Eastern euro

During my recent visit to some of eastern Europe, a friend asked me what's the appeal? Everyone talks about Paris and Rome, but rarely do you ever hear tourists rave about The Czech Republic or Hungary, what gives?

To answer that I'll break it down into three B's: beer, bucks and bizarre history.

It's no secret I like my beer. Ales, lagers, stout; I'll take 'em all. So naturally, the flourishing amount of beer produced, distributed and consumed in eastern Europe has to be one of the reasons I loved these countries. Specifically, the coty of Prague is home of the world's first lager and boy, does it show. These thing line the walls of every supermarket, whole sections are dedicated to varieties of beers, and on average a Czech person drinks 1.5 liters of beer...per day. Enough said.

On to the next B, bucks. By this I mean dollars, euros, pound, korunas, whatever you call it. In Budapest they call it fornits - a word I would come to love. The live affair began my first day in Budapest as I sauntered up to the money change desk and handed over a 50 euro bill to (my disbelief) receive over 14,000 fornits in return, for an exchange rate of 1:300 At first I was skeptical, what could this actually get me in the stores? I walked over to the nearest grocery store and went to the beer section (of course), amongst the most expensive beers there were 175-200 fornits...an equivalent of less than 1 euro. Again, enough said.

Finally, bizarre history. This B I was not expecting to encounter. I like reading about history and learning new things so I thought I had a good grasp on what has happened on this side of the pond, but that was to change. A few walking tours later and a trip to some of the memorial sites still standing and I realized I had no clue about most of eastern European history. Suddenly I was acutely aware of kings and queens, rebel religious leaders and Protestant martyrs I had never heard of before, but who each played a significant role in shaping their country as any name I ever had.

So there it is. Beers, bucks and bizarre histories. Just three of the reasons why eastern Europe should be visited, viewed and veered towards.