Hodge-Podge Adventures

On Thursday I finally brought home eggs and some olive oil, so my cooking possibilities expanded. I was glad to be able to make a cheese omlette and toast for breakfast. Eggs here all have brown shells.

I received an invitation to go to the Harkany Spa for Friday afternoon. I reluctantly said no, because I just had too many lectures to prepare. However, Friday morning went way off target for two good things. I worked with my owners on the documents needed for my residence permit. Monday I get the letter from the University and then Thursday when I have all day(!), I'll head off to the immigration office to see if I can get my long stay residence permit.

Then I got an e-mail saying the Metropolitan State students will be coming here for a day in March rather than going to Szeged. So I spent some time corresponding for the arrangements for that. My last task for this is to go restaurant hopping to pick out a good place for a sit-down dinner before they all go back to Budapest on the evening train.

I headed off at 12:00 to get a manicure. At one point the manicurist thought she had done something wrong to one thumbnail. Ok, igen igen, and jo jo are things that can be said for it's OK. She kept asking me a question  about my thumb nail, and finally I said in very poor Hungarian, "kiscit magyarul" -- trying to convey that I speak very little Hungarian. She patted my hand and said, "Oh,dragam." This means Oh, dearie. (I knew what dragam meant for a very funny reason.) This manicure cost me slightly less than $5.00.

When we were doing our Hungarian classes in Budapest, one of the men said the most important thing to know about maintaining a good marriage is "Yes dear." And that's how we all learned dragom -- and we laughed about it because the word is so close to dragon, particularly when viewed within the context of settling a marital dispute.

I did happily accept an invitation to go to concert on Friday night. It was held in a school auditorium in Szechenyi Ter, so I met Mark and Chen at the McDonald's on the corner of the square. We got there at 6:30 for a 7:00 PM concert. Good thing, as already chairs were short. The concert began with an opening act that indeed was wonderful. They played many instruments, sang, and danced. I couldn't believe the amount of music they got out of the instruments, and obviously, too, the room we were in must be very good for music. The sound was incredible.

The main act was Csik. On the web site it says this group has combined folk music with rock/popular music. By the time Csik was on stage the room was packed, with a huge group standing in front of us who were seated, so everyone ended up standing for most of the concert. Many in the audience could sing every word of every song with the group, and very obviously thrilled when they started some very favorite pieces. My guess is that most of the audience was less than 30 years old. This group is way more than folk music. The photo is not very good because I simply couldn't see the stage very well. Again the music and the sound was incredible. I was so glad Mark and Chen had brought this opportunity to my attention.

I opened my front door this morning, Saturday, and found a little gift. I did what any good Grammy does, and posted it up on the cupboard door in the kitchen.

This morning I went food shopping with my landlady, Zsuza. We went to what we would call a farmers' market in the United States. It took us 10-15 minutes to walk there. After we were done shopping, her husband came in the car to pick up us and bring us home with our arms full and shopping bags full. My bag came home with carrots, potatoes, chicken, saurkraut, and apple juice/black currant juice. The little bag of potatoes cost the equivalent of 25 cents.

Well, back to working on the lectures for the next week. It takes more time to prepare it and then prepare something more for a translator to review ahead of time. But I may have to try out a restaurant to taste test it before the students come.

PS -- Later in the day. I had some of the carrots with a toasted cheese sandwich for lunch. I just boiled a couple of potatoes to use tomorrow. If I can find vinegar, I can make potato salad, too, when spring comes!