The Budapest Times

Chocolate Festival in Budapest this weekend

ballan — Wed, 22 May 2013 13:25:20 +0000

The last Sunday in May is Children’s Day here in Hungary. Isn’t every day Children’s Day? And how come there is no Father’s Day here? Anyway, Duna Plaza (District XIII, Váci út 178.) is organising a Chocolate Festival 25-26 May to celebrate your household chocolate thieves, with lots of games, chocolate rewards, and concerts for kids. Aimed not only at the sticky finger set, the festival will have a chocolate exhibition, the Budapest Chocolate Museum will be on hand and special varaiations from the dark arts will be on sale. Visitors are encouraged to take photos with a live chocolate man too. We asked the mall for a pic of said chocolate man, but this weekend marks their first attempt to make one… perhaps they have bitten off more than they can chew. The best we can do is offer the Axe deodorant Chocolate Man (above) whose TV spots in 2008 were banned in more conservative countries. Check out our facebook page for that video.

The Budapest Times – Axe Chocolate Man

Celebrating Belgian Beers

ballan — Wed, 22 May 2013 11:59:26 +0000

Thirty Belgian breweries! Fifty beers on tap! One hundred and forty kinds of beer! No, it’s not the third Buda Castle Beer Festival (that’s in mid-June and they’ll have some 200 beers), it’s the smaller but much more potent Fourth Belgian Beer Festival, which pitches its tent at Vajdahunyad Castle in City Park starting next Friday 31 May.
With many Belgian breweries said to have their roots in the Middle Ages, it’s no surprise the country is now home to an estimated 1,200 different types of the drink – a fraction of which you can get a taste of during the festival weekend.

Details:
Fourth Belgian Beer Festival

Friday 31 May – Sunday 2 June
Vajdahunyad Castle

HUF 4,000

New chapter for bookstore chains

rkinga — Wed, 22 May 2013 10:07:47 +0000

Pending State Competition Authority approval, two of Hungary’s largest bookstore chains will merge under the Libri-Shopline name.
“The customers will not see a thing of this merger because we intend to keep all important brands – e.g. Libri, Shopline, Bookline, port.hu and fidelio.hu – in circulation,” Shopline CEO Ákos Starcz told news radio station Inforádió.
“We would like to take advantage of this deal as soon as possible. Our main goal is to increase our market share and to maintain or perhaps even increase revenues before the end of the year”.
Should the competition authority give its blessing, the companies intend to set up a joint logistics base and operation centre.

Manufacturing stutters

rkinga — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:07:19 +0000

Year-on-year industrial gross output fell 2.9 per cent in March, the Central Statistical Office announced on Wednesday.
Out of the three subsections with a significant weight an increase was recorded only in the manufacture of transport equipment, while the demand for communication equipment, consumer electronics and food continued to fall. Annual output fell 3.1 per cent in the first three months of this year, but the volume of industrial production in March was above the level of the previous month by 0.4 per cent.

Bullet to Belgrade

rkinga — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:05:56 +0000

The railway journey from Budapest to Belgrade is set to be faster, according to a letter of intent inked in the Serbian capital by state railway firm MÁV’s director Ilona Varga last Friday. The agreement, also signed by Serbian Railways boss Dragoljub Simonovic, calls for an upgrade to the 380 kilometres of track between the two capitals. The fastest rail journey to the Serbian capital is currently the 13:05 from Keleti station, which covers the 380-kilometre trip in 7 hours and 47 minutes. The new line could cut the journey time to three hours.
The signing follows a deal struck between the government’s foreign trade supremo, state secretary Péter Szijjártó, and Serbian Agriculture Minister Goran Knezevic in February. The plans call for laying two lines that can accommodate trains travelling at up to 160km/h, at an estimated cost of EUR 1.5 billion. The China Development Fund for Central Europe has been mooted as a potential financial backer of the project.

From zero to EUR 5 a month for kids, aged on fast trains

rkinga — Wed, 22 May 2013 06:05:04 +0000

National Development Ministry state secretary Pál Völner revealed on Tuesday more details of the extra fares for travelling on express trains (gyorsvonat and sebesvonat).
People aged under six and over 65 years of age, who are otherwise entitled to free rail travel, will only be able to use such trains if they buy a monthly pass for HUF 1,500 (EUR 5), which according to Völner is a “very favourable price”.
The new rates were introduced this week. Passengers are being informed of the extra fares by loudspeaker announcements at stations. Rates range from HUF 150 for less than 100 kilometres of travel to HUF 795 for more than 500 kilometres.
The Rural Development Ministry said it expects HUF 1.6-1.7 billion (EUR 5.50-5.84 million) additional annual revenue from the scheme, and this will be spent on railway development.
The government is cutting fares by 15 per cent on 15 lines considered to have the worst comfort levels, prompting news website hirado.hu to estimate that revenue will increase only HUF 600-700 million (EUR 2.06-2.40 million).
Those passengers who cannot purchase the extra ticket at the train station can still do so aboard without a fine until 31 July.
MSZP head Attila Mesterházy has accused the government of making pensioners pay more without guarantee of better service.

Who did it? When? Where? Why? How? – A weekend of Murder Mystery

ballan — Tue, 21 May 2013 12:51:41 +0000

It is time to bring out your inner Sherlock Holmes as Budapest’s very own Murder Mystery event takes place this Sunday. aKERT and Krimieste.hu will be hosting the event in and around the Horvath-kert park from 10:00am to 20:00pm.

Clues will be provided throughout the day and everyone with the right answer will be put in a prize draw at the end of the day. Registration fee is just HUF 200 and children under 14 years of age can go for free.

Courtesy of the team behind the Murder Mystery, The Budapest Times can now provide you with the first clue of Sunday’s event:

Behind the lady playing the guitar

The first handcuff is seen from pretty far.

aKERT is the place where all of that shall begin:

Funny, creepy investigation lies therein.

Cross-Europe hitchhike will stop off in Budapest

ballan — Tue, 21 May 2013 12:28:07 +0000

A group of 26 people from the Sciences Po in Paris will hitchhike from the French capital to Istanbul this summer, stopping off in Budapest during their 30-day trip.

During their stop-off in Hungary the group is hoping to experience the local culture and see what Budapest has to offer. “We will be in Hungary for several days during our voyage, and are hoping to meet young locals and share our experiences and observations, particularly in Budapest,” said Uzma Sherieff of Sciences Po in a letter to The Budapest Times.

Sherieff said that the group wants to observe and write on the state of European unity and diversity as they experience it.

Poultry factory is a dead duck

rkinga — Tue, 21 May 2013 10:06:56 +0000

Only 16 months after it began operating poultry-processing company Zalai Baromfifeldolgozó went into liquidation and released the 94 workers at its factory in Pacsa this week.
The HUF 1.5 billion (EUR 5.14 million) unit is one of the largest in Hungary and before the launch the company won HUF 625 million (EUR 2.14 million) in support for the investment, comprising HUF 401 million (EUR 1.37 million) from the previous government and HUF 224 million (EUR 768,000) in job-creation subsidy from the current one.
At the time the liquidation was requested the company’s assets were worth about HUF 1 billion (EUR 3.43 million) but debts amounted to around HUF 2.6 billion (EUR 8.94 million), receiver Ferenc Somogyi said.

State must keep Rába majority: MP

rkinga — Tue, 21 May 2013 06:06:32 +0000

A proposal by an MP of governing party Fidesz would make it mandatory for the state to retain at least a 50 per cent plus one vote majority even if the government should decide to sell shares of Gyõr-based vehicle manufacturer Rába Holding. “The automotive industry is key to Hungary’s economic growth, expanding employment and the strengthening of the SME segment,” the amendment proposed by Szabolcs Czira said. “Retaining majority guarantees a long-term corporate development, which considers geopolitical and national economic issues as well.”
The proposal came a few days before Rába announced its first-quarter results on Wednesday. The company increased revenue by 16.3 per cent, mainly as a result of a 23 per cent expansion in income from exports. Rába increased its annual profit from HUF 34 million (EUR 116,700) to HUF 860 million (EUR 2.95 million), which was due to increasing revenue and the HUF 524 million (EUR 1.79 million) sale of its stake in Fehrer Automotive.
The state acquired a majority in Rába in 2011 and this year signed a strategic cooperation agreement with Swedish bus manufacturer Volvo to manufacture 300 buses annually from 2014. The Association of Hungarian Bus Manufacturers (MBSZ) protested, saying that Hungarian-made buses include every model necessary for national public transportation and such an agreement would make fair competition more difficult. One Hungarian bus maker is already feeling the effects of the Rába-Volvo deal: Kaposvár-based NABI announced last week that it will shut down production at the end of May because it has no more orders.