While reading in the City Park of Budapest under a tree today, I could not help but feel spied by something in the bushes. And there he was. The strange man scratching a bit in the soil and just hiding in the bushes. Either I just met Hungary’s most obvious spy or a nut who thinks he is the world largest pigeon.
Imagine my surprise when an hour later I move to a greener plot nearby and a man is walking around in his underwear. As a matter of fact he is walking the same circle the whole time, up and down like a polar bear. He is rather tanned as if he had been doing this for the whole summer already. In the meantime I still hear big pigeon man trampling sticks and leaves in the same bushes. By now I am convinced he must be nuts, as only an idiot would pay somebody to spy like that. But according to that reasoning he could as well be paid by tanned polar bear man.
While on the benches in the shade old couples meet in perfect gendered separation -one bench for the grandpas, one bench for the grandmas- to chat away the morning in local gossip, the chatty crows in the trees above my head follow their example. Both their voices bearing the same raspy sound, one by age and one by nature.
Not having spend a dull moment (or read much I am afraid) the next character comes to the stage in the shape of an old man with an impressive beer belly and moustache. The impressive part being the amount of cultivation both must have enjoyed to get to this shape. This man takes off his t-shirt and hangs it in a tree. Then his arms go up like a penguin and he starts flapping them around as such. Most likely in an attempt to do physical exercises. After spending a few minutes doing the penguin exercises he starts jumping on one leg alternating from time to time to the other leg. Like a flamingo on hot coals. Or a young girl playing hopscotch. After these bird dances he tries to exercise the amphibian way by jumping like a frog in circles up and down. Much like tanned polar bear man is doing just a few metres away. Upon which he ends with half an hour of walking up and down in a manner best described as playing the French game of “Jeu de Boules”. Without the essential balls that is. Three youths with pink stripes in their hair enjoy the sight of this human zoo with me, while listening to the Hungarian pop songs on their cell phones. When the spectacle commences without somebody jumping out of the bushes screaming “candid camera” they lose interest soon enough and start remodeling their hair, make-up and clothes to make variety in the photos they make for the day as to look appealing to their friends on Facebook.
The six couples lying about do not have eyes for anything but their partners or their books and only unlock their embraces to kiss or drink water. Nor do the tourists walking by discussing their plans holding armfuls of maps, books and folders.
I guess I am the observer of the park writing about this silly zoo around me while being kibbled on by a variety of ants, bugs, ladybirds, moths, bumble bees and the occasional butterfly. Thus after two and a half hours of (pretending to) read a book, I shall leave these people in peace to fill my stomach. Before I turn into a lion and participate in the madness of this zoo uhhm I mean park.
Aruna Jacobs
Sociology
Photo: hongaarskinderplezier.eu
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