When you wander around the streets downtown Budapest watchfully with our free walking tours or on your own you can discover some small wonders… the mini, guerrilla statues of Mihály Kolodko, a Hungarian-Ukranian artist. Get to know more of him and his work in this blog article! 🙂

Mikhail Kolodko was born in Transcarpathia as a son of a Hungarian mother in 1978. In 2002 he graduated from the Lemberg Academy of Art as a sculptor. He was basically interested in monumental sculpture, but this genre was more typical of the period of the Soviet Union, where great, admirable works were favored. Initially, he made public sculptures as he studied plan air art, both individually and in groups. Most of his sculptures are in Uzhhorod, but after he moved to Hungary in 2017, his works were published here as well.

His first small statues appeared on the streets of Uzhhorod and were initially welcomed, when people got used to them, they really liked these works of art. The creation of small sculptures stemmed from the fact that sculptors must make a small version of large sculptures first. The artist did not always have a client to buy his designs, and thus, in the absence of financial means to keep his ideas going, he made a small version of the statues.

When he moved to Budapest with his family, Kolodko first made a statue of Főkukac The 15 cm statuette is opposite the Parliament at Halász Street. Kolodko’s favorite childhood fairy tale character came to life with this little statue: he wanted his children to see him as Kolodko did in his childhood. It was important to him because he learned Hungarian while watching this tale in TV.

The tiny statues soon gained popularity, so much so that some were stolen several times. The reason why we call them guerrilla statues is that they were placed to public spaces without a permission (there was actually no regulation for this first).

Let’s see some more examples of mini statues on the streets of downtown Budapest including some that have been made after a the city council of Budapest commissioned them.

At the intersection of Dohány Street and Osvát Street, we find one of the newcomers, based on the urban legend about the New York Café. According to the myth, Ferenc Molnár, one of the greatest Hungarian writers of the 19th and 20th century, solemnly threw the key of the café into the Danube after the opening so that it would never be closed again. This is evoked by a diver placed on the top of a hydrant, holding a key in his hand – Kolodko wanted to refer to the water with placing the statue on the hydrant.

Very close to the Dohány street synagogue, on a lamp post you can find the statue of Theodore Herzl (Herzl Tivadar in Hungarian) who was a Jewish Austro-Hungarian journalist, playwright, political activist, and writer who was the father of modern political Zionism. Herzl formed the Zionist Organization and promoted Jewish immigration to Palestine in an effort to form a Jewish state. Though he died before its establishment, he is known as the father of the State of Israel. He was born in a building next to the synagogue. 

The miniature of Rezső Seress, the world-famous composer of Gloomy Sunday, was also created by Mihály Kolodko. The work of art is located in front of the musician’s former residence in Akácfa street in the Jewish quarter. The song, Gloomy Sunday soon became known as the ‘suicide anthem’, as they repeatedly found the sheet music of it at places where those who had killed themselves passed away. The glamorous song has been sung by many around the world, including Billy Holiday, Serge Gainsbourg, Elvis Costello, Björk and Portishead.

We actually see some of these mini statues on some of our daily free tours like the Urban and street art tour, do not hesitate to ask your guide about them! 🙂

Dear Everyone!

We would like to draw your attention to the 20TH OF AUGUST, Tuesday, which is a national holiday in Hungary. We celebrate the foundation of the Hungarian state and our first king, Saint Stephen (Szent Istvan).  He ruled our county,ca. 975 – 15 August 1038, as the first king of Hungary, led the country into the Christian church and established the institutions of the kingdom and the church. He was canonized on 20 August 1083, and 20 August is his feast day in Hungary.  You can learn more about him, the 20th of August and our history on our free walking tours! 🙂

On this day ALL OUR FREE TOURS RUN. (There might be a small change in the route of the 10:30&14:30 Original Budapest free tour because of celebrations and closures. If yes, your guides will inform you in the beginning of the tours.)

Shops, malls will be closed (except for some nonstop supermarkets), but museums, thermal baths will be open.You can also enjoy programs in the Buda castle area, there will be a food fair called “The street of Hungarian tastes” at the Castle Garden Bazaar and a folk art festival in the Castle district, on top of the Castle hill. There will be a food fair, children’s and musical programs in the City Park (Városliget) as well.
On the Kossuth square, next to our beautiful Parliament building, there will be events all day long.
A party called National chill will be held on the terrace of MagNet House, on the Andrássy avenue, number 98. The event is free. At the end of the day admire beautiful fireworks at 21:00 on the banks of the Danube or join our ruin pub tour at 20:30 and celebrate with us in the Jewish quarter of Budapest! 🙂
See you soon!

Please note that the Police has just closed our meeting point area (24th July morning) the Elisabeth square for indefinite time. The closure is because they found a WW2 bomb under the ground during the renovation of the square. This happens in Budapest time to time, professionals normally dig the bombs out and deactivate them in a few hours.
We will keep you updated, but for now we meet at one of the corners of the Elisabeth square, more precisely at the corner of Jozsef Attila street and October 6. street. Here are some pics of that corner and our guides. You can also call us for help on this number: +36 20 340 9217

Between the 7th and 9th of June there will be an event happening at our meeting point, the Elisabeth square, close to the Budapest Eye Ferris wheel. All our free walking tours will run as usual and You can still find us a few meters away from the wheel in our blue uniforms and with our blue free tour flag. Someone will always go around the meeting point with the flag to help you find us!  🙂

The event is part of the “Week of Chinese Tourism and Culture” and is commemorating that Hungary and China got into a diplomatic relationship 70 years ago.

For the first time in June this year, the Chinese Office of Culture and Tourism of the Chinese Ministry of Culture and Tourism will organize a series of programs called the Week of Chinese Tourism and Culture with the joint support of the Hungarian and Chinese governments.The event will focus on the 70th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic relations between China and Hungary. The three-day celebration program, which has the motto “Wonderful China”, aims to bring Chinese history and culture closer to the Hungarian public through tourism, calligraphy, painting, music, dance, martial arts, aviation and other areas.
On the afternoon of June 7th, the opening ceremony of the China Eastern Airline’s direct flight between Budapest and Shanghai will take place. As part of the colorful program of the Chinese Tourist and Cultural Week guests can also taste Chinese gastronomy, while children can meet the symbolic animal figure of China, the pandas. Also,during the previous days, June 3-5th, Shandong, one of China’s most exciting provinces, will introduce itself on the “Confucius’ Birthplace – Shandong Cultural Fair 2019” in Budapest.

Enjoy your weekend in our lovely capital, and see you soon on our free tours on the Elisabeth square (Erzsébet tér)!  🙂

This post was born to inform you about the changes regarding the maintenance works of one of the three major train stations of Budapest, Keleti pályaudvar (Eastern railway station), and to tell you the history of this nice-looking terminal.

First, the practical info: Keleti will be closed for scheduled maintenance works from Monday, May 13, to Sunday, May 26, told the Hungarian railways company, MÁV. All trains will be redirected to other stations in Budapest. International trains leave from and arrive to Déli pályaudvar (Southern railway station), on the Buda side of the city during the works of Keleti. You can reach this terminal by taking metro line 2 until the final stop, which is the Southern railway station itself. Some of these international lines are going to: Vienna, Münich, Zagreb, Salzburg, Graz, Zürich, Bucarest. (The domestic lines impacted include major transport lines such as from Budapest to Győr and Hegyeshalom in Western Hungary, to Miskolc and Sátoraljaújhely in the Rast, to Pécs and to Békéscsaba in the South and to Debrecen, Nyíregyháza and Záhony in the East of the country.)

And now let’s see some additional info about the terminal itself: The station sits where one of the main Avenues of Pest, the Rákóczi Avenue splits and becomes Kerepesi Avenue and Thököly Avenue. Its name in 1891 originates not only for its position as the easternmost of the city’s rail stations, but for its original role as a terminus of the lines from eastern Hungary including Transylvania, and the Balkans. In contrast, the Nyugati (Western) railway station used to serve lines toward West, like Vienna and Paris.

The style of the beautiful building of the station is eclectic, designed by Gyula Rochlitz and János Feketeházy and was constructed between 1881 and 1884. The main facade is decorated with two statues depicting James Watt and George Stephenson. Inside of the station you can see frescos by Karoly Lotz, a famous Hungarian-German painter who also painted some of the frescos of the Parliament and the Opera house.

Keleti pályaudvar has been a station on the M2 (East-West) line of the Budapest Metro since the line opened in 1970. In March 2014, Line 4 opened making Keleti a transfer point between the two Metro lines. On our free tours you can also get a useful orientation about public transport to make your Budapest sightseeing even easier.

You can also adore one of the other two gorgeous railway stations of Budapest, the Nyugati railway station on the Great ringroad of Pest, at the section which is called Teréz ringroad. This building was designed by the Eiffel brothers in the 1870s.