Curiouser and Curiouser

Were I ever to write another book about Hungary (which I do not intend to), I have toyed with the idea that it would open with a young girl falling down a rabbit burrow, only to find she has arrived in a world of unimaginable topsy-turviness – but then it occurs to me that someone has already used this particular idea. Did Lewis Carroll ever set foot on Hungarian soil? Perhaps only in his drug-assisted fantasies; he could certainly have derived much inspiration for the further adventures of his heroine had he done so.

All countries have their idiosyncrasies: Britain is the home to many thousands of these, conveniently labelled under the headings ‘tradition’ and ‘eccentricity’. However, Hungary’s latest entry for the title of the Curiousest of the Curious must surely be awarded first prize – having neither the excuse of tradition nor eccentricity to rescue it from ridicule. It is the bizarre – and to me, at least – quite incomprehensible law which now forbids smokers from indulging at bus or tram stops.

I have never smoked, and I have endured countless evenings, and days, cooped up in small offices, staffrooms, cafés, restaurants and friends’ flats, as the only prim and kill-joy non-smoker in a room where I was barely able to make out who else was there. My initial desire to do as when in Rome... – well, at least not to complain about it – and accept their perogative to smoke, very soon gave way to sitting by open windows, gasping for air, goldfish-like, when I was able. I began to leave parties earlier, and once my son’s band began doing gigs in bars, I often waited on the pavement or in the car rather than endure smoke suffocation for hours.

It was announced in the media this week that proposals are to be put forward to ban smoking in restaurants, cafés and so on, from July. This has been greeted with the same outcry from those whose livelihoods may be affected, as it was in other European countries which have already taken this step. However, an editorial in the Metro newspaper suggested that the government might as well ban its citizens from drinking alcohol, since the rationale must be that of preventing cigarette-related illnesses, and alcohol was surely equally culpable.

Aside from the obvious difficulties of policing the capital’s public transport stops – apparently, an exact 7-metre by 3-metre area has been stipulated as designating the territory of the ‘bus stop’ – one surely has to wonder who, and more interestingly what the thinking behind this is.

But the fault is obviously my own. When Alice states, But I don’t want to go among mad people, the Cheshire Cat informs her: Oh, you can't help that. We're all mad here. You’re mad. You must be, or you wouldn't have come here.