Budapest / London / The Value of Doing the Wrong Thing

I write from this blessed Sunday from the deep deep comfort of my alcove studio.

My apartment has truly begun to feel like home in the past few weeks. My peaceful refuge after a few weeks of travel.

Words cannot fully express how comfortable I am right now. Peak Autumn mode. Sipping on a mug of Trader Joe’s Harvest Blend Tea listening to PJ Morton’s The Piano Album after having eaten a delicious meal of Trader Joes’s (shoutout TJ) chicken shawarma, roasted sweet potato and kale slaw.

very proud of this dish. I’ve realized that I haven’t learned to properly plan my meals out as an adult. So many diets going through the revolving door of my life. Keto, eating like shit, etc. This feels like a pretty balanced bowl to me. 1 part protein, 1 part starch/grain, 2 part vegetables.

What joy! What comfort!

To be honest, the past few weeks I’ve been having bouts of existentialism. Questioning whether I’m spending my time on anything worthwhile. Questioning whether I’m missing out on anything and letting my time slip by.

Fair questions that will probably echo through the rest of my life BUT in this moment I can’t think of much beyond how comfortable I am.

Budapest

I was in Budapest a few weeks ago.

Budapest came about on a whim. I originally wanted to go to NYC —> London —> Berlin. I’m a bit of a lazy planner so I left the Berlin portion unplanned till last minute.

Turns out Berlin was too expensive so I picked the cheapest European country that sounded appealing…Budapest.

Went with Ray who recently moved to London.

First impressions/thoughts of Budapest

  • Beautiful city. The Danube runs through separating the Buda and the Pest sides of the city. The river itself is pretty. The buildings are beautiful as well.

  • Cheap! A pretty nice two bedroom Airbnb ran for $100 a day. Meals were pretty affordable.

  • What does a Hungarian look like? For a lot of ethnicities there seem to be features that help identify them. You can take a country like Japan or England and have a mental model of what a person from that country should kind of look like. Even after my trip I can’t really describe what a Hungarian person looks like.

  • Deep history. Budapest got screwed during World War 1, 2. Even to this day they’re rebuilding a lot of stuff that was destroyed during the wars. Makes me wonder why they haven’t been able to get to it faster…

Some notable memories

  • Going to a club called Instant. I was a bit nervous about experiencing the night life in a new city. In any city where I’m considered a minority I’m always a little nervous about first experiences. We got to the club and the door was manned by a small posse of big Hungarian men. I thought we might get carded or have to pay cover but they pretty much ignored us and waved us through. This was the biggest club I’ve been to in my life. Spanning three floors and a basement, it’s split into six different dance floors playing different genres of music. Going from room to room discovering a new bar or new dance floor was pretty interesting—almost like going through a maze. We got there around 1030/11 and hung out for a few hours. By the time we left it was PACKED.

    • I’m so impressed by the fact they played different genres of music. They even had a rock floor. We alternated mostly between the house room and the pop room but the edm room had a trippy light show that was cool. Only regret is I didn’t find the R&B/hip hop room.

  • The food was fantastic. Cheap too. A fancier meal would cost maybe $30 each. Coming from NY where a burger and drink cost me $50(!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!) a few weeks ago this was great.

    • Had goulash for the first time. Prior to this trip I always thought goulash was a garnish or dip like a salsa (kind of sounds similar right?)… WRONG! It’s a very hearty beef stew. First sip I had blew me away. Sipping on a dish like this in the dead of winter—that would be amazing. I don’t know how they make it so hearty. It envelops you like a warm hug.

    • Langos. Imagine deep fried dough covered with sour cream, cheese and whatever toppings you want on top of that. We had sausage and bacon. Tasty but very straightforward. Of course that combination of dishes will taste good.

    • We also swung by a more traditional Hungarian restaurant called Csalanosi Csarda. Huge portions. Simple delicious food. The desserts were fantastic. Plus they had live music

GOULASH! Gonna learn how to make this. Perfect for the upcoming cold

incredible apple cake dessert we had.

  • Baths. We went to Széchenyi baths. A palatial outdoor/indoor bath with dozens of baths, saunas, steam rooms to explore. A little more run down than I expected but well maintained and clean overall. Alternated between the steam room and the cold pool. Ended with the dry sauna and felt buzzzzzzzzzzzzzzed hours after I left.

  • River cruise. All you can drink Prosecco while you float down the river Danube watching beautiful buildings pass by. $30 for this experience as well. Not bad…

  • Ruin bar. Bars made out of the ruins of old buildings. We didn’t stay that long here but the layout was pretty interesting and they had a great house DJ playing (high praise from someone who doesn’t listen to house).

Overall great four days in Budapest. Did pretty much everything I wanted to do. I’m sure there’s more we could have explored but this felt sufficient.

surprisingly a lot of Asian food in Budapest. This was the Korean restaurant down the street from our Airbnb but we never went because of terrible reviews…

While I was there I did wonder what non-tourists did day to day in the city. What industries did they have beyond tourism? Clearly people live here but it felt so designed for the tourist that it was hard to imagine what they’d do. Probably felt that way because we mostly stayed in the tourist parts

the view from City Park

One critique of the city—coffee scene could be better.

interior of the famed NY cafe. Didn’t stay because the line was so long

It was also pretty fun traveling with Ray. Hadn’t spent that much time one on one with him in the past but the conversation/fun flowed smoothly. Two bedroom two bathroom layout worked nice where we had our own spaces at the end of the night.

It did feel like a romantic city though. Would be great to come back with a girlfriend in the future :’)

London again

The remainder of my trip I stayed in London. London portion of the trip felt a little long. Given that I had just been there last year maybe I should have gone elsewhere.

Nonetheless there were some nice moments in this part of the trip as well. Weather this trip around was very nice too.

  • Dinner at Blacklock with Sherry and Ray. We got the All-In which turned out to be a heap of lamb chop, beef and pork. The meat was good. Definitely too much and got colder, unappetizing towards the end. We also got the cheesecake here which was REALLY GOOD! Oh lord that crust. That crumbly, buttery, sand-like crust.

  • Got dinner with Sherry at a Cocotte in Shoreditch (chicken was meh. Bread was really good). Caught up about life and shot the breeze. Talked about so many random life things. Such a comfortable, enjoyable, effortless dinner. I’m glad we’ve been able to get closer during NY and stay close friends across her travels to other countries. It was a shame she had to leave for Paris and we didn’t have much overlap but it was really nice seeing her again.

  • Met up with Rupert (before I left for Hungary actually). Good seeing him. Our paths seem to cross more than I’d expected. Back in Berkeley I rarely hung out with him outside of occasional church events. Seeing him over the years in the bay, NYC, London… unexpected.

    • Same old Rupert. He’s one of those people that seem like a constant. Happy go lucky, living life on a whim, getting into random shenanigans (is that a fair assessment @ rupert if you ever read this?). No tumult. No discernible ups and downs. Interesting guy

  • Saw Mimi.

    • We got coffee at a Japanese cafe and caught up on life. She seems like she’s up to similar things as the last time we spoke. Working in casting. Thinking about moving to Australia for film opportunities there.

    • Also trippy to think we’d be meeting up all these years later. Back in Junior year I crushed on her for a while and asked her out. We went on a date but the timing didn’t work out. We talked a little bit during the Summer after Junior year but lost contact for a few years. She hit me up randomly in 2019 and we talked over messenger a bit. I remember thinking “this is nice but too bad we live in different cities.” Messenger talk peters out. Pandemic hits. And years later I see her again in 2022. From 2016 to 2022…

    • Maybe I’m beating a dead horse but again—weird to know who enters your life and who leaves it. Who’s sticky. I never would have looked at either Mimi or Rupert when I first met them and imagined seeing them years later in a different continent.

    • After the cafe we hung out at the garden and I stuck around while she took a call. We were both sleep deprived but I think it was a good hang.

    • The following day we met up for dinner in Soho. Dinner was a little disappointing—she seemed far more tired than the day before. But it was great seeing her overall.

  • Watched Much Ado About Nothing at the Shakespeare Globe!

    • WOW. So unexpectedly good. I went in wondering whether I’d even understand the show. I left feeling like I’d seen some of the best live acting of my life.

    • Being in that iconic venue was really cool.

    • Will definitely watch another show next time I’m in London (wonder when that will be).

  • Did a walking tour in Hampstead Heath.

    • I was tired. The group turned out to be much older than prior walking tours and I felt a liiiiiiittle out of place. Seemed more like a group of retirees than tourists.

    • Hampstead Heath had that quaint English town vibe to it. I didn’t explore much of the park but it was nice.

  • Saw Buckingham Palace and rode through Hyde Park. Dare I say London’s parks on a sunny day might edge out New York’s parks. Absolutely beautiful on a clear sunny day.

Overall, London was fun. I’m always curious about why the food there is so heavy. Chop shops, Fish and chips, all the different meat pies people eat there.

bangers and mash @ Mother Mash. Bangers were banging. Mash was good

One of the things Brits do the best are potato chips. Tyrrell’s Sea Salt & Cider Vinegar chips became a new favorite for me during this trip.

I’m gonna try to go to new places in the future. Budapest was worthwhile. London felt too familiar. Though it was nice seeing so many friends while I was over there.

Also if I ever move to London I like Shoreditch. So much to eat, drink, explore there.

The Value of Doing the Wrong Thing

Now that I’m back in New York I gotta figure out some stuff.

Most specifically I want to feel like I’m directed towards something.

Pre-Euro trip I definitely felt like I was going with the flow too much. My habits were terrible too

  • getting drunk a little too often and ending the night with a bag of chips and cookies

  • waking up way literally minutes before having to log in at work

  • days when I’d work from home and not see a single person

I’m gonna clean up shop a little bit and start living towards something. Lately that’s been getting back into making music.

As I encourage myself to produce music again I keep questioning myself.

Is it worth it? What’s the point? This stupid ass music shit that will probably go nowhere…

To be fair producing music may be the absolute wrong thing to spend my life on right now BUT it’s better to be disciplined and honed in the wrong thing than aimless in everything.

If I can squeeze the best results from myself in this one thing I can probably do it towards other things in the future as well.

That is an irrefutable, undeniable T R U T H.