Public Transport Tiecket Budapest

It will be over with the little orange strips called “Vonaljegy” that you need to validate in trams, busses and the metro in Budapest soon. Well not too soon but at least starting from 2014 progressively a new so called E-Ticket system will be introduced. Plan is to have it all done by 2014 which is not a tough deadline I would say.

The tickets will be step by step replaced with a plastic card which is based on the same technology as PayPass and many people know already from cities like London where the Oyster Card also replaced paper tickets.

The first step will be to replace time based tickets such as monthly tickets which allow owners to travel unlimited within Budapest. As a second step than the one time tickets will fade out and the last step is the installation of automated entrance and exit stations that might will probably result in less jobs in the public transport sector as inspectors will drop out by 2015.

Additionally the city is planning to introduce P+R parking spots connected to the HÉV stations which are the suburban trains and also for Metro Line M2. With this step obviously the heavy city traffic should be reduced.
The entire project is connected to a cost of 1.1 billion HUF which is roughly 3.75 million Euro.

I myself started learning Hungarian in 2005 and can agree that it is a very hard to learn language but once you get into it and you mix with the locals and speak to Hungarians a lot e.g. at work or in the pub it just gets in your brain as it probably does with any other language to learn. In case you would like to learn Hungarian here is a list of Language Schools in Budapest or in case you just come for a visit check out some words you can learn and use quick.

So Hungarian is hard to learn and it is spoken only by a few people, why to bother? I think that it is only fair and showing respect towards locals if you at least make an effort towards them the same you would expect it from foreigners in your country as well. Not that you need to speak perfect Hungarian but at least some basics and some friendly expressions that help you through the day. Just my 2 cents concerning this topic.

What is your opinion on Hungarian as a foreign language? And what do you think, should expats learn Hungarian or is it not necessary?

I think that it is a cool way to show your interests or what you like, in my case it is the parliament building by night. therefore I have collected som nice images of Budapest that you can save to your computer and use them as your Cover picture on Facebook. Have fun and show your support to Budapest. Click to enlarge the pictures. If you would like to add an image as well just let me know.

Cost for Food in Budapest

• Daily Menu in the business district – 1.300 HUF
• Fast Food Menu (e.g. Big Mac menu) – 1.200 HUF
• 1kg of chicken breast – 1.200 HUF
• 1 liter of milk – 250 HUF
• 1kg of tomatoes – 480 HUF
• 12 Eggs – 400 HUF
• 1kg of normal, local cheese – 800 HUF
• 1kg of apples – 300 HUF
• 1kg of potatoes – 330 HUF
• 0,5l can of beer – 200 HUF
• 1l bottle of normal quality red wine – 1.800 HUF
• 1l Coca Cola – 330 HUF

Housing costs in Budapest

• monthly rent for a 85 m2 furnished downtown apartment – 125.000 HUF
• monthly cost of utilities such as gas, electricity, heating etc (2 people in a 85 m2 apartment) – 40.000 HUF
• 8MB internet flatrate per month – 5.000 HUF
• 40″ flat screen TV – 150.000 HUF
• Microwave – 20.000 HUF
• Cleaning help (hourly rate) – 2.500 HUF

Costs for Clothes in Budapest

• Pair of Levis 501 – 25.000 HUF
• 1 pair of Adidas trainers – 20.000 HUF
• 1 pair of average business leather shoes – 18.000 HUF

Costs for Transportation / Mobility in Budapest

• Volkswagen Golf 2.0 TDI – 4.300.000 HUF
• 1 liter of gasoline – 420 HUF
• 1 ticket for Public Transportation – 360 HUF
• Monthly ticket for Public Transportation – 9.000 HUF
• Taxi from the airport to the city center – 3.000 HUF

Costs for Personal Care

• 6 days of normal medicine against flue – 1.500 HUF
• Average Deodorant – 580 HUF
• Regular Hair Shampoo – 750 HUF
• 4 rolls of toilet paper – 370 HUF
• Tube of toothpaste – 470 HUF
• Standard Mens haircut – 2.500 HUF

Costs for Entertainment in Budapest

• Basic dinner for 2 persons in neighborhood area – 4.500 HUF
• 2 cinema tickets – 2.500 HUF
• 2 theatre tickets – 7.200 HUF
• Dinner for 2 in an good restaurant incl. wine and dessert – 10.000 HUF
• 1 cocktail in a city center bar – 1.300 HUF
• Cappuccino in the downtown area – 500 HUF
• 1 beer in the pub – 450 HUF
• Monthly fee in the fitness studio – 15.000 HUF
• 1 package of Marlboro cigarettes – 690 HUF

Please keep in mind, as mentioned above, that prices are only approximate as they very much depend on the place and also change very fast. A proper dinner for 2 can also be 6.000 HUF only or exceed 15.000 HUF easily. Beer in a real kocsma can be 300 HUF only but in trendy bars don’t be surprised to pay 750 HUF. This article should just give a rough overview of what to expect for certain services. If you have a special request for a service or product  or you disagree strongly with a point just drop me a line in the comments.

“Apple’s support included cash and computers at a time when Graphisoft was a small company with limited resources, working within the economic and political confines of what was, at the time, communist Hungary. Apple also introduced Graphisoft to its worldwide distribution network, which we rely upon to this day.”

The statue is made of bronzed by the Hungarian sculptor Erno Toth who created it the way Steve Jobs is probably most remembered, turtleneck, jeans and round glasses. If you want to see the statue of Steve Jobs in Budapest you should visit the Graphisoft Park (See on map) which you reach the best with the suburban train HÉV to direction of Szentendre.

Steve Jobs Statue in Budapest

David Guetta has been playing already on Balaton Sound this year and according to the reactions on Facebook or Twitter it was a blast. Though very comercial, or probably that is the reason why, he fills up every venue and so he will do with the HungExpo as well. The “Nothing but the Beat Tour” which this concert is part of has been very successful for David Guetta and also his recent albums and singles such as Where them girls at or Sweat are mega successful.

David Guetta Tickets for the Budapest Concert

At the moment tickets and further information are only available on this website. I do not know if this is a original and approved website from DG himself or just a website opened up for this concert by the tour organizer. The direct link to the ticketing system you can find here. Anyways you should get your tickets as soon as possible because as I mentioned it will be sold out very soon, the information is going around Facebook like hell at the moment.

Calvin Klein
Calvin Klein is a New York born designer from Jewish-Hungarian immigrants

Jamie Lee Curtis
Just like Calvin Klein Jamie Lee Curtis has Jewish-Hungarian ancestors

Freddie Prince Jr.
Hi grandfather was Jewish-Hungarian as well

Drew Barrymore
Her mothers name is Ildikó, I think that says it all

Paul Newman
His parents are Jews from Poland and Hungary

Alanis Morisette
Same here, mother is Jewish-Hungarian

Adrien Brody
His mother is a Budapest born lady

Goldie Hawn
Goldie Hawns mother is the daughter of Hungarian immigrants

Kate Hudson
Since Kate Hudson is the mother of Goldie Hawn, she is quarter Hungarian

Rachel Weisz
Weisz György, a Hungarian inventor is her father

Tara Reid
Tara is a super mixture of different nationalities, Hungarian is one of them

Andrew G. Vajna
Budapest born, still very present in Hungary and most Hungarians know that he is Hungarian so it is not such a surprise

River and Joaquin Phoenix
The grandparents are Jewish-Hungarian

Estee Lauder
She is the child of a Hungarian and a Czech

And there are also some other such as Tony Curtis, Mark Knopfler or Gene Simmons who also have somewhere Hungarian roots. I think it is quite impressive how many celebrities which we know from many movies, as singers or other world wide famous artists are actually with Hungarian background.

Budai Gourmet Festival

The Budai Gourmet Festival in Budapest (Millenaris Park) is organized by Sziget.hu, the company organizing the Sziget Festival, Balaton Sound and the Volt Festival in Sopron as well. So it is ensured that this festival is professionally organized maybe even a bit too professional in my opinion. For the relativly high entrance fee of 2.900 HUF you are equipped with a wine glass and a payment card (based on NFC -Near Field Communication technology) in order to make your payments at the stands. This payment method seems to be very popular nowadays among festivals in Budapest, this was the case at the Pálinka Festival already, and the card will be valid for the Balaton Sound, Sziget Festival as well as the Volt Festival as well. OK, enough talk about the organizational issues, let’s jump into what the Budai Gourmet Festival has to offer in terms of Gourmet.

Basically the festival is built up on 3 types of stands: Wine and Pálinka producers, gourmet stores and resturants in Budapest.

Wine and Pálinka

The wine and Pálinka part to be honest is more or less the same as what you get at the dedicated Budapest Wine Festival and the Pálinka Festival so you have well known brands such as Rázangyal Pálinka, Bock Wine, Duzsi Tamás from Szekszárd and so on. So compared to the Wine / Pálinka Festival you will not get any benefit though it is always good to have good wine and pálinka on such a fetival an the Hungarian wine is quite good. Anyways you will get the typical tasting of different producers just in case you are interested in products like this.

Budapest Gourmet Stores

This part of the Budai Gourmet Festival was actually the most interesting since it is not too easy to find gourmet stores in Budapest apart from the well known such as Culinaris or the ones I wrote about already like for example Villa Bagatelle. But as I found out there is far more to discover in terms of gourmet stores in Budapest and other shops dealing just with good food, spices and traditions from around the world. There is for example a cooking school called ChefParade which gives courses in cooking exotic dishes from Thailand, Mexico or mainly for foreigners Hungary. Also I discovered a Spanish shop, which unfortunately does not have any website to link to, which sells Spanish sausage, ham, wine and much more. So you don’t always need to run to restaurant Pata Negra in Budapest to get your Tapas. So all these gourmet stores were present on the Budai Gourmet Festival and showed their products and gave bits and pieces to taste.

Restaurants

As you know I am writing quite much about restaurants in Budapest so this part was not too exciting for me, nevertheless there were some restaurants which I have not heard off and some which I have heard off a lot but never made it to go there such as Nobu, the newly opened restaurant in Hotel Kempinski. The restaurants offered a small range of really impressive creations that you could try for fairly high prices but that is normal for a festival like that so I tried only a few things and definitely I have some more restaurants on my “To Go” list for the coming weeks and months. One highlight was for sure the Café Dérnyé which I wrote a review about some time ago and all I wrote was about having a good breakfast, which is still true due to the fabolous bread they have, but I will for sure revisit the restaurant for a good dinner.

That’s it for the culinary part of the festival. Additionally I have to say that the flair and atmosphere on the festival was extremely nice, I felt like on a small holiday for the few hours I have been there. Due to this atmosphere with live music, the good weather and much more it made the festival also extremly children friendly so it is a good place to go as a family as well. Overall I can just recommend the Budai Gourmet Festival in Budapest to taste things from around the world, discover the gourmet corner of Budapest and try Hungarian products in one go.

Budai Gourmet Festival Information

For more information you should visit the website and for impressions I recommend to have a look in the galleries on their Facebook page. In both channels you will be kept informed about the next festival.

Foursquare

Want a free drink? Or a little present? What about a half price for all drinks? That all you can have now with Foursquare in Budapest and all over Hungary. Foursquare recently released its version 3.0 and it is now possible to add specials to certain places so that you can boost your business with specials and as a user of Foursquare you receive discounts, freebies and all that kind of stuff.

Foursquare is a localtion based mobile application for all devices from the iPhone, over Android to Symbian, Microsoft and even Java phones. It gives you the possibility to share your location with your friends, give and receive tips about certain places and from now on receive specials from certain places.

What that means for Budapest I checked out a bit and till now it is still in the beginning and probably not too popular in Hungary but its fun. So I checked few of the special you can receive. In the “Opera Garden Hotel & Apartments” for example you get a free Nespresso coffee if you stay in the hotel and check in via Foursquare. Not a big deal but once you are there grab the free drink. In a bar called Moro Antik (I haven’t been there so I can’t tell you what place it is) you get a free coffe every fifth time you check in there. So if you are anyways there often grab your free drink.
To more competitive benefits you can have ub Cheers and Dürer Kert. Cheers gives you a drink for free once you steel the mayorship (kind of proof that you are there where often) from somebody else. So check in a couple of times, see if you became the mayor and get your drink for free. In Dürer Kert it is even more beneficial since you get all drinks you order for half price if you are the mayor of Dürer Kert. So you really need to be very often there but once you are the mayor you can get lashed for half price.
And a last one is actually not a bar or cafe but the House of Terror museum. Every 20th person who checks in receives a small gift from the House of Terror, whatever that is but try it.

All that is of course playing around with the new world of technology and mobile apps but if you are into it than check out what you can get for free or cheaper around you. Do you use Foursquare already or you think these kind of apps are useless?

Rihanna Budapest Loud Tour

This is probably the concert of the year, Rihanna in Budapest performing in Papp Laszlo Sportarena. Rihanna for sure is one of the top performers all over the world at the moment winning tons prices, giving sold out concerts and selling millions of albums. Yes, Rihanna is a megastar and she makes a stop in Budapest for a concert.

The 1988 on Barbados born Robyn Rihanna Fenty how she is originally called released 5 albums so far (Music Of The Sun, A Girl Like Me, Good Girl Gone Bad, Rated R and Loud), with the album Loud she is going on tour now with 58+ performances worldwide and on December 8th she will have her performance in Budapest’s Papp Laszlo Sportarena.

Rihanna is one of the worlds top performers at the moment having one hit after the other on her own and together with other artists like Eminem and even David Guetta. Whatever she touches will get gold status for sure. Just now she was rocking the Brit Awards and the Grammies with her live performances. Rihanna is definitely an act you should not miss in your music year 2011 here in Budapest. I promise that this concert will be sold out very soon, Papp Laszlo Sportsarena has not unlimited capacity, so if you want to see Rihanna in Budapest you should get your tickets as soon as possible otherwise you will see yourself hitting the black market.

Get Tickets for Rihanna in Budapest

Where to get tickets from? Still the concert is far away but be aware that it just recently got announced and once press jumps on it and tickets are really on sale the concert will be sold out within hours I guess. So get your Rihanna tickets for Budapest as early as possible.

What you can expect from the Rihanna Concert in Budapest

Since Rihanna is on tour already there are images and videos out already giving you a hint on what kind of Show Rihanna will come with to Budapest. One thing is for sure, that is always when Rihanna is performing, the show will be super sexy and full of energy. Have a look.

Rihanna Loud Tour

Lets get ready for the hottest concert in Budapest this year, get your ticket and enjoy.