Travels With Baby: Swim Fans
We land in Budapest and hit the baths.
by by Ayun Halliday
April 10, 2007
Like my paternal grandmother, I am a great believer in hydrotherapy as a cure-all for whining, and now, jet lag, or at least jet lag-borne whining. Within twenty-four hours of landing in Budapest, we were on the subway, bathing suits in our bags, bound for the Szechenyi Baths, a marzipan-yellow state-run bathhouse. For about ten bones a person, we got tickets for unlimited soaking in both the in- and outdoor pools, as well as a cunning little wooden changing cabin attended by white uniformed muscular Hungarians of both sexes.
On this cool and cloudy Thursday afternoon, the lounge chairs remained stacked in a corner of the football field-sized outdoor complex, but there were still plenty of bathers of all shapes and sizes taking the waters. We'd been tipped off that the pool nearest the admission desk contained a ring-shaped flume that would propel us around like socks in a washing machine. An apt description, I discovered, as I rocketed out of last season's stretched-out bikini bottoms, a passel of jacked-up teenaged boys churning in my wake. As if my hands weren't full enough with treacherous black nylon, Milo insisted he was going to shoot these rapids solo, which seemed like a bad idea, given that he weighs about the same as an empty Styrofoam cooler. Having not yet mastered the word for "thank you," the only way I could thank the concerned pensioners who fished him free of drowning half a dozen times was to apologetically tap my chest and announce, "Angolul," which 
Milo realized his dream of watching old men play chess while submerged to their nipples.is caveman for "I speak English."
After fifteen minutes of this, we hit the hotter, calmer pool, where Milo realized his dream of watching old men play chess while submerged to their nipples. We also checked out the Satanic-smelling indoor mineral baths and a narrow sauna the length of a subway car that that had both children gasping within seconds as if their little lungs were being roasted on contact. I didn't feel like it would be right for me to tell them to wait for me just outside the door, so I escorted them to the world's coolest ice machine, a ceramic chute that periodically dumps wafer-thin shards into a basin for the rub-down pleasure of barrel-bellied men in slingshot briefs. As we made our way back to our changing cabin after three rejuvenating hours, we passed a tank-suited dowager whose hairy armpits were a bit of a shock, but only because they were the only ones I'd seen beside my own.
©2007 Ayun Halliday and Nerve Media
About the Author
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Ayun Halliday is author of The Big Rumpus and No Touch Monkey! and the popular zine East Village Inky. She is a columnist for Bust and a frequent contributor to Babble. Visit AyunHalliday.com.
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