With Love From Wien

As my friends and I were boarding the plane on Tuesday to fly back from Istanbul to Budapest, on of my friends asked if we wanted to go to Vienna for the weekend, and we decided to do just that. Attila, my Hungarian History professor, was recently telling us about the importance of seeing as much of the world as we can while we're young and can spare the time and money, so I am doing my best!

Sadly I have no pictures from the weekend. It was very cold and rainy so we spent most of the weekend inside, but I think I'll be going back at the end of my program, so I'll get some nice springtime shots for you.  Weather aside, the short time I spent in Vienna was lovely. We got standing tickets to see Arabella at the opera house on Friday night. It was the first opera I'd ever seen, but I found it incredibly enjoyable. The cast was exceptionally good and I love just about anything that involves costumes. 

On Saturday, we wandered around the art museums since it turns out my friend Rachel and I both have a passion for modern art. I saw an excellent exhibit on Art Nouveau jewelry at the Leopold museum, but the Albertina Museum was by far the superior of the two we went to. There was a decent collection of the Liechtenstein pop-art comic book paintings, but it was the Kandinsky/Jawlensky Blau Reiter exhibit that truly blew me away. I've always loved Kandinsky, but I didn't think or even know much about Jawlensky really. His painting Girl in a Flowered Hat  was mesmerizing. 

I also discovered a new favorite modern artist at the Albertina. The museum had an exhibit by the painter Mel Ramos. He's very skilled, but more importantly, he actually seems to enjoy painting and takes a very refreshing tongue in cheek attitude about it. (Maybe it's all the Hungarian literature I've had to read, but it's just so nice to see an artist who actually enjoys what they do.)

Vienna is expensive, so for Saturday night and most of Sunday we were in Bratislava. It's still not a place I'd recommend planning a vacation around, and the train station is very scary and Eastern European at night, but if you have a few spare hours in your day, it makes for a nice side trip. The old town is surprisingly enough, very sweet, and the castle has some lovely views of the city and a very nice traditional Slovak restaurant which makes and excellent cheesy/leeky/gnocchi(ish) concoction. 

I had a lovely weekend, but right now I am so glad to be back in Budapest. Two nights in a row of hostel beds, and the worst snore-ers I have ever heard makes me very sleepy!

Adventures in Istanbul

I just came back from Istanbul yesterday. It may have been the most amazing experience of my life. Istanbul is so beautiful and old. Its got the perfect east-meets-west cultural fusion that I think I had hoped to find in Budapest.

My friends and I flew in to Attaturk airport around 2 am on friday morning, and once we woke up spent the day exploring the Blue Mosque and the Hagia Sofia.  It's so hard to believe places like that are real. My photos barely do them justice, and certainly can't capture the sheer vastness of the mosques, but here's a small peek.

Obelisisk in the Hippodrome

Ablutions fountains

Blue Mosque

Interior shot of the Blue Mosque

The Blue Mosque and some lovely palm trees

The Hagia Sofia

The Dome of the Hagia Sofia

The second day in Istanbul we wandered the Archaeology museum and the covered Bazaar which was touristy, but an interesting experience. (I am not made to haggle)
Sunday we finally made it to Topkapi Palace after having tried and failed to get there before closing the previous two days. We had been warned the day before by some tourists we met in a coffee house that it would take a while. We didn't believe them, but they were very right. The Palace is huge. The Harem was less exciting than it had been made out to be, but the jewels in the treasury were breathtaking. I wish i could have taken pictures of some of them.

Statue from the Roman/Byzantine era

Another incredibly realistic Roman statue

Trojan Horse model (Sadly I couldn't go inside)

Topkapi Palace

Entrance to the inner courtyard

Harem entrance

View of the Hagia Sofia from a restaurant terrace

Spice Market Stall

Gulls on the Ferry over to Asia

I loved Istanbul. I loved the architecture and history, I loved the food, I loved waking up to the sounds of the Muezzins. Everything about the place was magical and in spite of the fact that I spent five days doing nothing but exploring, I feel like I have so much left to see. If I could, I would fly back in a heartbeat. I'll be doing a quick trip over to Vienna for a day or two this weekend, so I'll post again soon!

Exploring more of Budapest

This weekend, I stayed in the city. I spent most of a very cloudy Friday nestled in Praga Kavehaz with some tea and homework. The coffee house is very cozy with excellent tea, antique decor and lots of pictures of the ever lovely Prague. The kavehaz and Lord Tennyson's tea shop are quickly becoming favorite haunts of mine. Saturday was sunny and warmish for the first time in weeks, so naturally I had to be outside. My friend Ana, her roommate Csilla ( pronounce Chee-la), and I walked down Andrassy Ut. Budapest's equivalent of the Champs Elysee and then made our way to Margit Island. Margit Island is a giant car free park. The island a sport arena, running trails, and outdoor concert venue, and apparently a small zoo. It's full of people walking their dogs and playing rugby. I saw what looked to be a pug convention. (Dogs are shockingly well behaved here. Even in the park.) I'll post photo's of the island in the spring when it's prettier.
On Sunday it was colder, so Ana and I decided it was museum day. We went to the House of Terror, a museum in the building that housed the Hungarian Nazi and Communist regimes. It was quite the experience. You enter and there is a giant soviet tank that they've turned into a fountain with a wall of photos of victims of the regimes behind it. The museum is very modern and conceptual with music accompanying each room and lots of video footage. Occasionally it was hard to tell what was going on particularly due to the lack of english subtitles, but it was very well done on the whole. I really have to give  these people credit for trying to make history interesting and accessible to the masses.

I'm jetting off to Istanbul on Thursday, so expect a much more interesting post and many pictures very soon!