A Study In Hungarianness

Everyone else in our program was gone on vacation for our semi-Thanksgiving break, but Carolina and I opted to stay in Budapest and get to know the city better before we are whisked back to the US. This means that we've been going to different bars/clubs every night, some of which we get kicked out of, some of which suck, some of which close at midnight and don't let us in, but most of which are way cooler than anything in the US. It's been a lot of fun, meeting some good characters. Something we've noticed, however, is that Hungarians really cannot understand why anyone from anywhere else would want to come study in Hungary. Their response, when we say we are studying abroad from San Francisco is, "But, why?"

Good question, I suppose. It's not like I got out a map, settled down with an encyclopedia on European history, and chose Hungary as the most worthy, while sipping on some brandy. In fact, I mostly chose it because USF made it mega easy for me to sign up for last minute, and because my tuition and credits just transfer over. I really knew nothing about the city or country itself. Which has made our classes here, which would probably bore anyone well-acquainted with the region to (shall I go for the cliche?) death, really fascinating. I'll forego my fear of sounding obvious or ignorant and just say that I never really thought I would be taking basic world history classes that just put a completely different perspective on things. And the country itself has some fucked up history. The more I learn about the transition from Socialism, the current government and economy, and prevailing individualistic attitude of the population, the more depressing it is. People here aren't interested in building a community, they're interested in self-preservation. The American dream whispers to the little man that he can do anything and be as successful as he wants if he works hard enough, and is honest and moral. However little truth may be left in this, it is at least the presented ideal. In Hungary, everyone had everything taken from them by communism. There was no success because everyone was poor and miserable. When the country transitioned to its altered form of capitalism, there was a false hope that the livin' would get easier. However, this was only the case for a few well-positioned people, and everyone else just went about their lives, doing what they've always done for as little as they've always done it. So Hungarians see successful people as those who cheated, lied, or were simply lucky. Laws are things that are to be followed at one's own discretion--people are not going to change just because their government does every four years. "Customer Service" is non-existent, which can be a little jilting at first, but then it's like, yeah, why the fuck should they smile at me and be nice to me? People don't give a shit about your problems, they've got themselves to worry about.

One busy night, Carolina and I got on the tram, only to be backed into a corner because it was so packed. Very unfortunately, but not surprisingly, we were trapped in our crevice by not one, but two couples mackin hardcore on either side of us. This is a common occurrence here in Bootypest. Not only do most girls seem to have nothing better to do than spend hours on their outfits, hair, makeup, and taking mirror-cellpone-camera pics of themselves, but, as would logically follow, they want nothing more than to have a boyfriend. It doesn't really seem to matter who this boy is--as long as they can make out in front of everyone all the time. I hope I don't sound too bitter, these beezies amuse me more than anything. Just making some cultural observations. Even our program director, Andi, who is really cool, was giving me a ride one day (to the police station, lolz), and she was looking for a place to park. There was a space that was most definitely big enough for her tiny compact car, and she passed it saying, " oops, not big enough for a girl!" Well, I suppose I'm used to trying to park between driveways that are smaller than my actual car on hills in the dreaded inner richmond, but I still thought I must of heard her wrong. Then she goes, "Oh, that one is big enough," indicating a spot that would most definitely fit two cars at least. "You know, in Hungary they are thinking of making special parking spots just for girls. Some people think that is sexist, but I think it would be nice." Ooookay Andi, comparing women to the handicapped and implying their inferiority at a simple daily task definitely isn't sexist....

Well anyway, can't wait to get back to you people and do a lot of good Hungarian accent impressions. It seems like everybody has a different accent here. It's funny. Speaking of "funny", this is the word Hungarians use for "fun". That's because they don't have a word for fun. How fucked is that? So, last week Carolina and Kelsey ran into Marcel. They were like yo, Marcel, what's up man? and he was like "Oh, I am sorry. I have TWO candies in my mouth right now!" ( I love Marcel). Later that day, he showed up to our class, and asked if we all wanted some of his candy. He proceeded to pass around a pack of original flavor Halls cough drops. God I love Marcel. So you can understand the magnitude of his "child trapped in a giant man's body" syndrome, here is a picture of him:


So, Hungary is different. It's not warm and welcoming and it doesn't give a damn whether you're there or not. But it's got soul. We found about eight really really legit bars, met some hilarious and cool people, and I know I'm going to be missing them, the 24 hour liquor stores (Hungarians are second only to the Irish in alcohol consumption), the every-two-minute trams, and the cheesey bread. Oh god. The cheesey bread will be in my dreams forever.

tragic consequences

yo!!! Something really shitty happened!!! On Saturday night, we went to this awesome club/bar, the DJ was spinning the jams, we were happy, we were dancing. We got back home at about 4:30am, and Baber left to go catch a flight home. Carolina and I stayed up for another hour, made some roasted veggies, danced on sofas and chairs, and sang loudly. Around 5:30 or 5:45 am, we passed out. Now, Baber always goes to bed last, and is the one who always chains the door. So, unfortunately, since we were drunk and out of the habit, we forgot to chain the door. At 10am I woke up, and walked out of my bedroom to see a strange pile of my belongings in front of the front door. It included: two sweaters, my gloves, my sunglasses, my hungarian dictionary, and a dance program pamphlet, and my coin purse. I knew that these had certainly been in my messenger bag the night before, so obviously I was confused as to why they were now in a neat pile in front of the door. My only thought was that Carolina had woken up and for some reason needed to use my bag, so she'd taken everything out and left. I walked over to her room to see that she was soundly sleeping in bed. Then I turned and looked at the place on the table in the living room where my laptop should have been. And obviously, it was gone. I yelled words I never thought I would yell: "We were robbed!".

Well, things turned out much better than they could have. Or would have, had this happened in the US, probably. My laptop, bag, student ID card, metro pass, keys and about $7 worth of forint were the only things taken. LUCKILY I had taken my atm/credit card and put it in my pocket that night, even though it's usually in my bag. Same story with my ipod. Carolina had taken her laptop into her room with her. Whoever came into our house didn't come into our rooms at all, since they probably didn't want to wake us us. We think it was someone who lives in our building since they were probably watching us and noticing our habits, and could see that Baber left with a suitcase, and could see when we went to bed, and probably didn't want to wake us up and have us see who they were. We called our landlord and he called a locksmith to change our locks, since they got my keys. However, since it was Sunday, they couldn't do anything until Monday morning, which led to the most terrifying night of my life. We chained the door, set up a booby trap of three stools and a chair in front of it, and knew they probably wouldn't even be returning at all, but still, every single noise I heard would jolt me out of any sleep I was sliding towards, and send my heart racing incredibly fast.

Now I get to go to the police station!! Luckily, my comp was insured for $600 so that's really good. The worst part of it all is really just the idea of some anonymous person coming into our house while we slept. Moral of the story, lock your doors and sleep with your valuables.

A Day of Not Understanding

Well, I wish I had written the last post in a more stable mental state, but so it goes. Essentially, we went to a futbol game for a team (Ferenc Varos, in case you didn't get that), that is rather controversial. Bank happens to be the VP in his free time (which I don't imagine he has much of considering he teaches 6 days a week--yes, Saturdays--in different cities, is a political scientist, and Sundays are, surely, entirely devoted to the games), which, as we found out more about the team, seems to fit right in with his personality. We called him when we got to the stadium, because we couldn't find him at the corner (embarrassingly enough for us, when we found him at a different corner he said "sorry for the confusion. but really, is that a corner?" pointing to the "corner" we had been at. It was not, in fact, a corner.), then, when we told him we wanted to sit "as close as possible for as cheap as possible" he did the classic "obviously" Bank head nod and led us past security, for the small fee of free ninety-nine.

I guess you have to understand, to fully comprehend why we were so excited to spend a day with Bank, why our whole class is so obsessed with Bank. And I don't really know how to explain it. It certainly has a lot to do with his name, and the fact that we can insert it easily and humorously into conversation. It also has to do with his weird voice/accent. I guess I would call it a combination of a crow and a beaver? Like, it's very deep for his small body, but it's oddly nasaly too. Like, he pronounces "to" as "tyew". I suppose it is exactly the voice you would expect to come from a Hungarian who looks like this:

actually, he looks too gentle in that one. Try this:
(thank you google.hu image search)

Also, it has to do with the fact that we all know that he is way smarter than us. This is made particularly apparent when he will mention a historical event (e.g. the Prague Spring) in class that we should all know. When we all sit there silently, he will respond with either: "seriously?" "really?" or "oh my god". At this point, we all just laugh. Basically, the idea of "Bank" is fascinating to us all.

Anyway, we found out that our team (green and white, mascot: the green falcon[or actually some hungarian bird with a funny name]) used to be first division, but because of financial reasons, they are now second division. This means they win all the time, which is a plus. With Bank's guidance, we learned that the "hooligans" sit on the sides of the stadium. We laughed when he said this, imagining a bunch of fun drunk fans, but Bank said, "No, seriously, they are really hooligans." After the game, which included a halftime full of cheesey pretzels and hot wine, and Kelsey receiving "the best text message of her life" which said "had to go outside be back in 10" just when we thought Bank had ditched us for good, the three of us bought green and white Ference Varos scarves. Today, to please our prof, we wore them to class. However, our Lit professor who we had beforehand, informed us that we should be careful wearing the scarves around because the team represents extreme right values, and has a reputation for getting in fights. They later told us about riots caused by the "football hooligans" who burned buildings. Okay, so I guess they really are hooligans.

Our Contemporary Issues class was pretty cool because the ex-president of Hungary came to speak! He was president from '89 to '90, during the transition from communism to democracy. Apparently he is a very respected figure, but was kicked out of his party (socialist) a few years ago because he voted for FIDESz (a right wing party)'s budget plan. Yeah, shit's fucked up over here. He "only" speaks Russian, French, and German fluently, so one of our professors, Marcel, translated.

Let me take a minute to talk about Marcel, for he is a wonderful, wonderful human being who we have developed an almost Bank-like adoration for. He is very tall, about 6' 5", but he looks and acts like an 8 year old trapped in a very big man's body. He is always beaming from his childish face, and despite his sometimes broken English, has fully mastered the phrases "okey dokey artichokey," and "see you later, alligator". He led us on a tour of Krakow while we were there this past weekend, and though he was the only real adult among a bunch of international students, had to be constantly reminded to wait for people, and that we were hungry, or needed tickets to the museum, etc. He also made a hilariously horrible joke that he was still apologizing for today-- at a church he said "Yes, and every country has a different saint. Do you guys know what yours is? (everyone looks blank) Yes, in the U.S. it is St. Bush." Basically, Marcel makes bad jokes that we laugh very hard at because of the way he says them, and the giant smile on his face as he does.

But, the ex-Pres, who helped draft the new democratic constitution after 50 years of a socialist dictatorship, and delivered it to the people from the windows of Parliament, was really cool. One of my favorite quotes, after he told a story of getting wasted with Kadar and Brezhnev at a hockey game, was "God save the human race from the leaders who want to push buttons". Amen.

Then we went to the Hungarian National Theater and saw a three hour play in Hungarian. The sets were great!!! That's about all I can say about that.

Just for funsies, this is Bank circa 1998

Hopefully that can bring you only a fraction of the joy I feel everytime I look at it.

gooooooo ferencvaros!!!!!!!!

Today was the best day ever. woke up, played power hour, then went to the stadium for the soccer game. Bank (do not forget, this is pronounced "bonk"), our european integration and the EU professor, is the vice president of the fan club. this makes him a huge celebrity. we met him (me, kelsey, and carolina), and he got us in for free, got us free beer, and they opened about 7 gates so we could get where we were going. it was awesome. then we just stood there and got drunker with Bank. Our team won!!!! They're called Ferenc Varos I guess. Ferenc means prince, and I don't know what varos means, but after the game we bought team scarves, then people kept trying to talk to us about it,, unforuntaely we stil don't speak Hungarian. Sorry, I am still drunk. Bank is my hero.

The Big Trip

Well, I've been putting off writing this entry on our grand tour of Europe for a while, so now that I have some homework due tomorrow, I think the time is right. First off: London!

We arrived in London and delighted in our ability to order food in English without feeling like total dicks. While passing through King's Cross Station, I got to take a picture with the sign and cart for Platform 9 and 3/4. It was a big deal for the secret Harry Potter lover inside me. Carolina and I checked into our Hostel, and immediately went to look for a big red double decker tourist bus to ride. We found one quickly and spent a retarded amount of pounds on a ticket. I'm not even going to tell you how much it cost, but it was really fun, and we saw pretty much every big deal building in London. This includes: Big Ben, Parliament, Westminster Abbey, the Globe theater, the London Eye, and a whiole bunch of other shit. Then we napped for a while. I recently was able to contact my best friend growing up, Amber Strellis. I've known her since we were wee babies, but her aversion to any kind of technology has left me unable to keep in touch with her for the past few years. I hadn't seen her since winter of 2006. Turns out, she's studying in London right now. So Carolina and I navigated the Tube and met up with her at a pub/restaurant called Shakespeare's Head, where we drank Strongbow's (cider is the best thing ever, both more delicious and higher alcohol content than beer), and ate fish and chips. It was awesome to see her, she's the funniest person ever, but unfortunately she was leaving for a trip to Rome the next day, so it was a brief, hour long reunion. But she told us to head off in the direction of an area called "Shorditch" (not "Shortage", as we thought everyone had been saying), which was supposedly where all the young people go out.

We finally found it, after asking a million people for directions, and following those directions until we ran into someone else to ask. Apparently, it's considered common courtesy to give people directions if they ask you, and rude not to, so people will tell you something even if they have no idea where your destination is. This resulted in us having to ask almost everyone we saw, which we also probably did because we were so happy to be in an English speaking country. We finally got there, and discovered is surely is where the young people go out--hipster centraaaaal. We met up with Baber and Kelsey and her sister, who lives in London, and we started to look for a bar or club. One of the first ones we passed was blasting MGMT, so that was our obvious choice. We pushed through the THICK crowd of hipsters to the dance floor, where no one was really dancing. Between shots of Beam and a few trips to the "off-license" (read: liquor store) to chug Strongbow (chanting "it's apple juice, it's apple juice"), we got a pretty legit dance party going on the dance floor. There wasn't an actual DJ at the DJ station, presumably he had gone to get drunk and left a mix CD to do his work. We had no problem with this, as it played more MGMT, Arcade Fire, Bro-Hymn by Pennywise (I'm not kidding), What's My Age Again (we were probably the only ones excited about this), London Calling, and some other good stuff. We somehow managed to get a bus back to our hostel, but it was a 45 minute ride with some Indian dudes from San Jose who were way more interested in us than we were in them.

The next day we walked around, took a boat cruise tour that came with our bus tour, and then went to sit in the park near Buckingham Palace. We thought it looked lovely and scenic, and there were tons of nice folding chairs in the sun, which we found out cost 2 pounds to sit in. Carolina found a tupperware full of rice that someone had left behind and scattered it into the grass. Twenty thousand pigeons started feasting on it, and Carolina was delighted until we all realized that rice expands in pigeon's stomachs and kills them. Hilarity ensued. Luckily we did not see any pigeon genocide, but a few of them had to lie down. We met up with our friend Claire, and then Lexi came into the city to meet us, and we all went to see Avenue Q. It was great, just some good old puppet sex and musical singing. We walked around forever trying to find someplace near there to get a drink until we realized it was futile. Carolina, Claire and I went back to the Shakespeare's head for the best deal on food/beer we'd seen in that insanely expensive city. Claire went home, and Carolina and I headed back to Shorditch to try and find some fun for the evening. After drinking some cheap vodka on a bench and hipster-watching, then chugging more Strongbow, we realized that all the clubs have huge lines or cover charges on Friday nights. We decided to play the pretentious game, where you go up to the most pretentious looking person you can find, and ask them where the least pretentious club around is. In this way, we ended up talking to four really cool guys. We chatted and goofed around with them for about forty-five minutes (actually I have no idea. I was pretty drunk), and a few people had come up and talked to the guys, but we thought nothing of it. Then some girl came up and was like, "Oh my god, Dave, I love you! You were my first crush!" or something, and then to Carolina she was like, "Oh my god, you guys are so lucky to be talking to them. Do you even know who they are?" and Carolina was like uhhhh no and the girl told her they were a famous band who had been at the top of the charts a couple weeks before. But we still have no idea what band they were. So if you've heard of a British band with a bassist named Carl and a drummer or guitarist named Dave, please let me know. Then they left, and we caught the bus back to our hostel.

The next day, before leaving for Dublin, we went to Portabello Road, where there were a bunch of touristy souvenir tables and a mean old racist bitch who's table Caro stole five brooches from. That was lovely. Then we went to Dublin! I for, some strange reason, booked myself a flight that was on the same airline, at almost the exact same time, but from a different airport than everyone else. Though my compadres had doubts that I would make my flight when left to my own devices, I managed it no problem, and met them at the Dublin airport. We shuttled into town and met up with Lara!! It was so nice to see her. We went back to her International student dorm in Blackrock, and bought ourselves some cider, then met all her friends and took the bus into town to a pub, and then what I like to call a "plub", a pub with a dancefloor playing shitty US top 40 hits. I even got to dance to "I Kissed A Girl and I Liked It" so needless to say it was a good night. We then experienced the bane of Lara's existence--trying to catch a cab back home. It took us over an hour, seriously. I don't know how she does it all the time. The next day we walked around, went to the museum of art (museums are FREE there... wow), walked through the park, and got some dank Irish food. Basically the conclusion we came to, which Lara backed up, was that Dublin is just some city that's not really that special, and that it's only cool once you get out into the country, where it's beautiful. Unfortunately, we didn't have enough time there to do that. C'est la vie. I was just glad that I got to see and hang out with Lara. We woke up early to head to AMSTERDAM the next day.

Well I gotta say, Amsterdam is pretty awesome. And seriously, not just because of the weed thing. It is an incredibly beautiful city built mainly on canals, with really picturesque tall houses lining them. And EVERYONE bikes. Seriously, everyone. It was so cool, because you just see everyone going about their normal day the way people in America do in cars, but they're on bikes. Old people, businessmen, people doing their errands. Everyone just does them on their bikes. All the streets are lined with bike racks and there are at least a hundred bikes on each block. Plus, they're all perfect looking. It's like they don't have jobs, they're just hired for their natural beauty and paid to cruise around the city like they just rode right out of a J. Crew catalogue. And, you can smoke weed. So, a freakishly perfect society. We had a good time. The first day, we went to a coffeeshop and smoked huge joints to our faces. Then it got a little creepy because there were these trippy mushroomy paintings on the walls and all these mirrors reflecting them everywhere, eeeeugh. So we left to go find a canal. This led to the first of a many, many part series called "We Are Lost". We spent the rest of the day trying to figure out where we were on the map, and how to get where we wanted to go, which was complicated because we didn't really know where we wanted to go. The evening ended with us finally finding a movie theater and selecting from the large selection of bro-flicks. We chose "Wanted" but left the theater because it sucked, and going to see "The Bank Job", which was probably a worse choice. Don't go see it.

The next day we rented bikes. This was a pretty good decision, but I have to admit I rode in constant fear that I was breaking the bike laws of the road that all the inhabitants knew so well. We biked through the beautiful Vondelpark, found a coffeeshop called Kashmir that was pretty cool, we tried to go to the Planetarium but it was expensive and you had to buy a zoo ticket too, and so we went to the Hash and Hemp Museum which was the biggest piece of shit waste of money ever. Seriously, talk about some uncreative stoners. Then we went to a windmill/brewery and got a beer. All this took the entire day since we continued the many installations of "We Are Lost". I am pretty sure I spent more time looking at a map bewilderedly in Amsterdam than doing just about anything else. We got back to the hostel and met some nerdy Canadian guy who wanted to go look around the Red Light District. We walked around with him and saw the hookers in their windows. It was pretty cool. The Canadian guy was waaay to into it, but really weirded out when a prostitute waved and beckoned him. He said he could never sleep with a prostitute because it would be too hard "emotionally". We ate some bomb falafel/kebab and then went to sleep.

The next day Baber went back to Hungary for the anniversary of the 1956 revolution, and we headed to Paris! We got there at night, ate dinner, walked around, drank wine, and ended up drinking wine while walking down the Seine River. We ended up at the Eiffel Tower, which was beautiful. I was too drunk at this point, and feeling sick, so we caught a cab back to our hotel. That is probably the only time I will sleep on a real mattress between arriving here in August, and going home in January. Because our Ikea mattresses at our apartment are basically hostel beds. The next day we walked through Luxembourg Gardens, went to the Luxembourg museum, which was basically like MOMA if it were four rooms big and had shittier, less well known of the artist's pieces. Then we met up with Kelsey and this guy Adrien who is from Paris, but we met him in Budapest. And his little shuffley leprechaun friend Gregory. He was oh so precious in a gingery, butt-chinned way. We went to the Sacre Coeur Church, which has an amazing view of Paris, where we witnessed a beezy who apparently had come alone, and was taking pouty-face, lip bite myspace style pictures of herself in front of the view. It was highly amusing. Then we tried to find a vintage store where Adrien told us we could "maybe find the hot fashions" and that he hoped we would find "quality products", but we were unsuccessful in our hunt. So we met up with our friend Claire, went out to a nice dinner for Carolina's birthday, and then did all we could do--bought a bottle of whiskey and drank it on the sidewalk. Then we tried to find a fun club, but just ended up at a shitty one somewhere we didn't know where we were. Then we followed some boys back to their place because they said the magic word "marijuana" but they turned out to be pretty cool and we danced to Justice. We left to find that we were very, very far from our hotel, and in the Red Light District. We made it back circa 5:30 am, and since our flight was at 9 am, and we had to be there at 7, we went to sleep for half an hour. Then we flew to Copenhagen.

Copenhagen is awesome. It's a lot like Amsterdam, except less touristy, and it seems like it has a really legit artsy, underground, bohemian deal going on. Also lots of pretty houses and people riding bicycles. It is where all the real blondes come from. On our one real day there, we rented bicycles from this really cool place. It's a charity that takes donated bicycles, repairs them, and then sends them to Africa to be used as ambulances, etc. It just started in May, and they've already donated 1200 bikes! Plus, he was so friendly. When we came in, he asked if we wanted coffee, made it for us, and we chatted for like, and hour. Then he gave us a map and drew a path with different cool things to do on it. So we had a lovely ride through Copenhagen. We saw Hans Christian Anderson's grave (he wrote Ugly Duckling, Emperor's New Clothes, Thumbelina, Little Mermaid, etc), lots of cool street art, cool shops, a little skate park, a graveyard, a beautiful park with a free elephant zoo, and finally arrived in Christiania. Christiania is a Freetown, started in old military ramparts by a bunch of hippies in the 70s, and there are no laws there. I guess. I dunno. But it was so cool! There's art everywhere on every building, all the buildings are really unique and homemade looking, there are stray dogs wandering around everywhere (really clean, cute ones too), fires in trashcans, homemade playgrounds, and stands selling, among other things, weed and hash. We bought some, went to a bar, rolled joints and drank whiskey. It was awesome. But when it got dark, the crazies started coming out. Or rather, they congregated at one bar we made the mistake of entering, where they stumble around drunkenly to songs about being wild American men and leer at stoned girls who didn't know what they were getting into. We left, tried to find an electronic club but were too drunk at this point, and ended up participating in the final chapter of "We Are Really Lost", before we finally found the club. We paid 80 Kroner to get in, then left immediately because it sucked and no one was dancing. Then we sat outside our hostel room wasted, trying to figure out the time change, and trying to set Carolina's watch alarm clock for our 7am flight back home to Budapest.

Needless to say, we woke up in a hostel room of 14 beds at the very moment our flight was taking off. We hustled off to the airport anyways, where we discovered that our airline's next flight to Budapest was three days later, and the other airline's flights were really expensive. So we did some quick thinking and ended up renting a car from Avis to drive to Berlin (so we wouldn't get charged a one-way fee, since the car was from Berlin), with the plan of taking the train back from Berlin. Carolina, being 21 and feeling much healthier than me at that point, rented the car and got in the driver's seat, only to realize that it was a manual, which she couldn't drive. So we switched seats, and I got to drive a VW Golf all the way to Berlin! We went the wrong way at first and ended up in Sweden, then drove back through the Danish countryside (which was beautiful), then took a ferry to Germany. Three countries in one day! It was dark as we got into Berlin, so we found an internet cafe, then tried to get to the train station to catch a late train home. Unfortunately, Berlin is nearly impossible to navigate, as all the streets change names all the time, and the smaller ones weren't even on our map. We finally made it, right after the ticket office had closed. We now had the task of finding the Avis, then sleeping in our car all night before returning it. Sleeping in a car seems like it would be warm, but it isn't at all. At 5am the next morning, we woke up, returned the car to the rental agency we had slept in front of, and caught a cab back to the train station (which is the most futuristic train station ever), where we finally got on a train bound for home at 6 am. We slept for 10 of the 12 hours of the ride. And we were finally home.

And now Obama is president!! (Or actually, he will be after Bush has a few more months to further decrease environmental protection, make getting an abortion more difficult, and make it easier for the government to spy on it's citizens!) Wahoo!! Obama-rama-ding-dong! Everyone in Europe is very happy about this, and I am finally not ashamed to admit my nationality. This is great. Let's get drunk and then go to Krakow tomorrow.

i love the wien

Wien is what people in Vienna call Vienna. Makes sense. As my dad informed me after receiving an enthusiastic email about the wonders of Vienna, the delicious phallic baseball snack "wiener" was invented there. Well, I really do love Wien. Carolina and I headed out there early on Thursday morning aboard a train. Now, as much as I will try to make this entire post sound like we aren't stoners, I feel it's rather futile. That said, we aren't stoners. But we've been seeing all these posters around for Eastern Europe's first "hemp festival"and it's sponsored by the growshop around the block from us, and we thought, ya know, might as well check it out, seeing as its only a 3 hour train ride away. So we booked a hostel and headed out, forgoing a University planned trip to wine country in favor of Cultiva. We arrived at Westbanhof station around noon, bought some picnic food and coffee to delay until check in time at two, and then made our beds alongside our Australian roommates. The hostel we stayed at, Wombat's, was definitely nicer than some actual hotels I've stayed at. We bought some cheap(ish--nothing's cheap when you're dealing with euros) whiskey called Ranch Wood which was allegedly brewed in the heart of Kentucky. Then we hit up the bar at the hostel, which one would expect to be full of world travelers and, I dunno, interesting people? Instead we were treated to a gaggle of teenage mutant ninja drunkards playing pool and hitting on each other. Well, I guess you can't win them all. So, we just got really drunk, and took a video of a 17 year old with a long braid dancing, alone, to Sean Paul's "Get It On". Then we passed out.

On Friday, we stopped by the Belvedere museum. It's split into two levels--the upper level is filled with really boring medieval paintings of Jesus being crucified, etc, but the lower level was basically devoted to the "Secession" art movement in the early 1900s under the reign of Franz Josef, most famous of which is Gustav Klimt'sThe Kiss, which, along with all his other works, were incredibly beautiful. I'm really glad I got to see his paintings, I was impressed and inspired.

Then we tackled Vienna's impeccable public transportation system, which took us out of town to the "Pyramid" Expo center, where Cultiva was going down. We didn't know how easy it would actually be to get weed here, especially since kids at the hostel had told us Austria's laws weren't too lenient, so we bought some disgusting rum in beer-sized bottles to bring with us. Because we had no idea what to expect, and what could be worse than wandering totally sober amidst a bunch of stoners in an expo center?

But we were in for a... treat? Rather than a bunch of stoners, it was a bunch of businessmen stoners! It was more about growers, seed companies, vaporizers, grow boxes, and hemp products than anything else. We found the booth, or really more like balcony-patio, of Bushdoctor, the growshop around the block from us in Budapest. They also have two stores in Vienna and Berlin. We found our friend Andras, who is a really funny, tall, bespectacled dude. He has a pretty good English vocabulary, but he isn't very good at structuring sentences, and when he talks (which he does A LOT of) it sounds like he's using a thesaurus. So in order to understand what he's talking about, you have to pay close attention and keep re-orienting yourself to what he actually is trying to convey. It can be hard not to start laughing while he talks. He was really excited to see that we came, and suggested we go down to the bar. On the way there, we wandered around all the booths, and were treated to Andras's extensive knowledge of marijuana and the process of growing it. Also, all the Bushdoctor guys, who were outfitted in a weird safari type costume they were all quite proud of, were like celebrities there. Everyone kept coming up to them and shaking their hands and asking them questions. It was hilarious. Because as we found out later, Andras is like, fucking crazy.

Somewhere along the way, we lost him to a friend who made hemp clothing, and we sat down on some couches at a booth to rest our feet. Immediately, the woman and man who are working there--both dressed up and clean cut--offered us a beer. They were Irish, and their 64 year old father invented one of the first handheld vaporizers, which is just a weed (hahaha I meant to type week) out on the market. It's a crazy little invention, full of catalytic conversions and looking basically like a walkie-talkie. They were complaining that they didn't have anything, like lavender, etc., to demonstrate it with, so another Irish friend suggested he take us outside and use marijuana. We gladly accepted. Wow, that thing is crazy!!! If I spent my money on drug paraphernalia, I would totally buy one. If only to support the cute Irish siblings and their father.

We returned to the expo with a new sense of wonder, saw some cool shit, got a LOT of free shit (two grinders, six lighters, grow solution, a t-shirt, a beanie, endless rolling papers, a bottle of honey hemp liquor, keychains, stickers, and munchies), and ended up meeting two people (who I SWEAR I didn't even know existed before our Irish friends pointed them out like giggling groupies) who are quite important in the world of marijuana growth and distribution. One is Jorge Cervantes, who literally and figuratively wrote the book on growing marijuana, and who apparently was "the inspiration" for our Irish friends to start growing. He was very sweet and old and we smoked a spliff with him. We also got a photo opp with Howard Marks, Mr. Nice, who was responsible for about 80% of the marijuana in Europe in the 80s, and had ties to the CIA, IRA, mafia, etc etc. He was also very friendly. We got a bunch of free beer, met really cool people, acquired free goodies, got smoked out.... it was a smashing time. Went back to our hostel, had a picnic on the floor, and passed out.

The next two days were actually just as wonderful. On Saturday, we rented bikes along with a dude from Holland that we met at the hostel, and rode around. We saw the Palace and St. Stephen's Church, and all those tourist attraction buildings. Then we picked up a GIANT bottle of wine for only 2.50 euro and some picnic supplies, and headed to Stadtpark. The weather was, there is no better word, lovely. Thus, the park was packed with people, including a couple crazies worthy of San Francisco. We lay on the grass and taught Holland how to play King's Cup. He got drunk and napped on the grass while we befriended some German architecture students who did nothing but roll and then smoke cigarettes, and then start rolling another as soon as they finished. We definitely park-seshed it for hours, it was like being back in GGP. The rest of the night involved some bold bike trips and map reading to an Irish bar called Charlie P's, where we bought some homegrown from one of our charming Irish friends from Cultiva, and then an "international" bar called Shebeen where we basically sat catatonic, slurping our Stiegl beer (delicious), waiting to bike home to our boring german roommates and uncomfortable hostel beds.

On Sunday, we woke up and and walked for (I do not exaggerate) two hours before finding any sort of food that was in English, open, or didn't make us want to vom. The city really shuts down on Sundays, it's bizarre and inconvenient for the hungry. We ended up getting some $12 pasta because we were so relieved to even see a restaurant that was open. Then, we walked to the Hundertwasser Haus, which was seriously the coolest building I've ever seen. Maybe I'm just goofy, but why can't every building in the world be as awesome as that? It was designed/built in the 80s (I think) by Friedensreich Hundertwasser for free, because he didn't want anything ugly being built there instead. And apparently it's a low income housing block. While we were there, bright red ivy was crawling all over the roof, and the neon leaves started raining down around us when the wind blew. So wonderful.

Our next trip, and adventure with public transportation, took us to Zentralfriedhof Cemetary, where legendary composers such as Ludwig Van Beethoven and Franz Schubert are buried. Now, you might not think that a trip to a cemetery would be wholly uplifting, but while I was there I felt, with only a stab of irony, that I was in heaven. It is a MASSIVE place, with a total of about 3.3 million dead peeps chillin under its fresh green grass. The leaves of all the trees were changing colors, and we were there in those afternoon golden hours where everything looks beautiful. Some of the gravestones were more like tiny, intricate churches than anything else. You could get lost in there. And not even be scared. As long as it was during the day. We found the dark, scary section where nothing was cared for. Ivy had taken over completely then died, leaving heavy brown tangles across all the rows and headstones, which were flanked by walls of dark, low hanging trees. In this spooky, sad section, we smoked a joint and dedicated it to the forgotten we sat amongst. Tired from walking miles for food and more miles in the maze of graves, we headed back to the hostel to check out, and take the train home.

I would like to say this is where the excitement ends, but our luck would not allow this to happen. After passing out in a first class cabin of the train (which we had not bought tickets for), we were suddenly awakened by a loud, flailing, happy, gangly Bushdoctor known as Andras. Apparently, he hadn't even seen us through the window--we just happened to be in the first booth whose door he flung open. He went on to chug my honey hemp liquor, talk passionately about the Netherland's government, peel and stuff a whole kiwi into his mouth, and generally spaz the fuck out before (and I don't know why this hasn't packed much punch when I've related it to others, so let me capitalize it to stress the seriousness of the situation) ROLLING, LIGHTING, AND SMOKING A JOINT ON THE TRAIN. So not cool. I mean, maybe on Muni in San Francisco, CA. But on a train, in a country with zero-tolerance drug laws, in a first class booth that we didn't pay for, and with a window that refused to open? NOT COOL. Carolina and I flipped the fuck out (which doesn't mean we declined the joint when it was passed to us). I think he freaked out then too, because he started throwing all his shit (that he had spent the past hour unpacking and flingling around the cabin) back into his pack, then stood up, told us his stop was coming up, and then declared that he was "fucked up". This really only gave us a great sense of relief. I think he only seemed like Spazzy McCrack #1 because of the alcohol and the language barrier. But it sure gave us a scare. We were left un-busted, and managed to lie there in terror with the lights off until we arrived in Budapest.

Vienna is a beautiful, open, light city, with a lot of friendly, interesting, generally helpful people. If you get the chance, please go there. We had an absolute blast.

TODAY I FED BEARS HONEY FROM A GIANT SPOON

took the train out to middle of nowhere country town and had the best day ever:

it's not very hard getting into places you're supposed to pay to get into... so far we've found is that it just takes a little confidence and you're in. however, sometimes you may see things you don't want to see. tonight, we came home after a long drunken night of dealing with shit, and somehow ended up in the "moulin rouge". as intriguing as it may sound, it is really just a place where clever people can get drinks bought for them and end up wherever they feel like it (us) and other people can do crude things to each other (the girls we ended up watching, unfortunately). pretty sure it was supposed to cost a lot of money to enter, instead i wished i could erase my memory. goodnight.

monosodium glutemate and other issues

Last night, after reuniting with our friend Kyoo, a 31 year old Iraq war vet traveling Europe, we made the really good decision to go explore the labyrinth underneath the Buda Castle in the Buda Hills. It costs 1500 forint (about ten dollars), which is supposed to include a lantern and cup of tea, but we, surprise surprise, were awarded neither upon check in. It's not actually a labyrinth, but a bunch of tunnels carved out by water hundreds of years ago, and later used for torture and hiding and all that good midieval shit. I was lovin' it the whole time, but bouncing back and forth between feeling like I was in line for Indiana Jones at Disneyland, and being hit with the realization that people were most likely imprisoned, tortured, driven to madness, and hopelessly lost within the cavernous tunnels. Most of the "artifacts" that were down there were disappointingly man-made and cheesy, notably the 8 foot tall fossil of a Coca-Cola bottle. Kind of a bonerkill, though I did appreciate the eerie, heartbeat soundtrack pumped throughout the maze. Also, I wouldn't advise carrying a very bright light with you. If you do, like Kyoo and his army headlamp, you will see disappointing things, like hidden speakers and light sources, but also very scary things, like massive gray spiderweb hammocks. All in all, it probably wouldn't have been worth it if we were sober.

The closest, fastest, cheapest restaurant near our school is a little Chinese place called Kinai Bufe, and all 9 of us have taken to buying our lunches there between class every day. We noticed there was some strange addiction we had to it, despite the fact that we don't even like Chinese food that much, and that it made us feel sick afterwards. Some investigation (wikipedia) confirmed our suspicions that our lunches were chock full of MSG. All I can say is.... that shit is delicious.

critical mastiff

It was the best pun I could think of, and it doesn't even make sense. It's three am and we didn't leave the house all day and I drank coffee around dinnertime and I think I can hear our neighbors having sex. So yeah, figured I should update. Besides the fact that we rented bikes and participated in one of Budapest's twice-a-year Critical Mass(es), this week has been more just general good drunken times and various nightlife. So maybe I'll talk a little bit about the everyday.

Our Evolution of European Political Systems professor is named Bank Boros. His first name is not pronounced like the money lending and protecting business that is currently and massively failing back in my home country, but instead like the onomatopoeia "bonk". It has become a common phrase in our vocabularly, e.g. "these french fries are bonk" or "hit the bonk!" He is a small man who wears military-colored dress shirts that are too big for him, has startlingly bulgy blue eyes, and punctuates every sentence with an alarming amount of of deep, drawn out "uuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuh"s. He is really smart and totally badass (he's a political scientist who commentates on Hungarian television), but our entire class (of 7 students) almost completely lost it when he hit "um" number 59 on Wednesday. Kelsey tried to cover up her laughter with coughing but it was of no use, and Carolina, attempting to come to her aid, was soon reduced to giggles as well, while Andrew hid behind his notebook, and I thanked God I sat in the back of the room where my doodle of his face and a speech bubble of "uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh" could not be seen by anyone. I then imagined my dog dying to ensure that I would control myself.

Feri ("like a little blue Fairy, you see?"-Feri) is our Hungarian professor. He is a hilarious old man who doesn't teach Hungarian so much as tease us, make sarcastic comments, and drop mad wisdom. I love him, and am sad that class will be ending soon. However, I don't think he's ever taught a language before, so he basically stands in front of the board and asks us what words we want to know. Rather ineffective. We got him to talk about nudity and love at first sight for almost an entire class period. Egesegdre.

We thought Contemporary Hungarian Culture was going to be all fun, games, wine tasting, and goulash slurping, but so far we've just been learning about the history of Hungary. It's really interesting, but it's also really fucking depressing. The country has only had its own independence for about fifty years of its ENTIRE HISTORY. There were some in there after the fall of the Ottoman Empire and there's been 19 or whatever since the Iron Curtain fell, but other than that it's just been conquering after land cropping after communist regime. People are still bitter about losing 2/3 of their land to the surrounding countries after WW1, and it's crazy to look at all the old people on the street (and even the regular-aged people too!) and think that for most of their lives, they lived through a dictatorship that was even Orwellian at times. Speaking of the old people, for some reason the ones we've been seeing here are so goddamn cute! And they're way more out and about, you know? You'd never see some shriveled old man riding his bicycle to an antique store in a suit in the states. Or just, like, chillin on their stoop and staring piercingly at everyone who walks by. Anyway, 1945 through 1989 were some rough years, and you can tell just by interacting with people at stores and stuff, that they aren't really over it yet. Weird, too, that we can learn it thoroughly in our history class, but it's clear that we won't really ever understand what they've been through. Even the teachers sort of talk to us like "yeah, yeah, okay, I'm telling you all this, but you're a 20-year-old American, there's really no point."

Last night some guy we met on the street was like, you guys bought horrible wine. We were like, yeah, it's fuckin cheap! He was all, you could get some much better wine for 800 ft (less than two dollars more than we paid for it). So we was like, whateva, we don't give a fuck! In the past week we've drinken (drank, drunk, drunken, dranken?) exactly one bottle of wine we found on the street (opened, but full) and three beers we found at a bar and on surrounding tables(opened, but full. mostly). I have like 4 dollars in my bank account. But it's cool, I got a hamburger bigger than my face (literally) at an American style diner called Feeling. Dank.

oooooh, the gypsies are out!!

Yesterday a strange phenomenon appreared. Piles of trash and abandoned household items crowding every street I walked down. Old torn furniture, outdated electronics, forgotten dolls and stuffed animals, garage sale clothing, gutted cupboards and doors, and any other scrapped piece of home imaginable constituted piles that were bigger than trucks. Watching the pile in front of our apartment from the window, we noticed that there was hardly a moment when hunched and babushka-ed women or their male counterparts weren't meticulously picking through these piles.

As I walked to a cafe and back along different side streets today, I noticed that some of the pile-pickers (still out in full force) had settled in with their piles, and seemed to be camping out and guarding them. Though I saw some stuff (old typewriter!!, weird dolls) that I wanted, it did not seem like a good idea to reach into any of these piles for fear of being yelled at in Hungarian by a (gasp) gypsy. When Carolina and I reconvened, we talked over the situation and drew some conclusions:
-the pile-pickers were mostly gyspies
-they had left their gypsy possies to watch over their piles
-they would sort out the best stuff, and sell, haggle, or trade the goods for stuff from other gypsies' piles
-we still don't know why the trash was there in the first place

Carolina got a sick skateboard deck from an un-guarded pile though. with some wheels we might make it work. watch out.

*amended: we got the sickest street art on tabletop from a pile.
tomorrow we're goin pickin

PRAHA

Even two nights in Prague is a lot of nights in Prague. We took a 9 hour charter bus there with all the other Erasmus (study abroad) kids from France, Spain, Italy, and Finland, who take themselves too seriously and throw trash away in storm drains. A good omen welcomed us as soon as we stepped off the bus--the smell of marijuana. In fact, a group of homies was blazin it right in front of our hotel. If they hadn't been missing crucial teeth, or been Czech wiggas, we might have asked them for a puff, but we stuck to our senses and took it only as a good sign for the weekend to come.

One of our traveling friends from last weekend, Kyoo, an Army Ranger from San Jose who just finished his tour of duty in Iraq, told us we had to get to a place called Cross Club. He told us you could buy spliffs at the bar. When we looked it up online, it was said to resemble "the inside of a giant, robotic, sci-fi whale". Well, that's all you needed to tell us, we were determined to find this place. After crossing the Charles bridge, we stopped at the American Embassy, aka Starbucks, and asked the guy working there how to get to Cross Club. He told us that "people who work at Starbucks can't exactly go to places like that, if you know what I mean." We knew what he meant alright, and it was then that we pinky promised each other we would make it to Cross Club that night no matter what. But we started out by following Starbucky's directions to a bar called Shadow, nearby. Beer and alcohol are pretty cheap in Prague, or at least it seems like it when you can pay with 30 in coins. After drinking a bit, we once again smelled the aroma of DANK. Carolina, in a stunning display of No Shame '08, drew a weed leaf and a question mark on a piece of paper, and started walking around showing it to people until we came into possession of a roach. Extreme fun ensued. With more shmoozing, we got directions to Cross Club and the Czech words for "250" to tell any cab driver that would take us.

Cross Club was absolutely insane. We bought weed very quickly, then proceeded to move from awesome outdoor area to zen indoor area to crazy indoor area--what I would call the belly of the whale--smoking at every stop. There was a bumpin' concert going on so we decided to join it. I really don't know how to explain what was going on in there. Basically, crazy techno house beats while a guy rapped incredibly fast in Czech. He sounded like a digeridoo. All the while there are mechanical moving light machines and a generally outer-spacey atmosphere. It was awesome until we realized how fucking freaky it was. Then we were spit out of the whale, and left to wander the streets at 5:30am, realizing our hotel was in the red light district. (Later we got to see a homeless guy shooting up on the corner in broad daylight! It was beautiful).

Some sort of normalcy was restored the next day, as we wandered through the incredibly clean, disneyland-like tourist streets surrounding city center. It was definitely beautiful but (as there is a bit of a rivalry between Prague and Budapest), I would have to say the dirtiness of Budapest is much preferable to the tourist swarmed, souvenir shop studded streets of Prague. At the castle/church in the palace, there was about a 40 minute wait to go see a statue of baby jesus.

Carolina and I tried to meet up with our group, but ended up at the Museum of Medieval Torture alone. After more stumblings through the streets, and a newly purchased bottle of Jim Beam, we ended up on public transportation to our friends' hostel, following a 14 year old's directions, that he gave us in exchange for a swig of whiskey. Even in Europe, that kid looked to young to buy booze. Realizing 15 minutes later that we had no idea where we were, we deboarded the bus to find ourselves, once again, in front of Cross Club.
What followed was a sort of... I guess we'll go in again.... I guess we'll buy more weed... I guess we'll smoke out this ladybug... I guess we'll go dance again.... we should get the fuck out of here...
luckily, a friendly Prague coupled scooped us out of the hands of what looked to be a serial killer roaming the streets, and let us ride in their taxi to the hostel.

The bus ride home confirmed that all the foreign Erasmus kids think we're absolutely nuts.

sweating balls

What a weekend! In reality it is more of a week, since we only have three days of classes. I'm learning how easy it is to make new friends... in some cases it is as easy as saying "jo este" and waving to everyone you see. We ended up spending all weekend with a group of guys from Britain, Canada, Ireland, and San Jose, who met each other at their hostel. The Canadian (who it is fairly safe to say is insane) quickly developed a bromance with Baber, and spent all Friday (after crashing on our couch) getting wasted with him. From the moment they woke up at 4pm, they drank, drank, went to the liquor store, drank, got gyros, drank.... until passing out again around 1 am. I'm all for benders, but all they did was yell about midgets, Big Macs, internet LOLspeak, and how they're going to hell.

Yesterday was awesome, one of the USF mentors, Lazsi, took our whole group to rent giant orange bicycles that do all they can to announce that we are tourists. We then went on a 20 mile bike ride to a quaint little town called Szientendre. It was a long, hot ride, but pretty much flat the whole way. Besides being the most picturesque, cliche little European village ever, all we did was get some pizza and pickles (which are a staple side dish on many menus here, much to our delight). But it was so nice to be on a bicycle again. After getting back to Budapest around 9:30pm, the group decided to go home, change, shower, and meet back up at 11:30 at Szimpla (we need to find a new bar). Deciding to opt out on the shower/change, Carolina and I decided to ride our bikes to Margit Island (in the river between Buda and Pest) and drink a beer on the riverbank, since we had the bikes for 24 hours. It was lovely time save for the part where we were almost raped, murdered, and thrown in the river by a Hungarian tweaker. Well, I can't really be sure what he was up to, but he was completely not normal, did not have good intentions, and did have an accomplice hiding in the bushes. Luckily, we hopped on our bikes and got the fuck out of there. After our terrifying encounter, we needed another drink even though we were supposed to be meeting everyone very soon, so we stopped at B City Pub on the same block as our house, and met two British guys who had just gotten into town. We shared some Jim Beam and then tugged them along to Szimpla with us (made them run while we biked slowly).

Reuniting with hostel boys at Szimpla (which led to Baber staying the night at their hostel) solidified the three day long friendship we formed with them, and we met up with them again today at the baths to assuage the pain of the 90 and humid weather, then went out to the fanciest dinner I've ever gotten for under $20. It's really exciting to meet other people who are traveling Europe, and we'll actually be in Prague at the same time as them next weekend. At least for now, Carolina and I have altered our after-college goal to opening hostels around the world.

My goal for this week: spending no money. and sleeping more.

Egesegedre!

Last night we, against our better judgement, ended up at yet another outdoor club blasting the biggest club hits of 2005. We should have known it would suck balls when our Hungarian professor told us "that is where the high schoolers go, already drunk". In order to fit in, we chugged European malt liquor on the tram, consistently chanting the newest Hungarian word we've conquered, Egesegedre, which means cheers, and sounds like already-drunken mumbling. Anyways, Carolina spent most of her time talking to a goofy guy wearing a goofy yellow hat because he said he knew how to get marijuana, but all she remembers from the conversation was asking him whether he was the po-lice.

Which brings me to my newest second-favorite activity-- drunken skype prank calls.
First favorite? People watching. We were warned in "culture shock" class that people watching is Hungary's national pastime, and not to be alarmed if people just blatantly stare at us. Nice to know that we have free reign to stare at people as much as we want, which is an activity we practiced readily at the thermal baths today... most European thing I've ever done. Here's a picture of it, it was beautiful. I didn't take this picture though. Anyway, there are three pools, one of them is pretty warm, another is a normal pool, and the other is cool and refreshing. There's even a mini whirlpool you can go get swept around in circles in. you can see the corner of it on the very left edge of the picture.

Lots of hilarious old people in bathing suits, old men playing chess, speedos, thongs, the whole deal.

HIGHLIGHT of the day: old Hungarian men playing chess in the park, one old guy playing had his crack hanging out, and his old friend snuck up behind him and was tickling his crack with a leaf.

don't talk about gypsies

Today was our second day of legit classes, and it was pretty cool. Hungarian was fun as always, since our professor is this hilarious old sarcastic guy who just teases us (there are only 9 of us) all the time. Then we had Comteporary Issues in Central Europe, which seems like it's going to rule. Our professor is this very sweet, earnest man, and every class we're going to have a speaker on a different issue, including the former President of Hungary, and the former governor. That's pretty awesome? So after class, our professor, who clearly wanted to impress us and show us a good time as much as possible, took us to the library a block away from school. It used to be a palace, and now it's the sickest library ever. There are 15 reading rooms that are the most ornate, impressive, stately things I have ever seen. I'm going to go there and read or even just sit there, for sure (by the way, Fo Shor means something in hungarian, we can't remember what. But somethign to do with beer). Anyways, it was an incredible building to be inside of, and our professor was clearly delighted with how amazed we were by it. Then we went to an outdoor cafe to get drinks with him. Now Carolina and I are looking up flights to London for our 11 day Europe Extravaganza during our fall break in October, and watching MTV dubbed in Hungarian and drinking wine.

Oh yeah, so Carolina and I were making jokes about Gypsies stealing our stuff, until we found out that it's no joking matter. Apparently, the "Roma people", a nomadic ethnicity without a nationality, traditionally referred to as Gypsies, face incredible amounts of discrimination throughout Europe, but particularly in Italy, Bulgaria, and Hungary, where they have their largest minority population. The reason they face this adversity? Because they're Gypsies. Lying, stealing, tricky, dirty gypsies.
Well, no, not really. But I'm sort of unclear on this whole subject. Sounds like these people have been a pretty bad reputation in these parts, and have been pretty consistently fucked over. But according to Wikipedia, it's because they don't really follow laws. I dunno, they sound pretty badass to me. But we get to learn more about them this upcoming semester, so I'll be more informed.

Being abroad is draining my pocketbook.

Buda Palace and other sightseeing photo opps

here are some pictures from our trip to Buda, on the other side of the river yesterday. I finally felt like I was a tourist in a foreign country. It was beautiful, and so old.


inside the church at the palace


my mentor Dory, Carolina, me, and Claire in front of the Buda palace.


this is part of the castle


the nicest mcdonald's i've ever been in.


the outside of our house, we live on the top floor

Why B is the Best Letter Ever

beer for breakfast
budapest bumblefuck (aka orientation)
bomb ass burritos
the Blue Baron (Big B.) our new hooka
beautiful Szimpla bar
irish beezies
subway bitches
black french funk brother wearing 2 belts
bedtime hooka sesh
aaaaand our discovery of Bushdoctor, one block away from our house


Well that was my day yesterday... Szimpla was the coolest place I have ever been to. It's this giant bar that is basically a courtyard in a cool old building with all these different rooms, plants, art everywhere, a huge movie projector outside, colorful lights, at least four bars.... basically it would be pretentious as shit if it was in America, but it wasn't, it was really awesome. Ran into drunk Irish beezies on the way home who were so relieved to find people who spoke "proper english", and talked shit on Romanians and Budapest being poor and having too many homeless people (hopefully they never go to San Francisco, I think I've only seen about two homeless people this whole time). We also discovered a shop called Bushdoctor right around the corner from our house, which is incredible news seeing as we were resigned to the idea of never smoking weed this whole trip. You can go to jail for smoking a joint. That place definitely knows what's up.

Today we had our second Hungarian lesson, and I'm actually pretty excited to learn this absurd and unique language. It is completely unrelated to any other language in the world, and the 44 letter alphabet is a little overwhelming. Because so many of the letters make different sounds than you would ever guess (S makes "sh" but Sz makes "s", Gy makes "d", J makes "y", etc) it takes us longer than a kindergartener to sound out words, but every letter always makes the same sound no matter what word it's in. But our professor is really hilarious. Carolina and I stumbled into some sort of weird dungeons and dragons-y cave bar place filled with weirdos playing Magic, drinking beer, and listening to metal, and tested out our skills on the crazy hippie bartender who certainly appreciated the effort but understood little of what we said. Also, this freaky "bar" connected through dungeony passageways to Bushdoctor. So we've gotta get to be regulars.

We bought a beautiful huge hooka with four hoses and named it the Blue Baron, so every night we come back and just sit around and smoke it. Very relaxing.

Also, our mentors at the USF program took us to a nice bar/restaurant on Margit Island in the Duna River, and paid for our expensive drinks and fancy appetizers, which led to the nicest bottle of wine I've ever tasted. It was complimentary since the server couldn't get our drink orders right for the life of him (I was served a mojito, and upon telling him I had ordered the Soco mojito, which has NONE of the same ingredients, and pointed at it on the menu, he came back with a shot of Southern Comfort and told me to pour it into the mojito.... uh, whatever).

Anyways, I'm going to go read Kafka on the Shore--which is an amazing book--and tomorrow my mentor Dory is taking us "sightseeing" around the city, including Buda castle.

What the???

Well, here I am in my nice-ass apartment in Budapest. It's right downtown and it's all you could possibly expect from an apartment in an architecture-centric country. It's probably the nicest place I will ever live in my life. We have quite the charming European courtyard, which looks haunted at night. I can understand why there's an architecture program here; every building is absolutely stunning and intricate, and really old. Still, I have to keep reminding myself that I'm in another country, and not just another district of San Francisco. Our alley is apparently the hot spot for drunken home-stumblers, plus we plan on getting roller blades since an acceptable amount of people here practice the sport with no shame. The flight here was mostly sleepy, courtesy of a dank nug we appropriately found on the kitchen floor on my last morning in the Dank Tank. Coupled with the fact that someone tagged our George Forman grill at our party the night before, and that Cathleen made a mega-pancake filled with bananas and chocolate for breakfast, I had the best last morning possible.

I think I'm still too delusional and jet lagged for this all to hit me, but I'm still stoked to be here. Tomorrow we start classes and all that, and there's still so much to do and I just hope it doesn't cost too much money. Carolina and I are looking into jobs at a hummus bar, where we would most likely have to get paid under the table.

Once I get some camera batteries I'll post some pictures.