Tuesday, September 05, 2006

The Fishermen's Bastion at Dusk

During the three months I spent in Budapest I came to the conclusion that the city is actually very photogenic. At night. Or at least late in the evening when there isn’t that much light to see and spot the numerous imperfections the city has. I mean, the buildings in Budapest are, were, beautiful but are in miserable shape. The facing tiles are falling off of many buildings; the stone arcs of some buildings have totally crumbled leaving only the supporting frames visible and so on. Sad thing to look at really.

But when the night comes away goes the miserable details and in comes the beautiful silhouettes. And the spotlights. And the decorative lights. And everything else that captures the attention. Like this setting sun behind the Fishermen’s Bastion, pretty much everything in Budapest looks better in night time than during the day. Well okay, this is bad example in such a way that the Bastion is actually kept in good condition. As is the Buda Castle which, alas, was pretty much covered in campaign ads and such during the time I stayed in Budapest. But nevertheless they became invisible during the night time, unless it happened to be at beam of a spotlight.

For all it seems I can quote a Hungarian traveling companion of ours considering the sad state of the buildings: “The Hungarian people just don’t seem to care.” Too bad.

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