Good Weekend

This past weekend was a success! Saturday morning I dragged myself out of bed around noon (not sure if this was jet-lag or the resumption of normal weekend laziness) and took the 80A bus two stops down Fogarasi út to the metro, got bad coffee and a cherry strudel for $1.50, and caught the 75 bus to Heroes' Square. The Museum of Fine Arts is a beautiful building. They have a good collection of El Grecos (an artist I remember from my art history class) but the exhibition with Klimt was closed, which was sorely disappointing. Awesomely a random youth choir sang in the echoey marble entryway at some point in the afternoon.  Anyway I stayed in that museum forever.

I wandered around City Park and the Castle, ate a spicy kolbasz sausage (the pronunciation of which I completely slaughtered when ordering), and cozied up near the river to write in my journal. The reverse bus stop was found by experimentation (basically I rode going the wrong direction until we starting passing the same numbered buses going in the right direction, got off and crossed the street to catch them.) I'm telling you, the buses come all the time. It's so great.

Sunday I went to the Hungarian National Museum (history, everything I never knew about Hungary); took a wonderful detour after failing to find an Internet cafe, that left me with wonderful pictures and a full impression of the beauty of the city; and saw the opera Otello that evening. Before you ask, yes the opera was sung in Italian and the subtitles were in Hungarian.

My original thoughts: 1. The guidebook says go to the Opera House, so I'll go to the Opera House; 2. I know Othello pretty well; 3. It's only $3, come on.
Reality: 1. No action. The entire second act was Othello singing with Desdemona, without moving at all; the entire third act was Iago singing (evil) to Othello in one place. The music was pretty, but otherwise I watched them stand there. 2. Three and a half hours. THREE AND A HALF HOURS. At least there were three intermissions and the refreshments were delightfully (as always) inexpensive. 3. No point three. I really did enjoy it!

       Hungarian State Opera House (remind anyone else of the Phantom of the Opera??)

View from my seat :)