funny story. annie and i decided to go to the kiraly baths today, an old turkish bath house built in the 1300s. igor at the hostel told us to go naked. the lady that worked there told us to go naked. so we went naked. when we showed up to the bath, everyone else was wearing swimsuits. and we were not. it was a tough, challenging moment for my comfort with with public nudity.
the baths were amazingly therapeutic, nevertheless. i felt so calm and refreshed, and when we got out, our skin was glowing so healthily. there is no way that i can describe how great it feels to movwe from a steam room to the cool pool to the hot pool, and back again. and luckily, later, people showed up naked, boosting the nude-to-clothed proportional count. i wish toronto had bath houses like these.
last night we had another surreal experience. we went to gieros, a traditional hungarian restaurant. we had been expecting some big loud pub-like place, but instead it was a tiny family-owned joint with a set menu, and the performers played hungarian gypsy music specially for us (we were the only patrons). the musicians were playing violin and some hungarian instrument (maybe called a timbolo?) which really resembled a piano, but was dated much older and involves hitting the strings directly with sticks. it was pretty amazing, if slightly pricier than we expected. i took a video of it, so i will try to upload the video later.
im still glowing from the bath. i had no idea it felt so good to get naked with strangers.
