So there was 1 Tesco, 2 Metros and that was about it! The Interspars & Spars shut at lunchtime Saturdays/ closed Sundays.

Dead cheap in the restaurants, though

I ate out every day in the evenings, 2 courses & 2 pints was about £5.

Beer well under 50p/ korso and we used to dance on the tables later on.

Those were the days (que the song). I remember when things were cheap - but the shops were empty. Trying to do building when you went to the builders merchant for nails to find empty shelves so you ask the assistant when will there be some and came the reply 'try next Thursday. Me - "will you have some then". Him - "don't know, but try next Thursday" The builders would say this is what I need, when you have got the materials give me a call and I will schedule the work.

Life here has changed a bit but IMO still better and safer than UK

I visited my sister in Bp in 1996 -her English husband worked for one of the big Global Players in finance - one of the high points of his jobs was that he knew he'd have to leave after max 3 years in order not to get involved with the locals...
So he was sent to Africa after that.
He showed us around, we visited some really good restaurants - dirt cheap!
After that (end of October and lovely weather) we went to the Balaton - but everything wasclosed for winter! We were lucky to find a room in a small hotel in Balatonfüred - and also very good food.
Next day we traveled to Hévíz - and there was life!
That's when we decided to buy a (summer) house near there and regularly had visitors from friends and family - really nice.
PS:
My sister has also visited us often, has a very good relationship with my second wife who's Hungarian - but my brother in law swore he'd never return to Hugary! And he kept that "promise" until today.
He'd seen and fought against so much ugly corruption - the stories he told ...

In those days flights arrived at the now defunct terminal 1 which has the railway station directly outside, now I have to get a bus from terminal 2 to the station, so not an improvement with time.
First airport hire car was a new Fiat Brava, no gps then (invented but not commonly used) but there were certainly a lot less cars on the roads to contend with, and parking spaces were easily found.

Generally I don't drink but had a beer with the future in-laws just to be sociable, and also my first AND LAST taste of the liquid called Palinka! How anyone can refer to it as a 'drink' is beyond me!

Not too keen on most of the commercial palinkas - but home-made palinka is another story entirely! Absolutely delicious on the whole, plus you always get the impression that a bit of care & attention has been put into making them. My M-I-L used to buy me a half bottle of palinka for Xmas & sourced them from small markets (she had some kind of a rare rocks & stones sideline as a younger pensioner & used to travel throughout Hungary at weekends peddling her 'gems'). Must say she had exceptionally good taste, the bottles were generally without labels & really delicious. Palinka from friends who have grown the fruit themselves is truly generally exceptional, hope they don't tax it out of existence.