Em uma ruazinha escura na parte alta de Budapeste, encontrei uma taberna belga onde, quase sempre, eu parecia ser o único cliente disposto a voltar. De todos os colegas que levei, só dois ou três admitiram ter gostado, mas ninguém pedia para voltar. Gostava não apenas pela cerveja e pelo tempero diferente, mas porque o dono, um senhor belga de poucas palavras, sempre colocava um jazz bem tradicional para ouvir. E foi ali que mentalmente precisei pedir desculpas a Thomas Friedman e seu excelente livro-argumento de 2005 de que o mundo é plano. Não é. Friedman diz (no livro) que precisou...

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Paulo Rebêlo The Budapest Sun - 13.junho.2007 link original After almost one year living in Budapest, if someone asks me to make a list of what I have learned or what most caught my attention, it would be a problem to fit everything in this space. What I know for sure is what I will miss, some things more than others, of course. Usually, what catches your attention is not something necessarily good or bad, but the unexpected. And the first thing to catch my attention, completely unexpectedly, was the different treatment you get being a foreigner and being a Hungarian. (more...)

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Paulo RebêloThe Budapest Sun – 09.maio.2007 – link originalExcessive bureaucracy is part of eastern Europe folklore. You will always find yourself in a situation when a bureaucrat is behind a desk and you’re the next in line. He'll make a fuss about forms and different offices you should go, sometimes related to small and insignificant things that do not make sense at all. (more...)

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Paulo Rebêlo ( email ) The Budapest Sun - 11 .April. 2007 link original Those that say there is a coffee tradition in Budapest are not telling the truth. At least not exactly. That does not mean to say they are lying. Most probably they just do not appreciate coffee enough to realize how difficult it is to find good coffee around here. Or maybe they are not as addicted as the average Latin American. (more...)

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Paulo Rebêlo The Budapest Sun - 14.mar.2007 Is Budapest a big city? It depends on whom you ask. One of the demographic oddities of Latin American countries is the general absence of medium-sized cities. We have huge metropoli - usually capital of a State - where most people live nowadays. And then we have thousands of small cities, especially in the rural areas. In Brazil, this is particularly odd, because the landmass has such continental measures that, in theory, we should have more medium-sized cities and less populated mega- cities. (more...)

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Paulo Rebêlo The Budapest Sun - 14.fev.2007 - link original You have just finished a delicious duck breast with croquette potatoes. You are feeling good after the nice wine, directly from the Hungarian countryside. The palacsinta pancake for dessert was marvelous. You are full, your belly feels happy (and bigger) and all you want on Earth right now is to pay the bill, go home and have a good night’s sleep. There’s only one problem: you can’t leave the bloody place. No matter how hard you try to look for the waiter, or raise your hand once in a while, no one will see you. No one will notice...

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Paulo Rebêlo The Budapest Sun - 21.dezembro.2006 link original The holiday season is a time when people get along more, cherish each other and even find themselves to be a little more romantic. In other words, it means that nine months from now we’ll be seeing hundreds and hundreds of shiny-lovely-little-Hungarians being born in Budapest. It is the joy of nature, the magic of procreation. There is only one minor problem: they will all be called Gábor. In the beginning of my stay around the city, I thought it was just my personal impression, perhaps the wrong stereotype that we, as foreigners,...

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Paulo RebêloFolha de S. Paulo – 18.nov.2006 (link original)BUDAPESTE – A morte de Ferenc Puskas, chamado de Öcsi (irmãozinho) pelos húngaros, causou grande mobilização ontem em Budapeste, com autoridades correndo para fazer anúncios públicos no rádio e na TV. O primeiro-ministro da Hungria, Ferenc Gyurcsány, classificou o ex-jogador como o húngaro mais conhecido do século 20. "Com ele dizemos adeus à era mais gloriosa do futebol húngaro. Sabíamos que Puskas Öcsi estava muito doente, mas não poderíamos nunca estar preparados para o seu falecimento", disse o premiê.O húngaro-brasileiro...

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The Budapest Sun - 09.nov.2006 ( link original ) I've already seen many dead bodies in my life. I've played pool with convicted murderers. I've seen a guy being stabbed in the chest right at my side. I've got drunk with pirated whisky and hot beer. The list of bad things I have seen is not short. But I have never before come so close to seeing heaven turn itself into hell as I did while covering the recent riots in downtown Budapest. Even though I've been living in the city for fewer than four months, and still feel a little like a lost foreigner, I felt ashamed seeing the places I had learned...

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Polícia reprime protesto com bala de borracha; manifestantes jogam explosivos. Oposição conservadora boicota atos oficiais e insiste na renúncia do premiê socialista, que mentiu sobre as contas públicas. Paulo RebêloFolha de S. Paulo – 24.out.2006 [ link original ]A Hungria parou. Deveria ter sido um dia de festa e reflexão nas comemorações da Revolução de 1956, a revolta democrática e anti-soviética que ontem completou 50 anos. Mas, em vez de festa, os húngaros viveram um cenário de violência sem precedentes desde o dia em que a rebelião foi reprimida pelos tanques russos,...

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