It may be scorching hot, who cares?
The only thing you have to have on you is mineral water or soda. Filtered tap water does the trick, too. It is not perfectly clean but the very low count of bacteria it may contain is not dangerous. Anyway, drinks sold in plastic bottles may contain microscopic particles originating from the bottle. Most people prefer cold water and buy thermoses or special bottles to store water. People keep moaning at wintertime about feeling cold and long for warmer weather. Once it arrives, it is not tolerated either. Truth be told, the weather is so very changeable. All of which may have a considerable effect upon your well-being. Warm spells may trigger childbirth, strokes or hypertensive crises. Anyway, I have always been loath to accept such explanations from patients as I know they may lead to serious errors.
One of my first patients was a young boy complaining of lower abdominal pain. His father gave me the explanation that the boy took part in a harvest carrying wooden boxes. I stood there somewhat perplexed. I had a gut feeling that something was lacking in this story. Thank God an experienced colleague entered the surgery at this moment and examined the patient. He was subsequently operated on within three hours for gangrenous appendicitis. I still cringe when I think about it.
Please validate your ticket
As soon as you board the tram or bus you have to validate your ticket. There are other options though. You may buy a tram pass for one month or even a year. You may do it online of course and store it on your phone. If you are caught red handed while travelling, you have to pay a fine. The payable amount will increase if you are violating the rules on repeated occasions. If you meet a train guard and don’t have a valid ticket you may pay right away or ask for the bill. The latter will cost you more money. If you visit a certain office and deliver a tram pass for the month in question, the amount to pay will be much less. If you are over 65, you may travel for free, be it anywhere in the city or trains around the country. If you choose Budapest or Vienna, you will have to pay for the whole ticket without discount, irrespective of your age.
Sea salt Black pepper Birdseye chili
These spices you will find on the table in many restaurants. Magyar people are famous for being fond of hot food like fish soup, chicken stew or goulash. These dishes are prepared using paprika, only slightly hot. People fancying stronger tastes, may then add things like chilly. There is also a paprika squash made of very hot paprika called Eros Pista. (Eros means here hot and Pista a nickname for Istvan which is a typical name for a country boy. It used to be as people give the extremely rare and weird names to their children nowadays). Reality has become very much different to date. Young people are fans of Italian cuisine, and these above-mentioned national treasures are cherished by tourists. To prepare them properly is pretty difficult and some people from older generations are ready to travel as far as Szeged to get a real one.
J’ai vu la mer Cote d’Azur
Another script on a T-shirt. There are loads of enterprises, dishes and words represented by a French word or words. Pret a manger for example, is present at railway stations or airports. They serve fresh and very nice food. They are eager to indicate those ingredients which may be problematic. Lactose may trigger bloatedness or urgent diarrhoea which is awfully unpleasant, but sesame seeds or peanuts have lately triggered fatal reactions. In one of these, Noradrenalin also called EpiPen was not effective and resuscitation failed. These extreme cases are called anaphylactic shock. Food allergy is often suspected and blood samples taken for the assessment and prevention of any allergic reaction, are misleading. We may say that symptoms of true food allergies are hives, shortness of breath and watery diarrhoea. Similar reactions after ingesting seafood may occur as a consequence of toxins mainly in the Far East. These usually resolve spontaneously but cause great distress.
