grab onto those Pecs

Pécs. Pronounced as if you're saying pear with a ch at the end. A much quieter student city in the south-west of Hungary. I guess you could call it a welcome relief and a pleasant change. Again this was nothing against Budapest, it was really just a state of mind that I was in at the time coupled with the irrational thought that a change of city would bring with it a change of luck. Did it work? Put it this way: nothing bad happened so that was a positive sign! We both had a very positive attitude on the train across the country, watching the unexpectedly green and vast landscapes rush past. That was until I realised I had left my iPod cord back at David's place.. Aaaaargh.. Luckily, I was able to get hold of Aaron and he managed to find it for me. Phew.
As we waited for a bus into the city centre, a dance class in session was visible in the window of a 2nd floor studio outside the train station. We met with our CSer, Simon, who was in the middle of studying for his medical exams at the time, and he asked if we would like to eat some McDonald's for dinner. We declined and instead he took us to eat in a cozy downstairs Hungarian restaurant with live piano music, just off the main square, Széchenyi tér - a much better choice, don't you think? This main square is dominated by the largest remaining Turkish building in Hungary, a remnant of the country's 150 years of Turkish occupation in the 16th and 17th centuries. The Mecset templom - or Mosque church - seems to be a contradiction in itself. Its name, however, reflects its nature exactly. This lovely domed building was once a mosque, serving the city's Muslim community until it was converted into a Christian church; the Islamic moon symbol atop the dome replaced by a cross. Another interesting feature within the city is the padlock fences. Small sections of fence that couples connect a padlock to in order to signify their love. I thought that was cool. We were treated to something a little different on that first morning. Simon took us to his university to sit in on a German medical practical on the human brain. And they were using real human brains! Now that's not something you get to experience everyday - looking at a human brain while not understanding a thing the German lecturer is saying (apart from an occasional reference to the hippocampus) in a university in the south of Hungary.
There was some sort of arts festival on while we were here as well and as part of it there were beanbags laid out in one of the small central squares and a giant screen set up showing what I could only imagine was a Hungarian animated children's show. Again, we couldn't understand a thing but it was funny all the same.
Our time in Pécs was short and not paricularly jam-packed but definitely enjoyed all the same. We left the next day on another train which was to take us back through Budapest (where we met again with Aaron and he was able to give me the iPod cord) and Vienna in order to get to our next destination. We were excited for this one!

Photos:

just one of those lovely skies you can't resist photographing

one of the padlock fences

the largest unoccupied building in Europe - damn asbestos

Brainserhausen

that's an impenetrable fortress of security she's got set up there

the Mecset templom