Bodor Ferenc: Coffee-Houses - Our Budapest (Budapest, 1992)
Bon-bom The successor of the former King patisserie, reconstructed many times, is a pleasant, cosy cave that tenderly enfolds the unfortunates reeling in from the flea market in the neighbouring subway. Bolstered settees align the walls in a space indefinitely magnified by the mirrors. In the semidarkness you bump into your own mirror-image and, not recognizing yourself, apologize for the incident. In front of the crowned instrument happy encounters, reminiscent of social soirées are enacted. The fun house cave with its green and claret colour effects stuns the visitor into a true boulevard mood. The last century, unauthentic, is displayed in ornamental picture- frames upon the walls. The porcelain casing of the espresso machine curves as gracefully as a supple waist during a ball. The gilded bracket-lamp evokes the atmosphere of the country houses of East European industrial magnates come down in the world. The customer sinks into the depths of the settee, some so unnoticeably that they only surface with the fluff in the early morning when the vacuum is at work. The wine-lists, like cranes about to take wing, are set on edge, waiting to be flown off the marble table-tops by privatization. 29 SZENT ISTVÁN KÖRÜT, V. A social in the BONBON 16
