main gate of the Central Zoo in Pyongyang

me and Thighs Wife went to Budapest/Prague/Vienna for New Years thyme.  guess what?  it was great, and you should go too, just prepare not to eat many vegetables, or see people drink water.  They seem to only drink beer or really strong coffee, but if you’ve been to Europe, you know this.  anywho, gonna break the adventure up by city, into 3 separate posts, so up first is…

Budapest

Everything about Budapest is steeped in the past – either from the monuments they erected in their millennial anniversary of 1896, or during the times of Nazi occupation, followed by the drab architecture of red Communism – and the look and feel of the city shows all this wear and tear.  While they do have Starbucks, this place retains a certain iron-curtained charm that the world now gets to peek behind

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the city is split into two by the river Danube – the hilly Buda to the west and the flat Pest to the east.  if you go, stay in Buda, and stay at the Hilton in the Castle District.  you’ll wake up to the best view ever.  EVERRRRRRRRRRRR!!!

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and yer literally in a castle or castle district or something!

and it’s amazing, day or night

and they have statues with giant awesome szósz mustaches

what’s ‘awesome szósz’?  it’s awesome sauce, but since the word for sauce in Hungarian is ‘szósz’ – it’s awesome szósz.  got it?

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btw – if you want to get to know a culture, seeing art and buildings is a good start, but so is visiting a super market.  in Hungary, since all ‘s’es have a ‘z’ after em, it’s called a szupermarket.  also – anything that has a ‘z’ in it, is followed by an ‘s’.  confuszing.  iszn’t it?

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but they muss import their pizzas, otherwise this would be called ‘Pizszsa Guszeppe’, no?

and who doesn’t want corn with their salami pizza??

speaking of salami – they love it.  at their central market, every other stall sells salami.  the other stalls sell paprika and dried fruits

what else did we eat?

CHIPS ON A STICK!!

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chimney cakes called kürtőskalács!!!!!

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cheese bread delicious things called Lángos, which will have you lángosing for more of dem as soon as you finish eating one

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chicken wrapped in cheese and bacon!!

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and of course we were going to eat goulash!!!!  and it lives up to its goul-lashy reputation!!!  I want to make shoes of em and call em goulashes!!!

and of course we went to McDonalds – cause you always HAVE to go to McDonalds in a foreign country to see what’s on their menu – like Falatkák!!  (plus it’s the only place guaranteed to have fountain sodas, and ice)

 

and then we did this thing called Eat & Meet where you go to this apartment and this nice young Hungarian lady and her parents make you a multi-coursed meal and get you drunk on wine and pálinka, and you meet random travelers from around the globe doing the same thing yer doing.  SUPER AWESOME-SZÓSZ!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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and we drank all these foods down with a hot cup of hot wife!!!

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OK, time for a quick break

and onto sightseeing!!!

no ben, all parliament – which is as beautiful on the inside, as it is on the outside

and paid respect to the great Synagogue

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and went to da Zoo

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where we found the missing link between chimp and man

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and went to da Opera house

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and watched people ice skate in front of a faux castle thing!

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and had schmancy coffee at this schmancy cafe

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and checked out a schmancy ye olde movie theater

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and brought in the new year at a schmancy restaurant in the castle wall thing!!

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and went to the opposite of a schmancy bar – called a ‘ruin pub’, which is like a former dump hole, turned into a super awesome szósz bar!!!  the one we went to was called Szimpla Kert, and it was szimply amazsing!!!

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and the best thing we did?  the thing locals AND tourists all do – go take a bath!!!

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we will never go hungry again, but we’d totally go to Hungary again, even if a lot of the food looked like this!!!!!!!

Salvador Dalí paints a rhinoceros, in front of Vermeer’s la Dentellière (The Lacemaker), at the Vincennes Zoo, April 30, 1955

a little Blackbuck, an Indian Antelope, gets some loving care and a mid-day snack in a special care section of the Columbus, Ohio Zoo.  The antelope was born April 19 and is shown getting a bottle from Mrs Georgia Bolin, May 12, 1969 [ebay]