Beating the Beggar in Budapest

Hello!

How are you?

I'm writing to you from Budapest, the capital of Hungary. I arrived here yesterday after a 36-hour coach journey from York.

I'm in Budapest for just a few more hours and then I catch a train to Cluj-Napoca in Romania where I'll be meeting five strangers. I'll spend ten days in Cluj and then head back to Budapest before setting off on 18 September for that country I know so well - Belarus!

I could tell you why I'm meeting four strangers in Cluj-Napoca tomorrow. I could even tell you what I'm doing in Budapest today. But then, of course, I would have to kill you. So, for the time being at least, it will have to remain a closely guarded secret...

What I can tell you is that I love Budapest and I have really missed the people of Eastern Europe. It's funny, but Budapest is very similar in many ways to Minsk in Belarus, with an identical Metro system and lots of beautiful faces and friendly young people.

Last night I stayed in a funny little hostel called the Museum Guest House. It's where I'm writing to you from now. It cost me 2,500 Hungarian forintz to stay here which is about six pounds.

The Museum Guest House has got to be the smallest hostel I've ever seen! It has just a few beds here and there, a couple of settees and some mattresses strewn across the floor. I think that this is the closest that you can come to actually paying to be homeless!

I was treated to an all over body massage this morning! I had to strip down to my underpants in front of a room full of strangers - which was rather interesting - but it was well worth it!

The massage was very nice, very relaxing - and I'm not just saying that because the woman who gave it to me might one day read this entry! The massage set me back 2,100 forintz.

Unfortunately, my all over body massage didn't include the two parts of my body that I wanted massaged most! But never mind. Someone else will do that for me!

On the subject of naked bodies, I awoke in the early hours last night to find that all of the people in my room had decided on the spur of the moment to have an orgy. They were all naked and in various positions, some of which just didn't seem possible.

It was very interesting to watch and - oh. Wait. That didn't happen. It was just a fantasy I had while enjoying my massage. Oh! The fine line between fantasy and reality becomes ever more blurred!

It was lovely to sleep in a bed last night after spending 36 hours curled into a ball and trying to sleep on the seat of a Eurolines coach.

The only thing about sleeping in a dormitory is that it makes indulging in a man's favourite hobby a real problem, especially when you're sleeping on the top of a bunk-bed and the slightest, smallest movement sends vibrations through the whole bed!

Ha ha! Oh, come on! Don't look so shocked! It's perfectly natural and just about everybody does it from time to time. Even YOU!

Soooo. Anyways. Leaving York was sad. After spending eleven months as a resident of York, it was sad for me to leave that magical little city behind.

I've never before lived in a city where I've made so many friends and met so many decent people. True, I did meet some bastards, but the people who became my friends were great. And, as each one left, I met somebody else who became my friend.

So, a big mention to all my York friends:

Urko, Roberto, Cesar, Andrew, David Shakespeare, Dana, a little boy called Jake who I met when he was a patient at York hospital, Chris, Shaun, Eileen and, finally, a huge mention to the sweetest girl I've met in years, Kimberley Dryden!

I only met Kimberley just a few weeks before I left York and yet she quickly became one of the best friends I have ever made. She is wonderful, pretty, sweet, extremely fragile, delicate, sensitive and utterly unaware that she possesses all of these qualities.

I have truly never met anyone that I feel so protective towards. Kimberly is not well and, to be painfully honest, she may not be alive in a few years' time. I have only been away from her for three days and already I am worrying about her.

I will never forget her or any of the friends I made in York. I will always look back upon my days in that city as days of wonder, filled with magic, laughter and romance, where I was able to enjoy the sort of life that I was deprived of in my early youth.

So, it's a sweet goodbye to York. For now...

And it's goodbye from me, too. Romania awaits. I have to buy my ticket for the overnight train that will take me to new cities, new people and new situations. I just hope that I can find somewhere to sleep on the train other than a squeaky bunk-bed!

Thanks for reading this. Take care.

From the memory box of a Professional Englishman.

Bruised and Broken in Brussels

Hi.

I think I know what the problem is.

I think that when I was a little boy I missed a very important day of my schooling.

I think there was a day when my teacher took everybody in my class to one side and told them about life and how a man should act and behave and be. I must surely have been absent on that day.

Yes, it's me again. I'm writing to you from Brussels and I'm feeling quite weird and weary. I've been here for a day - I leave on Sunday - and I'm not sure whether I like the place, but I am happy to be here.

Before I tell you my reason for coming to Brussels, I just want to tell you about something great that has just happened to me. I've been using this Internet cafe for a while and paying 1 Euro for each half hour. I was about to buy more time when a young man came up to me and gave me a card and said something to me in French.

I've just sat down to discover that he's me given me his unlimited Internet access pass and I now have 18 hours and 40 minutes Internet access! I'm so glad I thanked him!

Anyway: Back to weird and weary and my reason for being here.

I came to Belgium to be with a young French-Canadian girl named Patricia Leduc. Patricia and I met in York and spent a wonderful week together. I arranged to spend a few days with her in Brussels before she headed home.

I met Patricia yesterday as we'd arranged and at first everything was fine. At first. Then within an hour our entire "friendship" had fallen apart and it ended with Patricia telling me that she doesn't like me or my appearance and she thinks that I'm a "victim."

Hmmmm.

Patricia left Brussels today and now I will never see her again. It seems, upon reflection, that I have badly misjudged this girl. It's a shame, because I have so many beautiful memories with her from York. Memories of ghost walks, pubs, conversations that went on until 6am, a film called Sex and Lucia, getting caught together in the shower of a local youth hostel, laughs and much more.

Cardboard memories I will cut out and keep for many years to come.

I think my problem is that I simply get far too attached to people. I have friends in Eastern Europe and I know that many of these people value our friendship very much. With people from the West it just isn't the same. Many people I meet from Western countries seem content to have "disposable" friendships: Use one, throw it away, get another.

To be completely honest, I generally don't like Westerners and these horrible little capitalist societies that we've created. Eastern Europeans still seem to have something that we in the West have lost.

I know that I've said all this before and I don't mean to sound like a bitter young-old man. I just don't understand it. I think that, because I have never had a strong family backing me, I search for things in other people that I can't find in myself.

It's true that people are life. Life is nothing without people. While I'm in Brussels, I'm not taking photographs of churches or anything like that because they often bore me. They're just buildings! It's the people we meet who matter.

You can bet your bottom euro that in years to come, when this hair is grey and these crows feet run deeper than ever, it will be photos of my family and people like Katja, Tanya and Olga that raise a smile. Not photos of a museum or a church that I once visited! These will not be the snapshots that I cherish.

Soooooo. Anyway. Before I end this entry, I'd like to resolve my Patricia story. I told you everything fell apart. Well, the last hours we spent together were actually nice. I think we both understood last night that they were the last hours we would ever spend together.

We laughed. We saw the Grand Place, a remarkable piece of architecture. We jumped like Kangaroos. We danced in the street or, rather, I danced in the street.

I told Patricia that I shall keep one memory from last night. That memory is both of us standing near the Grand Place, watching two street artists playing violins. It was near dusk and there was a warm wind blowing. We stood there for maybe ten minutes as this beautiful, haunting music filled the air.

Despite everything that happened yesterday, despite Patricia's cruel words, I will never forget this girl. For seven days she lit up my life.

And though I will never write to her again, and though she will never know it, when I think of Patricia and the days we spent together I will always do so with a smile.

And now it's late. I only have sixteen hours of Internet access left!

I'm going to walk the streets of Brussels for a while, with the music of Sting in my ears, and soak up the atmosphere of this funny city. After that it's back to my hotel and off to sleep.

Thanks for listening to me ramble. I will be in touch in a day or two to let you know about any more adventures or misadventures that I have in Brussels.

If only I hadn't missed that day of school . . .

From the memory box of a Professional Englishman.