all around zagreb

After spending the entire day on the train yesterday, I was really excited to get back to sightseeing. We walked towards the main train station and the “Green Horseshoe” – a row of three parks across the road from the station.

Glavni Kolodvor, the train station where we arrived last night.

King Tomislav Square, the first of the three parks, with a monument of the first Croatian king.

It was a pretty quiet morning in Zagreb.

We walked along the Green Horseshoe...

...till we reached Trg bana Jelačića a.k.a. The Main Square.

Zagreb Cathedral and its Xmas tree.

These huts were for Xmas market. It was still early so they weren’t open yet.

We then headed to Dolac Market, the best known farmer’s market in Zagreb. It was amazing to see how clean and organized it was! Why can’t our Pasar Tani look like this?

The Stone Gate, the only surviving gate of the medieval town of Gradec.

Church of St. Mark. Its tiled roof is decorated with coat of arms of Zagreb (white castle on red background) and Triune Kingdom of Croatia, Slavonia and Dalmatia.

Our next stop was the Museum of Broken Relationships. The only one its kind, the museum displayed mementos from people who had lost their loved ones i.e. death of a family member, breakup, divorce. Most of the items were quite common i.e. shirts, letters, watches. Yet some, such as this one, were quite interesting...

Just like Shakira’s song, “Lucky that my breasts are small and humble so you don’t confuse them with mountains…”

And I found this particular exhibit to be very sad. Perhaps because it reminded me of home.

We then took this old funicular down the hill. It was one of the shortest public-transport funiculars in the world, the track was only 66 meters. I could have reached faster if I took the stairs.

Ilica Street, the city’s main shopping street.

We then headed to Westin Hotel to have lunch at Kaptol Restaurant. Why so classy? Because it was one of very few restaurants in town to serve halal food. Funny that we stayed at a cheap youth hostel, yet we ate at a 5 star hotel :-D I’ll talk more about the restaurant and the food when I write my halal feature later.

We returned to our hotel.. oops.. hostel.. to freshen up. Then we went out to see the city at night and visit the Xmas markets. By the way, I just realised I didn’t have any photo of the night :-( So you just have to trust me when I say that the night was cold, the Xmas markets were pretty and the stuffs sold there were really cheap as compared to other cities we went to before.

By the way, if anyone tells you that you can finish touring Zagreb in a day, guess what, that's actually right. By the end of the first day we had seen everything we wanted to see, some even twice. It did help that most of the attractions were within walking distance from each other. So we spent the rest of the night surfing the net, looking for things do the next day!

goodbye budapest, hello zagreb!

Gosh, it’s been a while, hasn’t it? Now that I suddenly wake up on a Saturday morning with a writing mojo hanging over my head, I better start typing before it goes poof again.

Where did we stop? Oh yes, Budapest. The last travelogue entry was about my final full day of sightseeing in Budapest, Hungary. So the morning after, we dragged our suitcases to Budapest Déli train station to head the next city: Zagreb, Croatia.

It was without a doubt the most nerve-wracking leg of my entire trip for several reasons:

1) I wanted to take a night train to save a travelling day and hotel cost (we could sleep on the coach and wake up in the next city) but unfortunately during winter only day trains are available. So we had no choice but to spend 8 hours of daylight staring at the window.

2) I couldn’t book the tickets online in advance. Had to wait till I stepped foot in Europe and bought them at DB office at Frankfurt Airport. I was so worried we couldn’t get a ticket, because we our travel date was 3 days before Xmas and there was only 1 train operating each day. If we couldn’t get on board, we would have to wait till the next day!

3) I read lots conflicting information on the internet about travelling from Budapest to Zagreb by train. Some said that it would be a non-stop ride, the only stop would be at the border to clear our passports. Some said that we would have to change train at Koprivnica, a small town just after Croatian border. Even worse, some said that we actually had to get off at Koprivnica, take a feeder bus to another station at Križevci and then only board the next train there. And we had to do it in 30 minutes, with our large suitcases!

4) Travelling from Budapest (Hungary) to Zagreb (Croatia) meant that we would be getting out of EU and entering a non-EU country. EU gives Malaysians a blanket visa (Schengen Visa) whereby we can travel freely in all 25 EU countries for 90 days. But Croatia is not in EU, so the rules are different. I did read online about travelers being asked to get off at Koprivnica and take a train back to Budapest, because they couldn’t provide enough documentation to enter Croatia.

Due to these various uncertainties, especially no. 3 and 4, I had to make myself mentally and physically prepared for anything.

Firstly, we had to be able to move quickly in case we had to change trains, or worse, change stations. So each of us should only carry one suitcase and one backpack, nothing more. No heels for me, only flat winter boots. And 10 minutes before the train reached Koprivnica, we must start putting on our winter jackets and gloves, get our suitcases from the rack and strap our backpacks on our shoulders. So when the train stopped we could immediately jump off and run to catch the next one.

Secondly, we would be entering Croatia by rail. Not many tourists enter a country by rail as compared to by air, so there was a good chance that the immigration officers at the border might never even heard of Malaysia. They might not be aware that Malaysians do not need visa to enter Croatia. So to avoid any hassle, I went to Croatian’s Ministry of Foreign and European Affairs website and printed the page that said no visa required for Malaysians – in both English and Croatian language.

So after all these preparations, what happened on the actual day?

Well, the start of the journey was already a bit dramatic. When we boarded the train at Budapest Déli station, a middle aged guy insisted to help me carry my heavy suitcase to the rack. I refused, but he did it anyway. Then suddenly he asked me for money! He couldn’t speak much English, but from what I gathered he claimed that he was the train’s porter (which I seriously doubted so) and he demanded EUR 1 for each suitcase.

Guess what I did? I pretended that I couldn’t understand what he said and brushed him off. After exchanging some incomprehensible words, he left our coach and went looking for his next victim. Thank goodness, or so I thought. Because about 10 minutes later he came again, begging for money. This time around I had a bit of sympathy towards him. He looked like a homeless guy, genuinely in need of cash. Being in the commercial world, I knew that European economy had been in a bad shape for some time. He didn’t ask for much, after all he did help to lift my heavy suitcase. So I scrambled through my coin purse and found some leftover HUF, so I gave him HUF 130, which translated to EUR 0.50 the most. He took it and left for good.

We performed solat in the coach and waited for other passengers to board. We took 1st class cabin, but honestly it was nothing much to gloat about. The train was very old and the facilities (seats, lights, toilets) were run down. I had taken many train rides across the continent so trust me when I said that even a 3rd class cabin in Western Europe looked far better. The truth immediately struck me – although Europe had always been seen as one, the east and west were still pretty much economically divided.

Each 1st class cabin accommodated six people. We were later joined by two South Korean girls dressed head to toe as if they were doing winter fashion show – long bright colored fleece jackets, spike heeled knee length boots, done-up hair and all. We tried to strike a conversation with them (we would have to sit together for 8 hours anyway) but they weren’t very responsive. Each of them had earphones plugged in, connected to Galaxy Note, playing K-Pop music.

Travelling 1st class from Budapest to Zagreb ;-)

5 long hours later the train arrived at Gyékényes, a village just before Hungarian-Croatian border. Hungarian immigration officers stepped onboard and stamped our passports to exit EU. A few minutes later Croatian immigration officers came along, together with customs officers. The two South Korean girls got their passports stamped immediately. But for us, as what I expected, the checks were much longer. The officer had to flip through some reference books, checked with her colleagues for something and then manually write down each of our names on her notebook.

Speaking of names, now let me tell you the trouble with Muslim names in Malaysian passports. In our passports, our names are written entirely as “first name”. There’s no “last name” indicated anywhere. For example if your name is Siti Aminah binti Ahmad, when the immigration officer scans your passport, it will appear as:
First name: SITI AMINAH BINTI AHMAD
Last name: <NONE>

For the rest of the world, say if the name is Brad Pitt, it will appear as:
First name: BRAD
Last name: PITT

This abnormality causes quite a problem when travelling overseas, especially in countries that rarely receive Malaysian travelers. I’ve been asked many times – What is your surname? What does “binti” means? Immigration officers often shocked to see the absence of last name. And the fact that I am a Muslim girl wearing hijab doesn’t make it any easier.

So back to passport control at Gyékényes, the immigration officer told me that she had to take our passports off the train to her office to do further checking. Then she ran off with our red books. I was very worried. We were in a strange lain, on board of a train that would be leaving in a few minutes, and we didn’t have our passports with us! I was really tempted to follow her, but I wasn’t sure if it was a smart move. Let he do her work, said the voice in my head. So I kept my cool, stared through the window with my eyes fixed at the immigration office, hoping that she would get out of there very soon.

Gyékényes train station. The immigration office was somewhere in there.

After the longest 5 minutes of my life, I saw the officer running out of the building with our passports in her hand. She jumped onboard, gave me the passports, and jumped off. The minute her feet touched the ground, the train moved!

I flipped through my passport. Glad to see Croatian immigration stamp on it. Definitely one of the most priceless stamps that I ever got. The journey continued for another couple of hours. At about 10pm we reached Zagreb Glavni Kolodvor train station.

So glad that the long dreaded journey was finally over.

Hello Zagreb, couldn’t wait to make the best of my stay here!

sedetik lebih bersama lelaki itu

Pada hari Sabtu nan lalu, I went to watch Anuar Zain’s first ever concert at Stadium Malawati, Shah Alam. Tak terpikir pun nak pegi sebenarnya, sebab dah sedia maklum tix Anuar Zain selalunya sangat laa mahal. Dinner show biasa2 pun boleh sampai empat lima ratus. So boleh agak laa dia punya concert tix rega cemana. Dok seat economy class karang nampak Abang Nuar beso batang mancis. Dok business class karang harganya boleh lepas return ticket ke Bali full fare. Kalau staff fare toksah cakap lah, ke Paris pun sampai.

Nak dijadikan cerita sepupuku Farah tiba2 wassup bagitau dia dan rakan2 seopis dah beli tiket beramai2. But one of them tiba2 back out. They bought bronze seats at early bird prize of RM 260. Kalau full price khabarnya RM 320 or sumthing. Ada kawan dia beli gold seat harga RM 750. Homaigod. Boleh beli handbag Coach satu. Tak cukup mahal? Beli platinum seat. Bulu idung Abang Nuar pun boleh nampak.

Before heading to the stadium we dropped by Kak Faez’s house, only a few minutes drive away. Haven’t met her since our trip to Europe last spring. Sempat makan nasi serai yang sedap. Then solat, touched up and off to see Abang Nuar. Hujan lebat tetiba so the traffic was slow. Polis trafik yang bijak laksana pulak pegi tutup jalan yang direct masuk ke parking dekat Stadium Malawati. So we had to take a long route to get there.

Sampai kat depan stadium, the queue to go in was super long. Finally dapat masuk. Seat kitorang rupanya dekat atas on the 2nd tier. Ngeri juga nak panjat tangga konkrit yg narrow dan takde railing pulak tu in my 7-inch platform heels. Elok je seminit kitorang duduk, Adibah Noor announced konsert akan bermula 5 minit lagi. Woohoo!

Wajah2 ceria nak berjumpa Abang Nuar.

Farah dan Kak Minie tersenyum riang.

Bukti pembelian. RM 0.00 coz  we were given new tix when they changed the venue from Stadium Putra to Stadium Malawati.

The stage, waiting for the main man to show up.

I think that was Burn AF1 tgh buat coverage for some tv program.

The audience was almost full house. Seriously. Sangat sikit seat kosong, maka tak boleh nak curi2 pegi depan ke apa. In fact the bronze section yg kitorang duduk adalah penuh. Yg depan2 like silver, gold, platinum and VIP lagilah penuh. Ada some kekosongan dekat sponsor’s seats I think. Wakil2 sponsor tu tak berminat tengok Anuar Zain kot. Diorang mesti dapat tix free kan. Duduk depan pulak tu. Might as well give em to me.

Harga RM 260 duduk jauh begini. Agak2 yang betul2 depan stage tu harga berapa?

Verdict? Suara Abang Nuar, as always, 5 bintang. Ada kadang2 bunyi macam rusty, maybe dah banyak sangat tarik time prektis kot. Sound system 2 bintang. Teruk. Bergema-gema sampai tenggelam suara Abang Nuar. I guess Stadium Malawati is not a good venue for concert. Kalau buat kat Istana Budaya mesti jauh lebih baik. Lighting I bagi 5 bintang. Superb. Permainan lampu yang sangat cantik. Tengok live cantik, tengok kat screen pun cantik. I’ve been to shows yang lightingnya cuma ok dalam tv, tengok live hampeh.

Stage dia bentuk huruf T, ada runway kat tengah. I think kalau bikin runway tu lagi panjang lagi bagus, rasa lagi dekat Anuar dengan peminat. Lagipun after every song he would throw red roses to the fans. Macam cerita The Bachelor pulak. Kalau runway tu panjang, merasa laa peminat yang duduk belakang sikit tu dapat bunga. Kitorang kat 2nd tier ni mungkin tidak laa kot. Unless si Nuar tu dulu juara rejam lembing peringkat olimpik, which I highly doubt so.

The best part to me was when Mac Chew played the piano and Anuar sang “Mungkin”. Sangat jelas betapa merdunya suara manusia bernama Anuar Zain. Oh, in between songs diorang ada tayang short clips. Ada ucapan dari musicians, kawan2 Anuar and some adoring fans. One of the clips was by this little girl yang nyanyi lagu “Sesucinya Cintamu” many years ago. Very popular on Youtube dedulu. Masa tu umur dia 2 tahun 8 bulan. Sekarang dah darjah berapa kot. So cute.

My friend commented that Anuar was narcissistic giler - screen semua penuh gambar dia, clips semua puji dia, dia tengah nyanyi atas pentas tapi backdrop kat belakang tetap muka dia. Sampai I kadang2 konfius nak focus yang mana satu. Kat orang sebenar atas stage ke kat gambo sebesar alam atas screen? Anyway it was his concert kan, takkan nak letak gambo Saleh Yaakob pulak. And it was his first concert after 30 years being in the entertainment industry. Maka kalau nak syok sendiri pun adalah dimaafkan.

Syok sendiri ye bang?

The concert ended around 11. By that time Farah punya muka dah macam nak bunuh diri terjun bangunan. Did I tell you dia kena paksa pegi sebenarnya? She only enjoyed the first few songs, lepas tu sibuk main game on her handphone. “Kalau tengok kat stage pun nampak kecik je si Nuar tu, baik dengo je,” begitulah katanya. Kak Minie pulak sungguh focus. Pandang straight to the stage, tak gerak2. Kagum. Kak Linda pulak sibuk amik gambar dengan Galaxy Note dia. She did take some really nice pics with it. Boleh tunjuk proof kat laki dia nanti. Kekawan Farah yang lain tak dan nak berkenalan, dok jauh sangat. Two of them duduk dekat gold seats. Dedua lelaki. Go figure.

Hasil kerja tangan Kak Linda dan Galaxy Note beliau.

As for me, sangat2 puas hati coz lagu2 dia yang I suka semuanya dia nyanyi. Tapi agak kurang suka the new arrangement that Mac Chew did for “Sesucinya Cintamu”, I like the old one better. Sempat juga Anuar nyanyi birthday song untuk diri sendiri (narcissus alert!) and other February babies. Lagu raya yang dengan Ellina tu pun dia nyanyi serangkap dua atas permintaan peminat. He’s indeed truly appreciative of his fans.

To my dear Farah, thanks coz sudi mengajak tengok konsert Anuar Zain. Thanks to kawan Farah yang tiba2 back out, lantas memberi peluang utk I pegi. Thanks to Kak Minie and Kak Linda for the pics. Thanks to Kak Faez yang bagi makan awal2 supaya kami tak kebuluran. And most importantly, thanks to Abang Nuar for putting up a great show. Lain kali buat konsert lagi!

budapest city park

Budapest has a huge city park, located at the end of Andrássy Avenue. Within the park’s compound there’s a square, an ice rink, a thermal bath, a zoo, a castle, a hall, an amusement park, several museums, many statues and hundreds of trees.

Heroes Square and its columns, marking the entrance to the city park.

At the base of the central column are statues of the leaders of the 7 tribes that founded Hungary in the 9th century.

During winter, the biggest attraction at the city park is its ice skating rink. Műjégpálya Ice Rink is the largest and one of the oldest ice rinks in Europe. With the rustic looking Vajdahunyad Castle standing in the background, it is definitely the most scenic ice skating rink I’ve ever seen.

I could hear it calling me… come join us here… down here…

…and let’s skate!

Kids learning how to skate with cones.

Santa Claus on ice.

Vajdahunyad Castle provides a beautiful backdrop.

Hot choc + Cold winter = Heavenly!

Budapest is also famous for its spas. And the city park is home to Széchenyi Thermal Bath, the largest medicinal bath in Europe. Entrance fee is about HUF 3,500 (MYR 50). I did go inside, but only made to the lobby. Seemed that the place was filled with elderly people. Perhaps the youngsters enjoyed skating more.

Entrance to Széchenyi Thermal Bath.

The spa complex is surrounded by the yellow walls so the public won’t see you splashing around.

On the other side of the road is Budapest Zoo.

This is not a mosque. It’s where the elephants stay. 

Ducks enjoying spa of their own.

As it was our final day in Budapest, we spent the rest of the afternoon shopping. Went to West End shopping mall, which was just like any other big modern malls. Good enough for us to escape from the chilly winter outside though. Had dinner at the food court (found a halal stall, yay!) and grabbed a cup of Starbucks to go.

Good night Budapest. Off to another country tomorrow!

mecset, aquincum, országház

Mecset means mosque in Hungarian language. As I said before, Hungary was ruled by the Turks for 145 years. Naturally, quite a number of mosques could be seen around the country. So today we went to visit one of them – Budapest Mosque.

Opened in 2011, Budapest Mosque is the newest and most modern mosque in Hungary.

The mosque is located at Fehérvári út 41. Getting there was easy. We took metro (Line M2) to Astoria station. Then we changed to the tram (Tram 47) heading towards Budafok / Városház tér direction. 7 stops later we arrived at Fővárosi Művelődési Ház, the nearest tram stop to the mosque.

It was very early in the morning, thus the mosque was still closed. We could only admire its beauty from the outside. Never mind, just seeing it already made me happy. We hopped back on the tram to return to the city centre and catch the commuter train to Aquincum.

Welcome to Aquincum Museum!

Aquincum is located in Óbuda, the oldest part of Budapest, about 8 km north of the capital. A long time ago, it served as military base of the Roman empire. As we walked from the train station towards Aquincum Museum, ruins of the ancient city could clearly be seen.

There were even ruins in the middle of the street.

We arrived way before the museum’s opening hours. So we walked aimlessly around the area to find a place to hang out. It was too cold to stay outside, so we had to seek cover. Fortunately there was Auchan hypermarket nearby and it was already open. Went in, wandered around and grabbed some snacks and drinks to fuel ourselves later. I even had time to try on some clothes ;-)

Thank goodness for Auchan!

We then headed back to Aquincum Museum and became their first visitors of the day. It was a downside though, because I only had big notes to pay for the tickets and they didn’t have enough change. It took a long while for the cashier to get her colleagues to jointly chip it their own cash to give me back my balance. Finally we got our tickets and went in.

Some of the Hungarian-Roman artifacts on display.

Trying my luck with the interactive quiz. Pretty cool! Felt like Calleigh Duquesne in CSI: Miami.

Outside the museum was the main site of the ruins of Aquincum. Unfortunately it was closed to visitors during wintertime. We could only view the ruins from outside the compound. It wasn’t too bad actually, as most of the ruins could be seen clearly the observatory deck and the roadside. Yet it would be fun if I could actually admire them up close like Foro Romano.

This was once the city of Aquincum.

Much of it was long gone, yet some of the walls remain intact.

We hopped back on the train and returned to the city. Went back to the hotel, freshened up, solat and out we went again. The main agenda for the evening was to go to Országház. The word literally translates to “House of the Country”, which actually refers to the Hungarian parliament building. It is only open to public for limited hours and only accessible with guided tour. Furthermore, certain tours are available in certain languages at certain times. So unless you speak Hungarian or Russian or Japanese, be there in time for the English tour. For us it meant skipping lunch.

Outside of the parliament building, waiting for our turn to go in.

A beautiful wooden model displayed inside of the actual building.

The great ornamental staircase and elaborate ceiling.

The signature dome from the inside.

The crown, the sword, the scepter and the globus cruciger – symbols of the former Kingdom of Hungary.

Cigars stand outside of the assembly hall. The members mingle here, smoking cigars. When they assembly begins, they leave their cigars outside on the stand. The numbers are essential so that nobody ends up smoking someone else’s stick.

Assembly hall of the House of Magnates, the upper house of the parliament (equivalent to Malaysia’s Dewan Negara).

Lajos Kossuth Square just outside of the parliament building.

By the time the tour ended, we were really hungry. Went to have cheap kebabs at a restaurant near a metro station. Then we spent the night walking along Andrássy Avenue, the city’s main shopping street. It was like a smaller version of Champs-Élysées – a long stretch of road, home to numerous luxury boutiques and trees decorated with Xmas lights by the roadside.

Walked up and down Andrássy Avenue and retired for the night.