OMG you guys!!1!1!!!1ONE! Stephen just made his very own blog. its pretty fabulous. In fact, I might say that is, um, full of wonder. Yes, wonder and merriment. hungaryfor.blogspot.com
Oh, yea, and New Years made Budapest all purdy. heh. neato.
So, I went out and bought myself an early Christmas present the other day. I got another external hard drive. And it is already my favorite thing ever. Its made by a Hungarian company called Sungoo (yea, I dunno...) but it was 250 GB for under 35,000 HUF. And it comes with a warranty, so who am I to complain? Plus, it came PRE-FORMATTED for both OSX and Windows, so I won't have any of the compatibility problems with my housemates' PCs like I do with the HD that my Mac's disk doctor formatted. I'm such a happy camper. So, I am working on storing all of the great things that I have been watching all year. I wanted to pass along a little list of the best things that I have seen and/or am desperately looking for: The Beauty Academy of Kabul Vizontele Gegen die Wand (Against the Wall--Eng title "Head On") Leila Atash (Thirst) Taxidermia Yossi and Jagger La Battaglia de Algeri The Business of Fancydancing Vukovar
I went to the zoo and saw raccons! What have you done with your life?!
A breif photo tour of the Budapest Zoo. Its n the east side of Pest, near City Park. 3pm. Nearly dusk. Before you even go in, you can see the elephants. Around dinner time, the elephants are particularly interested in passing children. At the Budapest Zoo, you can put the bald eagle in a cage... Get up close and personal with very clean barnyard animals... Meet new and interesting people. The white wolves came right up to the fence. All the animals were pacing because it was feeding time. I'm an otter, and I do cute little human things with my hands... Raccoons. At the zoo. Sloth can Salad. I just lost the game.
We speak the international language of "Don't screw with the monkeys" All animals come with their own braille display and a tactile model. And I ask you: is it worth it? How much do I love the little skater kids at Hero Square? So much. Hats! Butchery!
It occurred to me that there are a few things that i have never said thank you for that are really important to me.
Mom: --For making me take piano lessons. There. I said it. Let us never speak of it again. --For teaching me how to flatten peanut butter cookies with the back of a fork. --For taking me out of school that day when Ms. Bovine and I got in a row. --For telling me it was OK when I wanted to drop everything that I had been working for for 4 years and study anthropology instead. --For not totally freaking out when I went on food stamps. --For not totally freaking out, in general.
Dad: --For teaching me to fish. Even though I am a vegetarian now, I still know how to do it, and I think that this makes me way cooler than everyone else. --For taking me to Kentucky. --For taking over my youth group when everyone else bailed. That may have been my favorite year ever. --For keeping me a bedroom. --For playing Ikari Warriors with me everyday.
John: --For teaching me how to tie knots, and the difference between a cleat and a winch. --For driving all the way out to LA to get me. --For putting up with me.
Carolyn: --For offering things no one else would think of offering. --For teaching me how to use cover up. --For being the best advocate I ever had.
Oi. Alexis got here on Wednesday, after a lovely trompe de l'aeroport in London that ended up with her getting here at 11pm out of Gatwick instead of noon out of Luton. Such chaos. This is a lovely shot of her and Agi at the bar that my whole department descends on every Tuesday evening. We ended up here after a soc department lecture about mega churches in Oklahoma City. It was surprisingly phenomenal. The lecture-and the bar. And its Christmas season here. Like, officially. They even have a Santa to greet the kids at school and everything. Plus a sleigh for pictures, which we found hilarious. Agi brought her awesome little girl Theodora to meet Santa on Thursday, and she looked at the display and said, "Oh, look! Its Rudolph!" "No Agi. That's a moose. Why is there a moose pulling Santa's sleigh?" "Oh what is it supposed to be. He's a caribou right?" "A reindeer yea." "Oh, we Hungarians don't make these distinctions. We just call them all 'szarvas'." Here is a picture of Stephen driving the moose: It made him so happy...
So, yea, post moose, we went to the bar down the street. Most of us kept ourselves busy with more stories about Agi being killed one time by an italian tiger on a boat filled with monkeys. Aungo savored Hungarian bar food: And Asa, before he had had a single drink, shifted out of his earlier melancholy into his usual state:
After this gathering dissolved, a few of us decided to crash a poli-sci/IRES gathering that was happening at a place on the north side of Szent Istvan krt, but it was such a mess there that our group became divided and lost almost immediately, and the few of us who got out alive (namely, me, Alexis, Aungo, Agi, Brigette, and Colin) went back to the 7th district to a rad little shisha bar. I cant remember the name, but it reeked of authenticity and is right behind the KFC. yea. Lots of fun.
Oh, I have to add one more thing, though. Brigette, Marko, Alexis and I wandered down to Szimpla for David Berliner's goodbye party on Friday night. We were hungry before hand, and some of us had mentioned pizza. The guys have been known to go down to this place called Pizza King. Marko swears that its totally good. Exhibit A: Marko also apparently drinks Bacardi Breezers. If only we had known how screwed we were at the time. The pizza, after OVER AN HOUR, finally hits our table, and is way sad looking. And the damn Hungarians put the dreaded corn on it. They put corn on everything. Marko, enthusiastically digs in, and says "This stuff is really good." While simultaneously smearing ketchup all over his slice. Exhibit B: We tried it, and this was quite possibly the grossest pizza I have ever had in my entire life. Like, ever. Even worse than that one that Sean and I ordered from JoBo's on Clarendon that had adhered itself to the box. Even grosser than that. Raw dough. No sauce. Yellow peppers. Corn! Veni, Vidi, No Likey So, we did the only thing that we felt was appropriate with the remains, after we had picked through all the slightly edible peices. We made a diarama.
We have been having the worst time ever getting the internet to work here. We even got all of our portforwarding and ping issues straightned out. We are wireless network geniuses at this point. Which totally doesnt help us because there is no juice coming out of the actual cable internet line. I actually got an error message in Hungarian telling me that the cable company's server was offline the other day. Christ. And our download speeds have been down in the gutters. Even google was timing out. But, somehow, it all came back this morning. In a flood of bandwidth. And I got to wake up to see this:
Look at that swarm! I love it.
So, in a fit of foresight and serendipity, used this new found internet tour de force of connectivity to scan craigslist for a new flatmate, cause Stephen was pacing around stressing about it.
Oh, have I mentioned this? Wyatt is moving out. He's going home for Christmas and staying home. I TOLD Marko that he wouldn't think the horsehead in the sheets was funny...
But anyway, we have pouted and cried to the limits of our abilities, and still Wyatt has decided that he will be happier at home. So, we need to find someone who can pay rent. At this point, anyone with heartbeat and a checkbook will do. No one from school wants to move in with us cause our apt is on the slightly more expensive end of things that are available. I mean, the difference between what I'm paying here and what I could be paying if I lived on a smaller street is like maybe 70 Euros. Maybe. But that's a lot when you are on a student budget and living entirely off of George Soros. So, the anxiety level about finding someone to live here has been high, escalating something like this
So I did a quick search on budapest.craigslist.org, and found only 1 ad for a person wanting a room to let. It was from Ben. Ben is Australian, is moving to Budapest, and wants a room for about 200 Euros per month to rent from January to June. Sweet lord amighty. We need someone to pay us about 200 Euros a month for a room from January to June! Its like Jesus himself brought us together.
So, I email the guy and tell him what's up with our room. He replies in a matter of minutes, asking if he can see the apartment today, cause he happens to be in town apartment hunting, and leaves for London again in a matter of hours. So he comes over, takes one look around, and says "Hi. Im Ben. Y'all are great. I want to live here."
Rad. Oh, but it gets even better. Ok, so Ben is no ordinary 28 year old dude. He is a concert conductor who is coming here to start an apprenticeship with the Budapest Festival Ensemble. A conductor! Sheet music scattered all around the apartment a la Immortal Beloved! How luscious is this going to be? He's a rather proper fellow, but was really excited to be living with a group of students (somehow) and was just thrilled to find a place that has already been set up, got the internet connected, bills going, etc. He's only going to be here 2-3 weeks of every month, and then in London for the rest of the time, but I think this thing is going to be beautiful.
And the moral of the story is: don't stress about change and responsibility. Just wait for the forces that be to tell you "Hey, now would be a good time to take care of your shit." and then proceed to arrange everything for the future in a matter of hours under the graces of serendipity, divine providence, and falafel. Oh yes. There was falafel involved. And I am not at liberty to divulge those details. I can tell you, though, that I am a happy little camper right now.
So, here's a tasty little treat, just from me to you, to help bring in the cheers for a new roommate. Huttah!
Location: Ukrainian Village, Chicago, Illinois, United States
I am addicted to donuts.
I love running around after dark.
I am a beer snob and a vodka nerd.
I change my hair color alot.
Sometimes junior highers make more sense to me than anyone else in the world.
I am really good at finding neat things in dumpsters.
I can fix your bike for you.
I people watch.
I keep plants.
Whatever I am doing, I would rather be in the water.
