If your best friend’s mom once alluded to the fact that it is one of her life dreams to walk between Budapest and Vienna, by all means ruin it for her and beat her to the punch, but do not do it with a 25kg backpack in mid December. Actually, mid-December is beautiful along the Danube. Instead, just don’t carry a 10kg frozen goose with you, because that will slow you down and you will ultimately end up walking only between Szob and Sturovo, cursing the Schengen area for ever letting Hungary and Slovakia in and therefore eliminating the need for a rail stop at the border, adding a further 14km to your journey in pitch dark. Unless you’re into that kind of thing. I have no idea, but for me, hopping from one rail tie to another in the dark, tripping over aggressive bushes, and at one point meandering off the tracks to a road that turned out to be potholed and entirely covered in puddles that I needed to ford by moonlight, it really tested how far I wanted to take this rivalry. Well, I took it as far as Sturovo, and then trained all the way to Bratislava, caught my flight to Barcelona, and spent a sunny Christmas with Sally on the western Mediterranean. The rest can be obtained from this Boxing Day greeting:
Sally and I are staying in my friend´s apartment in the Gothic Quarter of Barcelona, just off La(s) Rambla(s), while he travels around Brasil. A normal person may react with, "Oh great, that must be so nice to have a flat in downtown Barcelona!" but that would expose that person as never actually having been to Barcelona, nor understanding that no one in this city ever sleeps and crowds of screaming tourists flood the narrow alleyways below the windows at all hours. For those of you who not yet convinced that every conversation in Spanish is so excited and heated and invariably results in one throwing a VCR at the other, last night there was a bar fight right below the apartment at 5:20am which involved half the neighbourhood, a lot of screaming, and naturally, household items being hurled.
My first day back in Barcelona, when I arrived at the apartment, I was gingerly tiptoeing over the mound of garbage piled up directly in front of the door to the building, and walked up the first floor doorway to discover my key no longer worked. I caught a passing neighbour who also could not help. I gave the door a gentle kick or three and all it managed to do was attracted the attention of the crazy, tiny, shrivelled upstairs neighbour who started screaming at me in Spanish and then threatened to call the police. Hoping that the sight of a fresh-faced blond kid looking dejected would ease this situation as well as it does (and should) in every other situation I have ever been in, I asked in French if she knew a trick to getting in because the lock was jammed. Her French was limited, but she managed to get across a pretty clear message: "Get the %@&$ out of here or I am calling the police." She did call the police, but by this time I was out of there. There was a tiny central courtyard/patio in this building, with access only via the ground floor apartment. Running up the sides were all the plastic piping and metal grates running up to the bathroom window of the apartment I sought access. I asked if I could go through their patio and climb up this complex series of pipes. They were hesitant because I was not only foreign, but also had the potential to break the poorly constructed pipes carrying human waste out of the building (and on to the street), which would turn an individual problem into a societal one. Being blond and forlorn finally prevailed, and I was climbing up a series of poorly attached, thin and rickety pipes, and was able to hoist myself up to the bathroom window ledge. With help from a broom, I pushed the window open, hoisted myself up, shouted "Success!" and life returned to normal. *Update on this: The old lady has knocked on the door several times in the past week to tell me that some "chico" was here speaking French and trying to break in. Naturally, I pretended to only speak Russian, which confused her and also convinced her that she chased away some dirty Frenchman and saved my life. She blew me a kiss and things have never been better between us. Then the police arrived. One week later. I hid and waited for my problems to solve themselves, which, I presume, they have.
In lieu of paying rent, I have agreed to paint the apartment. Now, this is an easy task in Canada (where everything works, and with a smile), but in Spain the paint mixers do not work and I´ve had to mix the colours manually. Furthermore, the colour chosen is not the colour that has now dried. I no longer care, because trying to catch the open hours of the paint store is difficult in a country that is on permanent siesta. If my friend has a problem with it, he should not have used crappy foreign labour at below-market wages (and please, I have an Arts degree. I refuse to productively contribute to society). In order to recoup some of the losses of renting an apartment while being away and getting nothing from me except back-breaking labour trying to seal up crumbling 18th century walls, my friend has sublet it for two months to a recent arrival from Israel. Some of you may think sharing a flat with a 34-year-old gay Israeli would be a dream come true, and you are 100% correct. This is possibly the most fun and exciting December Sally and I have ever spent together (surprisingly beating out 2003). The day typically begins with him criticising our breakfast choices, the coffee I make for Sally, and having a sassy retort for everything I say. He refers to everything and everyone as ¨bitch¨ (I actually don´t know if he has learned English personal pronouns yet, so this may in fact simply be a linguistic thing).
Apart from that, Barcelona is a pretty okay city. By all means, this is definitely the third world (and it seems any Christmas I have ever spent away from Grand Forks has been in a Spanish-dominated environment: Barcelona, Costa Rica, and San Diego, a fate most probably influenced by a certain elementary school teacher’s insistence we perform the Macarena to whichever Christmas song every year for 4 consecutive years in elementary school). It´s certainly not the city I remember from 1995 though, which had considerably fewer kebab shops. Today was a balmy 15 or so with clear blue skies, but the weather has mainly been a light, warm drizzle, making the rain in Barcelona a lot like urinal splatter (though considerably less sanitary). The drug dealers are nice here too. I can´t go anywhere without being asked if I want to buy cocaine or hashish. It´s nice to be noticed, and when they automatically address you in your native tongue, it gives a soothing feeling of home, especially when it´s 11pm and you cannot wait to eat the frozen Dr. Oetker´s pizza you just bought and watch an episode of 30 Rock with Sally. As you can see, we are really soaking up the Barcelona experience.
Hope all is well on your end. Sally and I are going to try to hit up the sweet Boxing Day sales at the Map Store in the Reval. They have old campaign maps of the Iberian Peninsula, c1815. Jealous?
Saturday, December 26, 2009
Monday, December 7, 2009
Batty over Banat
Budapest is not so much a city that sucks you in, but rather one that you instead willingly, eagerly submit to, even if it’s not interested in you. Sensing this, I decided it was time to give us a break and visit the oft-forgotten Republic of Banat. This is a territory in Europe that existed for about two weeks in what is today Northern Serbia, Western Romania, and Southern Hungary. If there is one thing I can say about Banat, it’s that it is flat. So flat, in fact, that Hungarians no longer need to explain why they are so upset about Trianon. Hungarians love a flat surface, and Banat provided just that. My proposed itinerary was a tour de force which included Arad, famous for the execution of 16 Hungarian generals by the Austrians after the failed 1848 revolution; Timisoara, the capital and well-known centre of discontent during the Ceausescu years, culminating in riots and Nicolae and Elena’s passing on Christmas Day in 1989; and…that is about it. This republic lasted two weeks, so my expectations were considerably lower than for, say, France.
Boarding a train at 4am from Nyugati—and yes, for all you Budapest club enthusiasts, Retro Police, located in the one of the Eiffel-designed towers of Nyugati and advertised by a strobe light in one of the windows, was still pumpin’—bound for Szeged, my plan was to walk across the border and re-train to Arad. I was expecting a day full of adventure and intrigue, of fending off brigands and using my wit and agility to get myself out of scrapes with the local highwaymen. Instead, I was extorted, legitimately, by MAV at 4:30am for having purchased a student ticket when I wasn’t a student of Hungary. ‘Hungry for Hungarians’ prevails once more.
The intrigue was not lost that day, however. If I had to explain to you the number of times I have sat outside a söröző in the cold in Lökősháza, you’d think it was a worthwhile destination. And do not get me wrong, it’s lovely, but if you’re only in British Columbia for the weekend, I wouldn’t focus my energies on Beaverdell. What makes Lökősháza such a hot destination? Well, it gained notoriety as being the last port of call before exiting Hungary starting in 1920. Why, a rational, Western observer might ask, is there not a direct rail line between Szeged and Arad, two large cities on the same latitude when they used to be part of the same country? This question has haunted my time in Eastern Europe and has led me to warn everyone else who wants to attempt the same journey*. Instead, it was required that I take a train north to Békéscsaba, connect with a train going to Bucharest from Budapest, and then cross the border to Arad. The exact same thing happened in 2007, and for some reason I have refused to learn from it. Feeling plucky, I opted to walk across the border with Romania from Nagylák to Nădlac (same pronunciation, same ethnic inhabitants…Slovaks. Wilson’s dream of self-determination sadly left these Catholic Slavs wedged in an uncomfortable Latin-Magyar szendvics), and had to contend with money-changers and taxi drivers (a common theme in my past year), hitchhike, share in a group taxi with a terrifying and large woman named Carmen, and then wander around a suburb of Arad looking desperately for the hostel.
I may or may not have dropped in casual conversation in the past that I think HI hostels in eastern Europe are fronts for laundering money. Of course it’s possible there is no proof to this, but when I decided to leave my sketchy hostel for the 2-star hotel offering a buffet breakfast for only $5 more, I m, gingerly tiptoed into the manager’s office, who was sitting in a leather jacket wearing sunglasses and yelling into his cell phone. He agreed to a partial refund, rooted around his desk and handed me a 50-lei bill and wished me luck. I, on the other hand, secretly wished luck to whomever he was yelling at on the phone. Furthermore, the hostel was too far out of town to be a legitimate base of operations, and there was roadwork which had all the trams not working. So, the next morning, showered, buffeted and after scenic walk along the river, I can say my memories of Arad were positive: three teenagers invited me for mulled wine at 9am one morning and explained to me the popular Romanian anecdote, “Romania is beautiful, but Romanians are not” to which they laughed heartily; I ate a lot of bread with lard and raw onions, which landed me in the fetal position in bed in near-tears; and an aged lady of the evening approached me on my way to the train station on a Sunday morning. Thinking quickly, I decided I only spoke French. She, on the other hand, was entirely fluent. In every conceivable language, so if you’re a linguistics major, prostitution in Europe is a very viable option. Seeing I was late, I ran as fast as I could with all my luggage only to arrive and discover I was late for a Romanian train, which really means the train was late for me. I had time to rest, cool down, have a coffee, search for wifi, check my e-mail, and then wait impatiently for the train.
So, after seeing Arad, Timisoara, and a couple of unnecessary, forced walks through the countryside, I can successfully say I “did” Banat. Actually, truth be told I spent about an hour in Timisoara, discovered that the museum was closed, had some mulled wine, ate some gogosi—mini donuts with confectioner’s sugar, which are so tasty I demand you find your nearest old Romanian woman and ask her to make you some—and then ran to the station to catch the train back to Budapest. Something none of you are aware of but I which I need to point out, is that Romanian State Railways (CFR) loves to overheat their carriages. They live for it. So after getting onto the train from subzero temperature, I immediately had strip down to just a t-shirt, and furthermore go down to the doors, open them and let the cold air stop my cells from undergoing irreversible chemical change. Aside from all the fun and intrigue, I was reminded of why I liked Budapest so much: cheaper food. As beautiful as Szeged was, and as much as Romania seems to be having some sort of closing out sale (cabbage rolls for less than $2! Mulled wine for $0.50!), Budapest had the variety, and the availability of Chinese food that I don’t like to be more than 10km from at any time. In all, a success.
*Pending on meeting someone who would ever want to take that same trip. I have yet to meet anyone who is aware either city even exists.
Boarding a train at 4am from Nyugati—and yes, for all you Budapest club enthusiasts, Retro Police, located in the one of the Eiffel-designed towers of Nyugati and advertised by a strobe light in one of the windows, was still pumpin’—bound for Szeged, my plan was to walk across the border and re-train to Arad. I was expecting a day full of adventure and intrigue, of fending off brigands and using my wit and agility to get myself out of scrapes with the local highwaymen. Instead, I was extorted, legitimately, by MAV at 4:30am for having purchased a student ticket when I wasn’t a student of Hungary. ‘Hungry for Hungarians’ prevails once more.
The intrigue was not lost that day, however. If I had to explain to you the number of times I have sat outside a söröző in the cold in Lökősháza, you’d think it was a worthwhile destination. And do not get me wrong, it’s lovely, but if you’re only in British Columbia for the weekend, I wouldn’t focus my energies on Beaverdell. What makes Lökősháza such a hot destination? Well, it gained notoriety as being the last port of call before exiting Hungary starting in 1920. Why, a rational, Western observer might ask, is there not a direct rail line between Szeged and Arad, two large cities on the same latitude when they used to be part of the same country? This question has haunted my time in Eastern Europe and has led me to warn everyone else who wants to attempt the same journey*. Instead, it was required that I take a train north to Békéscsaba, connect with a train going to Bucharest from Budapest, and then cross the border to Arad. The exact same thing happened in 2007, and for some reason I have refused to learn from it. Feeling plucky, I opted to walk across the border with Romania from Nagylák to Nădlac (same pronunciation, same ethnic inhabitants…Slovaks. Wilson’s dream of self-determination sadly left these Catholic Slavs wedged in an uncomfortable Latin-Magyar szendvics), and had to contend with money-changers and taxi drivers (a common theme in my past year), hitchhike, share in a group taxi with a terrifying and large woman named Carmen, and then wander around a suburb of Arad looking desperately for the hostel.
I may or may not have dropped in casual conversation in the past that I think HI hostels in eastern Europe are fronts for laundering money. Of course it’s possible there is no proof to this, but when I decided to leave my sketchy hostel for the 2-star hotel offering a buffet breakfast for only $5 more, I m, gingerly tiptoed into the manager’s office, who was sitting in a leather jacket wearing sunglasses and yelling into his cell phone. He agreed to a partial refund, rooted around his desk and handed me a 50-lei bill and wished me luck. I, on the other hand, secretly wished luck to whomever he was yelling at on the phone. Furthermore, the hostel was too far out of town to be a legitimate base of operations, and there was roadwork which had all the trams not working. So, the next morning, showered, buffeted and after scenic walk along the river, I can say my memories of Arad were positive: three teenagers invited me for mulled wine at 9am one morning and explained to me the popular Romanian anecdote, “Romania is beautiful, but Romanians are not” to which they laughed heartily; I ate a lot of bread with lard and raw onions, which landed me in the fetal position in bed in near-tears; and an aged lady of the evening approached me on my way to the train station on a Sunday morning. Thinking quickly, I decided I only spoke French. She, on the other hand, was entirely fluent. In every conceivable language, so if you’re a linguistics major, prostitution in Europe is a very viable option. Seeing I was late, I ran as fast as I could with all my luggage only to arrive and discover I was late for a Romanian train, which really means the train was late for me. I had time to rest, cool down, have a coffee, search for wifi, check my e-mail, and then wait impatiently for the train.
So, after seeing Arad, Timisoara, and a couple of unnecessary, forced walks through the countryside, I can successfully say I “did” Banat. Actually, truth be told I spent about an hour in Timisoara, discovered that the museum was closed, had some mulled wine, ate some gogosi—mini donuts with confectioner’s sugar, which are so tasty I demand you find your nearest old Romanian woman and ask her to make you some—and then ran to the station to catch the train back to Budapest. Something none of you are aware of but I which I need to point out, is that Romanian State Railways (CFR) loves to overheat their carriages. They live for it. So after getting onto the train from subzero temperature, I immediately had strip down to just a t-shirt, and furthermore go down to the doors, open them and let the cold air stop my cells from undergoing irreversible chemical change. Aside from all the fun and intrigue, I was reminded of why I liked Budapest so much: cheaper food. As beautiful as Szeged was, and as much as Romania seems to be having some sort of closing out sale (cabbage rolls for less than $2! Mulled wine for $0.50!), Budapest had the variety, and the availability of Chinese food that I don’t like to be more than 10km from at any time. In all, a success.
*Pending on meeting someone who would ever want to take that same trip. I have yet to meet anyone who is aware either city even exists.
Monday, November 23, 2009
Transversing Transdanubia in a Train, or: why I am still in Hungary
This was first released to much acclaim on November 23, 2009. Since then, interest has dwindled.
Hello!
This is really long. I won't even read it. Control F for what you want to hear about.
When I first met my friend Ali in 1st year, I thought, "Oh great, another hot, boring, blonde girl from California" but after learning she is of Hungarian royalty, she has become an increasingly interesting person. So, this weekend I took a trip to her ancestral home, in the mountains above the Balaton in the little village of Lovasbereny. As it was a Sunday, no trains ran directly there so I had to walk from the train station for about two hours through a foggy forest uphill, but it was all worth it. Walking towards Cziraky Kastely, I spotted a group of babas who were leaving the church. I approached and asked, in what I can only assume was perfect Hungarian, where he castle was. They all got excited and pointed in its general direction. They asked if I was Magyar, I said no but tried to explain that my friend's grandpa was born there. In the end, they didn't understand me, I didn't understand them, and they were too shy to have their pictures taken (they were all four foot tall octagenarians in fur coats with canes, linking arms as they walked. This photo would have financed another year of my trip). I did get a photo from far away but it wasn't as amazing as the up close. Anyways, the palace was incredible, though almost entirely abandoned and boarded up. I snuck around the perimeter and spied through the windows like a creep, but it was completely gutted. It was a very beautiful building, but the plaster was falling off it on the outside. I actually felt it was more real and easy to place historically than the retrofitted tourist attractions. So, feeling conflicted about preservation vs authenticism, I naturally went to the only pub in town (right across from the castle) and let the experience soak in with an enormous mug of mulled wine. It helped. (Afterthoughts: I took a whole series of pictures and a video diary of this trip but somehow my photocard caught a virus and they are trapped, possibly forever. Maybe we'll never know what this trip was actually like?).
I love being Canadian. Not only does it win me friends by the pound here, but being around other Canadians is a culturally comforting thing. A guy from Montreal and I went out with an Australian and American to a cluuub and on the way home stopped for some paninis. There was a man inside who asked where we were all from and was so excited that we were from Canada that he insisted on paying for our meal. We couldn't accept, but he told us he had lived in Toronto and found the level of openess and multicultural awareness in Canada to be so great and beyond compare that he left with a much more open minded view of the world and felt that it was a way to repay us for what Canada gave him. It was quite tearful and we gratefully accepted. He even bought sandwiches for the Australian and American, and afterwards the Montrealer and I smugly said to them, "you're welcome" because lord knows their countries haven't done anything for the world.
So as you can see I am making fast friends here, as demonstrated by the following conversations:
Me: "I really like red cabbage with apples. Where can I buy some?"
Woman: "That's not a Hungarian dish."
Me: "But I had some the other day with my meal."
Woman: "In Hungary? No, we don't eat that here."
Me: "But the menu actually said 'Red Cabbage with Apples'"
Woman: "It wasn't red cabbage with apples. That's not a Hungarian dish."
Me: "Look. It happened."
Girl: "I am an English teacher. This is one of my students. He speaks English really good."
Me: "He speaks English really well."
Girl: "@%$& you."
*pause*
Me: "Well I can see you don't need help with the imperative."
Have any of you ever actually tried to learn English? Evidently we have 12 tenses, and I have no idea where those came from. I cannot believe the hoops we make the rest of the world jump through. It is fascinating to see how people learn English, because what logically follows in their language comes out bizarre in ours. What's most shocking to me is that English is not the world standard from which everything deviates. I can't believe American cultural hegemony has lead me astray. The receptionist at the library loves me and asks me questions about English (i.e. "The cat is purring" vs. "The cat purrs") that make me stop and realise I have no idea what I am talking about half the time and the only reason I know anything about the English language is because I studied Russian. I go to the library to read the Economist and L'Express when I'm feeling plucky (I really only browse the article titles and the captions but no one speaks French here so I end up looking very high class. You have no idea how terrified I am of being called out one day).
So I was potentially poisoned the other day. I was in the market, buying fresh sauerkraut, salt pork and walnuts as though it were a usual Thursday and I happened upon a kindly old baba who didn't have much in her barrow so I decided to buy some walnuts. She was also selling homemade V8 juice, sealed with an elastic over some seran wrap. The seran covering on one suddenly popped and she marked the price down. I thought, "for 200 forints, she's practically paying me to take it" so I took a few sips and went on my way. I was sitting and reading a few hours later when suddenly a vision came to me of Ms. Thompson from Foods 9/10 holding a bulging can and saying, "I could kill everyone in the room with this." While I have been known to defy Ms. Thompson in the past, there was no denying her sage advice in this instance so I ran to the washroom to induce vomiting, in a vain attempt to purge every last trace of botulism from my body. But there was no tomato juice to be found in my stomach, and I suspected it would show up later, in 3-5 days when I went paralyzed and stopped breathing. The worst part was not knowing how to handle the situation. Do I pay money for preventative treatment now or should I let my health insurance cover the Iron Lung that I will be put on for several weeks in a Hungarian hospital? I'm fairly uneasy about non-Western medical care. In my world hierarchy of medicine there is Canada at the top (and I know we are good because we poach doctors from all around the world and make them mop floors and drive taxis until they are ready to practice real medicine), then the UK, metropolitan US, and maybe Australia and Western Europe. After that there is Hungary, the former Soviet Union, Spain, and then Somalia, East Timor, rural Idaho, etc. Anyways, I have spent the last 5 days in paralyzing fear which does little to help detect the early warnings of botulism, paralysis. This is the hardest thing I have ever had to deal with, emotionally, in my entire life. On the one hand, I cannot believe that I am going to die, but on the other hand, I can believe thatthis is how I am going to die.
Going to market has been pretty positive for the most part. I made chicken paprikas the other day, and when I was buying meat the lady reached into a huge display case of raw chicken with her bare hands, grabbed a few breasts, weighed them, took my money with the same chickeny hands, then gave me my change and a bag of chicken. I had no room in my bag so carried it. I think I like the East most because it's the only place where I can walk around the city with a clear plastic bag full of raw meat without attracting attention. In fact, I feel even more inconspicuous this way.
Hope you're all keeping well,
Rory
Hello!
This is really long. I won't even read it. Control F for what you want to hear about.
When I first met my friend Ali in 1st year, I thought, "Oh great, another hot, boring, blonde girl from California" but after learning she is of Hungarian royalty, she has become an increasingly interesting person. So, this weekend I took a trip to her ancestral home, in the mountains above the Balaton in the little village of Lovasbereny. As it was a Sunday, no trains ran directly there so I had to walk from the train station for about two hours through a foggy forest uphill, but it was all worth it. Walking towards Cziraky Kastely, I spotted a group of babas who were leaving the church. I approached and asked, in what I can only assume was perfect Hungarian, where he castle was. They all got excited and pointed in its general direction. They asked if I was Magyar, I said no but tried to explain that my friend's grandpa was born there. In the end, they didn't understand me, I didn't understand them, and they were too shy to have their pictures taken (they were all four foot tall octagenarians in fur coats with canes, linking arms as they walked. This photo would have financed another year of my trip). I did get a photo from far away but it wasn't as amazing as the up close. Anyways, the palace was incredible, though almost entirely abandoned and boarded up. I snuck around the perimeter and spied through the windows like a creep, but it was completely gutted. It was a very beautiful building, but the plaster was falling off it on the outside. I actually felt it was more real and easy to place historically than the retrofitted tourist attractions. So, feeling conflicted about preservation vs authenticism, I naturally went to the only pub in town (right across from the castle) and let the experience soak in with an enormous mug of mulled wine. It helped. (Afterthoughts: I took a whole series of pictures and a video diary of this trip but somehow my photocard caught a virus and they are trapped, possibly forever. Maybe we'll never know what this trip was actually like?).
I love being Canadian. Not only does it win me friends by the pound here, but being around other Canadians is a culturally comforting thing. A guy from Montreal and I went out with an Australian and American to a cluuub and on the way home stopped for some paninis. There was a man inside who asked where we were all from and was so excited that we were from Canada that he insisted on paying for our meal. We couldn't accept, but he told us he had lived in Toronto and found the level of openess and multicultural awareness in Canada to be so great and beyond compare that he left with a much more open minded view of the world and felt that it was a way to repay us for what Canada gave him. It was quite tearful and we gratefully accepted. He even bought sandwiches for the Australian and American, and afterwards the Montrealer and I smugly said to them, "you're welcome" because lord knows their countries haven't done anything for the world.
So as you can see I am making fast friends here, as demonstrated by the following conversations:
Me: "I really like red cabbage with apples. Where can I buy some?"
Woman: "That's not a Hungarian dish."
Me: "But I had some the other day with my meal."
Woman: "In Hungary? No, we don't eat that here."
Me: "But the menu actually said 'Red Cabbage with Apples'"
Woman: "It wasn't red cabbage with apples. That's not a Hungarian dish."
Me: "Look. It happened."
Girl: "I am an English teacher. This is one of my students. He speaks English really good."
Me: "He speaks English really well."
Girl: "@%$& you."
*pause*
Me: "Well I can see you don't need help with the imperative."
Have any of you ever actually tried to learn English? Evidently we have 12 tenses, and I have no idea where those came from. I cannot believe the hoops we make the rest of the world jump through. It is fascinating to see how people learn English, because what logically follows in their language comes out bizarre in ours. What's most shocking to me is that English is not the world standard from which everything deviates. I can't believe American cultural hegemony has lead me astray. The receptionist at the library loves me and asks me questions about English (i.e. "The cat is purring" vs. "The cat purrs") that make me stop and realise I have no idea what I am talking about half the time and the only reason I know anything about the English language is because I studied Russian. I go to the library to read the Economist and L'Express when I'm feeling plucky (I really only browse the article titles and the captions but no one speaks French here so I end up looking very high class. You have no idea how terrified I am of being called out one day).
So I was potentially poisoned the other day. I was in the market, buying fresh sauerkraut, salt pork and walnuts as though it were a usual Thursday and I happened upon a kindly old baba who didn't have much in her barrow so I decided to buy some walnuts. She was also selling homemade V8 juice, sealed with an elastic over some seran wrap. The seran covering on one suddenly popped and she marked the price down. I thought, "for 200 forints, she's practically paying me to take it" so I took a few sips and went on my way. I was sitting and reading a few hours later when suddenly a vision came to me of Ms. Thompson from Foods 9/10 holding a bulging can and saying, "I could kill everyone in the room with this." While I have been known to defy Ms. Thompson in the past, there was no denying her sage advice in this instance so I ran to the washroom to induce vomiting, in a vain attempt to purge every last trace of botulism from my body. But there was no tomato juice to be found in my stomach, and I suspected it would show up later, in 3-5 days when I went paralyzed and stopped breathing. The worst part was not knowing how to handle the situation. Do I pay money for preventative treatment now or should I let my health insurance cover the Iron Lung that I will be put on for several weeks in a Hungarian hospital? I'm fairly uneasy about non-Western medical care. In my world hierarchy of medicine there is Canada at the top (and I know we are good because we poach doctors from all around the world and make them mop floors and drive taxis until they are ready to practice real medicine), then the UK, metropolitan US, and maybe Australia and Western Europe. After that there is Hungary, the former Soviet Union, Spain, and then Somalia, East Timor, rural Idaho, etc. Anyways, I have spent the last 5 days in paralyzing fear which does little to help detect the early warnings of botulism, paralysis. This is the hardest thing I have ever had to deal with, emotionally, in my entire life. On the one hand, I cannot believe that I am going to die, but on the other hand, I can believe thatthis is how I am going to die.
Going to market has been pretty positive for the most part. I made chicken paprikas the other day, and when I was buying meat the lady reached into a huge display case of raw chicken with her bare hands, grabbed a few breasts, weighed them, took my money with the same chickeny hands, then gave me my change and a bag of chicken. I had no room in my bag so carried it. I think I like the East most because it's the only place where I can walk around the city with a clear plastic bag full of raw meat without attracting attention. In fact, I feel even more inconspicuous this way.
Hope you're all keeping well,
Rory
Saturday, November 14, 2009
Best of the Pest / Le plus de la Buda
Aside from the architecture, the planning, the Danube, and its history, what makes Budapest such an enchanting city is the constant reminders of where you are, culturally. Not quite East, but not West enough, structure from the North with a penchant for the finer things of the South, as much as I tease Hungarians for being wholly and truly “Eastern Europe” they are in fact firmly in the centre. As a result of this crossroads, matched with a language that accommodates no one, much of contemporary Hungarian culture is a fusion of their deep-set roots with the Kanti and Maansi tribes of the Urals, and their reaction to long term cohabitation with Slavic, Teutonic, Latin and Turkic neighbours.
1) Limited Opening Hours. If you tend to get hungry outside the hours of 10am-8pm, then Hungary may not be for you. Not even the bakers rise before 9am. Furthermore, grocery stores will close at 8pm, and cafes and restaurants at 10-11pm, and the ones that remain open will simply stop serving food. And, just to be a tease, they will hang their ‘Open’ signs, open all doors and windows, lay out patio furniture, and then when you walk in bark “Closed!” at you. So is it any wonder I find myself rising at 7am every morning, and heading straight to the 0-24 NonStop Tesco, or Costa Coffee, again to be disappointed?
2) Irrational Opening Hours. And then are shops that are open all the time. NonStop. If I want a panini for less than $2, I can have it at 4am on a Wednesday. But I cannot have it at 10am on a Sunday morning. That would be silly. Nothing is open on Sunday.
3) NonStop. Of the few English words appropriated into the Hungarian language, “NonStop” is one that slightly missed the mark. ‘0-24 NonStop’ typically implies just that. If, when I approach at 23:30, and I am told by a security guard that the place is closed, would it not be easier to have that man run a till?
4) The Hungarian Language. Oh my. If you’ve ever failed at learning French, Hungarian is not the logical backup choice. It won’t even help you achieve your dream of learning Finnish. Hungarian is a language that waits for no one. ‘Vendeglő” is a restaurant, ‘Vendeglo’ is a ‘guest horse.’ As in, a horse who is a guest. If you don’t lengthen or shorten a vowel sound, no one will know, or even show interest in wanting to know, what you are talking about:
“Kérek egy kávét tejjel.”
“Tejjel?”
“Igen. Tej.”
“Tej?”
“Igen, tej.”
“Nem ertem.”
“Tej.”
“Ó! Thé?”
“Nem, tej. Look, hogy mongyák, ‘Reach into your lexicon and find a three-letter word that starts with a “T” and could possibly relate to something that goes with coffee. Please. Just infer. We are in a café. Kérem. Köszönöm’ magyarul?”
Then again, if a Hungarian showed up in rural Canada without knowing a lick of English, aside from being totally impressed that he or she had made it that far without dying, I would have no time for that.
5) Roma women who give me free socks: Sure, it sounds all friendly at first, giving you free socks , but do not think that that 3-pack of athletic sockettes does not come with strings . First they are making kind gestures, and the next thing you know they show up at your door with their vardos and all 37 members of their immediate family and move in, start doing laundry in your sink and using your dishwasher to store their many trinkets, castanets, and gold and lapis lazuli jewelry, not unlike my grandmother used to do with her kettle (store it in her dishwasher, not hoard semi-precious stones).
6) Trianon. Please, I beg you, stop. Stop blaming me for Trianon. I can assure you I played little to no role in the Paris Peace Conference. As far as I am concerned, ‘Trianon’ is a song by Fleetwood Mac.
7) Paying for ketchup. And I am not even sure if this red, glossy goop is real ketchup. Dollop for dollop, at $1 each this works out to about a $48 bottle. In fact, I am starting to understand the logic behind old ladies who hoard packets of ketchup and vinegar from fast food restaurants. They have seen it all, they remember.
8) A heightened sense of awareness. In keeping with inconsistency, Hungarians will both swerve into you while walking, stop directly in front of you and turn around with no warning, and then will hold the door for you and thank you for doing the same. Certainly in the running for “Politest Society in Europe.”
9) Obligatory (but free), coat check. Despite the fact that public buildings are heat full blast with no disregard for the Russians possibly cutting off the gas again, the one-worker-per-coat-check thing is not working for me. I am not waiting somewhere between 30 seconds and 25 minutes in a line that does not actually appear to exist while one old man deals with both taking in and handing out coats on a completely arbitrary basis. Hungarians take pride in organized irrationality: this place is so…German about being Russian.
10) Queuing. And Private Security Firms. One till open, and four security guards standing around making sure no one in the line that wraps itself around the entirety of the Tesco Expressz steals. I’m sure with shorter lines, we’d all be less inclined to steal. I just want my Dr. Oetker’s pizza.
1) Limited Opening Hours. If you tend to get hungry outside the hours of 10am-8pm, then Hungary may not be for you. Not even the bakers rise before 9am. Furthermore, grocery stores will close at 8pm, and cafes and restaurants at 10-11pm, and the ones that remain open will simply stop serving food. And, just to be a tease, they will hang their ‘Open’ signs, open all doors and windows, lay out patio furniture, and then when you walk in bark “Closed!” at you. So is it any wonder I find myself rising at 7am every morning, and heading straight to the 0-24 NonStop Tesco, or Costa Coffee, again to be disappointed?
2) Irrational Opening Hours. And then are shops that are open all the time. NonStop. If I want a panini for less than $2, I can have it at 4am on a Wednesday. But I cannot have it at 10am on a Sunday morning. That would be silly. Nothing is open on Sunday.
3) NonStop. Of the few English words appropriated into the Hungarian language, “NonStop” is one that slightly missed the mark. ‘0-24 NonStop’ typically implies just that. If, when I approach at 23:30, and I am told by a security guard that the place is closed, would it not be easier to have that man run a till?
4) The Hungarian Language. Oh my. If you’ve ever failed at learning French, Hungarian is not the logical backup choice. It won’t even help you achieve your dream of learning Finnish. Hungarian is a language that waits for no one. ‘Vendeglő” is a restaurant, ‘Vendeglo’ is a ‘guest horse.’ As in, a horse who is a guest. If you don’t lengthen or shorten a vowel sound, no one will know, or even show interest in wanting to know, what you are talking about:
“Kérek egy kávét tejjel.”
“Tejjel?”
“Igen. Tej.”
“Tej?”
“Igen, tej.”
“Nem ertem.”
“Tej.”
“Ó! Thé?”
“Nem, tej. Look, hogy mongyák, ‘Reach into your lexicon and find a three-letter word that starts with a “T” and could possibly relate to something that goes with coffee. Please. Just infer. We are in a café. Kérem. Köszönöm’ magyarul?”
Then again, if a Hungarian showed up in rural Canada without knowing a lick of English, aside from being totally impressed that he or she had made it that far without dying, I would have no time for that.
5) Roma women who give me free socks: Sure, it sounds all friendly at first, giving you free socks , but do not think that that 3-pack of athletic sockettes does not come with strings . First they are making kind gestures, and the next thing you know they show up at your door with their vardos and all 37 members of their immediate family and move in, start doing laundry in your sink and using your dishwasher to store their many trinkets, castanets, and gold and lapis lazuli jewelry, not unlike my grandmother used to do with her kettle (store it in her dishwasher, not hoard semi-precious stones).
6) Trianon. Please, I beg you, stop. Stop blaming me for Trianon. I can assure you I played little to no role in the Paris Peace Conference. As far as I am concerned, ‘Trianon’ is a song by Fleetwood Mac.
7) Paying for ketchup. And I am not even sure if this red, glossy goop is real ketchup. Dollop for dollop, at $1 each this works out to about a $48 bottle. In fact, I am starting to understand the logic behind old ladies who hoard packets of ketchup and vinegar from fast food restaurants. They have seen it all, they remember.
8) A heightened sense of awareness. In keeping with inconsistency, Hungarians will both swerve into you while walking, stop directly in front of you and turn around with no warning, and then will hold the door for you and thank you for doing the same. Certainly in the running for “Politest Society in Europe.”
9) Obligatory (but free), coat check. Despite the fact that public buildings are heat full blast with no disregard for the Russians possibly cutting off the gas again, the one-worker-per-coat-check thing is not working for me. I am not waiting somewhere between 30 seconds and 25 minutes in a line that does not actually appear to exist while one old man deals with both taking in and handing out coats on a completely arbitrary basis. Hungarians take pride in organized irrationality: this place is so…German about being Russian.
10) Queuing. And Private Security Firms. One till open, and four security guards standing around making sure no one in the line that wraps itself around the entirety of the Tesco Expressz steals. I’m sure with shorter lines, we’d all be less inclined to steal. I just want my Dr. Oetker’s pizza.
Saturday, November 7, 2009
MagyaRORszág
Right, well get used to puns and portmanteaux.
From Bratislava I took the train to Budapest, but rather than do anything directly, I was determined to save 1 or 2 euros and spend countless additional hours and emotional energy to get there. I took the train to Komarno, a small Slovak town on the Danube and walked cross the bridge to its Hungarian counterpart, Komarom to catch a train Budapest-wards. I was ecstatic to be back in Hungary, but was disappointed East-Central Europe has joined Schengen and that I would not be getting a stamp of a port-of-entry rife with umlauts (I had to wait a few weeks for Lőkösháza. Ask me how to pronounce it. Go ahead). The first thing I noticed was how different the two towns were in terms of development. A journal entry from November 2, 2009, confirms this:
“The Hungarian side seems much more run-down and less prosperous. The Slovak side is hopping: more stores, scaffolding, and well-dressed people. It must receive more money because they are renovating a huge fortress there. Hungarian trains are nicer, newer, cleaner and faster, though not on time. Slovak trains are efficient and nothing if not punctual, though considerably shabbier. It’s interesting to see where the governments decide to allocate money and how it is spent. Just like when I was at that golf event this summer and that British/Australian/South African woman sat next to me and started talking to me about being a councilor for Port Moody and being on the budget committee and going to Africa to work in a village and how when she started, they had no computers and how they had to convert everything over to a new system to make it more efficient. At this point I realized I hadn’t been listening (her accent was strong) and I wasn’t sure if she was talking about Port Moody or Africa, and right now I’m not sure why I deemed this story relevant, but nevertheless, the allocation of public monies and infrastructure upgrades are interesting.”
Interesting indeed. The following post appeared on November 5, 2009, in select e-mail inboxes across North America but is now available en masse, with additional footage and afterthoughts. Everything is better retrospectively!
Hi.
So Eastern Europe is, without a doubt and from a wholly biased point of view, the greatest place on earth. This is why I have waited over a month to even bother emailing. Italy, for the most part, was as to be expected, and while I felt much less safe anywhere near a road in Italy, Italians iare, more or less, simply Latin Americans who went to private school. France was quaint and expensive, though I really enjoyed the French as a people. So welcoming and kind, and with such a flat out refusal to learn English. This helped me greatly when I decided to hitchhike from Montpellier to Barcelona, and rode with 8 different people. I could not get over how friendly they all were. One guy, a Jesuit missionary, offered to pay for my train ticket but I refused, because as much as I love getting money from Catholics, I like to improve my conversational skills more. Spain, for the most part, is as we left it in 1995 (for more on this, please consult "The Babins in Europe '95," with a special feature of the Legoland Driving school which is available through the Perley Elementary Library, or was until a certain teacher took it home and kept it and kindly informed me that I could have it back—for a price). So when I was given the option of flying to Sicily and then taking a ferry to Tunisia, but I realised that it involves sitting in Tunisia for several months. With little chance of getting into Algeria, and no chance of getting into Libya, it seemed that I would be bored. Not to mention how terrified I am of the Middle East, what with the terrorism and everything.
So, on a whim, I changed my flight to one of my favourite cities in Europe, Bratislava, and I am now in Budapest. It is so cold here. My plans of never seeing snow this year were thwarted by the flurry that hit Bratislava the morning I left. I also reek of smoke at all times and have had a permanent coating of phlegm in my lungs, and have a weakened, ephemeral sense of smell from all the smoke and pollution of Barcelona, and now from the beer parlours of Slovakia. Unfortunately for me, my olfaction returned to me just as I was boarding a flight to Bratislava from Barcelona and was placed next to an elderly Slovak couple. The ripe smell of old wool and the steadfast refusal to use deodorant was a clear and present reminder of communist-era consumer goods shortages, and these two seemed intent on keeping this memory alive. Barcelona was sweltering when I left, and I boarded the plane with hopes that a slightly cooler climate would help. Instead, I landed in 1 degree weather and immediately regretted every step in my life I had taken that led me to this point. But the bus ride to the hostel, and the overabundance of fur on the riders reminded me why I had come to experience the east, once again.
I had a nice dinner of Chinese food tonight, which I have resolved is something I will do in every country I visit. Chinese food is an interesting thing to use as a control subject, because it has such similar qualities everywhere you go. For starters, it is never "local" cuisine (not even in China), so people don't charge outrageous prices for something that could be disappointing. Instead, it is reasonably priced and you're well aware it inevitably will be disappointing. Second, the interiors are immaculately kept and they spare no expense in decorating. Third, as in Vancouver, as in Barcelona and as in Bratislava, they are completely empty. At all times. As a result, the actual food is the only thing that ever changes. Apart from that, I have wandered around Bratislava which is a pretty amazing city for being so small. And I met Mormons! They were from Arizona and Utah, fluent in Slovak and they invited me in for coffee and conversation, but I forced them, to answer all my questions outside in the freezing cold where people could see me and ensure my safety. Nice people. Most/all answers related back to Jesus. Slovak English language television seems to consist of four music channels (one which is devoted solely to music from the past 30 years in an effort to allow Slovaks to “catch up” and normalize I take it) and E! or whetever that channel is called. So far I have watched a documentary on Eva Longoria Parker and "Kourtney and Khloe Take Miami." In hindsight, it's a really good thing I briefly started watching "Keeping up with the Kardashians" this summer because it has really given me background into the complex relationships there. I've also watched parts of episodes of "Girls of the Playboy Mansion" or something along those lines translated into Slovak. I think this is the type of television Slovaks can really relate to. Considering the vast majority of today's most popular adult film actresses come from Slovakia, this is a pretty effective recruiting tool.
I am now in Hungary and will be dining on goose and roast pumpkin this weekend for the Feast of St Martin. Hungarians are the warmest of people I have encountered so far and are fully aware of how ridiculous their language is, vis-a-vis every other language on the planet ("with the possible exception of the African clicking ones," Fungary Magazine tells me). Have you any idea what a "Gyogyszertar" is? If you have ever tried to find a place to eat after 8pm in Budapest, you would think this language to be very frustrating. I have no idea what "restaurant" or "eatery" or even "kebab shop" is (¡they don't have kebabs here!) so who knows what I have passed up. The other thing is that they separate restaurants, beer parlours, wine parlours, bars, and cluuubs here. The prices for wine are outrageously high in beer parlours, and so on. Also, on main streets prices are triple their equivalent on side streets. Hungarians love the market economy. I did find an all-you-can-eat-Hungarian buffet, where for $18 I can eat and drink all the traditional Hungarian fare I want in the space of 3 hours. I will report back soon.
Fur is everywhere. I saw a woman wearing a whole bear and I asked to take a picture. She was (very) Russian and quite excited and asked, "And you are deeesigner from Amerika?" Considering that I look dirty and poor, I had to say no, but I do think people should be wearing more full animal carcasses.
I'm out. I need to beat the crowds in the metro to buy fresh peppers for the morning stew. Yes, stew for breakfast. I'm probably never coming home.
Rory
From Bratislava I took the train to Budapest, but rather than do anything directly, I was determined to save 1 or 2 euros and spend countless additional hours and emotional energy to get there. I took the train to Komarno, a small Slovak town on the Danube and walked cross the bridge to its Hungarian counterpart, Komarom to catch a train Budapest-wards. I was ecstatic to be back in Hungary, but was disappointed East-Central Europe has joined Schengen and that I would not be getting a stamp of a port-of-entry rife with umlauts (I had to wait a few weeks for Lőkösháza. Ask me how to pronounce it. Go ahead). The first thing I noticed was how different the two towns were in terms of development. A journal entry from November 2, 2009, confirms this:
“The Hungarian side seems much more run-down and less prosperous. The Slovak side is hopping: more stores, scaffolding, and well-dressed people. It must receive more money because they are renovating a huge fortress there. Hungarian trains are nicer, newer, cleaner and faster, though not on time. Slovak trains are efficient and nothing if not punctual, though considerably shabbier. It’s interesting to see where the governments decide to allocate money and how it is spent. Just like when I was at that golf event this summer and that British/Australian/South African woman sat next to me and started talking to me about being a councilor for Port Moody and being on the budget committee and going to Africa to work in a village and how when she started, they had no computers and how they had to convert everything over to a new system to make it more efficient. At this point I realized I hadn’t been listening (her accent was strong) and I wasn’t sure if she was talking about Port Moody or Africa, and right now I’m not sure why I deemed this story relevant, but nevertheless, the allocation of public monies and infrastructure upgrades are interesting.”
Interesting indeed. The following post appeared on November 5, 2009, in select e-mail inboxes across North America but is now available en masse, with additional footage and afterthoughts. Everything is better retrospectively!
Hi.
So Eastern Europe is, without a doubt and from a wholly biased point of view, the greatest place on earth. This is why I have waited over a month to even bother emailing. Italy, for the most part, was as to be expected, and while I felt much less safe anywhere near a road in Italy, Italians iare, more or less, simply Latin Americans who went to private school. France was quaint and expensive, though I really enjoyed the French as a people. So welcoming and kind, and with such a flat out refusal to learn English. This helped me greatly when I decided to hitchhike from Montpellier to Barcelona, and rode with 8 different people. I could not get over how friendly they all were. One guy, a Jesuit missionary, offered to pay for my train ticket but I refused, because as much as I love getting money from Catholics, I like to improve my conversational skills more. Spain, for the most part, is as we left it in 1995 (for more on this, please consult "The Babins in Europe '95," with a special feature of the Legoland Driving school which is available through the Perley Elementary Library, or was until a certain teacher took it home and kept it and kindly informed me that I could have it back—for a price). So when I was given the option of flying to Sicily and then taking a ferry to Tunisia, but I realised that it involves sitting in Tunisia for several months. With little chance of getting into Algeria, and no chance of getting into Libya, it seemed that I would be bored. Not to mention how terrified I am of the Middle East, what with the terrorism and everything.
So, on a whim, I changed my flight to one of my favourite cities in Europe, Bratislava, and I am now in Budapest. It is so cold here. My plans of never seeing snow this year were thwarted by the flurry that hit Bratislava the morning I left. I also reek of smoke at all times and have had a permanent coating of phlegm in my lungs, and have a weakened, ephemeral sense of smell from all the smoke and pollution of Barcelona, and now from the beer parlours of Slovakia. Unfortunately for me, my olfaction returned to me just as I was boarding a flight to Bratislava from Barcelona and was placed next to an elderly Slovak couple. The ripe smell of old wool and the steadfast refusal to use deodorant was a clear and present reminder of communist-era consumer goods shortages, and these two seemed intent on keeping this memory alive. Barcelona was sweltering when I left, and I boarded the plane with hopes that a slightly cooler climate would help. Instead, I landed in 1 degree weather and immediately regretted every step in my life I had taken that led me to this point. But the bus ride to the hostel, and the overabundance of fur on the riders reminded me why I had come to experience the east, once again.
I had a nice dinner of Chinese food tonight, which I have resolved is something I will do in every country I visit. Chinese food is an interesting thing to use as a control subject, because it has such similar qualities everywhere you go. For starters, it is never "local" cuisine (not even in China), so people don't charge outrageous prices for something that could be disappointing. Instead, it is reasonably priced and you're well aware it inevitably will be disappointing. Second, the interiors are immaculately kept and they spare no expense in decorating. Third, as in Vancouver, as in Barcelona and as in Bratislava, they are completely empty. At all times. As a result, the actual food is the only thing that ever changes. Apart from that, I have wandered around Bratislava which is a pretty amazing city for being so small. And I met Mormons! They were from Arizona and Utah, fluent in Slovak and they invited me in for coffee and conversation, but I forced them, to answer all my questions outside in the freezing cold where people could see me and ensure my safety. Nice people. Most/all answers related back to Jesus. Slovak English language television seems to consist of four music channels (one which is devoted solely to music from the past 30 years in an effort to allow Slovaks to “catch up” and normalize I take it) and E! or whetever that channel is called. So far I have watched a documentary on Eva Longoria Parker and "Kourtney and Khloe Take Miami." In hindsight, it's a really good thing I briefly started watching "Keeping up with the Kardashians" this summer because it has really given me background into the complex relationships there. I've also watched parts of episodes of "Girls of the Playboy Mansion" or something along those lines translated into Slovak. I think this is the type of television Slovaks can really relate to. Considering the vast majority of today's most popular adult film actresses come from Slovakia, this is a pretty effective recruiting tool.
I am now in Hungary and will be dining on goose and roast pumpkin this weekend for the Feast of St Martin. Hungarians are the warmest of people I have encountered so far and are fully aware of how ridiculous their language is, vis-a-vis every other language on the planet ("with the possible exception of the African clicking ones," Fungary Magazine tells me). Have you any idea what a "Gyogyszertar" is? If you have ever tried to find a place to eat after 8pm in Budapest, you would think this language to be very frustrating. I have no idea what "restaurant" or "eatery" or even "kebab shop" is (¡they don't have kebabs here!) so who knows what I have passed up. The other thing is that they separate restaurants, beer parlours, wine parlours, bars, and cluuubs here. The prices for wine are outrageously high in beer parlours, and so on. Also, on main streets prices are triple their equivalent on side streets. Hungarians love the market economy. I did find an all-you-can-eat-Hungarian buffet, where for $18 I can eat and drink all the traditional Hungarian fare I want in the space of 3 hours. I will report back soon.
Fur is everywhere. I saw a woman wearing a whole bear and I asked to take a picture. She was (very) Russian and quite excited and asked, "And you are deeesigner from Amerika?" Considering that I look dirty and poor, I had to say no, but I do think people should be wearing more full animal carcasses.
I'm out. I need to beat the crowds in the metro to buy fresh peppers for the morning stew. Yes, stew for breakfast. I'm probably never coming home.
Rory
Saturday, October 31, 2009
The South of France
It is so typical of my parents to, when told that I have bought a one-way ticket to London, make it all about them and decide to rent a villa in Tuscany for the whole family to stay in. They are always doing things like this. So on the 27th of September, 2009, I flew out of YVR to London (and received extra leg room at no extra cost), slept in Gatwick for an hour and flew to Pisa, arriving fresh-faced and ready for a week-long B-Family Tuscan Extravaganza. The French Riviera (a region in my geographical imagination spanning from Pisa to Barcelona) was spent in typical family fashion: we ate a lot of cured pork products, argued about which wines to buy and how to properly cook polenta, saw Roman ruins, and my dad sat and read the same issue of the Guardian over the course of one week. Afterwards, we went to France.
So, Provence: wine, fresh produce, blah blah blah, Lavender Museum, blah blah blah, corkscrew museum, blah, Joan of Arc(?), pain au chocolate, and Carrefour. Trust me, it’s beautiful and the people are awesome, but there is nothing I can tell you about this place that you can’t get from Google Image, or from asking any American college student who did an exchange in Lyon, or Rome, or Barcelona. Just assume my experience was exactly the same. Perhaps a list of my Facebook status updates will fill in the gaps:
September 27, 2009: Rory has the day off tomorrow. For a year
October 2, 2009: Rory is trapped in the mountains of Tuscany with no Internet and only his parents' credit card.
October 6, 2009: Rory à Provence, jaloux? And has a whole slough of generic, filled-out and stamped post cards requiring addresses.
October 9, 2009: Rory est gros à cause de foie gras. Jaloux?
October 12, 2009: Rory. Stay tuned for a "Rattails of France" facebook album.
October 19, 2009: Rory is in Spain, and had no idea Spanish was actually spoken outside of Mexico/California.
So, you guessed it, after Provence I took the TGV as far as Montpellier, and then hitchhiked my way to Spain, improving my French considerably in the course of one day. This was the more French I had ever been exposed to at any time in my life. Despite constant bombardment by bilingual packaging laws and the “Qu’est-ce que c’est?” segment of Sesame Street growing up, I knew zero French until I decided, on a whim in May 2009 and much to the annoyance of my coworkers, to finally conquer the Everest that is the French tongue. So, on October 16, I hitchhiked with a combination of eight different people, ranging from 1980s hatchbacks to brand-new, climate-controlled Renaults, the last of which dropped me off in downtown Barcelona at the start of Las Ramblas. For those wondering if I spent the entire time in BCN partying and “gettin’ crunk” in the cluub, you better believe it: every night I had one or two glasses from a tetrapack of wine, and then watched an episode of 30 Rock (and…Desperate Housewives, but really only one or two episodes), and then went to sleep.
With all due respect to Western Europe, nothing exciting happened until I arrived in Bratislava on Halloween. After sitting on a sweaty bus from Central Barcelona to the airport at Girona (a bus ride which cost more than my ticket to B-Slav, I’ll have you know), I arrived in Bratislava in freezing cold weather. My first thought was, “What sort of faulty synapse led me to think this was a good idea?” but when I saw the overabundance of fur-clad locals piling into a sturdy, utilitarian socialist Hungarian-built bus from the 1970s, I knew that yes, this is exactly where I wanted to be at 23. This is so my life. If you’re so interested, read on.
So, Provence: wine, fresh produce, blah blah blah, Lavender Museum, blah blah blah, corkscrew museum, blah, Joan of Arc(?), pain au chocolate, and Carrefour. Trust me, it’s beautiful and the people are awesome, but there is nothing I can tell you about this place that you can’t get from Google Image, or from asking any American college student who did an exchange in Lyon, or Rome, or Barcelona. Just assume my experience was exactly the same. Perhaps a list of my Facebook status updates will fill in the gaps:
September 27, 2009: Rory has the day off tomorrow. For a year
October 2, 2009: Rory is trapped in the mountains of Tuscany with no Internet and only his parents' credit card.
October 6, 2009: Rory à Provence, jaloux? And has a whole slough of generic, filled-out and stamped post cards requiring addresses.
October 9, 2009: Rory est gros à cause de foie gras. Jaloux?
October 12, 2009: Rory. Stay tuned for a "Rattails of France" facebook album.
October 19, 2009: Rory is in Spain, and had no idea Spanish was actually spoken outside of Mexico/California.
So, you guessed it, after Provence I took the TGV as far as Montpellier, and then hitchhiked my way to Spain, improving my French considerably in the course of one day. This was the more French I had ever been exposed to at any time in my life. Despite constant bombardment by bilingual packaging laws and the “Qu’est-ce que c’est?” segment of Sesame Street growing up, I knew zero French until I decided, on a whim in May 2009 and much to the annoyance of my coworkers, to finally conquer the Everest that is the French tongue. So, on October 16, I hitchhiked with a combination of eight different people, ranging from 1980s hatchbacks to brand-new, climate-controlled Renaults, the last of which dropped me off in downtown Barcelona at the start of Las Ramblas. For those wondering if I spent the entire time in BCN partying and “gettin’ crunk” in the cluub, you better believe it: every night I had one or two glasses from a tetrapack of wine, and then watched an episode of 30 Rock (and…Desperate Housewives, but really only one or two episodes), and then went to sleep.
With all due respect to Western Europe, nothing exciting happened until I arrived in Bratislava on Halloween. After sitting on a sweaty bus from Central Barcelona to the airport at Girona (a bus ride which cost more than my ticket to B-Slav, I’ll have you know), I arrived in Bratislava in freezing cold weather. My first thought was, “What sort of faulty synapse led me to think this was a good idea?” but when I saw the overabundance of fur-clad locals piling into a sturdy, utilitarian socialist Hungarian-built bus from the 1970s, I knew that yes, this is exactly where I wanted to be at 23. This is so my life. If you’re so interested, read on.
Thursday, October 15, 2009
Les Aventures Rorientales
I am in Moldova, and the you know what they say about the best way to live it up in the beautiful city of Chisinau: sit in the basement of your hostel and condense 7 months of travel into a blog to make things all the more manageable for you and your friends, which is far less intrusive and attention-demanding than a mass e-mail. It's so true! It's actually April, 2010, but I had to find a way to change the date. You know frustrating backdating paperwork can be. So if you're curious to find out how I got to Moldova, you can continue reading. Otherwise, it's really not that interesting. I'll shall christen this inaugural posting with the start of an email from November 5, 2009:
Before you even bother with this, here are some key points to note before continuing:
1. To understand the context of every e-mail I will send, and everything you will hear, please refer to entry # 120 on www.stuffwhitepeoplelike.com. In fact, please read #s 19, 20, 47, and 115. I mean, let's face it: I spent the past 5 years reading Marx, Said and Smith. Someone had to do it. I deserve this. Furthermore, after reading these entries, you basically no longer need to read any e-mail I send because everything that will happen to me is covered in those 5 entries.
2. My biggest fears are, in order: having my organs stolen; losing my iPod; losing my camera; being stabbed by a Roma; and not checking to see if there is enough toilet paper until it is too late. In retrospect, if one of these happens, I can assure you that all four will happen at the same time, so if any of you have an eye on one of my plump kidneys, you will probably be able to buy it in Moldova (Afterthoughts: I feel as though now you have to read on because if I am in Moldova now, it's very possibly I'm kidney-shopping).
3. Let's just address the elephant in the room: the world was designed for middle class native English-speakers. When people can't speak English, I'm naturally frustrated and offended. This always ends well.
4. You can unsubscribe at any time.
So, get involved! (Or heed my warnings. Whichever works.)
Before you even bother with this, here are some key points to note before continuing:
1. To understand the context of every e-mail I will send, and everything you will hear, please refer to entry # 120 on www.stuffwhitepeoplelike.com. In fact, please read #s 19, 20, 47, and 115. I mean, let's face it: I spent the past 5 years reading Marx, Said and Smith. Someone had to do it. I deserve this. Furthermore, after reading these entries, you basically no longer need to read any e-mail I send because everything that will happen to me is covered in those 5 entries.
2. My biggest fears are, in order: having my organs stolen; losing my iPod; losing my camera; being stabbed by a Roma; and not checking to see if there is enough toilet paper until it is too late. In retrospect, if one of these happens, I can assure you that all four will happen at the same time, so if any of you have an eye on one of my plump kidneys, you will probably be able to buy it in Moldova (Afterthoughts: I feel as though now you have to read on because if I am in Moldova now, it's very possibly I'm kidney-shopping).
3. Let's just address the elephant in the room: the world was designed for middle class native English-speakers. When people can't speak English, I'm naturally frustrated and offended. This always ends well.
4. You can unsubscribe at any time.
So, get involved! (Or heed my warnings. Whichever works.)
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