Regarding the popping of our couchsurfing cherry

Of course, no epic journey can begin without some kind of drastic catastrophe (think Kate & Passport of Italy 2006; Courtney & Visa for Edinburgh at the start of this year; and so on). So, complacent and worriless us, are sitting around all day Sunday, packing, cleaning the flat, stopping for food breaks, and thinking we have plenty of time until our train at 22:00. Only, at 20:38, we finally check our tickets, to recognize to our blank shock and horror that the train in fact left at 20:00. Sheer negligence. Utterly depressing and no excuses.

On an interesting note, my facebook Tarot card of the day was the “Fool”: desiring to achieve many things without realizing the effort entailed. Aaaah, if the effort to check the ticket was only made!!!

Moment of silence for recognition of the waste.

But in perspective, it’s better to have had such a stupid mishap occur while we still had a home and were in a familiar location. (Rationalization at work, I realize). Truly though, alertness and organization will now be the orders of the day.

So Monday, the 26^th, we took an 8:35 train to Warsaw, arriving 12 long hours later in Warszawa Centralna. Maciek, our host, was waiting for us, with another couchsurfer, Konrad, from Germany. I guess this is where I fill you in on our brilliant plans for backpacking through Europe on the pitifully low funds that we have: the CouchSurfing Project. Travelers around the world create profiles and offer their couches while they are at home, and request to stay at couches when they go traveling. Hospitality for weary travelers like in the old days, pure and simple. Plus, you are more or less guaranteed to make friends and have interesting encounters and conversations.

Warsaw was our first stop, and so Maciek was our first host, as Konrad and we were his first surfers. Pop goes the couchsurfing cherry, all around! Maciek is the consummate host and has probably set the bar far too high for all future hosts I will encounter—he picked us up from the airport, fed us, drove us into town, showed us around when he could, and arranged for a friend to be our guide when he had to go into the University. Moreover, he and his friend are complete gentlemen and always insisted on helping Courtney and I with our bags, to our American-Independent-Girl embarrassment (and gratitude of course).--Don’t worry, Mom, we were absolutely grateful and brought wine and left a gift.-- Maciek lives with his parents and his sister, and we had some amusing conversations between English, Polish, Russian and German. They had a very cozy and welcoming flat, with lots of plants and flowers, two cats, and his mother’s homemade tea brew. It was a fair bit out of the city center, and was within a block of apartments with their own stores, cinema and nearby Carrefour. Kind of like the area near AMC Cinemas in Naperville, barren and bland but the indoors are always nice.

The Little Insurgent

On Tuesday, May 27^th, after breakfast (Thanks Maciek), we went into town. A 24 hr day pass costs an incredibly cheap 3.60 zl (~$1.70)! We wandered around the Stare Miesto (Old Town) and then went into the Warsaw History Museum where we saw a film on the destruction of Warsaw during WWII. So Stare Miesto---not so Stare, it’s all been entirely reconstructed, with historical accuracy of course. Saw some other sights (check out the photos), and we had lunch at a Bar Mleczny, a milk bar. In communist days, these places had subsidized food and particularly lots of dairy products, hence the name. These also inspired the Milk Bars of Anthony Burgesses’ A Clockwork Orange. Not saying thanks to the reds, but the brilliant thing is that the Bar’s Mleczny still serve incredibly low-priced polish food (5 zl for soup and pierogis = $2.35), to the delight of pierogi-and-barszct fiends like Courtney and myself. Since Germany is going to bankrupt us and doesn’t have particularly enticing food anyway, we plan on eating our fill of Slavic yumminess now. Bar Mleczny, every day baby.

On Wednesday, May 29^th, we saw Konrad off at the train station, and visited Zilienski Park with Maciek and his friend.

Palace on the Water in Zielinski Park

Maciek left us with his friend who continued guiding us and saw us off—he was pretty hilarious, very knowledgeable about pop culture and he dropped more names than I probably could. We dropped into the Ghetto, which mostly has no remnants left of its Jewish history, but we saw the rather underwhelming Jewish Historical Institute. It’s probably a great place for significant research, but the exhibits on the Holocaust and the ghetto uprising left much to be desired.

Overall Warsaw was nice, particularly as any thought I’d given to it previously had dealt with WWII, and it’s been entirely reconstructed since—clean buildings, lots of parks. Still, I didn’t get a sense of a cohesive center, it seemed too big and too industrial (first time I’ve seen skyscrapers in Europe since Milan), and it obviously still had the commie presence with all the aesthetic-lacking apartment blocks.

Now we are on a train for Krakow (2 for 3!) and we’ll be meeting our next host within a few hours. Stay tuned…

Regarding daytrips and the actual last days in Budapest

We went on two daytrips outside of Budapest over the last week.

On Tuesday, we took a 2.5 hour train and arrived in another country--Slovakia, and of course it was the one day that was actually cold and rainy. Bratislava takes about all of one hour to get one's orientation--the old town is rather small and filled with lots of cute and funny statues. In fact, our time in Bratislava between trains was basically spent trying to track down all the funky statues and trying to find good food, which is rather plentiful and the only significantly worthwhile aspect of the trip. Immediately upon arrival we sought out a 'jedalen' for lunch (note: all my blog posts will likely be missing the necessary accent marks, I apologize but time is limited), which is a no-frills cheap eatery serving standard slovakian fare. The menu was written on a white-board, in cursive, with some stuff half-erased, so I proceeded to order 3 random meals for us = cutlets, mashed potatoes and so on. Not bad, but holds no candle to the offering of the Milk Bars in Poland (stay tuned...). After a suitable sightseeing break (the castle "Hrad", and finishing our round of the old town) we went for hot chocolate at Schockocafe in the main square, upon Orla's suggestion. This place takes its hot chocolate literally and they serve basically melted chocolate in cups.

My companions: sarcasm and lack of expression. (drinking liquid chocolate)

If I were a chocolate fiend I would have been in chocolate heaven (Steve was, I think). More wandering ensued, and at this point we were definitely just killing time until it was acceptable to go for dinner and then to our train. We got garlic soup and bryndzove halusky in the Slovak Pub for an incredibly reasonable price and were beyond sated as we returned to Budapest.

Bryndzové halušky - potato dumplings with sheep's cheese and bacon bits

Our second daytrip was on Friday (May 23rd) to Eger, a small town in Hungary known for its wine, particularly Egri Bikaver (I think I already mentioned the story behind the name--hungarians fighting against the Turks drank the wine for spiritual fortification, and the Turks thought the Hungarians drank blood so they fled). Once again, it rained, but only upon our arrival. We wandered around the town and ate enormous pancakes (Courtney and I shared: one with peas, chicken liver, beef; another with peaches and cottage cheese) which made us full for the rest of the day. Then we trekked into the Szepasszonyvolgy (Valley of the Beautiful Women) which is a valley with rows of wine cellars, and had ourselves some tasty Cabernet before catching the train back.

Wine cellar entrances, one after another

This last week also included the Farewell Dinner, at Trofea Grill, and we did quite a bit of kissing and hugging that night (with Steve and Courtney nearby sampling the impressive layout of Hungarian cuisine). Erasmus was going full blast for the last few days, with another sunrise after going to Obuda, the summer island of clubs. Getting there, quite amusing with 40 of us on a nightbus, making it sway dangerously to each side when taking a turn. And getting back, at 5:30 am...a train, to a tram, to home, longest odyssey on no sleep. Ah, I am glad we won't be clubbing while traveling.

Obuda, an entire island devoted to clubs. Sheesh.

And finally, my last night, with Szimpla and a quick stop to Rio, with me actually shedding tears--what a sap I am. But these kind of goodbyes are no good, nem trendy, b/c there actually is no foreseeable dates set for when I will see my friends from Budapest again. Our lives could be entirely different when next we meet. I have definitely made some good friends though, and I will miss them. (If any of you guys read this, which I am sure you don't *crossed fingers* you know you are always welcome in LA!) And, as in the words of Big Chris from Lock, Stock and Two Smoking Barrels: "It's been emotional."

And for your viewing pleasure: photos.

Regarding the arrival of my travel companions and last days in Budapest

This post will likely be written in a series of sittings. Just warning you.

I just finished my paper. Whoo. Absolutely, finally, definitely finished with Junior Year now.

Thursday 15th May: Steve arrived from Florida at 1 pm in Ferihegy Airport and I went to meet him, after first stopping by the Plus discount store I used to shop at near my old apartment where I picked up 8 bottles of the most drinkable wine that exists in Hungary for a grand total of 2000 forint (= $12.71). God I love this city. Though of course, it would help if Hungary had some concept of retailing, and this bottle of wine were sold in multiple stores throughout the center of the city and not just in that one lone outpost, fringing on the streets of communist apartment developments. Anyways, back to Steve's arrival--this signals the beginning of summer travels, while coinciding with my last days here in Budapest as a student. Kind of exciting and bittersweet at the same time.

Steve is a friend from high school, from when I was quite the know-it-all 13 year old brat, and this is his first time in Europe.

We got coffee at Praga Kavehaz on Baross (one of my fave cute little cafes in this city) which now has its terrace open for use, as do most of the city cafes. The time for people-watching and caffeine-addiction has officially begun, aka. summer has started. Then we proceeded to shop for groceries at the Grand Market, before Steve passed out from jet lag and I researched some of our future transportation possibilities. We met a lot of Erasmus students at Szimpla later that night (I can't NOT show a visitor Szimpla, it's absolutely a crucial spot), but it was an early evening as Steve was still tired.

Friday, 16th May: Steve and I and my friend Emilie set out to investigate what was proclaimed to be one of the largest flea markets in Central Europe--the Esceri Pac market. This requires taking a metro far out of town and then switching to a bus and going even further. Luckily it was not a Saturday, the busiest and most crowded day, because there was already a plentitude of antiques, communist memorabilia and assorted bric-a-brac to sift through.

Commie and WWII pins and medals

Later that day we went to the Museum of Applied Arts which is housed in a gorgeous building resembling a church, with an interior modeled on the Alhambra in Spain.

Interior of Museum of Applied Arts

The collection was gorgeous, as all craftwork from olden days always is remarkable, but not particularly unique from the type of stuff found in most history museums. We got another coffee on the now bustling and lively Raday Utca, absolutely peppered with terraced restaurants and hanging flags. I finally tried the 'Melange,' a choice I had seen on menus many a time but never known the meaning of. Well folks, it's basically a latte with honey, and I am glad to know that these ingredients mix so damn well together.

That night we went with everyone to Rio yet again, but given the club's proximity to Gellert Hill, I was determined to survive until 5 am and then climb the hill to see the sunrise. Which we did, and it was worth it (my only other sunrise, as in actually witnessing the neon disc cross the horizon, was at Masada in Israel) and then we passed out.

Sunrise from Gellert

Saturday 17 May: Slept/loafed around the apartment for a good while, and then found out that the National Muzeum was having a weekend event, with live music, vendors, free entry and so on. We saw a jazz/gospel performer, the weather was grand, and these adorable kids were playing at being knights. Man, the U.S. would be so much cooler if they overthrew cowboys vs. indians and played at Knights vs. evil Knights instead. We watched a movie with a lot of Dutch friends, and although Hayden Christensen is much more attractive than his prequel-Star Wars films, the movie Jumper still sucks. I was still beat from very little sleep, so we watched another movie--La Orfanata, spanish scary movie, produced by Guillermo del Toro (of Pan's Labyrinth fame), and ooooooeeeeeeee, I had to get up midway and put on more layers to stop all the chills I got.

Sunday 18 May: Since the National Muzeum had free entry, we went there, and it was nice to go through a second time. I think I more neatly comprehended what was initially a bit of an overload of chronology and history. I left a worried Steve at the museum while I went to the airport to meet Courtney (!!!!), proceeded to get utterly drenched during a flash rain, and then escorted the recent Edinburghian to my apartment. The first half of the summer traveling crew is officially assembled. Made dinner together (I am going to cherish these free moments with a kitchen as I predict our access this summer will not allow for particularly elaborate meals), then killed a few bottles of wine and discovered yet another festival in the city--a Czech beer festival with delicious dark beer (the name escapes me).

Once I used to like light beers. I still like Corona, and I like pale ales and such, but I realize that I am finding light beer more and more like p*&s-water and dark beer more and more delicious.

At the beer fest, we met a Latvian and a South-African, both expatriates in Budapest and had what I hope was the first of many impromptu and intriguing conversations with strangers.

Monday 19th May: I took my guests around the city for sightseeing, and we went to Menza on liszt ferenc, a tree-lined and mostly pedestrian street, for lunch. Menza is often touted as one of the best restaurants in the city, but like many of the other Budapest establishments, it's lunch 2-course special is incredibly cheap and it doesn't require a reservation like it usually does at night. The asparagus soup was mighty tasty.
This monday was also my last night frequenting Morrison's pub at the opera. Good times were had there, always.

So, I will finish this faithful recollection of sequenced events at this point, to give you a bit of a breather. Time to start packing.

Regarding the end of Junior Year

Yippeeekaiey-mofo! I have finished all my exams, and have assuredly passed, including the monster of a finance class. Just have to pound out a 10-page paper tonight and then I am done with junior year! (Which means senior and final year is next, then a real job, maybe grad school, more real job, total frightfest)...but I'm going to ignore all that at the moment and be really, really pleased and reassured in my abilities.

Also, it is 23 degrees here--life is good.

Puszi (kisses in Hungarian)

Regarding ruminations and back to Kerouac

It's all sort of coming to a close here which is incredibly sad. My urges are torn between going and doing as much as possible immediately, or to burying my head beneath the covers with a movie and not admitting I won't be seeing this place or these people for a very long time.
I have a feeling this post is going to reveal way more feelings than I want it to.

Warm weather is ever-present, the island and the sun beckon, open-air clubs are springing up all over the place and all I can think is...I am not ready for that next stage. Because once this is over, I will be traveling, and with that comes a lot of uncertainty. Then back to the real world, university, and finding a job--uncertainty rains and thunders down!

And all of my worries and anxieties, from the question of "what in the heck do I want to do with this life?", to "what can i do that will enable me to be productive?", "am I even capable of productivity and doing something worthwhile?", "do I do Film? but do i want to stay in LA forever? Accounting? International work? Environmental management?", to "how can I manage to not go flat broke before the end of my journey's?", to the ever-present "does everyone find love, will I?", and all the way to the silly "i am a girl and i want a pretty pair of new shoes but I can't"...well, I mostly manage to keep these tamped down and not flooding out and making a mess of my daily functioning. But then someone important asks me..."Why did you stop seeing that guy" or "so you know you have to actually get a job, become independent, make a career for yourself--when and how are you going to go about doing this?" Of course it's all out of concern for me, but I am thinking about this ALL THE TIME and I don't have any of the answers, not for myself and sure as heck not for anyone else.

Ok, phew, just wanted to get that out. Apologies for the complaining. I know I have to and I will man up to whatever faces me and everything will work out, but that doesn't mean that I have any certainty about anything and I am just trying to muddle my way through the best way possible, leaving no casualties. And please consider that my general behavior of being flippant or sarcastic or witty about something might mean that I actually care MORE rather than less.

If I might bring things back full-circle to the quote that started all this:

"I like too many things and get all confused and hung-up running from one
falling star to another till I drop. This is the night, what it does to you. I had
nothing to offer anybody except my own confusion."
Jack Kerouac, On the Road

I guess I needed to put all this out there because I might be getting hung up on my worries and all I can do is try to experience, learn, move forward and 'muddle through.' So yep, that's the plan, 'don't worry, be "learning" (and hopefully happy).' Actually, once when I was little, my brother asked me "what have you learned today?" And being a 'too-cool' little brat I responded "nothing," and then he said, "no, you learn something every day." Course I just beat a path out of his presence at the time, but that little exchange has stuck with me and he was very right.

On a more upbeat tone, the events of the past two weeks have been more or less uneventful in any 'exciting stories that would interest my blog readers' sort of way. I had some serious group project work put on my shoulders, but my grasp of the English language (despite my free way with grammar) seems to be my biggest asset (if only I could motivate myself to put it to use to actually write something from ME, like a screenplay or a story. oops, did I just admit another anxiety/repressed wish?). So the work passed smoothly and I am amused to note that I have the highest grades in a few of my classes--amusing as this is the only semester where my grades will not count.

There was also a great deal of partying, though I opted out rather often or early. Two more friends came in for two nights from their study abroad at HEC (outside of Paris) and it was interesting to compare experiences, plus we went to a ridiculous club that basically had a circus show going on inside. There was also an ESN party on a boat on the Danube and my god this city is fantastic, at night especially.

Rope act from Studio

Wall of g0-go dancers at Studio

View from the Europa boat (Parliament, Chain Bridge, Castle Hill)

The Chain Bridge from the boat

I also spent a lot of time with the Irish this past week. Orla's family was visiting and they kindly took us out to dinner for her 21st at Koleves Vendeglo (Stonesoup Bar) which has the most fantastic duck with orange sauce and the poppyseed mess dessert I had attempted making at home, 'makos guba.'

Makos Guba aka Poppy seed Mess

Her father and I had some interesting conversations about propaganda and political regimes, and Orla herself is 'good people,' one of the best here. Plus, the Irish accent, as Courtney puts it, is utterly charming. And on Saturday we celebrated Kevin's 21st (he is also Irish) which was utterly hilarious but also a bit sad as their absolutely crazy landlord joined the party, and seeing an old alcoholic lady like that is just unfortunate. By and large, there are just too many alcoholics in Central and Eastern Europe. That night I also showed a couchsurfer around town, and that was a cool new experience--she was an Australian, working as an au pair in Paris for 6 months, and traveling around now on her own. She was exceptionally outgoing and just contacted me to see if I could provide a bit of company so I invited her out for the festivities with us. In exchange she imparted some useful advice on our future travels from Switz to Croatia.

Now I have exams, which will be done on Wednesday, plus a paper to finish. Probably the minute I finish with all my work I will feel a little 'freer' and less down than this post may suggest. And Steve and Courtney arrive soon after and the great adventures will begin!

I'll add a photolink to this post later.

Regarding a Life & Death Situation, another Visitor and a Trip to the Country

Upon my return from Transylvania, I was faced with a threat to my very life: computer trouble.

This might seem a bit extreme but really…think about being without reliable access to the internet, without Microsoft office, Skype (now that I am abroad this is an essential tool), and so on.

My usc labtop has always had ‘slowness’ issues, due to “Vijay and his sons”—the IT department at USC. However, it usually worked ok anyway, until now when I was apparently riddled with viruses, Symantec was absolutely worthless, and my free download of AVG and anti-adware couldn’t work fast enough to stop the infiltration.

Anyways, point is, this is the reason I have been MIA and late on blogging about past events. I got a copy of Windows and reinstalled, then a very kind Dutch guy helped me reinstall all the necessary drivers and now the labtop is working like a newborn piece of shiny, sleek and exciting machinery. Can’t believe I didn’t reinstall earlier.

Oh the things I keep learning about with computers. It seems like anyone who is a computer expert expects everyone else to have the same knowledge that they do and they omit useful information. I am not an idiot, I will understand if you explain to me, but if you never tell me that reinstalling XP removes all the drivers then how am I supposed to know until I am left with a new XP and no drivers so no access to the internet to even research anything. Anyways, thank you Karst, my life saver! And now I know.

During this mild crisis, Celine came to visit. This was exceedingly cool for me, but I feel bad that I had to deal with all the computer stuff while she was here. She did an astonishing amount of sightseeing in one day while I was in class, and then together we went on yet another fruitless search for the Budavari caves and then to the ritzy Gellert Baths. These baths are very beautiful and the entrance hall looks like it’s modeled off of a Parliament building or a cathedral. However, the layout is rather confusing and we wasted some time just to find the changing rooms. All the other patrons were French—and as Celine put it, she spent more time with French people with me in Budapest than she does while studying in Paris. So Gellert was nice, but Szecheniy and Rudas are still my favorites.

Inside Gellert

In Friday Celine was leaving for Cairo to visit her roommate from USC who is studying there, and I left for Balaton. Budapest this weekend was deserted of Erasmus students—half went to Krakow and the other half went to Balaton. While being the largest lake in Europe and a favorite summer vacation destination, I can’t see much to separate it from small town America. I even saw a town rally and cheerleading show. Still, it was nice to spend time with my French friends, get to know some others, bask in the sun, eat lots of Hungarian food and drink lots of wine (wine-tasting/dinner/party in a restaurant built into a hill, completely Hobbit style!).

Balaton photos