Hm. CPAC is meeting in Budapest next week. Perhaps I can cobble together a wobbly aggrieved-and-entitled angry manifesto on social media and sneak into the tribe, and then sneak off at the Nepliget station for points south, after a day at the Szecheny baths. (Excellent strategy for long trips, much less than a cheap hotel room, and even if you don't doze off, you feel like you've had a good rest.)
When I was less familiar with southern European bus routes, I once accidentally got off at the wrong Budapest station in the middle of the night, completely deserted. Saw a map in an adjacent rail station, went over to look, and hopped on the first train in blind faith. Turned out to be the last train of the night, went right to my destination, after a scenic trip over the river. Magyar luck.
Hungary would be near the top of my daydream list, were it not for the firm social divisions. Centuries ago, a cool tribe from Asia took a walk west, and found a great place at a bend in the Danube, and stayed there -- in the middle of people of completely different genetic ethnicities and languages. (Most linguistic borders in that part of the world are slightly blurry -- not that one.) But to keep their identity, they've had very firm social rules -- e.g., the balcony at the opera house. So, a very likeable people, and Catholic as well, but I think I'd always be a Slavic/American stranger.
Perhaps not -- apparently there has been a split between the Buda gardens sensibility and the Cafe New York folks dating to the early 20th c. I've only stayed there for several weeks, given the rental costs. (Sort of my respite from the stranger countries to the south.) So, hardly an expert.
I remember performing in the Molnar festival there as an undergraduate -- my first taste of freedom from the bonds of home. And the literature -- I discovered Kraznahorkai many years ago by keeping an eye on the window of a good bookshop, frequently when walking around in the middle of the night -- and now, the Nobel, as well as an upcoming tribute at Lincoln Center for Bela Tarr. If you keep on keeping on, folks will come to you in search of the better mousetrap.
Especially the New Yorkers -- the greatest concentration of actors and artists on the planet, but everything (correctly) thought worthwhile comes from the outside. So keep an eye on the display windows.