Heves – a passionate little town that no one can get to by bus.

I, the No, have a love/hate relationship with the bus. Mostly I hate it, with its sweaty riding, the inability to get up and walk around and go to the bathroom, the gimlet glares if you bring out a roast chicken and palinka (all of which are perfectly acceptable on Hungarian trains). So when I discovered that the train station is way outside and on the other side of town, but the main bus terminal lies tantalizingly just a minute up my street, I thought I would reconsider my old enmity.

So I bleary eyed left for Mariapocs, early one Saturday morning. I’ll admit it; I would not have looked forward to the five-hour journey even on a train. It went smoothly enough, I gracefully switched onto a large comfortable bus in Kalpona. I made it to Nyrighaza and other than an intense need to use the loo the ride had gone well. I met J and T and we wandered through Nyrighaza and later through the beautiful pilgrimage town of Mariapocs. We watched weary pilgrims process past us, and listened to the chanting of the faithful.
But all too soon our weekend was over, and it was time to face the beast…otherwise known as Public Transport in a Foreign Language.

Earlier in the weekend I got the beep beep of a text notifying me that I had less than 300ft on my phone, but had not found a place to recharge it. So, 5 hot and sweaty hours later on the bus, I should have not been surprised by the fact that I missed my stop.

I knew that I was supposed to get off in Gyongyos at 6:23, so at about 6:10 I began to look for a bus terminal. 6:23 came and passed as we stopped at small stops, but I was not too worried, as the bus had been 15 minutes late, and so I gave it a couple extra minutes. Then we passed the TESCOS, and I knew there was trouble. In my previous stay, I had visited Sara in Gyongyos, and we had walked to the outskirts of town and gone to the TESCOS, so when I saw it, I knew we had almost left Gyongyos.
In a panic I turned to the guy behind me and asked where the Bus terminal was. He replied that we would be there in about an hour. “The Gyongyos terminal?” I asked. “No the Budapest one”

Frantically, I texted Emily for help. She saved me on the phone front, which allowed me to call everyone I knew in Budapest asking if they knew if there was a bus back to Heves. No answer, no answer, no answer….until finally a returning teacher, who I had met at orientation answered. He did not have Internet however, and suggested I call Hajni, our amazing program director. She was able to find two buses back to Heves that night.
Later as we got off of the bus, the man who had sat behind me, asked if he could help me find my way. Turns out he was a student returning to Budapest from a weekend at home, and he very kindly found the platform I was to wait at and walked me there.

So after my Budapest adventure, I was a little hesitant when T, was to take the Bus to meet me in Heves. I warned her of the Gyongyos stop, and was assured that she would not be going through Gyongyos, but would be arriving at about 9pm.

At about 8:45pm I got a phone call. “Are you already here?” I asked groggily waking up out of quick nap. “Nooo,” a faint voice called over the phone, “I got off at the stop, to change buses, but my next bus is not on the list at all. Do you know where Dekt is?”

Not having Internet, I could not help much. So as I called Emily, who knows everything, T called J, who had Internet, No longer a tri-fecta, we worked as a quadfecta trying to get our friend out of Dekt.

An hour and a half later of chaos and frantic text messages, our efforts to get her to Heves by Bus had failed. Our program director had found her a place to stay in Eger, and T had new advice for all CETP-ers trying to get to Heves: “never go into Dekt.”