It has been a week now since I left Budapest. A busy week in which, however, I caught myself forgetting how scared and happy I was while living my Hungarian fairytale; how I struggled with finding my way around, memorizing in which utca (street) I lived, getting used to the fact that receiving auditory signals from the locals will not help me make sense of written Hungarian. Cautious about the tricks that the human mind often plays I decided to immerse myself in my most vivid memory once again, so that I ‘lock’ it on paper and know that at least it is partially true.
While in Budapest, I also periodically dragged myself out of bed to search for inexpensive food which in my case always meant a visit to the nearest supermarket. Yes, you got that right! What could I do? I had not even realised how engrained the British way of living had become in me that the news about the existence of Tesco here gave me sweet shivers of joy. My routine was simple and pain-free. To eliminate any inconvenience caused by the language barrier, I was going to their most central supermarket, moving quickly through its tight shopping lanes, choosing impulsively from its miniature shelves and eventually enduring punches from the locals who unlike Britons are not very polite and can easily hit you when passing. At the checkout I was greeted by a grey-haired lady who was soon not too happy to discover that I had still not learned the value of their coins. This usually ended up with her angrily counting the money on my behalf and charging me for the plastic bags (In Hungary they charge for the carrier bags and I always forgot to bring mine).
‘Horrible’ you probably think. However, I was enjoying my little supermarket battles – at least they were part of something familiar and I knew that eventually I will get out of there with my bags full of food packed in plastic boxes and jars.
However, my newly-created equilibrium cracked open when my boyfriend came to visit. Being the adventurous type himself, he was shocked by my lack of enthusiasm to explore. ‘Now, we are going to the local market!’ he said. Without even leaving me time to reply, we had gone out of the apartment. Following his intuition, he took me by the hand and turned right. In less than 10 steps we found ourselves in front of a baroque door. ‘Are you ready?’ he asked. I nodded bashfully. ..He opened the door and there it was – a food market, right in front of me. It was small but very well-supplied with a wide variety of seasonal vegetables, herbs and fruit, home-made cheese, smoked meat and fish. We ended up having Lángos for breakfast that day – a traditional deep-fried Hungarian snack, truly the best one I ever remember having.
From this day on I became so much stronger and confident. Looking back now I sometimes think how big of a difference a baroque door can make…
Thank you for reading and commenting. Please enter the Gratitude Travel Writing competition and tell your story.
