the Last Stop

Sam, Jaro and I sit at a picnic table. We’ve just hiked around Zugliget, a huge park up in the Buda Hills for the past five hours. You take the 21 Bus all the way up. To Normafa. That’s the last stop.

It’s an incredible place. The view from the top gives you a bird’s eye view of all of Budapest. It also reminds you of the capitalist system now in place in Hungary. There are rich families. With big fucking mansions.

It feels like Malibu. Only greener.

I had come up here the day before on a shoot. It went like this: Go up to Normafa. We need that view in this video. Whats Normafa? What do you mean ‘What’s Normafa?’

Next thing I know I’m sitting in a slow smelly bus going up into the hills. Its over 90 degrees Fahrenheit. I haven’t been this hot since last summer. And at least I had the Puget Sound to jump into. Now I’m stuck on a bus, sticking with sweat, with some weird girl staring at me. I look away. I figure she’s slightly retarded; by the way she’s staring. Some time later she shambles off, her arm and face pointing in the wrong direction, every way she turns.

I was right.

By the time I finally reached Normafa, I’ve gone through a transformation. There are rich Hungarians! No fucking way!! It really is a revelation.

Then I start to wonder if that’s all the expats that own those houses that I’m trying get to come here to buy more expensive houses in the hills. I wonder what the Magyars in Pest think about this place? It probably doesn’t matter. They won’t ever understand.

I was only there for 30 minutes, but it was worth it. The view can be caught on camera, but it doesn’t match the feeling. Maybe that’s what happens when you get used to city life. I hop on the bus back. I know I’ll be back soon. This place is awesome.

Twenty four hours later: Sam, Jaro and I sit at a picnic table. We’re exhausted. Or at least I am. Jaro and I sit on one side of the picnic table. Our view is this magnificent meadow with the sun raining down upon it. A large group of Hungarian Goth musicians are tuning their instruments up under the trees across the field. They hide from the sun too. Sam’s view is different. There’s a wall of trees behind us. She tells us there’s a snail crawling up the tree. I’m watching the Goths.

Some time later this conversation came to be:

Sam: Do you brush your hair every day?
Hunter: Yes.
Sam: Why?
Hunter: I don’t know. I just do.
Sam: What would happen if you didn’t?
Hunter: I’m not sure. It would be messy.

(silence for a while…Sam starts to laugh and hides her face in her hands)

Hunter: What’s up?
Sam: Nothing.
Hunter: No, you’re happy now. What happened?
Sam: I don’t know. I just am now.

(we both look at Jaro at the same time. He hasn’t spoken in 5 minutes; its like a record)

Jaro: Oh, don’t mind me. I’m just watching the leaves fall.

It was that kind of hike.