Monthly Archives: March 2008

I told one of the teachers at work that I went with my friends around Budapest and helped them see some of the sights. “You were the tour guide?” Well I tried and I only pushed Nel out of the metro at the wrong stop once. Actually we only rode the Metro once. There was also that time I got them off the tram two stops too early. … It always happened when I was talking instead of paying attention. I’m sure real guides learn to do both. Zsuzsa does a good job of talking and driving like a European and finding a parking space but then I understand that she was a professional guide for the Russians. She took us to Szentendre a Serbian town which for some reason the socialist left alone

I was glad to get a chance to get back to Buda Castle and I saw a lot of things with Nel and Pat that I hadn’t seen before. It’s also always more fun to go to a museum with other people see if their impressions match yours.

I’m sure if we had just two more days we would have seen it ALL but as it was we did cover the “best of” the major attractions as far as I know. I think our greatest surprise was the Fine Arts Museum (Szepmuveszti Muzeum.) It’s even bigger than it looks and it looks pretty big. We went to a special Medici exhibit that was four rooms and then tried to take in the rest which just wasn’t possible.

I don’t think I realized I could be lonely until they left. 😦 Well I have a NEW project at the University. I am preparing a talk about the American education system and one about the current U.S. election process. Both are to be presented at 10am Monday and I didn’t find out for sure until this afternoon. I hope to get a PowerPoint together for future lectures. I think I have to give the technician 24 hours notice and I don’t even know what room I’m going to.

We are strictly a blackboard and chalk operation here. We open the windows for air conditioning which is needed all winter in the southside rooms. We have funny red curtains that we pull in an attempt to keep the sun from shining in our eyes. I’m still learning to pin down my notes so when a breeze picks-up so I don’t end up with lecture notes and homework completely scattered.

Attached is a slideshow of our chilly week. http://picasaweb.google.com/Janwingen/EasterWkend

We had a great Easter dinner and I am going to be eating ham sandwiches all spring. I don’t think I bagged a Mangalica pig but I thought our grocery store ham was quite good. My food wasn’t wasn’t taken to mass on Saturday to be blessed another Hungarian tradition. Perhaps this special pig will soon be available in Spokane or Seattle. Pat & Nel contributed carrots, potatoes and a

great bottle of Bock Hungarian red wine.

Unfortunately their tour guide let them loose after dinner without making sure they knew which street to go up.

Zsuzsa took us touring Monday so we could avoid being sprinkled with cheap cologne. On Easter Monday which is an official holiday here, boys traditionally sprinkled the girls and were rewarded with gifts of decorated red eggs and shot of pa’linka a fruit brandy. As with many traditions this has apparently degenerated into an excuse to drink. Several people asked me if Hungarian celebrate St. Patrick’s day and the answer is NO but Hungarians do have an Easter Monday drinking tradition.

Nel Hellenberg and Pat Nasburg have arrived. What a treat! Not only can I speak English as much and as fast as I’d like but they treated me to a great meal. I had fish soup that was NOT overly salty and a REAL salad with lettuce also my first glass of red wine since I’ve been here. Of course similar meals for the three of us added up to almost $100. Talk about sticker shock. I’ve been living like a Hungarian here and the average Hungarian makes something like $650.00 a month. It’s clear prices in the tourist district are out of line. Still the food was much better than I’m used to.

Vorosmarty Ter. the big square was crowded with people selling crafts and cooking great looking stuff on the street. The only problem was it was about 39 degrees F and a cold wind was blowing. I think the people sitting out in the street eating were wrapped in down coats or more acclimatized than we are. Wish I had taken a picture maybe I can find some to steal.

Today we climbed Gellert Hill and saw the Liberation Monument. Those two are real troopers. We did a little menu shopping this time so the damage wasn’t so bad and the food was still great. We bought carrots and potatoes at the Central Market.  I’m cooking for dinner on Easter. 

One of the teachers in my office Aniko, took me on my first library outing last Friday. We took the bus and the metro to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences where her friend Hedvig Kuselits is one of the catalogers. I also met the “boss” and she had an office full of book trucks and appeared to be cataloging also. Hedvig normally has three people in her office. It was my impression that they are all cataloging books but I should have clarified that. It is one of those things I didn’t think to ask.

Hedvig speaks English very well. She had an undergraduate degree in chemistry and when she lost her job in the chemistry she got her library degree. Obviously she is perfectly suited as a science cataloger. Hedvig showed me how she was cataloging the English language memoir of a British photographer. The Academy of Sciences seems to interpret science very broadly so someone of minor importance to the history of photography fits into the collection. Hedvig used a site called the European Library to look-up her book and then used Cyber Dewey to help her come up with the library’s unique call number. She also added language codes and she read enough of the book to decide to classify it as a memoir not just a book on the photographers unique contributions to the field. Now that is real cataloging.

The reading room in the library was fantastic, beautiful dark old wood, green glass reading lamps on each desk and only the occasional plug for a laptop but I did see a few. There were at least three staff members behind the reference desk. I have no idea what they were doing but they all looked busy doing something. The library has a collection of two and 1/2 million books but most are kept either in storage on a lower floor or off site. In other words, this is a closed stack library except for the reference collection and current periodicals. The reference collection was up-to-date and in pristine condition. The library had a room devoted to the old card catalog also polished dark wood in beautiful condition. Like our libraries the old catalog was closed in 1986 and they had a table full of OPACs for the new catalog. There were quite a number of old professors and students reading books and taking notes in pencil of course. I saw one or two laptops.

As is common in Hungary there was a system with three sets of electronic numbers above the desk. You request a book and when it comes your number is lit up although I’m under the impression it may take hours or even days for your book to come. Once your book comes they keep it in a locker on site for you. Only a few privileged scholars are allowed to actually check books out of the library. You can use the library for day for Ft 500 about $3.85 or buy an Academy of Science membership. As Hedvig said for the price of a movie you could amuse yourself all day reading. They did subscribe to the New York Review of Books which I think costs more to buy than the day fee. Besides cataloging, Hedvig works an occasional Saturday at the Reference Desk in the reading room.

We visited the auditorium where they sometimes have lectures and concerts.

We also visited the Academy of Science Oriental Collection which is another special collection of books in a specially designed room in the same building. The academy of Sciences also has an art collection. A young man on duty with an excellent English and a very quiet library whisper described the room and it’s contents to me.

There are also four rooms of paintings mostly portraits of famous Hungarian men of arts and letters who were founding members of the Academy of Sciences. Annico explained a bit about the men pictured to me. The only ones that were familiar names have metro stops named in their honor. One other item of note, Hedvig has one of the most beautiful views of the Danube from her office that I have seen. Since when did they give catalogers this kind of view?

Our building has at least two coffee machines that make about 8 different varieties of instant Nescafe espresso We also have Sodexho here just like at Spokane Falls but I haven’t seen anyone making individual lattes around our campus. I notice way more students getting coffee from the building coffee machine than from the lady who pours espresso from a pitcher into a cup. It is quite a bit cheaper 43 cents from the machine versus $1.19 from the lady with the pitcher. Unfortunately to me the machine coffee tastes like pretty much like instant espresso coffee.

The campus restaurant also features coffee from a coin-op machine which struck me as a little odd for a place with tablecloths and vases of pussywillows on the tables.

I’m puzzled over is if you would pay for really fresh orange juice and not want freshly made coffee as well?

I was preparing a slide show of my neighborhood and also my visit to the Hungarian Academy of Sciences Libraries but this seems more timely. I even found a short film clip from the news which includes a video of what we experienced and another protest we missed. It is almost as good as being here except unfortunately for you no sausage and beer with it. To begin at the beginning, after being warned by Zsusza and others not to go out of my neighborhood or anywhere interesting on this national holiday, the 160th anniversary of the failed Hungarian Revolution of 1848. I was suprised when Zsuzsa called me & arranged for me to meet her near the National Museum. I took the bus across the bridge to downtown which was really neat because the Elizabeth Bridge and the Szechenyi Bridge were both closed to cars.

We started at the National Museum where activities had just ended but a band was playing national songs that sound like a less energetic version of John Phillip Sousa marches. We wandered to the poet of the revolution Sandor Petofi’s statue is and then to an area where you could hear the mayor’s speech. There were also activities like a horse guard demonstration, clowns on stilts, many Hungarian crafts for sale and of course beer and sausage.

I’ve never felt so safe, the security guards were big and numerous.

The protesters tried to break-up the Mayor of Budapest’s speech. Rather than cutting it short he went on and on. Zsuzsa says- “More like an American than a Hungarian.” I wasn’t bored, between listening to the rioters whistles and jeers and watching the security guards run around in their riot gear there was always something going on. We really couldn’t see anything described in the news article just the mayor’s supporters who seemed to be unfurling more and more Hungarian and Budapest flags as the speech went on. I’m sure it was a select crowd of supporters and friends. We observed this from our little area set aside for festivities surrounded by a temporary fence and a security guard every two feet or so. They only allowed in the people who weren’t protesters. Zsuzsa just had to taunt the protesters as we entered. It’s a very Hungarian thing to do and only in Hungry could you drink a beer surrounded by guards while you watch a protesters try to cause a riot at a political event or so it seemed to us.

Zsuzsa started laughing when the protesters shouted en mass. Her translation was “Impeach everyone!” Sorry I didn’t get any really exciting pictures but I’ll attach my slideshow.

The video in the news seemed more real than being there.

Guess I should mention the rest of the pictures are from the family activities on the blocked off Szechenyi bridge. Kids had to participate in singing the revolutionary song, reciting the poem, hearing about the printing press, for some reason race to pile up a rope and so on to get their revolution passport stamped.

Since I’ve been down with a cold I’ll catch-up with last weekends’ tourism. I went to the Hungarian National Museum. This is the history of Hungary from the Roman stones they’ve excavated to Hungary in the 1990’s. I must admit I skipped the stones this trip. I went right to the top floor for the history from the 11^th to 20^th century. There was a paragraph or two in each room in English the artifacts were all labeled in Hungarian. The weather out was terrible so I planned to spend Saturday afternoon and I did.

One of the most fascinating things was the “Hungarian take” on their history. Zsuzsa had already explained to me that ANYTHING invented by someone who lived Hungary at any time in his or her life is a Hungarian invention. Who knew that Hungarians invented the atom bomb? Well they did according to the National Museum.

I bet you weren’t even aware the Hungarian U.S. Congressman recently died. Wait a minute; how can we have a Hungarian congressman? Well according the front page news here the famous Hungarian congressman Tom Lantos AKA Lantos Tamás Péter recently passed away after an extended 61 year stay in his second home in the U.S.

Other more interesting viewpoints were based on the fact that Hungary is a flat country and everyone marches through Hungary to get to somewhere else. Sometimes the conquering army is on its way to Europe(Turks) and sometimes it’s on the way to Russia (Napoleon) or other points east but they always come through Hungary. This phenomenon is blamed for both World War I and WWII along with having a knack for always having alliances with the wrong side. This is always blamed on Austria as in Austria-Hungary alliance.

Pictures and posters about the post WWI dismemberment of Hungary were quite interesting. I can tell you the Hungarians are still bitter about the Treaty of Trianon after WWI. I mean students age 26 in my language class lectured me on how Bratislava should be their capitol or something. These people speak Hungarian but they were taken away.

The Jewish deportation during WWII was the story of Raoul Wallenberg and many other brave Hungarians who hid Jews. All indications are that Raoul Wallenberg was Hungarian too.

I really like the 1956 and 1989 pictures and posters. They really didn’t need much translation. If you need one the Soviet tank is beating down the Hungarians in 1956 and when thet were trying to get the Russians out they cut the center which had a soviet imposed medallion out of the center of the flag. I assume this 1989 picture is the back of a Russian.

I wasn’t tired yet but the weather was awful so I took the subway two stops west to see where I would land. To my surprise I came out behind the Parliament building. I just started walking and ended up at a park I later found out was Martyrs’ Square (Vertanuk tere) commemorating the 13 Hungarain generals executed after the 1848 revolution. Of course I had NO idea what it was but the man in the statue on the bridge looked very familiar. It’s Imre Nagy who was executed after the 1956 uprising. A nearby park has the only Red Star memorial to the Soviets left in Budapest. I can’t seem to find my picture of it so I will have to go back and take it again.

Take a close look at the picture you will see they are still leaving flowers. We certainly don’t have a history like this in the U.S.

Luckily so far I’ve only experienced toothpaste tourism. A big mistake I made was buying herbal Colgate toothpaste at the PLUS discount grocery store. Who ever thought that chamomile, sage and eucalyptus would make a good flavor combination. I must have bought it because it was a familiar brand and I think the only label in English I saw that day.

My teeth seemed a little sensitive but I think it’s from drinking too much orange juice because I have a cold. With luck I won’t have to experience any of this while I’m here. I believe I have located a tube of Sensodyne toothpaste. At least it has a word close to that on the tube and is in the toothpaste section of the store.

The inciDENTAL tourist

By Mary Beth Marklein, USA TODAY

In Hungary and other Eastern European countries, dental tourism is putting a twist into the trend. Here in Mosonmagyarovar (moshon-mag-yah-RO-var), brass plaques and molar-shaped signs bearing easy-to-grasp names like “Eurodent” and “Happy Dent” line the streets along a central shopping district. Some clinics take up a full block; smaller practices are tucked inside hotels, above gift shops or beside casinos.

With the fall of the dollar I don’t think they will be seeing many more U.S. tourists.