For Whom The Bell Tolls

 I often end up in a ridiculously stupid adventures on my solo trips. One of them happened in a Hungarian cemetery one beautiful drunk night. It all started from a scenic and a harsh hike in Visegrad hills. I descended from a difficult path and returned to Dömösh. Now I need to return to Visegrad since I’m spending the night there. My original plan was to do another hike early in the morning, before checking out from the guesthouse. I didn’t expect that today’s hike would be so difficult though, and I descended from the hills as the sun was already setting. My plan for tomorrow slowly but surely fell apart. Plus, there was an hour and a half left before the next bus. It will get dark soon, there was no one around, besides drunk young people laughing at the opposite bus stop. They saw me and started shouting and whistling something. That didn’t feel nice. I thought that one and a half hours sounded like enough to find any open place where I could sit and feel safe. And so I did, the only open place was a local pub. No shit it was a bad idea.

Beware Of Czech Beer

The people here were already very drunk and loud, and, oddly enough, there were several drunken families with bored children. My experience with local beer is not good, just like with coffee, so I ordered some Czech beer and went out to the patio. Little did I know about the alcohol percentage in the beer I sipped. I stared at the phone, then at the darkening sky, then took out cigarettes and was about to order another beer. I tried to sound harsher to fit the crowd, but that turned out somehow unnatural, and the bartender probably decided that I was sick since he brought me the next beer wearing a mask. It was hilarious but understandable, it’s a pandemic after all.

I don’t know if it is a lack of proper food, a stressful hike, or Czech beer magic, but for some reason (as it sometimes happens) I got totally drunk from two beers. I also didn’t notice at all how time flew by, and as soon as I checked the time I had to run to catch the bus. By now there were more drunken people at the bus stop on the other side of the road. The guy who shouted something to me before started talking again and, this time, he walked towards me. I felt threatened, all his buddies at the bus stop laughed and clapped for him. I also shouted something, for some reason in Finnish, and wanted to set my hiking poles on the ground in front of me. As I tried that the scope of waving my poles turned out to be greater than I had planned since I was standing unevenly on my feet. I can imagine I looked like a drunk ninja, swaying my poles, trying to find ground beneath them. Apparently, it looked threatening, since the guy got scared, raised his hands, like he was unarmed, and stepped back. His buddies laughed even louder.

As mentioned previously, it was pandemic-time and one could not access public transport in Hungary without wearing a mask. There were a couple of minutes left before the bus would arrive, that was just enough time to put on one. If you are sober. I took out a clean mask from my pocket still holding my hiking poles, stretched the rubber band, and fitted it onto my ears. Or so I thought. As the bus arrived I moved forward to walk in. Unexpectedly as I moved my hiking pole stepping forward the mask stretched and fell onto the ground. Apparently, I fitted one rubber band on my ear and another one on a hiking pole thinking it IS my ear. I didn’t have another mask with me, so I had to pick this one up, shake it off, and wear it. Although I must say, it looked like a virus-catcher, being all in dirt after I picked it up. Well, the main thing is that it’s on my face, which means I am allowed on the bus.

The Night Just Began

I got to Visegrad and even got off at the right stop. I still had to go uphill deep into the city, and in this state, it seemed like another hike, so I decided to rest halfway. Moreover, I felt so capable of managing the difficult hike, annoying people at the bus stop, and finding my way in the night to this village, I felt this all should be celebrated. And so I went to the nearest pub. No shit it was a bad idea.

It was light and cozy there, and people were also drunk, but not irritating as in Dömösh, more like cheerful-drunk and happy. I took the beer and started drinking it. The weird feelings caught my mouth: I felt like the liquid was pouring, but not into my mouth. I felt like I could smell it and taste it but it doesn’t really go down my throat. It turned out that I had forgotten about the mask on my face, and persistently tried to sip beer through it. Watching this comic scene, the man sitting opposite could not stop laughing and eventually sat down to ask me what kind of weirdo I was. I remember our chat hazily since he didn’t speak English and I (still) don’t speak Hungarian, so it is a mystery how we communicated for the next hour. But I found out that he has a girlfriend and children (well, or he just showed me photos of children he kidnapped and a woman he keeps in his basement), and their entire family does not live here, but visits in summer. Then he asked if I saw everything in Visegrad and waved his hand, pointing to the castle. I said that I went to the castle, and saw pretty much everything, except the cemetery, which I walk past every day. I always wanted to go, but never ended up going there. So, we went to the cemetery. No shit that was a bad idea.

All Roads Lead To The Cemetery

The best adventures one has are always unplanned.

I checked the gate and it seemed locked. I threw my hiking poles over the fence and decided to climb over, to give the situation a teenage vibe. I started climbing, but that was not going well. My new “friend” checked the gate while I attempted climbing and figured out it was not locked, it was just opening another direction. Luckily. As I entered the cemetery grounds I thought I gotta first pick my hiking poles, otherwise, I would forget them there. That was easily said but not done. I bent down after them and at that exact moment, I realized that I couldn’t get up. My back suddenly felt hurt, and my legs felt heavy and numb at the same time. All my body suddenly felt exhausted and unbearable. It is like the struggles of a difficult hike ached in every corner of my body just now. Only a drunk can have sensations like that: nothing at all or all at once. This time it was all at once. I felt clearly and surely that the moment I started to straighten up I would fall. I started laughing at this folded granma position and the whole situation in general. So did my new friend looking at me in my hysterical laugh, being unable to move. I tried to say that I was tired, but that made it even funnier. I began to grab the air with my hand and then I felt a rope, a rope people! Just like the one I saw in the mountains hours earlier but could not reach. Well, this time I could, it was just next to me. I grabbed it and lifted myself up, but at the same time, there was such a loud and unexpected noise filling up the air, the hills projected it back and the echo was mesmerizing. In the silent night of a village, this noise felt too loud, too scary, and too disturbing. Nether to say we both got scared and instinctively ran away. After a minute I realized we were running in different directions, I ran towards my guesthouse and my new “friend” (with possibly kidnapped kids in a basement) – well, I never saw him again. It turned out there was a frame with a bell on a cemetery and I rang it pulling the rope. What are the situations in which people do that? When someone dies? In terms of a zombie apocalypse? I truly wonder now what people living around the village thought hearing it in the middle of the night.

At that moment I got so scared I ran all the way to the guest house. It takes 5 minutes to walk there from the cemetery, 2 minutes to run, and 10 minutes to run drunk. Last one – I discovered that night. Eventually, I walked into my room, fell on the bed, and started laughing. I remembered about my plan to hike tomorrow morning, I laughed at my plan to go to bed early, and about the unknown dude, whose name I don’t even know. I laughed at the whole cemetery thing, how we stupidly ran away from fear in different directions and now we will never see each other again. And it was all so comical and so out of the blue that I fell asleep chuckling. The best adventures one has are always unplanned.