Pestilog: [Insert Reference to White Elephants Here]

Tuesday, March 06, 2007

[Insert Reference to White Elephants Here]

I woke up sick again. My throat hurts and I have a cough and I feel generally terrible. I didnt go to class today. I decided ust to rest, especially since I have a huge pile of work that I want to do before folks get here next week. I know I dont work well at home, so I packed a bag and went down to Siraly, a cafe on Kiraly utca, down the street from my apartment. Siraly means 'seagull'. This bar has been host to countless gatherings, live bands, plays, study breaks, and even thesis meetings with my adviser in the last few months.

It looks just like this, except that the outside has had little blue waves painted on it, so imagine that under the graffiti. Here's a rad little video of the place on the inside and the usual crowd. You can follow the link above if the embedded video runs slowly:

Anyway, at this point I have been at Siraly for about an hour now, and I just had a startling realization.

Here I am, in Eastern Europe, Budapest no less (so romantic) midday in an artsy cafe (intellectual), where peole are downing beers at 2pm and posting listings for the jazz bands that will be playing here this weekend (hipster). I've been drinking long coffee and seltzer water (lavish) at a secluded table by the window (Hemmingway), reading Habermas (pretentions), while listening to Bach's cello suites (fartsy) on my mp3 player (bourgeois). Oh, I am also ill, tired, with rings under my eyes and a rattling cough (afflicted!).

I am a black turtleneck away from the TB stricken artist-intellectual types that Susan Sontag wrote 98-too-many pages about. Oh, how frail am I. My legs are also aching form sitting for so long because I havn't had a chance to take my bike out in months. What the hell has happened to me? I've gone totally soft.
Maybe I should take up boxing or something.

On the upside of things though, I found some of the pictures from the Hummus Bar on my computer, and I offer them here for your amusement. (and check me out in that link. I can leave restaurant reviews in Hungarian. I may not be able to ask for directions, but I can talk volumes about food, cause I have my priorities in line. I'm so cool.)