Tales of Nell's Excellent Budapest Adventure: Be in 2 Cool Places at Once... CHECK!

Hello friends! I am currently blogging instead of finishing a paper..... we all know I'm good for procrastination.... especially when something fun is an option. I am here to tell you about a quick trip I took this past Saturday just for the day to a small Northern Hungarian town called Esztergom. It is located on the right bank of the Danube River, which forms the border with Slovakia! You can see a GIANT bridge connecting the two countries and you can take a quick walk over to the other side and there you are in Slovakia! Grace, Courtney and I set off paying out 550 HUF train ticket ($2.50) and off we went! We saw a vast amount of Hungarian countryside as the train makes about 10 stops in between at other small towns.

When we got there, we roamed through the streets (following an elderly crowd of tourists- of course, letting them look like the group of tourists and we just followed.....) until we made it into the central part of the city! There we used our expert map skills to find out way through the town. We crossed through a few squares and walked down along a river bank spotting several forms of wildlife (a swan, a doggy and some birds). From there we found our way to the Esztergom Basilica... providing with us the most beautiful view I have ever seen. We climbed to the top where we could see miles and miles from every nook and cranny- Hungary to Slovakia. It was incredible. The climb up was a bit traumatic... you'll see a photo of the stairs... and not all Europeans use deodorant so some that were walking near us.... let's just say they could have used some Secret or Dove. It is the tallest building in Hungary and 72 meters high inside. We also toured the crypt at the bottom of the basilica which was incredible. I got to light a candle for Paul, Vicki and Krista which was very nice for me.
We then headed out to explore the Esztergom Day festival which we did not know was taking place that day! A great thing to stumble upon. We got to experience some of the culture and see some delicious food stands, that I drooled at of course. On that note of realizing how "hungary" we were (hahahaha) we set off to cross the bridge into Slovakia for some lunch! And boy oh boy, did we live up to our reputation of being the typical tourists. Midway through the bridge when you hit the border, we must have stood at the sign for about 10 minutes, causing serious traffic problems with people, just to hit every pose possible, making sure we could be seen in two places at once. Of course, there had been a giant marathon and everyone was coming back from the finish line across the bridge so that was a nice crowd of people. As soon as we made it into the town, we stumbled across a dance performance going on in the main square. Performers ranged from all ages and did all sorts of dance/gymnast type of performances. It was an incredible show.
Now brings us to one of the more disturbing experiences. Of course we have encountered many homeless people and I am AWFUL at it. I always feel so sorry for them, it makes me depressed and I want to give them money. Now I know that's not really the best thing, but I also have a hard time walking away. Well, this once lady approached us at the entrance of a restaurant and I though she was offering menus or something. Nope, she wanted money. Well, in asking for it, she blessed me on my forehead and then, meaning to bless me on my chest, she got a nice boob grab in there. That was one of the more awkward things. Needless to say, I didn't give money.

Well finally, we found a place to exchange our HUF for EUROS and found a nice place to eat. For good food at a cheap price, we sat in this cute outdoor lounge and ate as we observed the culture. There were a few troubles with the food. For example, Courtney ordered dumplings and received a loaf of bread to the side of her breaded chicken. hmmmm. I ordered chicken with a sour cream and mushroom sauce and got a slab of fried chicken. hmmmm. But hey, we worked it all out. We finished off the Slovakian adventure with our latest addiction: GELATO. It is 173489487 times better here than in America (no offense America) and is SO CHEAP. This particular stand however was quite an entertaining one. The man would throw the scoop in the air and catch it in the cone, or "throw the scoop to Hungary" as he told me, flip the scoop, ya know all those tricks cool kids do. The funniest thing though- Grace and I ordered and got our waffle cones. But when Courtney ordered a regular size cone, he came out with quite a creation. You will see below. There was also an inappropriate joke made regarding some American political figures that was quite hilarious, considering he didn't know we were American (shocking, actually) but I will keep it to myself as to not offend anyone. Please contact myself or the Stirling parents and we can share it privately.
ANYWAY, after this we headed back home. Of course not without the following- making a second scene on the bridge with photos, telling the lady in the station (who did not speak any English) that we wanted a return ticket to Nyugati-Budapest and receiving one for Urom?... getting our ticket switched and then almost missing the train. Oh and being dehydrated with no water to be found. ALL IN ALL, This was a fantastic trip. Now I can cross one more thing off my bucket list: be in two places at once.
Thanks for playing! Keep it real people!

I'll be back soon with a post about our trip to the Riot Police!

OH AND I GOT MY CARTILAGE PIERCED! cool stuff.