Convergent Evolution, an economic necessity?
So Budapest is slowly becoming a clone of just about every other international city. 2007 has the open threat of Gucci, Starbucks, the Body Shop and Burberry littering the high street (typically along Andrassy), joining last year's entrants Louis Vuitton, Schlecker, Mevida, L'Occitane and Tally Weijl. Personally, one of the few decent places is the Apple Center opened at Andrássy út 4. A visit there almost makes up for the close of the Goethe Institute at 24 (now to be found at Ráday utca 58) - which Louis Vuitton supplanted. Intellect was never much of a match for shallow chic. Along with the magnificent reopening of the New York Cafe in May last year, Budapest is looking more like the gem we have always known it was. All of which is, of course, good news. But depressing, too. For example, just taking the New York Cafe as an example. This place was once one of the centers of literary life in mitteleurope. Now, judging by the window displays it is a designer bag shop, with the threat of a more overt display of ostentatious tack to come (there are signs warning of an 'outlet shop' opening soon). But what this all does mean is that there is money about town. Not only from passing tourists, but from increasingly wealthy locals. The rate of change never ceases to astonish me. Blink and another shopping mall has bulldozered your local bakery out of existence - though you now have a convenient range of international franchises from which to get your morning danish. Truth is, I almost completely love the change. I've managed a parallel existence to consumerism in other cities and it's kind of great to have the choice here too. The cafe culture is alive and well, thriving in new hot spots around the city. So, let Andrássy be theirs. The sooner it is fully cloned and assimilated the better.
Word for the day
So, here's some useful vocab. to throw around:- 'ízléstelen' meaning tasteless.
- 'lompos' meaning tacky, with an undercurrent of untidiness. When used to describe a person it approximates to 'sleazy'
- 'giccses' meaning cheesy.
- 'kirívó' meaning showy or ostentatious.
Evil Eyebrows
Yes, didn't you know? Eyebrows that meet are the work of the devil. Don't believe me? Well I'll paraphrase the article I was just reading (Őrdögi szemöldök):
"A lot of people think that bushy eyebrows are devilish. More than that, they believe that they bear the magical power of a witch."Do you know, I think that all the time. I just have to look at a person's over-sized eyebrows and know that they are possessed by evil spirits. Where's the holy water when you need it, I think to myself. In a spirit of scientific inquiry the article continues:
'Do you know what eyebrows are for? According to experts, in the course of evolution only this small patch of hair was left on our faces, so that the eyes would be protected from the drops of perspiration from our brows. And because they are still there, we can express many things with them such as wonder, by raising them incomprehension, and of course, by knitting our brow's anger.'I always wondered what those things were for and now I'm going to find it a lot easier to follow what feelings people are expressing. Hey, and who knew that in evolutionary development terms having hairy eyebrows was such a competitive advantage? As it turns out the main focus of the article is an excuse to reuse the same photos they had one a previous piece on the demise (or not) of blondes in the media. Cleverly they have even preserved the old title rather than bother to update it for the new piece. But, strangely, I do have an opinion on this and I didn't have to work to hard to form one. I find it completely unnerving talking to people who have plucked their eyebrows out of existence. Those that extirpate their sweat catchers and decide to replace them with a wonky pencil line are the evil crazy ones. I realise this isn't a rational response, but I have seen too many Hungarians (female, of course) lacking any natural sun shades. Please, the article suggests many alternative treatments for self expression with your eyebrows, but could people just confine themselves to tidying them up, unknitting them when they meet, but generally leaving the essence of it there. Because otherwise you spook me out.
