Proof of onward Travel?

First off, we learn a lesson. We'll call it Vagabond lesson learned.... Know onward travel requirements of each country prior to entering. Even if they don't ask you about it when you go through customs. At 3:30 AM on October 2nd a nice Delta ticket agent asked Melissa - "Do you have a ticket exiting Hungary?" Melissa very proudly says "No, we are vagabonds for 6 months and have no detailed plans." Wrong answer. Apparently, Hungary wants to know you are leaving their country and requires proof of onward travel. What do you do in this situation - call Mom. Melissa's Mom lives in Tennessee and we thought that she might be awake, but we gave her about an hour before calling. Task - find out from the B&B where we are staying if this is indeed true when you get to customs and if so, buy us a train ticket out of Hungary on October 9th. And what do Mom's do? Come through with flying colors. She had the idea that she could fax us our reservation in Germany, where we are meeting them. So, this was faxed to Salt Lake City airport where we had a one hour lay over. After she spoke to both the B&B and the Hungarian Consulate - we wouldn't have thought of calling them, we figured this would work. A HUGE thank you to Trudy, Melissa's Mom!!! In the end we were never asked about onward travel, but we were happy to have some proof that we were going somwhere else. And Julie was very excited that she got to see she had security clearance for staying in government housing in Germany. She had never had to go through a background check before. No cobwebs in her closet. Now to Budapest. So far we've only seen Pest(in a much sleep deprived state), since we are staying on that side of the river. Before planning this trip we did not know there was a Buda and a Pest. The Dunabe River separates the two. A bit of history for the history buffs out there(are there any?)- 1945, after WW2 the Soviets liberates the country and establishes a communist state. 1956 Hungarians revolt but were not successful and 25,000 were killed. 1989-Hungary was the first of the Soviet states to open it's borders with the west. 2004-Hungary joins the European Union. Still no euro currency here because the debt of the country is at 10% and they need to get to 3% before they can go euro. Julie's first impressions: I have been to western Europe several times and this is much different. You can see the communism influence in the architecture and in the people. The people appear to be more serious, not too many smiles around but that is just my first impression. I do know that there aren't many, if any, blonds around, and Melissa says I'm giving her away as a tourist. We took the very ancient transportation system. Bought a pass so we can hop off and on the efficient system. Budapest is huge but we managed to get around okay, our first ride Ron, the B&B owner took us on, which helped. He also stopped with us at our first pastry shop, another important first. Big, old, old city. Lots of construction going on so you can tell that things are and have been changing here. Today we go shopping at the Great Market Hall --- very exciting! Melissa's first impressions: What in the world? When is the last time they replaced a bus, tram or metro train? They look as though they are from the early 1920's. Rusted, unpainted, and archaic. They run, so I quess who cares. I am seeing a lot of cars that we don't have in the US, all tiny. Gas is very expensive here. The town itself looks dark and dank to me, and the people are indeed very serious. I am tempted to stop and do the chicken dance on the spur of the moment to see if the people will lighten up a little. The buildings are beautiful in a weird kind of way, not because of color or looks, but because of the design and care it took. The Hungarian women are into a bright red hair color - the men are very nice to us, traditional - giving up their seats on the tram for us, opening doors etc... a perk! The two things we absolutely want to do while we are here: Rick Steves says we must try the Hungarian baths - and we want to do the bridge walk at night, specifically the Chain bridge. More later.