka (apricot brandy) which has proved to be a keeper. A fine drop! We like Futyulos best.

 

We spent a week in Budapest after returning from Transylvania.

 

And you need to be aware that Hungarian folk music is distinct from gypsy music. The former tends to come from specific villages and the tunes (and dances) evolve only very slowly from one generation to the next. On the other hand, the gypsy players tend to pick up and use bits and pieces from all over the place. That said, the musical tradition in Polotka (one of the villages we visited) is now kept alive by a Rom family.

 

If you want to hear traditional folk music in Budapest and see folk dancing - or even go to a tanchas (literally dance house - loosely “bush dance” in Australian), I would suggest getting in touch with the folks in:

 

Teka http://w3.datanet.hu/~teka/teka.html

 

We met them in Perth last year when they played for a dance camp we attended. Pal the bassist, who is the contact, speaks English.

 

Tukros www.myspace.com/tukros

 

We have not met them but have one of their CDs. They visited Australia before my wife and I got the bug.

 

Just found this as well.

 

http://hungarianfolkmusic.blogspot.com/

 

Jazz

 

We went to the Jazz Garden and saw a younger guy playing like Wes on the most distressed L5 I have ever seen. They have a jam session on Monday night. I turned up thinking it would be amateur and found myself playing (way out of my depth) with pros including the head of jazz studies at the local Conservatorium.

 

Accommodation

 

We stayed at the Landler Hostel which is a university dormitory when school is in but accommodates backpackers in the holidays.

 

I guess you will want something a bit nicer. Probably easiest to discuss this over the phone with Google maps in front of us. I would try and get something on the Pest side not too far from the river and north of the markets.

 

The Gellert, which is where the senior communist functionaries used to stay, now seems to get bad reviews.

 

Other Places to Visit

 

We mostly just walked around and rubbernecked.

 

We visited the palace.

 

We went to Statue Park just outside Budapest where all the Soviet era statues have been collected by a historian with a wry sense of humour.

 

I’m sure you’ll sort this out.

 

Getting from the Airport into Town

 

We like to engage with the locals so we took a regular bus from the airport to a train station and then took the subway into the centre of Budapest - kinda like Kennedy really.

 

Food and Beverage

 

Food is hearty. I hope you like pork. Not sure how you will go if you are vego.

 

Have mentioned the pahlinka.

 

The beer is great. Plenty of big brews. You don’t have to drink yukky watery stuff.

 

RN

[Steven Tari]

I wish I could go. My family is from there also. My last name is supposed to be from about the 13th centry. Hope Y'all have a good time.

[Notes_Norton]

Thanks for the replies.

 

My family is from Italy (the name got changed when my uncle went into politics - at that time anyone with a vowel at the end of his name couldn't get elected dog-catcher). Leilani and I have been to Italy and even met a couple of distant cousins there who showed us a few places way off the beaten tourist routes.

 

Leilani's ancestors are all Hungarian, I think from the countryside near Pest. I could be wrong about that and Leilani isn't here right now to check the facts. She is out walking with her mom, getting her into physical shape for the trip.

 

I love traveling and visiting foreign (to me) cultures. I like seeking out the differences between "us and them". But the differences are just in lifestyle. No matter where we have gone, from the US to China and so many delightful places in-between, the people are really the same all over. Most of them are very nice, all they want to do is to raise their families in peace and make the world a little bit better for their children.

 

And I am aware that Romanian and Hungarian music is different.

 

For those who are curious, a great primer on Gypsy music is a film called Latcho Drom -- if you can rent it, do so. We ended up buying it (the film and the CD). Unfortunately the film is only available in VHS in the USA but a DVD is available for non US (if I remember correctly it's encoded in PAL).

 

You can hear the range of Gypsy music from India all the way to Southern Spain with many stops along the way. You can even get the soundtrack here - highly recommended.

 

Personally, I like the Romany music the best, the group Taraf de Haidouks do a great job on a couple of numbers. The French Jazz was great, the Andalusian singers very impressive, the Hungarians very spirited, and those from Egypt and Turkey very different. But after listening to it a number of times, one can hear common threads and motifs through much of it.

 

But it seems I'm hijacking my own thread.

 

Any more and all information is appreciated. We will only be there a week (minus the two flight days) and we want to pack as much joy into the trip as possible.

 

And Steven, you should go some day.

 

We paid for 2 of the flights using frequent flyer miles accrued with credit cards. The trick with that is to buy everything you would with cash on a mileage credit card. Then you must pay it off every month because the interest on those cards is very high. We have to pay full fare for Leilani's moms ticket (close to $1k) but ours were less than $80 each (port taxes only). We flew to Alaska a few years ago for $35 each and I forget how much the England tickets were, but they weren't that much.

 

Thanks again for the info. Keep it coming.

 

Notes

[djroge1]

I don't have info for you, but its interesting topic because I'll be in Hungary next month with an overnight/day stop over in Budapest. Oh, and thanks for the reminder ~ I can use it as a tax deduction. I forgot about that.

[Notes_Norton]

<...> I'll be in Hungary next month with an overnight/day stop over in Budapest.<...>

 

Have a great time!!!

 

Notes ?

[Robin Nahum]

Thanks for the replies.

 

.....

 

For those who are curious' date=' a great primer on Gypsy music is a film called Latcho Drom -- if you can rent it, do so. [/quote']

 

A great suggestion. Thank you. We missed it when it came through the cinemas. We now have a DVD subscription service so will put it on our list.

 

I forgot to mention that the best way to get around the centre of Budapest, if you are not walking or cycling, is by the frequent and reliable tram service.

 

RN

[Notes_Norton]

<...>I forgot to mention that the best way to get around the centre of Budapest' date=' if you are not walking or cycling, is by the frequent and reliable tram service.

 

RN[/quote']

 

Thanks again.

 

We are waiting for a couple of Budapest books to arrive from Amazon, I hope it will be mentioned.

 

Leilani and I like to walk, but her mom is 80 and not a spry as she used to be.

 

I recall when I visited Rome, my cousins worked all week so we had the days to ourselves. My cousin bought us a book of bus tickets. We used one ticket each. As we were riding the bus we saw at least a dozen things we wanted to stop at, so we got off at the first stop and walked back to see them.

 

But the pacing of this trip will be determined by how much my mother-in-law can walk. Leilani has been going to her house every day and taking her for a walk to build up her stamina.

 

Notes ?