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Before next weekend I guess I better tell about last weekend’s sightseeing. Saturday I decided to take the no. 6 tram over to Pest. I think I had some vague destination in mind. I got on the number six as usual and right after we crossed the Danube it seemed to be turning the wrong direction. They kept making some long announcements and playing the music that I’ve always heard reserved for when they reach the end of the line. The no. 6 should do a big curve around the city to the Northwest. I’d swear we were turning East. I decided things had gone wrong especially when there was only one woman left on the tram. She didn’t look at all perturbed or worried. I told Zsuzsa this story & she thinks I am absolutely nuts. I mean the number six tram runs on a track line and it’s not like it’s going to jump off the tracks & start cavorting across town some other direction.

Since I didn’t have anyplace I was going I couldn’t possibly be lost even though I didn’t see the street I was in on my map. The print is small & the streets are many. I just started walking which is what I wanted to do anyway. I found a beautiful little upscale neighborhood with a strange little park. I will add the picture but it won’t do it justice. The small park has twisty paved paths and tile covered somethings in the middle. I have no idea what they are. I assumed the neighborhood was upscale because the streets were really narrow so traffic was kept to a minimum. The surrounding and nearby apartment buildings were new or rebuilt and the whole area just had a clean pleasant and quiet feel. I wonder if I can ever find the place again or if it was like Brigadoon or Camelot and has sunk into the pavement never to be seen again.

I found my way to a major street & saw a huge interesting building. Two girls that looked Asian walked in so I decided I’d check it out too. I assumed it was a church but it turned out to be the Museum of Applied Arts. I asked if there was an English guide and was handed an English list of the prices for admission. It is a very strange museum with the prime well lighted space in the middle completely empty. I bought the full regular ticket but not the special exhibit. I still don’t know what the special exhibit is. It’s just called Hungarian Private Collection. I had my Budapest guidebook with me so I learned that the exhibits change a lot but that I would probably see art nouveau and Ottoman rugs. The collection of furniture and glass was nice but most impressive was seeing the second largest collection of oriental carpets in the world. There must have been some kind of caveat because I’m sure there weren’t more than 30 carpets. It must be the second largest collection of 14^th and 15^th century Ottoman carpets having arrived in Hungary via Transylvania or something like that. Anyway there were Usak carpets, rose carpets, 4 and 6 pillar prayer rugs, lozenge(lattice) carpets and one type I could only translate as big blob rugs. After I had studied all the materials, I felt quite accomplished in the field of carpet appraising. With that I found my way home via BUS with a minimum of difficulty.

Very short slide show of some neighborhood activity http://picasaweb.google.com/Janwingen/Pest2_23

I found the links for the art exhibits you all won’t get to see because they are leaving soon.

One fairly efficient aspect of the bureaucracy was getting my medical clearance. I guess you have to be healthy enough to teach although now that they’ve got me over here are they going to consider sending me back? Anyway the day before school started I was told not to eat anything because I had a medical exam at 10am. When we arrived for the appointment the doctor was out. It was explained that he has a general practice and was called away by one of his patients. Zsuzsa did a proper huff and it was decided I could have some breakfast & come back.

We had a lot of time & I observed that the office was full of big paper file drawers, 24 drawers. I noticed they were arranged by year of the patient’s birth. Only one drawer for 1986+ but several drawers devoted to the 1920’s. That’s optimistic isn’t it?

The appointment struck me as really funny. Zsuzsa filled out my medical information the questions were pretty standard but when it came to “Do you drink alcohol? “Igen“with multiple choices. I said – bor(wine) and sor(beer) Zsuzsa was very pleased. “I didn’t know you drank beer- Do you want to go out to a pub tonight?”

Back to the doctor, when we got in, he asked if I had brought enough asthma medicine. I told him I hoped so. I think there was a debate or discussion on how to spell asthma & sulfa drugs (I’m allergic to) in Hungarian. He looked-up something in his medical dictionary. He took my blood pressure and told me to take off my shirt so he could listen to my chest. So there I was with my slightly holey undershirt. It was clean at least. My thought had been to pack an undershirt I could discard when I left, one less thing to carry home. I wasn’t expecting to have three people looking at me in it but there I was with Zsuzsa, the nurse and the doctor in my worn out undershirt. Next, Zsuzsa asked him to write a prescription for an ointment she needed. So the doctor took her blood pressure and listened to her chest. If she has any blood pressure problems they are probably due to the hassle of dealing with me. In the middle of our exams his cell phone rang then his desk phone rang. He talked for a very long time. Meanwhile the nurse was on the computer doing something that didn’t seem at all related at least she wasn’t playing tetras or anything.

I asked Zsuzsa what the long call was about and she said one of his patients called & said she had fainted & wanted to know what to do. The doctor told her she should go to the hospital. Apparently she didn’t like that idea and there was quite a bit of discussion. I got a piece of paper officially stamped which I took to the Modern Language Department office. Zsusza got her prescription. I found the whole thing incredibly Mickey Mouse but Zsuzsa commented that it was quite efficient. We both got the papers we needed and the lady who fainted got some good advice and the whole thing was done before noon less than two hours after our original appointment. I guess as far as dealing with bureaucracy goes this wasn’t bad. Besides that I had a really delicious dinner at the pub that night.

I will have my tax id number next week. My first bureaucratic success if I can find my way back there & if they have it. I may pick-up my number in a week OR wait until MAY for it to come in the mail. H-m-m-m, I wonder what I should do.

I got my first electric bill Friday. Some things are VERY efficient. It’s about $25.00 for my first two weeks.

I went to the National Gallery Sunday. Lot’s of art and two special exhibits. I got trapped in the castle leaving and came out the wrong direction. As is now usual for me I ended up wandering around in the dark trying to find my tram stop. I did succeed and got home safely. I will attach pictures and something about the exhibit later.

http://picasaweb.google.com/Janwingen/BudapestCastle

I really liked the Vaszaray exhibit http://www.mng.hu/vaszary/vasary_hun.html

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Riding the bus with a bus pass as I do is the easiest thing in the world. You don’t do anything but get on the bus. There are very rare and random bus inspectors who check passes. I got quite excited when I saw my first inspector. I haven’t seen one since. She was dressed like any other little old lady but was wearing an id clipped to her coat. I didn’t actually spot her until all the passengers around me started pulling out their passes & I did likewise. I guess if you get caught she writes you a ticket. She seemed a cheerful little lady. She waved as she got off and hopped on a tram. Might be an interesting job just riding around the city on random busses and trams all day. Zsuzsa thinks it is a ridiculous system. She says they estimate one out of 8 passengers is riding for free.

I bought a copy of the Budapest Sun an English language weekly. One of the front page articles was bemoaning that a number homeless whom refuse to sleep in the shelters. All the politicians would like to get them off the streets and there are adequate beds but many would rather sleep on the street. Zsuzsa and I ran into a mass feeding of the homeless on the street. They seemed to be feeding them rice with a sauce or gravey of some type and hot apple juice, unless it was something stronger.

The homeless I’ve seem are a little more industrious than Spokane’s homeless. One guy on a busy traffic circle was trying to sell a paper. He approached our car and my understanding is that he told Zsuzsa he needed money for a beer. She liked that he had a more direct approach and started to give him some small change. She said he complained that he needed more than she was giving so she got mad & gave him nothing.