Illustrated Travel Journal

On my first day in Budapest, when got off the bus from the airport and walked to my apartment in the city, I noticed the many Israeli restaurants everywhere. It wasn’t until the next day that I understood that our apartment was in the Jewish Quarter, just one street away from the largest synagogue in Europe. That explained the amount of Israeli cafés and why their menus sometimes were written entirely in Hebrew.

When walking the streets of Budapest, there are mainly two different types of street food stalls that you come across again and again: First there is “Langos” (savory): Fried yeast dough topped with sour cream, garlic oil and grated cheese. The other food you’ll find everywhere is “Chimney Cake” (sweet): Sweet yeast dough wrapped around a tube, baked and rolled in cinnamon and sugar.

I love markets of all kinds and how beautifully and carefully fruit, vegetables and other foods are set up and presented by the stall holders. One type of market I have mixed feelings about is fish markets. To all Hamburg residents who are now having a little heart attack while reading: I’m not talking about the Hamburg fish market, which is basically a farmer’s market, but rather the real, somewhat coarser fish markets in huge market halls.

A detail in the cityscape of Athens that I particularly like is the amount of plants and trees. There are orange, lime and lemon trees everywhere, the blossoms of which make the streets of Athens smell good. Most apartment buildings in Athens have balconies, some of which are large, many of which are filled with beautiful plants.

Anyone who has ever booked a hotel or Airbnb in a foreign city knows how difficult it can be to judge distances and the coolness of different neighborhoods. If you’ve never been to a place yourself, you just don’t know what the best neighborhoods are. Since we chose our Airbnb based more on looks and feel-good factor than location in the city, we ended up in the “Exarchia” neighborhood more or less by accident.

Probably the most beautiful building in our district is the Archaeological Museum. The impressive row of large columns, the wide staircase to the entrance and the spacious forecourt of the Archaeological Museum can be seen from afar. The elongated building looks particularly great at night — then it is brightly lit and looks even more majestic than during the day.

Anyone who read my post about “Black Salami Bakery” a few days ago now knows that I love good bread and baked goods and am therefore always on the lookout for great bakeries. As part of my internet research on special (sourdough) bakeries in Athens, I not only came across the “Black Salami Microbakery”, but also discovered the great “Kora Bakery”.

After almost a week here in Greece, where I really like it so far, there was one thing that I was missing more and more: German bread! All over Athens and also right in our neighborhood, there are a lot of bakeries that offer different kinds of bread, which also taste very good. Most of the time, however, it is a very light, somewhat softer yeast dough bread. Super tasty, but after a few days I just felt like eating heavy, crispy sourdough bread again.

One detail that probably surprised me the most about living in Athens is the large number of orange, tangerine and lime trees in the middle of the city. To my surprise, these trees are not only found in well-maintained parks in the city center, but also on the side of the road on almost every street!

During my first walk late in the evening on the first day in our district, Exarchia, one coffee shop in particular caught my eye: the “behold theman”. Although it was already closed that evening, I could guess the colorful and modern interior through the large glass facade and really wanted to go there.