Hungary, the country

I had the same experience in both places. I was with some friends in Prague and we all had backpacks on, and they stopped us and asked for our tickets. It was actually kind of funny because they pulled out these badges that looked like something Fisher-Price would make and tried to act all important and hardcore.

And I got hammered in Budapest one day. I think they purposely make the ticket rules confusing for tourists. I actually had to pay two fines that day, and they even asked to see my passport! As if these dorks had the authority to deport me. It's just a huge power trip for these guys.

 

I haven't been back for a few years, but it's an old but technically legal scam. They figure you're more likely to pay now rather than later I guess. I think they try to get you to pay on the spot because, well, I think it's how they (ticket inspectors or even cops) supplement their crappy pay. I agree though that it's pretty stupid to pick on tourists, but then ticket inspectors are not know for their intellect in any country. By the way, Hungarian police dress in blue. Your man in black with the armband works for the transit authority...

I hope your long list of places you didn't enjoy visiting isn't too long.

 

Re: Re: Hungary, the country

Besides, you shouldn't really judge an entire country by the capital city's stupid ticket rules. Or the capital city, for that matter. Aside from their subway, I thought Budapest was pretty cool. They have great hotsprings, and this one area of the main park that has a bunch of trampolines that were a lot of fun. Plus, it's cheap.

I actually went to a soccer game there (Ferencvaros) and really enjoyed it.

 

How were the women, were they hot, easy?

 

Getting tickets stamped is pretty common in most European countries, but as a general rule if you don't know what your ticket entitles you to then ask someone. Not everyone in Hungary speaks English, but most of the young people do, and a curious amount of the older people do too. When it comes to tickets, if there's no date or time on it then you need to stamp it.

Perhaps they could have let you off, but loads of tourists try the "oh, I didn't know" method deliberately. The fact is, even if you didn't know you were doing something wrong, you still were. It's not as if they weren't justified in giving you a fine. It would have been nice to have been let off, but you don't have any grounds for complaint because you weren't. It IS something they are very hot on in Hungary though, and on the spot fines are normal, so no, you weren't being picked on as a westerner. They don't look for tourists, they look for everyone.

 

and how many stories have you actually read about featuring tourists murdered in Prague for their body parts?

would the answer be none by any chance?

There's your answer.

 

But I swear, they purposely make it complicated if you're not used to it. I got hit on some stupid technicality there, something like I bought a ticket that was good for three stops, but what the ticket didn't say was three stops ON THE SAME LINE. And they busted me for that and refused to listen to my excuse. That's BS.

 

Yeah, but your only excuse was that you hadn't bothered to find out. Would you expect to get off a parking ticket because you didn't read the sign?

Tickets are valid for a certain number of stops or a single trip and don't cover transfers. It's not exactly quantum mechanics. Buying books of ten tickets is the easiest. Even if the ticket seller speaks no English, holding up 10 fingers gets the message across easy enough.


The ticket machines in Prague have been there for decades, way before western tourists arrived on the scenes. Perhaps the inventors of the machines anticipated the fall of communism and the resultant influx of tourists, and made the rules deliberately complicated to catch them out, but perhaps not. Even if you can't speak Czech and can't find anyone to ask, anyone willing to give it 5 minutes can have work out how the machines there work. Tickets there are valid for a certain amount of time, in case anyone is interested.


It was said making tourists pay a fine creates a bad impression. You don't think expecting to be let off creates an equally bad impression of westerners in general?

 

What if I don't want 10 tickets, or a whole book?

Basically, when I get my ticket and there's a line of people waiting behind me, what you want me to do is say "OK, let me get this straight..." to some Hungarian lady who's pissed off 'cause she sits in a 3'x4' room all day, and she's behind about 3 inches of plexiglass with a couple of tiny holes drilled through it so that even if I did speak Hungarian she probably couldn't understand me anyway.

All I'm asking is for them to write instructions IN GOOD, CLEAR ENGLISH so that it is clearly understood what is expected of the ticket holder.

Obviously others have been confused by the subway rules in Budapest as well. Reason being, the directions aren't clear. They should fix it instead of being negligent and scamming tourists for money.

 

I have never been to Hungary but a lot of my family is from there. Hungary is a very poor country and they enjoy taking money from tourists to help feed their corrupt government. It has started to become safer there over the last few years but I would recommened learning some of the language before heading over there.

 

The following is the result of a couple of minutes worth of Google: All you need to know about public transit in Budapest. Ignorance is one thing, laziness something else entirely.

Unless you are beamed down from the mothership, there's no excuse for not knowing before you go. Sorry.

http://travel.roughguides.com/roughguides.html
"Tickets and passes

There's a whole array of tickets available for travelling on public transport, but since validating your ticket can be complex and is easy to forget – and ticket inspections are much stricter than they were – the best advice if you are staying for more than half a day is to get a pass (see below).

Single tickets valid for the metro, buses, trams, trolley buses, the Cogwheel Railway and suburban HÉV lines (to the edge of the city) cost 110Ft and are sold at metro stations, newspaper kiosks and tobacconists. Tickets valid only on the metro come in a variety of types, depending on how many lines you want to use, and how many stops you want to go: a metro section ticket (75Ft) takes you three stops on the same line; a metro transfer ticket (170Ft) is valid for as many stops as you like with one line change; and a metro section transfer ticket (120Ft) takes you five stops with one line change. Tickets must be validated when you use them: on the metro and HÉV you punch them in the machines at the entrance (remember to validate a new ticket if you change lines); on trams, trolley buses and buses you punch the tickets on board in the small red or orange machines. Books of ten and twenty tickets are also available – but note that if a ticket is separated from the book it will become invalid.

Day passes (napijegy) cost 850Ft and are valid for unlimited travel – on the metro, buses, trams, trolley buses, the Cogwheel Railway and suburban HÉV lines – until midnight; three-day passes cost 1750Ft. Season tickets cost around 2150Ft for a week, 2700Ft for two weeks and 4000Ft for a month, and are available from metro stations, but you'll need a passport photo for the accompanying photocard.

There is a 1500Ft fine for travelling without a valid ticket and inspectors are very strict. If you have a season ticket but are not carrying it, the fine is higher, though most of it is refunded upon presentation of the season ticket within three days at the BKV office at VII, Akácfa utca 15, near Blaha Lujza tér metro. Children up to the age of 6 travel free."

 

sorry, I was a tad harsh. It's an urban myth that normally does the rounds via email, usually with a bit about someone waking up in a bath full of ice with instructions spelling out what they need to do if they want to live.

 

here's some more info on it. Doesn't mention Prague here, but it's safe to assume it doesn't happen there or anywhere else.

http://www.snopes.com/horrors/robbery/kidney.htm

 

I know a lot of people from continental europe and do you know what one of their biggest complaints about American (& British to be fair) tourists is? The fact that they assume everything will be written in English for them, and what's more get angry when it isn't, as if a country is being deliberately awkward for having a different language. The US gets a lot of overseas tourists. How many of your metro systems have the instructions printed in several languages?
I do also know that a lot of people who speak English will actually pretend not to if a tourist doesn't even have the courtesy to ask if they do or not. They actually find someone assuming everyone speaks fluent English, as if their own language was something insignificant, unsurprisingly offensive. Nobody would be expected to learn Hungarian for a day trip, but basic common courtesy to the people whose country you are in should be a pretty minimum requirement.

 

You're preaching to the choir here. When I went to S Korea I was actually stressing a little bit about trying to remember how to say Please and Thank You in Korean. I totally agree with you, when in a foreign country the least you can do is learn some simple phrases.

My point is that if they're going to bother to put instructions in English, make them clear and concise. Find a native english speaker, instead of paying some high school kid who's taken a couple of English classes or using babelfish to act as your source of translation.

 

to be fair I've no idea what was written on your ticket, but I still have the book of 10 little purple tickets I bought (cheers, by the way, while looking I found a 20 euro note!) and on the back of each it says "You can use the ticket for only one trip without changing lines or breaking the trip. We draw you kind attention to the fact that you should validate another ticket when changing metro lines".

One tip for anyone going there I would give is if you have to call a Hungarian mobile phone number (if you've arranged to meet someone there, or as I did try to call the owner of an apartment you are renting) you have to put "06" before the number or it won't work.

 

I'd guess it is different, but how many people in Israel speak English? I could be wrong but I'd guess a much higher percentage than in Hungary (where the most useful second language to learn is apparently German). Before the fall of communism nobody learned English in schools (the second language taught was Russian, a lesson at which the kids took great pride at being bad at) and exposure to any English language media was very limited.

I could be wrong, but from your prevous reply it almost sounded like you were having doubts about your ticket but decided to risk it rather than possibly missing your train finding out for certain. If that is the case you really don't have any grounds for complaint. You took a risk and it didn't pay off. It also sounds like you assumed you get away with it by playing the dumb tourist. Again, if that was the case, then that's your mistake, nobody else's.

I'm sure in time instructions will be perfected. Often translations are done perfectly, yet in a way that doesn't impart the necessary information - such as the info board at Nyagati station informing people that the luggage lockers can be found on the other side. Nothing at all wrong with the translation, just no info an exactly what the lockers were on the other side of. Until then you have to accept that in a country where tourism is a relatively new phenomenon, things are going to be less than perfect (and if you go even slightly off the tourist trails you should expect there to be no English notices anywhere).