56
PARTISAN REVIEW
"Occupancy rates range between 85 and 95 percent." Thus tourism
plays a large role in Hungary's finances: it has reduced the deficit in the
country's balance of payments by more than half. Besides the spas and
Budapest, Lake Balaton is the most important region. Moreover, many
foreigners have bought second apartments in Budapest and country
houses on the lake's shores, and then spend money in restaurants and on
entertainment. Altogether, the infrastructure of Hungarian tourism
started at a higher level than it did in the other former communist coun–
tries, although the major cities in Poland and the Czech republic did so
as well. However, small towns and rural areas have developed much
more slowly: credit is hard to come by; and an ever more demanding
international public expects comfortable facilities.
Westerners who like to arrange for their own travel (rather than join
tours) are often thrilled by the quaintness of towns that still seem mired
in the Middle Ages, since under communism they never had the funds
to modernize them. But sometimes the pleasures of travel are marred by
the high rates of car and other kinds of theft. And Western visitors don't
come at just any price: high hotel rates have encouraged tour operators
to shun nights and arrange for only daytime visits to Prague; and when
beautiful restaurants in Slovenia remain empty, it is due to overpriced
menus. Unlike in, for instance, New York, the cost of taxis is not regu–
lated, and travelers are easily rooked. Also, Slovakia is not the only
country where on hotel registers two prices are listed: one for citizens
and another for tourists. The latter may be double or triple the former.
This keeps some tourists from even starting their trip.
• •
•
ASIDE
FROM
THE PRIVILEGED
nomenclatura,
at one time Eastern Euro–
pean societies were fairly egalitarian, though rough, and individuals
tended to have more money to spend than merchandise to buy. But after
the transformation of
J
989, a dramatic recession lowered the level of
income. The economic upswing that began in some sectors in
L992
engendered a rapid polarization between the rich and the poor. Life
expectancy had been drastically lowered since the 1970s, and in Poland
and Hungary there was a recognizable increase in poverty-all of which
accelerated after "the turn." The unemployed were even worse off, since
new safety nets first had to be created. Inflation played havoc with the
salaries of state employees, whereas those of individuals working for
foreign and export firms-especially those who knew foreign languages
and something about marketing or banking-rose exponentially.
