Day 16: The Easiest Way to Run More Than You Think You Can Is To Just Get A Bit Lost

This post is coming several days late, and I don't really have much of an excuse, really. I haven't been busier than usual or anything---in fact, I think these last few days, I've spent more time in the apartment than I have my entire stay here thus far. Nevertheless, on Saturday, I went on my first run in Budapest! I had planned for it to be a short one (less than two miles), but I got lost, and it took me about 3 miles to get myself back to my apartment. (As a side note, want to know how I know how far I run? Check out this website!)

My goal was to run to Városliget, a public park in Budapest located not too far North of my apartment. I stretched and put on my running shoes, headed down the stairs, out the front gate, and then started running South. Excellent start, wouldn't you say? Well, it didn't take long for me to discover that I absolutely had no idea where I was, so I just sort of ran aimlessly around, hoping to see a glimpse of grass beyond the streets lined with office buildings and apartment complexes. Sure enough, two miles later, I ran into this:

Part of the park is a memorial, and here was a monument
to honor the Hungarian Independence.

This was the engraving at the base of the flag.

(Not really sure what this was...)

Grass!

Trees! And a path!

On the map I looked at back at the apartment, there was supposed to be
some sort of lake thing in the middle of the park. I assumed that these people
were admiring the view, so went to join them.

And instead of water, I found construction.

Yay construction.

I was pretty tired by this time around, so I just ran around the front bit
of the park and then decided to try to find my way back to my apartment.

I ran down this street that had lots of pretty houses and buildings.

This building looked nice.

It had a nice, quaint-yet-polished-and-clean feel to it.

And it turned out to have a sign on the side of the
building saying (roughly, pardon my Hungarian):
Franz Liszt Academy of Music, Bela Bartok College. (!!!!!)

There was also a fancy bank building.

And a church (I ran in front of the main door the exact moment that
a bride and groom came out... a bit awkward, I'd say).

And then I found the Chinese Embassy!

They had all these pictures of recent architectural conquests
in China, to show of their modernity, I think.

The gate outside the Embassy.

This was the Embassy building. I only got one picture of
the building because there was a guard outside the gate
and I didn't want to finish my run with a trip to a
Hungarian jailhouse.

So that was my run in pictures, and needless to say, in my completely out-of-shape, thoroughly non-athletic state, I was exhausted by the time I got back to the apartment. I made myself some pasta (pre-packaged tortellini), topped it with some olive oil, some lemon juice, black pepper, basil (dried, unfortunately), and fresh tomatoes. Yum, yum, yum.