Presidential Fuss

The whole city turned upside down yesterday when George W Bush (aka Themostendangeredpersonindaworld) came to Budapest for a quick visit. I don't think he popped over to check out the town in its full summer buzz or to dip into the thermal waters of the Gellert Spa. Nor did he have any chance to sit out in Liszt Ferenc Square with a cold drink and watch girls go by in incredibly little clothing in the 36 degrees. And he couldn't even hope to peep into the Ghana-USA football worldcup match (2:1). Oh no, the poor sod spent most of his time in this monster:

He basically marched up and down in a ghost-town like Budapest where for just this one special day there was no traffic jam, no litter on the pavement and no homeless under the bridge: all the filth had to go. Instead there was a defence wall of trams around the Parliament and 2000 armed policemen looking after the President and the good reputation of our country now that the world was watching us for a moment.

Of course he did some terribly important things as well: he remembered the anti-Soviet Revolution of 1956 and congratulated the Hungarians for being such free-spirited people who dared to rise up against the enemies of democracy 50 years ago as well as now... wink wink...He had lunch with my father's favourite musician (and a few politicians I can't be bothered to name) and rang the bell in the House of Parliament.

But most importantly, he made sure the gorgeous views of the Danube and Parliament was shown live on CNN for a few minutes for everyone around the world to see it. I'm not quite sure that the fact that the President of the United States of Aggression patted us on the shoulder was good publicity though. Maybe CNN could do a special edition one day of just the city views and its people going by (preferably in incredibly little clothing of course ;)) with no Endangered Politicians ruining the panorama.