Two Sundays ago, I headed out on the last week long field trip for my study abroad program. Our destination was Central Europe. In one week we visited Budapest, Krakow, and Prague, and met with different government officials and NGO members to discuss the prospects of the most recently accepted nations into the European Union. On Sunday, we took a bus to Stuttgart, where took a plane to Budapest. The first night was pretty chill, since we got there at 11 pm and barely any restaurants or bars were open. The next morning there were no meetings scheduled, so some of my friends and I decided to go exploring Budapest.

Our first stop was the Gellert Hill, where the Statue of Liberty stands atop. This statue is very different from the one greeting ships arriving to New York. For starters, this statue uses both hands to hold a feather above her head, and it's resting on top of 20 ft tall pedestal. The statue is the only remnant of communist art in the city as well. I would love give a more detailed explanation of what the statue means, why was it placed there, etc., but we didn't have time on our schedule to have a guided tour around the city.

We then headed to the Castle District. The Castle was built during the Hapsburg Empire, and it is breathtaking. The Palace now houses several museums and it is huge. Unfortunately we didn't have much time to walk around because we had to change into our formal attire to go to the Parliament meeting. However, here's a small sample of what I saw.

Later that day, we went to the Hungarian Parliament. It's one of the largest governmental buildings in the world, and certainly the landmark of Budapest. We began our visit with a short guided tour through the premises of the Parliament, but that day we couldn't visit the debating chamber since there was some political unrest. One of the Ministers was being dismissed due to a scandal and the current governing coalition is very likely to collapse. In any case, some rooms were off-limits for us since some meetings were being held to discuss how to approach the situation. The building itself is a monument to the Hungarian pride, due to its grandeur and the fact that it was built with raw materials coming exclusively from Hungary(with the exception of Swedish granite columns).

The building also houses the Holy Crown jewels, items that every king had to wield during their coronation and then return to the Treasury.

After the tour we had a meeting with two parliamentary aides from the European Issues Comission, who discussed the implications of EU accession for Hungary. As a transitioning economy, Hungary has had many challenges in its history. The change to a free-market economy brought many destabilizing economic factors, and overall it is the "poster-child of everything that could've gone wrong" (to quote the lecturer) among the new EU member states. Their most important challenge now is to comply with all the requisites in order to adopt the Euro. They are the only candidate country that does not fulfill any of the criteria, and the current economic environment doesn't yield any optimistic panorama.

After the meeting we had a boat cruise on the Danube River. The tour took place at dusk, so we got a view of the Budapest from both daylight and nighttime. One of the most beautiful experiences ever, accompanied of course by Strauss's Blue Danube.

After that we had a small dinner at nearby pub, and went back to the hotel. The night was not party friendly since it was Monday, all pubs were closed, and we had to wake up at 7 am to go to our next meeting.

The meeting was with an researcher from the American funded NGO Freedom House. This body researches the development of freedom in the former soviet states. Of course, Hungary is part of it. He highlighted many of the challenges of a transitioning economy. It caught my attention when he mentioned that since his branch had the label "Freedom House...Europe", he didn't have a hard time as his colleagues in Turkmenistan, where the organization was directly linked to the US (although both branches are).

Afterwards, we went to the House of Terror.

The name can be misleading, but actually, it isn't. Let me explain myself better. The House of Terror is not a haunted mansion, or anything of that sort. It is the building where the Hungarian Nazi Party had it's headquarters and later the Communist Party. It is now a museum talking about the oppression people were subjected to during the time. Now, the name is not misleading, because the whole exhibit excels at manipulating your psyche to creep you out. There's creepy music in every room, they play with shadows and lights to give everything a creepy look, except for the most shocking part of the building. You take an elevator that descends very slowly into the basement, while a screen shows an interviewee explaining how the people who were against the regime were executed in that very same basement. You get out the elevator, and the basement is basically a small prison. You walk down the prison cells and then you come to the room where all the gallows are. At the end of your visit, you have a very dark display of iron crosses dimly illuminated with red-colored lights. The place pushed the "terror" thing a little bit too much for me.

This part of the trip was a good start on the rest to come, overall. The weather was great and we were there in an interesting political time for Hungary. Coming up, more excitement and some depression, since Krakow, Prague, and Auschwitz were also part of the field trip.