Best of Budapest Parks: Memento Park

This isn’t your typical park to hike, sunbathe with your headphones on, or feed the ducks. This is a sculpture park brooding with dark history.

IMG_6232Memento Park [Budapest, Balatoni út – Szabadkai utca sarok, 1223 Hungary] isn’t very big. You can walk through it quite quickly if you had to. You will want to take your time here to remember the important history of this country. After the fall of the Communist regime in Hungary, many of the statues of the era were removed. Someone had the idea to gather them all into one place and put them on display for the public. Lenin, Marx, and Engels guard the entrance to the park.

IMG_6266 IMG_6219There are 42 statues in all ranging in subject and size, heroes from the communist era.

IMG_6231 IMG_6244 IMG_6261 IMG_6257If you are a lover of history you will want to see these larger than life statues with your own eyes. A bus ride through the city, past the suburbs, and into this rural area will put you right at the doorstep of the park, right in sight of Stalin’s boots.

IMG_6263“This Park is about dictatorship. And at the same time, because it can be talked about, described and built up, this Park is about democracy.” – Ákos Eleőd

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