The biggest Central-European music festival, the Sziget Festival, is underway in Hungary's capital Budapest and rain hasn't dampened the spirits of participants.
ADVERTISEMENTThe biggest Central-European music festival, the Sziget Festival, began on Wednesday in Hungary’s capital Budapest.
Despite the rain and mud and low evening temperatures of 13 degrees Celsius, nothing could dampen the spirits of festival-goers.
One woman from Holland told Euronews: “This is my third time in Sziget, this is the best festival in the world… the rain cannot destroy any party here, no problem.”
Two older Hungarian ladies were determined nothing would stop them from having fun: “We come here every year,” they said “And we have decided that as long as we live, let’s say until we are 100 years old, we will be here. And we come even when it rains, we have already experienced worse weather here.”
Good morning! Wonderful Thursday! Who is ready for today? #szigetfestival#sziget#Sziget2016pic.twitter.com/29qfiyeZlk
— Sziget Festival (@szigetofficial) August 11, 2016
Sziget began as a small festival in 1993. It quickly became the biggest festival in Hungary and in the last few years one of the most important in Europe, bringing in festival goers from across the continent and beyond.
“Most of the weekly ticket owners arrive from the big Western European countries like Germany, England, Holland, France, Italy, and of course most of the daily tickets are bought by Hungarians, so if we look at the visitors day by day than we can say that the half of them are Hungarians and the half of them are from other countries,” said the festival’s Managing Director, Tamás Kádár.
The festival will last for a week. Amongst the headliners are Muse, Manu Chao,The Chemical Brothers and Rihanna.
Sziget, which means The Island, is the biggest of hundreds of festivals held every year in Hungary.
Watch our special report here