by Jessica Pan
I end up falling asleep and wake up twelve hours later. 7:30 a.m.
I can’t tell Charles that I spent my first day in Budapest asleep. I pack my day bag to try to redeem this vacation. And myself.
✽ ✽ ✽
After I get a tip from a barista to head to a bathhouse, I walk toward the Danube and cross over the bridge, wind whipping in my hair. When I reach the Gellért baths, I immediately fall in love with the Art Nouveau building, with its tiled arcade and painted dome ceilings.
In the locker room, I change into my black one-piece and flip-flops (flip-flops are always necessary, no matter the destination). I shove my clothes in the locker and look around.
I literally have no idea what I’m doing. I’m going to go take a bath . . . with other people? Isn’t that . . . swimming?
Essentially, I am going swimming in Hungary. Also, I keep calling it Hungaria in my mind because I used to have a roommate from Bulgaria.
I follow some other bathers up some stairs outside, where I find a gorgeous blue pool with colorful mosaic tiles. Trees surround the grounds—orange and yellow leaves because it’s late summer.
This place is stunningly beautiful. I gingerly climb into the water. It’s warm, but not hot. Like I’m sinking into the womb. There are only a handful of other people in the pool. I shake my head in surprise—I’ve found an unexpected oasis, and I suddenly feel incredibly happy, elated at the surprise of ending up here.
I ease my body in and then do the breaststroke across the length of the pool. I flip over onto my back and take in the regal surroundings. Floating there, I close my eyes and take a deep breath. The air is warm with a slight bite to it. I open my eyes, looking at the blue sky and the orange leaves on the trees.
OK, I really like this. Despite hating the idea of traveling alone without a plan, I’m now in a foreign country, having fun by myself. Somehow, I have ended up floating in a giant bathtub staring up at a Hungarian sky. Honestly, it feels liberating. Sure, I had been slightly miserable yesterday and I’d dragged my feet through Budapest. But apparently I didn’t need to be tied to spreadsheets or five-year plans or itineraries. I could find a sliver of adventure by myself in unknown places.
After swimming, I wander around exploring the grounds and see a line of men entering a wooden doorway. Ah, yes, the sauna. My old friend. It’s crisp outside, and so I bound over to warm up. As I enter the sauna, the darkness is discombobulating.
It’s always awkward to walk into a room full of strangers—but it’s stranger still when you’re wearing a swimsuit and all the strangers are chubby topless Hungarian men in their fifties who stare at you as you walk in.
Still, I’ve been in worse rooms.
I spread my towel out and sit, the heat engulfing me. As I settle back against the wooden slats, it comes to me in flashes: the spa receptionist, me dressed in black sweats, roasting the water out of my body for the weight loss contest. I look around me, at the Hungarian men. I try not to think about how I could easily beat all of them in a fitness and weight loss competition.
Instead I focus on how far I’ve come. I’m not scared and depressed like the last time I was in a sauna; I’m in a moment of unexpected bliss in a very unlikely place. Who’d have thought that would ever happen?
Eventually I grow hungry. After changing back into my clothes, I go in search of food I’m craving: a delicious slice of cake.
I cross the Danube again and wander around for what feels like hours. With no destination, it feels impossible to pick a place to stop. Finally, I reach a large square and spot a place called the Café Gerbeaud. It’s grand, in the way so many things in Budapest are. There is a window display full of colorful cakes and shiny éclairs.
The room has high, arched ceilings with pea-green trim and floor-to-ceiling window alcoves, faux marble floors and chandeliers. I take a seat in a corner by a window, facing the room. And it hits me: I’ve been here before. With my parents. We had asked their concierge where to find the best cake, and he had told us to go here. I’m sitting next to the very table we sat at seven years earlier. About to order the best cake.
When it arrives, the Gerbeaud cake is a rectangular slice of dark, shiny chocolate over pastry layers with almond-apricot jam and covered in chocolate.
It looks gorgeous. Almost too good to eat.
Almost.
I take a bite.
It’s dry. Extremely dry. The whole thing tastes like a desiccated Fig Newton with bitter chocolate on it. Last time I was here, this cake was delicious. What had happened?
My low blood sugar is making me disproportionately furious.
This is CAKE. How can cake be bad? How do you fuck up cake, Hungaria???
In The Great British Baking Show, sometimes Paul Hollywood will bite into an exquisite masterpiece, make a face, and say, “You need to work on your flavors.” And I always say, “Oh come on, Paul! She made a beautiful cake in the allotted time! I’m sure it tastes FINE!”
Now I know that he was right because fuck this shiny, pretty, parched cake.
My bliss shatters.
I drink my coffee and push my cake aside with a mixture of shame and contempt.
Jason Bourne doesn’t cry over bad cake! Jason Bourne doesn’t cry. (Although he should. Because toxic masculinity.)
The truth is, regardless of my afternoon at the baths and the sense of adventure that brought me here, I haven’t connected with anyone since I arrived, and I feel painfully alone.
It’s a strange paradox. I want desperately to be hanging out with people, but the idea of talking to strangers makes my stomach hurt. A lot of my shyness that I thought I had banished has returned in this unfamiliar city. Had my comfort zone only been able to expand when it was home in London? Was I not really changed?
I hear a voice and glance to my right.
In the corner next to me is a bearded man with curly, dark hair and a big frame. He asks the waitress for his bill in English, but he has an accent. This is my chance to strike.
Plus, I need intel.
“Hi,” I say to the curly-haired man. “What did you order?”
He picks up the menu and points to a picture of a fancy vanilla éclair.
“Was it good?” I ask.
“Yes!” he says.
“Where are you from?”
“Greece,” he tells me. “Are you here for work?” he asks. I guess my vibe doesn’t scream “local.”
“No, I’m . . . I’m just visiting for fun,” I say. Ish. “What are you in town for?”
“I’m a manager at the World Wrestling Championships this week,” he tells me.
Bingo! I would go to a wrestling match! This is what the universe wanted me to do.
But then the man tells me that the matches don’t begin until after I fly home, and before I can follow up with an earnest interrogation about his career choices, he gets up and leaves.
“Take care!” he calls, as he disappears out the door.
Undeterred, I order the éclair he’d recommended. It arrives looking immaculate, but I’d been fooled before. I dig my spoon into it and take a bite: coffee-flavored whipped cream, fondant topping, bourbon vanilla. It’s delicious. The Greek man may only have been in my life for a fleeting moment, but he has saved the afternoon and my need for cake. I consider us bonded forever.
No one else in the café is alone. I’m usually fine eating on my own in public back home, but back home there was none of this crushing loneliness that had just sprouted up, the cumulative effect of two days of not connecting with anyone. That’s because time passes differently when you’re trying to kill it. In London, I could easily spend a few days alone, enjoying this solitude, but here, in a foreign city, slightly overwhelmed by everything, and with nothing to really do, my mind is going all over the place.
I’d gone around London asking men how they felt about l
oneliness, feeling like if we could just talk about it, it would break its spell and disappear forever. And now here I am in Eastern Europe—and loneliness has hunted me down again. Just like the other times when it has descended upon me, I feel aimless and lost.
I haven’t brought any books to read on this vacation, which is a first for me. That’s because I’m not supposed to be reading—I’m supposed to be meeting fantastic new friends at every corner, exciting people who order tequila shots and take me to secret gardens or steal boats. Where are these people? Why haven’t I found them yet?
Suddenly, with all this time on my hands and all this time alone in my head, I find myself missing my parents, wishing I saw them more, missing Sam, who would make this weekend fun, missing my friends who live scattered across the world, and doubting all of my recent life decisions. Like a surprise solo trip to Budapest.
Even though solitude is important to me, I like it on my own terms. And right now, I’d really like it if Sam or my parents or Rachel or a surprise friend-date walked through that door.
Then I remember—I know someone from Budapest! Eniko, whom I’d met in my improv class back in London. Before I can stop myself, I text her, asking her for tips. I tell myself this is fine and definitely not cheating: she’s a local, I met her at an improv class while extroverting my heart out. It. Does. Not. Count.
She texts me back, “You should definitely eat at Zeller Bistro.”
Reinvigorated with this insider advice, I finish my éclair and make my way across the city toward Zeller, which twinkles with lights in the distance. Just try to talk to someone tonight, I tell myself. Just one person. You’ve been doing this for months now. You know it usually goes fine. You even have the data to back this up. You’ve interviewed social psychologists. You took a class in this. You’re highly trained now.
You can do this.
When I arrive, I note that the restaurant is incredibly romantic: decorative plants and leaves hanging from the ceiling, warm lamps, candles on the table.
I take a seat at my table for one, and a waiter tells me the specials. I’m contemplating the truffle soup when I hear someone say, “I’ll have the truffle soup.” I look to my right and see a woman who looks a lot like me, also eating alone. She then orders the beef carpaccio, and I realize she has an American accent.
I look at the candles and the plants. A couple at the table next to me are holding hands and looking into each other’s eyes. A big group across the room is laughing, loudly. They pause and then break out into a new roar.
I brace myself for what I’m about to do.
“So, where are you from?” I shout across to the woman at the table next to me.
I have become my mother. It has happened. I’ve been pushed to the brink of loneliness, and I have caved. The woman starts and then glances over at me.
“Chicago,” she says.
“Are you traveling alone?” I ask.
“Yep,” she says. She picks up a piece of bread. I look around the restaurant, at the groups, at the romantic couples. I can sit here and stare at my phone while sitting by her, staring at her phone. Or I can choose to be open.
“Want to have dinner with me?” I ask, gesturing to my table.
“Oh . . . OK,” she says. I realize, given our proximity, I have put her in a position where saying no would have been the more excruciating choice. The next thirty seconds are agonizingly awkward as she moves her shopping bags, her plate, her drink, and her purse over to my table. The Hungarian waiters watch on.
She takes the seat across from me.
“I’m Jess,” I say, standing up and offering my hand.
“I’m Wendy,” she says, taking my hand.
“And I’m Mark,” a waiter interjects near us. “And I’m Lukas!” another one says. They shake hands with each other, laugh, and then high-five.
Cool.
✽ ✽ ✽
Wendy, my dinnermate (new best friend?) is visiting Budapest, then Vienna, and then Bavaria alone. She prefers traveling solo, because in the past, she’s been saddled with travel partners who don’t want to explore or eat the local food. I tried to see it through her eyes—that solo travel is rare and precious and gave her enormous freedom to do whatever she wanted.
I want to ask, “But don’t you get struck by devastating loneliness that drives you to do things like cry at a cake?” But I’ve just met Wendy, this is our first date, and I’m also busy shoving the free bread the waiter has brought into my mouth. Then I devour my ribs and potatoes, my first decent meal since I’ve arrived.
Wendy just applied to medical school, and I feel suspiciously like my dad sent her to me as an example. My wily doppelgänger, who has researched everything in Budapest to a tee.
The waiter brings the bill over and then says, “You made a new friend! I’ve never seen that happen here.”
He doesn’t know what bad cake and a lonely day can do to a person.
Eniko had also recommended a pub, so I invite Wendy to come with me. We chat as we wander the streets of the old town, and gradually I feel that sense of aimlessness that has plagued me all day beginning to slip away. In Wendy’s company I feel grounded somehow, here in this time and place. Less rootless. Like I exist.
The bar feels more like ten bars in one, with multiple rooms spread over two floors. Each room has different kinds of music—Europop, jazz, Oasis.
Szimpla Kert is a “ruin pub,” so it’s actually very old, but it doesn’t feel that way. Wendy insists on us ordering palinka, a traditional Hungarian spirit (a friend who orders shots!). The bartender hands us clear-colored shots of alcohol. I down it and feel the heat of the alcohol spring instantaneously to my cheeks. I shudder and order a cider instead. Screw tradition.
Wendy and I wander and settle in a room where a woman is playing “Memories” from Cats on the piano. We sit in half of a broken bathtub and face a group of Europeans (it’s unclear where they’re from exactly, but they are blond and their confidence is high and the men all have long hair) smoking shisha out of hookahs. The old ruin walls behind them are adorned with the terrifying and the crazy: a decapitated baby doll, real old-school portraits of anonymous twelve-year-olds, pewter plates, child toilet seats, paintings of gray cats, Slinkys. It all somehow feels totally normal.
In the bathtub, Wendy talks about her job as a lab technician in Chicago. I listen to her, feeling a vague affection for her, this woman who has shocked me out of my loneliness and accompanied me to this must-visit bar.
Wendy tells me that for breakfast she ate at the New York Palace Café, but she fears that might be too lackluster for me. “Because you live in London, so you must eat in palaces all the time,” she says.
Sure, let’s go with that.
I tell her that she has to go to the Gellért baths, where I’d had my unexpected moment of bliss in the blue outdoor pool. Where I’d floated under the trees, in a rare state of Zen. It feels nice to swap travel tips with someone I’ve met randomly on the road.
On the way to the bathroom, I accidentally walk into the men’s room, flee, then run smack into a British bachelor party. While bolting from them, I am absorbed into a crowd that is pushing me into a room with a Europop song sung by a precocious, girly voice.
When I finally get back to the bathtub, Wendy says she’s ready to go home. I wonder whether I should actually be staying out, trying to meet new people for this undertaking, but my phone is on 8 percent battery life and I have no idea how to get back to my hotel without it.
10 p.m. in the liveliest bar in Budapest. Isn’t this the ideal time to have an adventure? Yes, but it’s also the ideal time to get murdered. Despite Charles’s advice, I still feel this way. Even after everything I’ve done this year, I still don’t feel comfortable approaching strangers in bars at night alone in a foreign city.
On the way out, Wendy and I pass a food market, and I stop to bu
y lángos, a traditional Hungarian snack. It’s essentially deep-fried bread dough covered in a hefty serving of sour cream and smothered in grated white cheese. It is bigger than my face.
I eat it because I feel like I have to. This is lángos! This is tradition! Wendy approves!
Soon after, Wendy and I bid farewell to each other. I wish her luck on her next travel leg to Vienna, and she tells me she will follow me on Instagram. Perhaps Wendy is not my future new best friend, but she’s definitely a welcome ally in a foreign land.
As I make my way back to my hotel, alone on the dark and empty streets, I’m extra alert. Passing grand, unfamiliar buildings, I get a happy, buzzy feeling as I wander through this city I didn’t know I’d be visiting again.
For about ten minutes, I feel transported back to when I used to walk home during the time I was living in Beijing. It was a magical time because so much of my life was still unknown. Everything in Beijing had seemed so exciting: the charming tiny streets, the street vendors, the cyclists.
It’s difficult to maintain that sense of wonder in the city where you are settled. Sure, every now and then you glance up and notice the astonishing beauty of the trees you scuttle past every day on the way to the supermarket, or feel a glow of pleasure as you settle in a beloved café down the road from your apartment, but most of the time we’re too caught up in our daily lives to really notice. Traveling abroad reboots that setting in our brains.
Right now, I’m in Budapest, and I am finally looking up.
Six hours later, I’m in my hotel puking up fried bread.
It is there, on the bathroom floor in Budapest, that I finally admit to myself that I am not having the time of my life here.
Though some of it is my fault, Budapest is also a little tough. She is a beautiful, cold mistress. She’s imposing, mysterious, unsmiling. She doesn’t know what salad is. She is obsessed with bathing. She scares me, a little.
I have failed to connect with her. To seduce her. To make her laugh. To fall in love with her.
These days, we talk a lot about authenticity, especially in relation to travel. To really dive deep into a place, you need to meet locals. But I’d found that I couldn’t just walk into a pub and chat with a bunch of Hungarian men. I can’t crash a lecture hall. And while the waiters I met were perfectly friendly, they definitely didn’t want to be coerced into an intimate friendship at the local baths (or maybe they did, I don’t know, but I probably shouldn’t investigate this too thoroughly).
