Jared Smith

WHAT. A. MORNING.

We started the day with breakfast from the coffee shop next to our Airbnb, before walking around the Great Synagogue: where Hungarian Jews have met for centuries. It was here that political Zionism was founded, and this place that the Nazis used as a ghetto for Jews during the Holocaust. Some victims who could be identified are buried here today. Outside the synagogue sits a metal tree, its branches filled with "leaves" bearing the name of each lost Hungarian Jew.

After the synagogue, we took a taxi to the city limits to see the remaining communist statues that were torn down in 1989. They include statues of Marx, Lenin, and various other nameless komrades. Also included are a giant set of boots; all that remains of a giant Stalin statue which was torn down in the Velvet Revolution of 1956. Not-so-fun fact: after the Soviets crushed the revolution (which began as a peaceful protest), they had killed over 200 demonstrators and would go on to execute another 500, and some 200,000 Hungarians (mostly students) fled to Austria for fear of reprisal.

We then visited the Citadel atop Gellért Hill, which was installed by the Habsburgs after the failed Hungarian Revolution of 1848. For seventy years, cannons pointed from the fortress in the hills of Buda at the citizens living in the plains of Pest.

While at the Citadel, Jared mistakenly spent too much money on a painting of the city from above. So, cashless and unable to spend more, we headed for lunch back at Cafe Gerbaud. This time we avoided the sweet treats and instead opted for a pork potato pancake and a coconut mushroom soup.Læs mere