Balaton Lake - Holiday Area

Blue sky and a 19 footer leisure craft ; pleasures of the rich

Hungary is a landlocked country, there is no access to the sea. Thus it is quite apt the Balaton Lake is known as the "Hungarian Sea". The Zala and Sio rivers provide the main inflows to this huge lake measuring 77km at its length and 14 km at its width.The depth of the lake averages at 3.2 m or 10 feet (not very deep) and the maximum depth is 12.2 m or about 40 feet deep. It is 104 m above sea level and the Slavic name "Blato" means "mud" or muddy lake.


Beautiful scenery and a lovely smile

We stayed in one of the many resort towns by this huge lake, called Keszthely and the weather at this time of year is very comfortable. When we arrived at the lakeside, we ventured up to view a church and the many shops selling pottery, lavender leaves with wonderful smells and porcelain.


After a hearty Ostrich lunch

Tibor and Tunde were great hosts and we have had a truly enjoyable time with the Csombordis. The 2 full days they spent bringing us around Budapest and Balaton will forever be in our collective memories of Hungary.


House overlooking Balaton lake

We hope we can all meet again sometime in either Singapore or in Europe in the near future. Many Thanks to Tunde and Tibor !

Labyrinths of Buda Castle and Europe's second oldest Subway

Preshitoric Bison Drawing


Underneath the Buda castle compounds lies an amazing complex of underground tunnels called labyrinths. According to the brochures, the labyrinths of Buda castle stretch for up to 200 km and some sections are still yet to be discovered.dating back to prehistoric times, there were actually prehistoric drawings of bisons and people hunting for food. We initially took all of this information in like primary school children learning to read and write.


Stairway to What ?

Tibor has his doubts about the age of the labyrinths and guesses that they are at most 300 years old. During our walk into the labyrinth, there was this musty smell of dampness and there was this eerie piped in music of tribal drums which leant an air of mystery and fear.I was quite startled to find that around several pitch black corners were some steps leading to some kind of pagan structure. See picture above.


Half statue (of Saint Istvan) in the Labyrinth !

There was an young American tourist group behind us and they too were scared out of their wits, not knowing what kind of beings or structures lay beneath the Buda castle. Again, Tibor put the whole thing into perspective,stating that Hungarian history had no mention of labyrinths although I would think that they would form an effective form of escape if there was an uprising by the general population !

Midway through our walk, we came across what seemed to be a statue whose head was half submerged into the ground. It was in a sealed off section and one could not help thinking at perhaps there was something sinister about the labyrinths.It came to a head, (pun intended) when we all arrived at underground fountain spouting of all things, spoilt wine from a gargoyle's head.



Stone Sentry Guarding part of the Labyrinth

We finally realised that the marketing department of this attraction had put in all of these statues and creatures to spice up what would have otherwise been a boring walk in damp underground tunnels. The joke dawned upon us when the display plate on an underground feature stated that they had found what appeared to be a footprint, obeviously of a Nike Air Max and the statement had stated affirmatively that "this footprint was obviously not from a human being" !! All of the statues were actually fakes !


Underground Station in Budapest

The underground subway at Budapest was real enough though. It was the second oldest in Europe to be built after Moscow's Subway and is still in use, although tourists who don't understand Hungarian would be lost as all the signs are in Hungarian. Very fast an efficient, it was built during the Soviet occupation of Hungary during the 70s.

Pictures from the Royal Castle at Buda

May and Me on the hill overlooking Pesc

After Saint Stephen's church, we parked in downtown Budapest and walked across the bridge to the Buda (hill) side of Budapest. Budapest was named after the 2towns Buda (on the hill) and Pesc and thus the name Budapest was formed.The first king, Stephen obviously occupied the castle overlooking the Pesc side and with the river as a natural deterrent, probably had a drawbridge or nothing at all, (they may have had to use boats to transport materials etc.) and this kept him away from the peasants. This has always been the hallmark of the rich, who create bastions like castles high above the town so that they can observe all that goes around the town and not be bothered by the commoners.


Szechenyi Chain Bridge linking Buda Castle with Parliament House

With a population of just 10 milion, Hungary has several well known figures worldwide, most famous in recent times is George Soros, head of the Quantum Fund which made billions of dollars during the 80s - late 90s in hedge funds.His partner, Jim Rogers, an American is a permanent resident in Singapore together with his family, and amazingly, Rogers has insisted on his 2 daughters on learning Mandarin, stating that Chinese language will be THE dominant language of the 21st century.

Several other famous names are Rubik, of Rubik's cube fame as well as the Hungarian Water Polo team which has won Gold in every Olympics since 1956, an amazing feat when you consider that Hungary has no border to any sea, and everyone learns to swim in the pool or public bath. Hungary is also famous for their Paprika, a chilli like vegetable, similar to the capsicum but far hotter !


Famous Hungarian Porcelain

On day 2, we drove to the famous Hungarian porcelain factory near Balaton and witnessed some of the most beautiful and expensive porcelain pieces. Costing anything from EUR 100 to hundreds of thousands of EURO, Hungarian porcelain has been renowned throuout Europe for its intricacy and colourfulness.There were entire tea sets made for the Royal Families of England, Holland and Belgium to name a few.



The porcelain process is similar to clay whereby the cups,saucers or teasets are first moulded by hand and then placed into an oven to set, after setting, the painting and the lacquering are ovelaid before the final product is ready.

Budapest and St Stephen's Church

St Istvan (Stephen) Church in Budapest, Hungary

After the wonderful breakfast at Tibor's we proceeded downtown to visit the oldest and largest church in Hungary, the Saint Stephen's Church. It was built in the 1500hrs in honour of the first king of Hungary, St Istvan, who was later made into a Saint.


Beautiful stained glass icons

Though not as large as the Notre Dame, it is nonetheless a magnificent place of worship in a country which was predominantly non religious for 54 years under the Soviet occupation (from 1945 until 1989 when the Berlin Wall came down). Interestingly enough, Hungary actually supported the Nazi regime during the Second World War, as part of the Axis powers which my friend Tibor said was a 'mistake'. There are signs of the Communist rule in many parts of the city with statues and
monuments dedicated to the Soviet cause.


The preserved right hand of Saint Istvan

The hand of St Istvan was preserved somehow and till today, one can view the shrunken hand in a humidity controlled cabinet in the church.Hungarians are ethnically unicultural and there is only a very small population of non Hungarian people, the Han Chinese who typically keep to their small community in Budapest. They normally run Chinese restaurants and laundry shops as is their inclination the whole world over.


"I am the Truth and the Life" - from John 14 : 6 in the Bible

We were fascinated that Christian beliefs were widespread throughout Europe, making it all the way to Russia though we were not sure how many of the Hungarian population practised Christianity or any religion.I made a mental note to as Tibor the next time we meet in either Germany or China.


Tibor and Tunde outside St Istvan's (Stephen) Church

Budapest is not very builtup as in many other European major cities, like Paris or London.As the capital of Hungary, it is not very populated with a population of 1.7 million, down from a peak of 2.1 million in the late 1980s.Greater Budapest covers 525 square kilometers and is home to 3.2 million people.

Budapest was originally 2 towns one called Buda and one called Pest and became a single city occupying both sides of the Danube river after a unification of the right bank Buda and Obuda with left bank Pest.Regarded as one of the most beautiful cities in Europe its extensive World heritage Sites include the Danube banks, Buda castle quarter, Andrassy Avenue, Heroes Square and the Millenium Underground Railway, the second oldest in Europe.

It is a city with beautiful charm and disposition which we hope we can visit again another time.

Budapest Day 1 ; at Tibor's house for breakfast

May,Tibor and Tunde

Tibor Csombordi, the business owner of Amtest in Hungary, invited May and I to visit Budapest for a few days for some sightseeing and dining which we readily accepted. His wife, Tunde and him live in the suburbs of Budapest. The house is a bungalow in a quiet neighbourhood. One the first morning after our arrival,it was drizzling slightly but we had the most glorious breakfast in a long while made by Tunde.


Photo shows bread baked at home, with ripe strawberries,cherries and raspberries all grown in their garden naturally, without any growth hormones or fertilisers.

The best thing about the breakfast was everything was natural or organically grown, without any pesticices,artificial fertilisers.It was the sweetest raspberries I had ever tasted, same went for the strawberries. We deduced that the fruits found in Singapore are normally shipped before they are ripe and thus are not as sweet.



The scones were made themselves by their breadmaker(reminding myself to get one such breadmaker one day!). The complete spread included ham, cheese, scones, cherries,raspberries, strawberries and the home brewed coffee.

Nice !

Death and all his Friends

Great Song by Coldplay

Eiffel Tower

View from the base of the Eiffel

Built in 1887 to 1889 as the entrance of the World Exposition, the Eiffel Tower has become the icon of France. Visited by a staggering 200 million people since it was built, each year sees an average of over 6 million visitors alone. Imagine the amount of tourism revenue generated,hotel rooms booked, croissants, baguettes,air fares,train rides,and lots and lots of wine drunk just due to Eiffel alone. The Eiffel Tower is an engineering marvel which was once the tallest structure in the world. Its height at the roof is 300 m (986 ft) and at the antennae top it is 324 m or 1063 feet. It was intended after the Expo to be used as a communications tower and after 1920, it was returned to the city of Paris.

From 1889 to 1930, it was the world's tallest building until the Chrysler Building in New York beat it when it was built, reaching a height of 319 m or 1047 feet.


View from the Champs de Mars

Designed and built by the engineer Gustave Eiffel, and his team, it took 300 workers almost 3 years to finish. Using puddled iron, it weighs 7300 tons of iron and its total weight including the non metallic base structure and foundation is only 10000 tons - very lightwieght. He was very careful in his design taking into consideration wind resistance and wind shear. On a hot day, it expands by 18 cm away from the heat of the Sun. Also, it sways about 6 - 7 cm daily due to wind force.


Underneath the Eiffel Tower

Gustave Eiffel's creation was met with alot of criticism with many calling it an 'eyesore'. However, his brilliance as a designer and an engineer saw his product stand the test of time and is today the one of the most recognisable structures in the world. He used a non-linear differential equation when designing the structure based on counter - balancing the wind pressure with the tension between the construction elements at the point. A most recent engineering study showed that in fact, there were 2 non-linear equations being applied to the tower, one for the base till the lower structure and one for the upper structure.

Sheer brilliance.