As piquant as the paprika it’s famous for, and romantic as Roma music that inspired Bertok, Hungary offers visitors a taste of Europe’s heart and soul-but at half the price of anywhere in Western Europe. Budapest is the star attraction, fabulously located on the Danube and rich in Art Nouveau and baroque architecture. Outside the capital, there are ruined castles, rejuvenating spas, Roman and Turkish remnants, and exquisite lake and vine country. Now that Hungary has joined the EU, the time is more than ripe to experience Magyarorszag.

May to September (summer)-or before 1526, and the devastating Battel of Mohacs

Soothing away those aches and pains in one of Budapest’s thermal baths Letting loose at a resort on Lake Balaton, Hungary’s inland sea’ Strolling around the Castle District in Buda Cycling along the Danube Bend, particularly around Szentendre Birdwatching in the Hortobagy National Park Caving in the Aggtelek Karst, a Unesco World Heritage site

Read Fateless, by lmre Kertesz, an autobiographical novel about the author’s experiences in concentration camps in WWll; Eclipse of the Crescent Moon, by Geza Gardonyi, a tale set in the 16 th century during the Turkish siege

Listen to Marta Sebestyen, whose haunting voice appears on The English Patient soundtrack, or Hungarian folk ensembles such as Cifra

Watch lstvan a Kiraly (Stephen the King ), written by Levente Szorenyi and Janos Brody, a stirring rock-opera about the life of the first king of Hungary. 6:3 is Peter Timr’s account of the impact the ‘football match of the century’ between England and Hungary in 1953 had people’s lives

Eat toltott kaposzta, cabbage leaves rolled and stuffed with meat and rice; madartej is a delicious custard-like dessert

Drink Tokaji Aszu-‘the wine of kings and the king of wines’; palinka, a kick-like-a-mule brandy made from stone fruits such as pear, apricot or plum

Szia (hello)

Goulash; salami; Rubik Cube; water polo; Noble Prize winners; Zsa Zsa Gabor; Roma music

Hungarian surnames appear before their Christian names, as in Asian cultures; the burial place of Attila the Hun and his lost treasure is said to be somewhere in Hungary

The national anthem calls Hungarians ‘a people torn by fate’ and the overall mood is one of honfibu (literally ‘patriotic sorrow’, but really a penchant for the blues with a sufficient amount of hope to keep most people going).