Getting lost in thermal bath

One of the specialties of Budapest is its thermal baths. Basically they are art-nouveau style mansions built over natural hot springs. They house outdoor/indoor pools of different temperatures and have interiors that can only be described as exotic. In my Budapest trip, I visited Széchenyi Bath, a 100-year old bath, touted to be the biggest in Europe.

I bought a day-ticket (apparently, people spend whole day lazing around in the water). Upon opening the door of the changing room, I glimpsed women in bikini so I hastily closed it, mouthing apologies. But it turned out that the area was common for both genders. Actually there were small booths inside for privacy. I changed into swimming trunks, took my stuff to the locker room and asked the attendant there if I could click pictures. She said yes. So I took my camera and entered the bath area. It is a huge circular shaped building with many indoor pools, rooms for sauna, steam baths and what not. At the centre, there is a large outdoor pool. I went there, took a few pictures and came back inside to keep my camera in locker. But in my eagerness, I had forgotten the way to the locker room. I roamed and roamed-- a clueless half-naked guy with a camera, discovering that there are many entrances to the building and hence many locker rooms-- but couldn’t find it. After half an hour, I shyly asked one attendant for help (she understood English well, thank god for that!). She led me to my locker room and I got rid of my camera. Now free of all worries, I was finally ready for the bath. I spent two hours in the outdoor pool, floating, lying on the steps, watching people playing chess in the pool and another one hour trying out different indoor pools. The outdoor pool was the hottest at 30 degree Celsius. Finally I left because I had plans to see other places.

I must say that it was a learning experience for me. Men and women don’t share such close space in India. Here, there were no inhibitions, no awkwardness. I quickly grew comfortable with it because nobody cared. And the hot bath? I don’t know if it benefited my skin as claimed but it was incredible fun to move around in that giant bath tub. If anything, it made me feel sleepy for rest of the day.

I didn’t take any pictures indoors. People were clicking pictures with their phones and everyone was cool about it. But I was the only one with a camera so I didn’t, thinking it would be inappropriate. Here’s one of the outdoor pool.


Till next time, tschüss!

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