Budapest, Hungary 2023 Day 1 & 2

“It’s lights out and away we go!” That’s the start of every Formula 1 (F1) race – and just like the 20 speedy race cars – Obi and I are on another adventure – away we go! We just got back to out hotel after a full day’s adventure in Budapest – with the main event of today being an F1 race. Yes, many of you may be wondering what am I doing at a race track – but alas, love and marriage make you do crazy things:) Obi is a huge Lewis Hamilton fan – a driver for the Mercedes team so we ventured to Hungary to see the race. By default (and some personal vested interest) I am a fan of the other Mercedes rider, George Russell. So, not only did I attend my second F1 race – but this time, I even wore one of Obi’s Mercedes team shirts – I blended right into the crowd. In attendance today were probably about 330,000 people at the Hungaroring race track. Floods of people, may sun-brunt to a crisp after getting to their seats or ground perch early in the day. Beer cans clinking, water bottles empty, dusty blankets coated with specks of grass (mostly dry dirt), the smell of porta-potties mixed with baked dough wafting along at every turn, huge plates of fries and meet kebabs nestled together passing me left and right and nearly every person from babies to adults all sporting their teams colors or jersey. Water stations are strategically placed so if you are lucky enough to pass one – you take the chance to fill up your bottle – drink it down and fill it up again. It’s quite a scene indeed. A sea of colors and pride – lot’s of team pride. We were seated in the silver section, which were pretty decent seats providing us with a clear view of the start/finish line, a DRS (I call it super speed) zone and one hairpin turn. We could also see various other sections like a few other straight aways in the distance. The Hungaroring track is a bit smaller than some other tracks to it’s 70 total laps from start to finish – mixed in with some insanely fast pit stops of a crew of well trained and coordinated people who rush out to change the tires in just over 2 seconds and send the car back on it’s way. Zip – zap – zop – around the cars go. Unfortunately, while Hamilton began the race in first place, he had a terrible start and ended the race 4th – but his teammate, Russell started in the 18th place and finished 6th. The track was hot – given the high temperatures mixed with the energy of the cars so there is a lot of attention given to keeping the cars from overheating and what seems like keeping the rubber tires from melting. Honestly, the whole F1 craze is really not my jam – it’s hard for me to get over how much money is funneled into metal and rubber – when all of these resources and brain power to make faster and more aerodynamic cars could be put towards causes of greater value like education or healthcare – or the climate! Obi knows how I feel – it’s a love/hate relationship for me. On our way out – we stopped to use the bathroom and about 20 feet from us a man fell to the ground and was having a seizure. The people stood around gasping – I jumped into action and held his head off the rocky dirt and tilted it sideways to avoid chocking on his saliva. It was a tonic-clonic seizure – he was drooling and eventually I saw blood from his bitten tongue. After about a minute of me holding his head- two EMTs arrived but they were spectators and through a mix of English and Hungarian we communicated about what was happening, then a spectator who was a doctor came – and finally two race official EMTs joined. At this point, I stepped away and handed the man’s hat and sunglasses to an older woman possibly his mom and girlfriend who came later to the scene. They were crying. It was sad to see how scared they were but, by the time I finished using the bathroom I could see the young man holding his girlfriend’s face and giving her a kiss. It seemed that he would be alright. After this incident – we began our journey home. It was a long journey. We started by heading back to the taxi drop-off point to find the longest mass/line I have ever seen with no clear beginning or end with hundreds of people waiting for a taxi. This was clearly not going to work out – so we decided to walk 25 minutes to the bus station. Along with many other people we arrived to find a huge crowd – and the next bus scheduled to come in 50 minutes. We tried to flag down a taxi but they were doubling the price and only taking cash – so we walked about 45 minutes to a local train which took us into the city – at which point we caught another train to our hotel. Two hours and 20 minutes later we made it to home base – luckily we still had some water (nearly boiling from the sun:) in our bottle so keep us going. We ate at a delicious Lebanese restaurant – Obi’s favorite item was the grilled Haloumi cheese and mine was the roasted red pepper spread and fresh pita. Yum.

Our day however was not ONLY all about mass consumption and fuel burning – we began the day with a visit to the Hungarian National Gallery. a huge and stunning building with tickets to see the retrospective exhibition of Lajos Gulácsy born in Budapest in 1882 he was one of Hungarian’s most famous 20th century artists who never had any formal art training. He allowed himself to occupy much of his life in his imaginary world and depicted what he believed to be true and real through his art. Some of his works were adaptions of other famous works and he was also heavily influenced by Dante and his poetry. Gulácsy was incredibly connected to nature and this was evident in his work – and most of his paintings included flowers, trees, grass, the sky. He seemed to almost always find a way to add nature. The self portrait I enjoyed the most used colors and brush strokes that encouraged his face to blend into the rich autumn colors of his surrounding environment, a strong depiction of his love of being outside and nature. The piece though that struck me the most was called, The Mulatto and the Sculpturesque White Woman. This was the only piece Obi and I saw that depicted a black man – let alone a black man with a white woman, painted in 1910! The description of the painting talked about the stiff sculpturesque pose of the white woman and the “dynamic mulatto.” It was hard to tell from the painting or it’s description if the man and woman’s interaction was forced or consensual? Approved by society or disgraced upon? I wanted to learn more, but the piece left me with feelings and questions.

Tomorrow we will spend one more day in Hungary – with tickets to see the parliament building and we’d like to visit the inside of the second largest church of medieval Buda and the seventh largest church of the medieval Hungarian Kingdom – the Matthias church. On our first day (yesterday, Saturday) after settling into the hotel after a sleepless night on the plain we walked around town towards one of Hungary’s oldest cafes and yes – we shared three pieces of cake – my absolute favorite was the cream cake – and did some sight seeing from the Fisherman’s Bastion near the Matthias church. The Fisherman’s Bastion has a beautiful view of the city. Till tomorrow.