Apocalypse Now

That I already long for my bunker so quickly.. Budapest set this year's heat record yesterday and my modest hotel room has no air conditioning. Like Martin Sheen in Apocalypse Now, I am standing here in just my underwear in my 8-square-meter room.

I lie down for a nap and wait until I'm tasked with the search for Colonel Kurtz in the Cambodian jungle..

Although I am not geographically there yet, the subtropical climate is already wearing me down. To escape the sun, I spontaneously decided to visit the semi-underground ethnological museum after breakfast. However, the exhibitions are so extensive that it turns into a day's task. So, I stagger my visit: from 10:00 AM ceramics and shamanic masks - around 11:00 AM a false fire alarm in the museum - 11:30 AM back in and continuing with the masks - 12:30 PM lunch - 2:00 PM recolored family photos from the 19th century - 3:00 PM nap..

The very simple hotel in the villa district was used as an emergency shelter for freedom fighters during the uprising of '56. When I pick up my washed clothes at the reception, I hear fragments of an old man's voice from a side corridor on my way to and from, conducting ominous business on the phone in broken English with an Eastern European accent. 'You have to transfer... Let me tell you.. you must understand.. All this business is ehm.. is crazy.. is bla bla bla.. at the end of the day.. that's fine.. 20 percent.. 40 thousand..'

In my new habitual spot, a café in the 7th district, I eat 'as usual' (for the second time) an avocado toast and listen - as usual - to the conversation of two Austrians. He explains to her the Austro-Hungarian dual monarchy. When she asks what this connection between the two countries actually stems from, he has no answer. The know-it-all in me mentally snaps my fingers with my raised hand. But wait - could I actually explain that? The Free Walking Tour with guide Gabor in the afternoon provides clarity. Well, not very concrete - but the reason is a mix of clever succession and marriage politics of the Habsburgs and the victory of the Austrians over the Ottomans, who previously occupied Hungary. That should suffice for a quiz duel. At this point, the obligatory dad joke: 'Grandma, today Austria plays Hungary on TV!' - 'Against whom?'

At Keleti station, I have to spend my last Forints before my night train to Bucharest and toss them to a street musician between two songs into his guitar case, without knowing what he plays next. It's One by U2. Well spent money. Later, while I play my playlist on random in the train, it plays first in the cover version by Johnny Cash.

My compartment has three locks! A sign indicates that not only the door but even the narrow flap window must always be kept closed. I obediently follow the guideline and try not to imagine who has attempted to rob the passengers here in various ways before. Some Romanian John Wayne must be up there holding the gangsters at bay with his Chesterfield coat..

Instead, a distinguished Austrian in a checked look enters the compartment and reassures me: The thefts had been like that years ago and the locks and warning signs are more like relics from that time. Business-like, he hangs his jacket on the hook and immediately goes to sleep.

As the sunflower fields pass by the window, I check in online at the next hostel. You can book some services in advance, early check-in, late check-out, and even a fee for vomit clean-up. The structured Bucharest drinker can thus free himself in advance for all eventualities for 300 Romanian Lei (=60 €). However, the price is valid 'per quantity one time', so there is no clean-up flat rate. I have other plans anyway; for now, a daily nap and occasional eavesdropping will suffice.