DAY 490 (26 OCTOBER): LJUBLJANA
The smallest country in Eastern Europe, Slovenia achieved the closest thing to a âvelvet revolution' of any state to emerge from the shadow of Yugoslavia. Its ten-day war of 1991 had the least bloodshed of all. It was a firm act of will, almost a civil uprising, that saw off the Serbs. From a nation of two million people, that's as gutsy a performance as anything since David got within a stone's throw of Goliath.
The placid Slovenesânot for them the excitable passion of the Serb or Bosnianâinhabit the westernmost of all ex-Yugoslav countries, not only in their geography, but with a capital W in their democratic instincts. That they have been accepted in the new wave of European Union expansion is proof that this pro-Western outlook is recognised by the West itself.
The capital, Ljubljana, is a picture-book idyll of how every European town might look if it could be built to human scale. Friendly and engaging, its small ambit (population 280 000) makes it the most accessible of destinations and all the central sights lie within ten minutes of one another by foot or wheel.
DAY 493 (29 OCTOBER): PIRAN
Slovenia owns just a sliver of real estate on the Adriatic, a mere 20 kilometres of the Istrian Peninsula coast wedged between Italy and Croatia, but it certainly makes the most of that. Built around a lazy fishing harbour, the town of Piran could be transplanted across the water to any point south of Venice and only the accents of the inhabitants would tell you it wasn't Italian.
This afternoon I take the minibus south along the coast to Portoroz, another beach resort, but one with a difference. Here the Hotel Palace offers its guests a full range of thermal baths. Three months in the Balkans have primed me for this novel form of relaxation, but first I must ask whether a paying non-guest (as opposed to a non-paying guest) may sample this little luxury for himself.
The manager, a pleasant-faced chap who gives me his cardâFredi Fontanot, Esquireâtells me that I am welcome to take a free bath at the management's expense, because he has always liked âthe idea of Australia'.
Offhand, no other European country comes to mind where one can see three distinct environmentsâcity, beach and mountain rangeâin such close proximity. Of the seven nations I have traversed since quitting balmy Greece, this is the Balkan land least cursedâor, rather, most blessed.
Chapter 20
WALTZING BY THE DANUBE
My friend ⦠Welcome to the Carpathians. I am anxiously expecting you. Sleep well tonight ⦠I trust that your journey ⦠has been a happy one, and that you will enjoy your stay in my beautiful land
.
BRAM STOKER
D
RACULA
NOVEMBER 2002-JANUARY 2003
The Danube and the Carpathians are the two dominant geographical features of the next four lands on my journey, taking me from the Balkans back to the Black Sea and then looping back into the heart of central Europe. Along with Poland, Hungary spearheaded the overthrow of communism in Eastern Europe in that year of miracles, 1989. Romania, by contrast, never really got round to throwing out the communists until the December 2004 elections removed their socialist heirs from power, even if it showed a particularly bloodthirsty zeal for getting rid of the dictator Nicolae Ceausescu. Moldova is a land torn between allegiance to Romania and Russia, its sense of nationhood stunted at birth. And in many ways â when I was in the country and indeed until its own elections of December '04 changed everything â Ukraine was the most disappointing of the four: still in the thrall of a communist leader, Leonid Kuchma, who baulked at all economic reforms and rules in a way that the old Kremlin hardliners would have applauded.
Call them what you wantâthe Wild East, the badlandsâtheir history of rough and ready justice makes exploring this quartet an adventure within an adventure. Yet to judge even Romania as a superstition-ridden territory full of Gothic grotesquerie is a distortion that can blind us to the everyday struggles of ordinary peopleâtown dwellers and peasantsâwhose concerns would be instantly recognisable to their counterparts in any country.
The blue Danube, which flows from central Europe down to the Black Sea, broadening as it goes, and the green mountain chain give these lands one type of unity; their experience of communist ideology, another. But in several other ways, starting with their size, the differences outweigh the similarities.
The area of Ukraine, the largest country in Europe (if one discounts Russia as a hybrid, most of it being in Asia), is eighteen times that of Moldova. Ethnically the Ukrainians are Slavs; the Moldovans a mixture of Slavs and Romanians; the Romanians mostly descended from Roman settlers (as the country's name implies); and the Hungarians are a race unlike any other.
HUNGARY: 4 NOVEMBERâ3 DECEMBER
For eleven centuries, ever since their ancestors rode west from Central Asia, the people who call themselves Magyar (rhyming with ârajah') have been keenly aware that they are like no other. What sets the clannish Hungarians apart is also what makes their culture most interesting to the outsider: its food and folk traditions being but two examples. Apart they may be; individualists they are not. In fact, their strong sense of collective identity explains why communism took root here and also why the forces that uprooted it in the end acted as one. Virtually all of Hungarian history and art can be seen as an unending struggle to be left alone.
DAY 500 (5 NOVEMBER): KESZTHELY, LAKE BALATON
They're not struggling tonight, but nor are they alone. Music dominated by accordion and violin, of a type associated in my mind with fairground rides, pervades the Hungaria Gosser, a restaurant reputed to serve the best goulash in this lakeside town, and some say in all of Hungary. The
specialit
é
de maison
arrives steaming in a sort of Hungarian wok, a silver bowl suspended over a low flame.
DAY 501 (6 NOVEMBER): KESZTHELY
Even when Keszthely is not enveloped in fog, its atmosphere is gloomy and thick, and getting around is like wheeling through a short story by Poe. The three-storey houses with their acute-angled gables and eye-brow embrasures frown on the passer-by. It's all pleasantly spooky.
DAY 508 (13 NOVEMBER): BALATONFURED TO BUDAPEST
It is not that Hungarians are unfriendly, I tell myself, justâwell, perhapsâa little stand-offish, or perhaps it is better to say they are unusually respectful of others' space. I suppose that might come from having been invaded over and over again.
Working out how to get myself, with my luggage, up to the virtually inaccessible railway platform is a puzzle worthy of the nation that gave us Rubik and his cube, and I âcrack' it (with assistance) just in time.
And then one is left alone to contemplate the pastoral charms of the pancake-flat Great Plain all the way to the outskirts of Budapest, Hungary's greatest pride and joy.
Hours are taken up with finding âdigs' for a fortnight's layover, long enough to soak up the city's atmosphere and plot an itinerary covering the final few months of my route through to northern Scandinavia. Partly for architectural reasonsâcentral Budapest dates from the 19th century, when staircases seem to have been
de rigueur
âand partly out of hoteliers' reluctance to offer discounts for a longer stay, I am almost out of options when a taxidriver suggests we try Nepstadion.
It's not listed in my guidebook but the driver is quietly insistent that this will be the place for me. When we roll up to the building, I wonder if he has lost his mind. This is where Budapest would probably hold the Olympics if it ever won the right to host them: a 100 000-seat national stadium used principally for soccer matches and athletics meets.
However, a special discount rate of US$10, a real bargain, is struck without fuss; and I repair to a modest-sized but clean room in that part of the stadium designated the Hotel Pilon.
Later I discover that Nepstadion is the home of Hungary's sports academy and the hotel exists to put up sportsmen and sportswomen from all over the country, and even overseas, who come here for training.
DAY 510 (15 NOVEMBER): BUDAPEST
Today is short on relaxation, long on business: the getting of visas (Moldova done, the Ukrainians a work in progress); the collection of mail, and the sending of mail (a more complex matter, taking up to two hours). Sometimes I look on travelling as the hardest unpaid work I'll ever do.
DAY 513 (18 NOVEMBER): BUDAPEST
We've only just become acquainted but Budapestâwith its magical blend of history, elegance and dynamismâis already up there with Isfahan and Istanbul among my favourite cities.
The best way to savour the capital's special ambience is to head straight up, or down, its version of the Champs Elysées or Fifth Avenue: Andrassy Boulevard. This morning I do both, beginning at Vajdahunyad Castle, an 1890s specimen of kitsch designed to reflect architectural styles from all over Hungary. From the castle to Heroes' Square, where Andrassy begins its long straight run to the Danube, is a mere 200 metres, but to reach it you must make a slight detour around what is a magnificent sight: an open-air skating rink where the mass movement of people, counterclockwise, resembles a painting come to life. Then it's across the street and along Andrassy, 3 kilometres of never-failing interest all the way down to the river.
Once there, it is impossible to resist ambling onto one of the stately bridges that span the mighty Danube and link the half of the city I've just come fromâPest (pronounced Pesht)âwith Buda. Originally Buda was the preserve of royalty, Pest where the commoners lived. I leave it to your good sense to work out which quarter was built on the higher bank; which on the lower, more flood-prone tract of land.
DAY 515 (20 NOVEMBER): BUDAPEST
Authority and I have never hit it off. That said, it is no fun being led away in handcuffs from the precincts of a national parliamentâespecially when it's not even your nation, there is no great principle at stake, and the parliament belongs to an âemerging democracy'.
On approaching the neo-Gothic parliament building, I could not help noticing a powerful dose of regimentation. A dozen police, some in paramilitary gear, were holding back dozens of tourists behind a chain-link fence and it must be added (though this may be just my imagination) that the atmosphere was somewhat menacing.
The previous day, the parliamentary tours office had told me to arrive 20 minutes early for one of the tours, which commence on the hour. But now I wasn't allowed to âoverstep' the line so I couldn't even make it to the office to buy a ticket.
After ten minutes of this, with a growing risk of missing out on the tour, I observed aloud that the uniformed squad preventing me from buying a ticket was more what one would expect of a fascist state than a parliamentary democracy. This is a provocatively rash thing to say, given that the word âfascist' is bound to touch a raw nerve in a country that was part of a pretty evil Axis before George W. Bush was even a twinkle in Barbara's eye.
The chief of the parliamentary guards didn't exactly have smoke coming out of his ears but was clearly having no truck with such talk. âThis is police territory,' he warned me, unconsciously confirming my point.
By this time Elizabeth, the parliamentary officer in charge of foreigners' tours, had arrived and pleaded in vain for me to be allowed to join the noonday group. Further pleading by her elicited grudging approval for me to come back later that afternoon and try again.
As I began to move off, with the thought of spending a couple of hours in the city âkilling time', I found my way blocked by a rookie from the Fifth Police District. While he had removed his name tag he had forgotten to take off his serial-number tag, so he can confidently be identified as Officer 18246. It was 18246 who whipped out the handcuffs and took gleeful delight in tying my wrists behind the back bar of my chair before leading me off to the police station three blocks away.
Major Tibor Varga, 18246's boss, listened with what appeared to be thinly veiled impatience as his zealous young gun outlined the case against me. The major then demanded to see my passport. On this of all days, with no visa to collect or money to change, I had left it behind at the stadium hotel. At last, Varga agreed to let me join the tour of parliament provided I produced my passport ID (which I did next day).
At 2 pm I was back behind the parliamentary lines and finally, with Elizabeth leading the way, shown over the colossal edifice which took seventeen years to buildâdemocracy takes even longerâand would swallow the MCG whole, if such a thing were possible.
DAY 518 (23 NOVEMBER): BUDAPEST
Every Saturday night the city backstreets resound to the vibe of Hungarian folk dancing. Tonight, I sit goggle-eyed in a corner while zithers and fiddles get the joint jumping.
Early in the proceedings, the floorboards of this rather shabby but undeniably authentic venue audibly creak. Later, when the crowd swells to a round hundred, they groan. But the Transylvanian zithers are galloping ahead at full twang and the revellers, dressed as if attending an 18th-century folk festival in the heart of Europe, are clearly lapping it up.
They leave the best till last. Just after 10 pm an 80-year-old violinist with the energy of someone a quarter his age takes centre stage. All the way from Romanian-ruled Transylvania, the celebrated Sanyi Bacsi saws that virtuoso fiddle fit to bring the house down.
DAY 520 (25 NOVEMBER) BUDAPEST
This evening I visit a planetarium with a difference. Calling itself the Laser Theatre, this âsky show' incorporates musical arrangements by pop singers and groups including Madonna, Pink Floyd and Queen. Graphic designers have tailored their creativity to the music of the spheres. Tonight's âstar turn' is Jean-Michel Jarré, the âgodfather' of such spectacles.
Naturally enough, it is impossible to describe a light show in words, but that doesn't stop the official brochure from trying. With an obvious fondness for the word âlight', the first two sentences set the tone:
Cobwebs woven of emerald laser light are spun into transparent veils by ruby flashes of light where pulsating polygons dance madly amid thousands of vivid light waves. Suddenly, fireless fireworks explode in the midst of a cavorting vortex of light to crown this enrapturing celebration.
DAY 521 (26 NOVEMBER): BUDAPEST
The neoclassical State Opera House is one of the most impressive buildings on Andrassy Boulevard, which is saying something. Tonight I have my own personal conductor (a man in a bow-tie leading me on a detour through the building so that I can reach my seat without being obstructed by stairs).
Being no ballet enthusiast, I cannot say whether this âDon Quijote' (Hungarian spelling) is better than any âDon Quixote' staged elsewhere in recent years, but it is what occurs after the show that makes me think everyone should go to the theatre in a wheelchair. Immediately the final bouquet is tossed on stage, the personal conductor appears at my side, ready to escort me through the labyrinth to the building's exit. But, as that way takes us near the dressing rooms and we have to wait a minute for the lift that will take us down, I am treated to the sight of the prima ballerina, a Brazilian with the delightful name of Pollyanna Ribeiro. She struggles not to drop any of eight bouquets while curtsying and being kissed on both cheeks by an obviously overwhelmed Brazilian ambassador to Hungary. Graciously, the pair let me take a more formal photo of them, much to the annoyance of my personal conductor who is itching to get into the lift and away.
DAYS 524â525 (29â30 NOVEMBER): EGER
Eger's charm resides in its winding streets and fine examples of Zopf architectureâan elegant hybrid of the classical and baroque, the formal and the fantastic, peculiar to central Europe.
Irina, a typically open-hearted Egri who met me by chance while I was registering at a local hotel, has
adopted
me (I can think of no better word for it) by offering to show me over the castle, and then acting as my escort to the town's nationally famous Gárdonyi Theatre. Given that I was never going to understand a word being uttered on stage, my initial regret was that this Friday night I couldn't have seen a homegrown theatrical product. However, after the performance I could appreciate what a lucky coincidence it was that my visit fell on the same night as a local version of playwright Arthur Miller's
Death of a Salesman (Az
ü
gyn
ö
k hal
á
la
in Magyar). After all, every market economy has its Willy Lomans, and the scourge of alcoholism is not unknown in Eastern Europe either.