A few days after arriving back in Budapest after my Christmas and New Year leave in the UK I went to a cellar bar nearby for a drink one evening with some people visiting from home. We walked downstairs and I was aware that something was a little different, but could not quite put my finger on it.
After a little while one of the people I was with worked out what was different: no cigarette smoke.
Yes, after several years of prevaricating and finding various excuses to avoid doing it, the government here has finally banned smoking in bars and restaurants. And what a difference it makes. Many of Budapest's bars are small or subterranean, and after an hour in one of them your clothes would be absolutely reeking with tobacco smoke. No longer.
What it does mean is that, as in other countries with a smoking ban, you can spot the bars up and down a street by looking for the huddles of people standing outside puffing on their fags. But here in Hungary, where the great majority of people smoke, the crowds are obviously larger. Probably fortunately for the government this has been an extremely mild winter so far, with barely any sub-zero temperatures. I suspect the smoking ban would have been harder to get started if evening temperatures were the more normal -10° at night.
But what to me seems to be the ultimate irony is that currently Hungary is getting criticism all round for introducing new legislation regarding small things such as limiting media freedom, the independence of the judiciary and suppression of parliamentary debate while nobody praises it for finally introducing the smoking ban.
Sometimes, life is just so unfair.
Monday, 16 January 2012
Friday, 6 January 2012
State of the nation
My morning shave was interrupted today by a report on BBC Radio 4's "Today" programme about Hungary.
It was talking about the big demonstration in Budapest on Monday night, where 'tens of thousands of people' demonstrated in Andrassy ut against the government's celebrations of the coming into being of the 'Basic Law'.
According to the government spokesman quoted, this simply removes the final vestiges of the old pre-1989 socialist regime, but to the protesters it marks another step towards what many people see as a new dictatorship. A huge majority in the 2010 elections has given the current ruling party a mandate to make enormous changes to the constitution, many of which seem to, ironically, be using democracy to stifle democratic freedoms.
One comment I read in an English-language news feed likened what is happening now in Hungary to the Fascist regime of Admiral Horthy in the 1920s and 1930s, where the regime curried favour by stoking up memories of old nationalist resentments relating to the loss of Hungarian territories in the 1920 Treaty of Trianon. Which is what we see here now.
The problem that Hungary now faces is that the European Union, of which the country is a part, sees human rights and democratic freedoms as a cornerstone of its values, and is making it very clear that it is not happy with the trajectory along which the current government is moving.
That would be bad enough, but this unease means that Hungary is not being given a loan to help it meet its debt obligations that are racing up to meet it in a few weeks time. Consequently the forint is sinking lower and lower (in January 2010 my British pound bought 290 forints, now it gives me 385).
All everyone is talking about is the state of the nation and what is going to happen next. We wait and see.
It was talking about the big demonstration in Budapest on Monday night, where 'tens of thousands of people' demonstrated in Andrassy ut against the government's celebrations of the coming into being of the 'Basic Law'.
According to the government spokesman quoted, this simply removes the final vestiges of the old pre-1989 socialist regime, but to the protesters it marks another step towards what many people see as a new dictatorship. A huge majority in the 2010 elections has given the current ruling party a mandate to make enormous changes to the constitution, many of which seem to, ironically, be using democracy to stifle democratic freedoms.
One comment I read in an English-language news feed likened what is happening now in Hungary to the Fascist regime of Admiral Horthy in the 1920s and 1930s, where the regime curried favour by stoking up memories of old nationalist resentments relating to the loss of Hungarian territories in the 1920 Treaty of Trianon. Which is what we see here now.
The problem that Hungary now faces is that the European Union, of which the country is a part, sees human rights and democratic freedoms as a cornerstone of its values, and is making it very clear that it is not happy with the trajectory along which the current government is moving.
That would be bad enough, but this unease means that Hungary is not being given a loan to help it meet its debt obligations that are racing up to meet it in a few weeks time. Consequently the forint is sinking lower and lower (in January 2010 my British pound bought 290 forints, now it gives me 385).
All everyone is talking about is the state of the nation and what is going to happen next. We wait and see.
Seconds out, Round 3
Towards midnight on January 2nd I arrived at Budapest Airport, two years to the day since I first arrived.
I remember stepping off the plane that night in early 2010, and feeling the intense cold, and the first months as I tried to get to grips with my work, the city and the language. And thinking that I would only be here for two years.
Yet now I am just starting my third year. So why the decision to stay?
Well, Helen and I had many long conversations about returning to the UK or staying, and these covered many practical issues, like the security of a salary in these uncertain economic times, but another factor was our relationship with Budapest.
During our first year many friends in the UK commented that we seemed to find it a difficult place to be living, and in truth we found that to be the case: the incomprehensible language, the reserve of local people all contributed to this.
However, after Helen had fallen off her bicycle and had been 'confined to quarters' for some months we both realised that we had turned some sort of emotional corner and had now really come to enjoy living in the city. So why is that?
In no particular order:
It's a beautiful city. Every time I walk or cycle along the river my heart is lifted by the beautiful buildings, the shimmer on the water, the light and so on.
We know local people. Through our conversations with Hungarian friends we have started to come to understand some of the reasons why the place is like it is, and so it all seems to make more sense. And I now wonder why when I first arrived people seemed somewhat unfriendly; nowadays most people seem perfectly okay. Maybe it was me...
The language seems a little less impenetrable. Although I still find constructing a sentence nearly impossible, I know enough vocabulary to be able to make sense of the world around me and to articulate important needs in terrible Hungarian.
So we approach 2012 with great optimism, sure that we will continue to enjoy living in this fascinating place.
I remember stepping off the plane that night in early 2010, and feeling the intense cold, and the first months as I tried to get to grips with my work, the city and the language. And thinking that I would only be here for two years.
Yet now I am just starting my third year. So why the decision to stay?
Well, Helen and I had many long conversations about returning to the UK or staying, and these covered many practical issues, like the security of a salary in these uncertain economic times, but another factor was our relationship with Budapest.
During our first year many friends in the UK commented that we seemed to find it a difficult place to be living, and in truth we found that to be the case: the incomprehensible language, the reserve of local people all contributed to this.
However, after Helen had fallen off her bicycle and had been 'confined to quarters' for some months we both realised that we had turned some sort of emotional corner and had now really come to enjoy living in the city. So why is that?
In no particular order:
It's a beautiful city. Every time I walk or cycle along the river my heart is lifted by the beautiful buildings, the shimmer on the water, the light and so on.
We know local people. Through our conversations with Hungarian friends we have started to come to understand some of the reasons why the place is like it is, and so it all seems to make more sense. And I now wonder why when I first arrived people seemed somewhat unfriendly; nowadays most people seem perfectly okay. Maybe it was me...
The language seems a little less impenetrable. Although I still find constructing a sentence nearly impossible, I know enough vocabulary to be able to make sense of the world around me and to articulate important needs in terrible Hungarian.
So we approach 2012 with great optimism, sure that we will continue to enjoy living in this fascinating place.
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