Stupid Tourists are Us
I am sitting in a basement in a Budapest internet cafe. This is our third day in Hungary and the second cool and overcast day in a row.
We arrived here early Friday morning on the night train from Sighsoara (Romania) and were quite tired and a sleep on the train is never great, especially when border crossings and passport checks are involved. With the one hour time difference, we arrived at 7:30am. Since we could not go in to our room at the hostel until later, we decided to walk around and see some sights. It was a gorgeous day and we were all hot and sticky but since we were walking it really did not matter.
We also decided to take some local transportation, which is plentiful in Budapest. We bought transit tickets and hopped on the tram, then tried to validate our tickets in the machines. With most such machines, all you do is stick the ticket in the slot and it validates the ticket. There were 4 Dutch boys and Jenna and I who did not notice that you had to pull a little button forward to validate the tickets. So we rode along hoping to see others validate so we could do the same. Before we were so fortunate a very large man came along and began to check the tickets. When he saw ours were not validated, he yelled at us and told all the English psekaers to get off the bus. So we were stopped off and this man and a friend tried to intimidate us, make us pay a fine that was the equivalent of 10 Euros each and threatened to call the police, who would make us pay a larger fine. We decided that we would not pay anything as the whole thing seemed pretty sketchy. These men had no officical ID tags. Then they got a man who spoke better English to come along and continue to yell at and intimidate us. This did not work because we kept our collective cool, and refused to take out money or passports. So he left, and the original two continued to yell at us, get in our faces and even gave one of the Dutch guys at little push. They continued to threaten calling the police and we continued to tell them to go ahead and do so. We would be happy to walk to the police station.
Finally about 15 minutes and no police phone calls later, they told us to go home and yelled rudely at us as we walked away. I think they called us idiots about 20 times during the encounter, or some Hungarian word that sounds an awful lot like IDIOT.
The day got better as we continued to see some sights and take pictures, drink some beer enjoy the day. Then we got back to the hostel to find our room was to be shared with two guys, but this mistake was quickly cleared up and we got a double room. By this point, we were exhausted, hungry and sticky from sweat. The room was a college dorm room with no character and although relatively clean, not great. The washroom had a shower and no toilet. The toilets, which reeked, were down the hall. I was prepared to find another place as even for me, this seemed like pretty low standards. But. The trouble is there is a huge outdoor mousic festival on right now and there are heaps of youth from all over Europe taking up all the hostel spaces and there was not too much chance of getting another space unless we wanted to book an expensive hotel. So we decided to stay, and although the bathrooms stink, the shower is consistently hot and has the best water pressure of any shower I have used.
I like Budapest as a city but seriously, they rip tourists off like nobody else. We did not pay attention one day to a printed cost and the woman charged us the equivalent of maybe 50 cents to a dollar more for transit tickets. How rude! Apparently this is very common in Budapest, and it is crucial to pay attention to prices in restaurants and such so as not to get ripped off.
As it turns out, transit inspectors all have red arm bands and the men who hassled us did not. This, too, we learned, is a common scam. Thank goodness we stayed cool.
And after all that, I think I should be going. I like it here, though Romania did capture my heart. Farmers use horses and ploughs. Grass and weeds are taken care of by sicles and man power and I am not exaggerating. It was like stepping back to Saskatchewan pioneering days. I could spend a long time in Romania, and the language is somewhat manageable because is is a romance language similar to French and Italian. Magyar, the Hungarian language, is complicated and I do not undestand all the accents on the letters. But I digress.
My friends, we live on a beautiful planet full of many amazing cultures and wonderful people.
peace,
r
We arrived here early Friday morning on the night train from Sighsoara (Romania) and were quite tired and a sleep on the train is never great, especially when border crossings and passport checks are involved. With the one hour time difference, we arrived at 7:30am. Since we could not go in to our room at the hostel until later, we decided to walk around and see some sights. It was a gorgeous day and we were all hot and sticky but since we were walking it really did not matter.
We also decided to take some local transportation, which is plentiful in Budapest. We bought transit tickets and hopped on the tram, then tried to validate our tickets in the machines. With most such machines, all you do is stick the ticket in the slot and it validates the ticket. There were 4 Dutch boys and Jenna and I who did not notice that you had to pull a little button forward to validate the tickets. So we rode along hoping to see others validate so we could do the same. Before we were so fortunate a very large man came along and began to check the tickets. When he saw ours were not validated, he yelled at us and told all the English psekaers to get off the bus. So we were stopped off and this man and a friend tried to intimidate us, make us pay a fine that was the equivalent of 10 Euros each and threatened to call the police, who would make us pay a larger fine. We decided that we would not pay anything as the whole thing seemed pretty sketchy. These men had no officical ID tags. Then they got a man who spoke better English to come along and continue to yell at and intimidate us. This did not work because we kept our collective cool, and refused to take out money or passports. So he left, and the original two continued to yell at us, get in our faces and even gave one of the Dutch guys at little push. They continued to threaten calling the police and we continued to tell them to go ahead and do so. We would be happy to walk to the police station.
Finally about 15 minutes and no police phone calls later, they told us to go home and yelled rudely at us as we walked away. I think they called us idiots about 20 times during the encounter, or some Hungarian word that sounds an awful lot like IDIOT.
The day got better as we continued to see some sights and take pictures, drink some beer enjoy the day. Then we got back to the hostel to find our room was to be shared with two guys, but this mistake was quickly cleared up and we got a double room. By this point, we were exhausted, hungry and sticky from sweat. The room was a college dorm room with no character and although relatively clean, not great. The washroom had a shower and no toilet. The toilets, which reeked, were down the hall. I was prepared to find another place as even for me, this seemed like pretty low standards. But. The trouble is there is a huge outdoor mousic festival on right now and there are heaps of youth from all over Europe taking up all the hostel spaces and there was not too much chance of getting another space unless we wanted to book an expensive hotel. So we decided to stay, and although the bathrooms stink, the shower is consistently hot and has the best water pressure of any shower I have used.
I like Budapest as a city but seriously, they rip tourists off like nobody else. We did not pay attention one day to a printed cost and the woman charged us the equivalent of maybe 50 cents to a dollar more for transit tickets. How rude! Apparently this is very common in Budapest, and it is crucial to pay attention to prices in restaurants and such so as not to get ripped off.
As it turns out, transit inspectors all have red arm bands and the men who hassled us did not. This, too, we learned, is a common scam. Thank goodness we stayed cool.
And after all that, I think I should be going. I like it here, though Romania did capture my heart. Farmers use horses and ploughs. Grass and weeds are taken care of by sicles and man power and I am not exaggerating. It was like stepping back to Saskatchewan pioneering days. I could spend a long time in Romania, and the language is somewhat manageable because is is a romance language similar to French and Italian. Magyar, the Hungarian language, is complicated and I do not undestand all the accents on the letters. But I digress.
My friends, we live on a beautiful planet full of many amazing cultures and wonderful people.
peace,
r
posted by Granola Girl at
3:54 AM
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