EU brings tourist trade to Budapest

Khamor is an average 9-year-old. He is 4 and a half feet tall, with wide brown eyes and dark… Khamor is an average 9-year-old. He is 4 and a half feet tall, with wide brown eyes and dark hair. But he sits in the back of his classroom, alone and ignored by the other children.

In the school in Budapest, the capital of Hungary, his name stands out among the other children: Simon, Kazmer, Angelika. He is not Magyar, nor ethnic Hungarian, but Romany, a “gypsy.” His parents took a risk in naming him Khamor, a Romany ethnic name, and not a Hungarian name like many parents choose.

“I guess I look different anyway,” Khamor says. “It makes no difference.”

Although the Romany have fought for civil rights and parity in society in many European countries, Hungary has remained a central battleground. More than 500,000 Romany live in Hungary, and about a third of them live in cities. Romany tend to live in worse neighborhoods, have lower-paying jobs and receive inferior educations.

In schools like Khamor’s, on the Pest side of the Danube River, Romany are often separated, and many drop out. The chances of Khamor finishing school are one thirdof Simon’s or Angelika’s.

The nearer I get to the Danube, however, the more evident the changes in the city and the country become. Like several other eastern European countries, Hungary recently became a member of the European Union. Budapest, like Krakow in Poland and Bratislava in Slovakia, has become a popular tourist attraction overnight.

The Danube splits the city into the Buda side to the west and the Pest side to the east. In the market on the Buda side of the Danube, several languages can be heard: Magyar, English, French and several Slavic languages. People deal with Hungarian merchants for clothing, dolls and bolts of cloth, all with patterns and colors unique to the Magyar. Tourists circulate between the churches and parts of Buda Castle, perched high over the Danube.

The nearby Citadel, an old fortification, lies at one end of a modern bridge and offers a panoramic view of the government center and churches on the Pest side.

Farther north, away from the river, lie the remnants of the communist government that long held Hungary. Moscow Square, a traffic center on the Buda side, is home to a major rail station. A monument stands in a concrete park where children chase pigeons in circles.

At the station, many men stand around in a cloud of cigarette smoke, barking offers of their services as workers and builders. Some look for a day’s worth of work, while others want to work for a week. Suburbanites often come to Moscow Square to hire a man or two for work back in the hills and valleys of the Budapest suburbs. Some unskilled laborers are cheap, offering themselves for as little as 3,000 forint a day — the equivalent of $15.

Unemployed laborers have survived this way for three decades, seeking work in small amounts for little pay. For some, it is the only way to support a family, or themselves.

Farther up Margit Boulevard sits the bridge to the Parliament on the Pest side, with an extension to Margaret Island, a place of relaxation. On the stone coasts of the island, men and women lie in the sun. Some are reading or talking, while many are simply sunbathing nude.

One Englishman stands on the bridge to the island, staring down at the topless women soaking up the sun.

“You could never show your body within sight of our Parliament,” he says of his home country.

Just south of Margaret Island is Budapest’s famous Chain Bridge, often closed to traffic for pedestrians and shows. As the sun drops over the hills on the Buda side, a Magyar band begins to play jazz and spectators stand around with beer. Some people lie on the sides of the bridge, watching the sun set over Buda Castle.

One man scolds me for fiddling with my camera and trying to capture the sunset.

“You’re in Budapest, man,” he tells me. “You’re not going to see this again. Just enjoy it.”

So I stand, watching the sunset from the Chain Bridge, knowing I will never see it again.