Spirituality

September 30, 2009 | The Little Chapel of Silence

Hmm, I should work on not tilting the camera, especially with long exposure. This is, as labeled, a little chapel! It's very cute. It small and quaint with old bench pews with worn padding. When you enter the chapel, you see a large wooden carving of a tree above the alter. There's a prayer request box, and a guest-book type thing. The Religious Center holds interfaith meditation on Wednesdays (that's what the white piece of paper is about). I think maybe I'll go sometime. Meditating sounds nice.

Multinotable

September 30 | Bethlen Gábor Street

I have the privilege of uploading when both you and I are on the same day, the 30th of September. Today is special for a variety of reasons.

• Today is the first day of classes at UW. Classes started about 5 hours ago. Though, I think most people didn't start until 3 or 2 hours ago.
• Today is exactly three months that we know each other. To our mutual gratification, neither of us remembers the day very well.
• This is post #100! Fifty days ago we planned and took the first picture for this blog. (Actually, it will be exactly 50 days today at 2:59pm.) Incidentally, the ice cream stand today cut the price per scoop from 100 forints to 50 forints. That's about $0.25 per scoop! To be fair, the Hungarian scoop is about half of an America scoop. Still...

When you return after 2pm, let you be so happy as planned, and more! And there be much rejoicing, whereupon to the two of us!

Tents

September 29, 2009 | Farmer's Market

There is a farmer's market on Tuesdays at the Shrine. I went today. Unfortunately, I had already eaten, so I could not partake of the cooked foods. I didn't get any fruits or vegetables ironically. Jen and I bought hummus. Yum. :) There were the standard vendors selling clothes and accessories. I'm excited to go back. I saw a cobbler (the eat-able kind) stand.

Fans

September 29 | Verseny Street

The view is from my window. Verseny means "competition" in Hungarian. And today, another huge crowd of people walked past toward the football (soccer) stadium, chanting "Hungaaah-riah!" If you look carefully, you can see police leading the front.

I often hear the chant and see small groups of people walking down our street. But crowds as big as this one are uncommon.

Liberry

September 28, 2009 | Doheny Library

This is the same library with the scary bookstacks. There is a door of entry in the study hall to the bookstacks, not well marked, but you can't see it from here. :( The lighting is fantastic when it is bright outside, but at night it is too dark for me usually. I like very bright rooms for studying. Anyway, importance of this library? I got to know a table and a chair very well for four hours today. I'm a fan of the arrangement and assortment of study tables which is more interesting than the other major library which has boring individual study tables and is all grey. And the windows here are awesome.

Also, have you ever noticed that children say "liberry" instead of "library"? I had this problem as a child.

Player

September 28 | Living room

This is the inside of an old large-format tape player that one of my house mates found dumped out. The power cord is chopped, suggesting that something's wrong with it. We looked at it a little but didn't find the source of the problem. Maybe it even works!

The electronics are interesting, though. Big elements.

Sign

September 27, 2009 | Trousdale Parkway

Hmmm, I seem to be in the habit of posting pictures taken at night. This is the parkway I walk/bike down to go to class. Actually, I have two classes in Taper Hall which is on the other side of the parkway (to the right), so no biking down is required. Well, it's night time. I don't know if you can really tell much. Anyway, I wanted to take a picture of the sign because it's relatively new. And it is hilarious, partially because there's a good chance someone going past it will miss it, and my roommate from last year almost got taken out by one of the gate arms once. Also, I enjoy that this gate arm is dysfunctional.

Anticar

September 27 | Road to Boldogkői Vár

Today's trip was full of little good surprises. One of them was this man and his ride. I wonder if he has any modern form of transportation. It is quite possible that he doesn't.

Cars

September 26, 2009 | Patterns

I thought this was interesting. This street borders the 32nd Street School which is directly across and below my bedroom window. All the cars were black with the exception of one very dark blue truck which could pass for black.

Train

September 26 | Beech National Park

Are there trains in national parks in the US? There are in Hungary. Thy take you into the forest and you can hike there. Much better and more exciting than driving in, in my opinion.

Here we are returning to Szilvásvárad after a little hiking in the forest. I am planning to return there tomorrow if I have time.

Damages

September 25, 2009 | Hole in wall

I don't know what is up with drunk people, but they are weird. I think there is a correlation between alcohol consumption and damage to walls because this happened in my apartment complex last year, too. I wonder what is going through their minds such that punching/kicking a wall is necessary.

Envelope

September 23 | Kitchen table

I received your envelope on Wednesday. The customs slip conveniently described the contents: "card and pictures".

Getting mail is more exciting than I imagined it. Thank you very much!

Cinematography

September 24, 2009 | School of Cinematic Arts at night

Overall, not that interesting, I think, but it is the newest building on-campus. I think it is architecturally not bad, but it looks a lot different from the other buildings on-campus, and all the other buildings look different from the others. So, it really sticks out. Maybe it's supposed to be kind of extravagant and foreign to represent one of the roles of cinematic art. I do not so much like the new fountain. Not as cool as other ones on-campus.

Leibniz

September 24 | College International, CLA

Our Classical Algebra professor brought treats to class today to encourage people to come to the last class. This is one of two packages of "Leibniz Minis" that got passed around. (Get the math joke?)

I've dropped all the green classes at this point, and my schedule is pretty much finalized.

Crossing

September 23, 2009 | Crosswalk

Hmmm, it doesn't look too congested from this angle. But I can assure you it is mass chaos going across. Well, it's not so bad since everyone is going very slowly. People cross laterally and diagonally. If X is crossing diagonally and Y is crossing diagonally not from the opposite or same corner, it's not quite wise to ride and swerve around the other. Of course, at this crosswalk, there are quite a few more bikers to complicate things. We get approximately 23 seconds to shuffle from one point to another. Go!

Figaro

September 23 | Hungarian State Opera House

Today a twelvesome of us, BSMers, went to see the Marriage of Figaro in Budapest's opera house. Tickets were in bunches, and I sat in one of those boxes. View is good if you're in the first row, almost nonexistent if you're in the second.

Jacaranda

September 22, 2009 | Purple Tree

You should look up a picture of these trees in full bloom. They are quite purple! I like their seed pods. Interesting. I miss being surrounded by evergreen trees.

It is officially fall. Yay! And the forecast for tomorrow is low 90s. Hurray! :/

Supercritical

September 22 | The "Big Circle Road"

I should first explain the title: today was "critical mass" and it was super. Hence, supercritical.

Apparently it's a worldwide thing but Budapest's is one of the biggest. Of course, I had to take pictures. And since that was too easy and I like to challenge myself: let's find me friend Chris and run after him, and take pictures of him. Find him in a crowd of tens of thousands of bikers. I was very systematic. He was not surprised to see me.

Peppers

September 21, 2009 | Bell peppers!

Bell peppers are yummy. Cooked or raw. :) I also enjoy tomatoes, cucumbers, and lettuce. Well, as for tomatoes, they are fruits. And I don't eat my fruits cooked, generally. Wait...cucumbers are fruits, too. And so are bell peppers, possibly. I'm confused and have no time to think this out.

It's weird knowing that I'm missing you by just a few minutes. Evil presentation. Honestly, who does sexual education at 10PM?

Yogurtology

September 21, 2009 | My refrigerator

Here's a bit on my approach to yogurts:

• Yogurts are bought in groups of ten: two cherry, two peach, two strawberry, two raspberry, two mixed berries.
• Yogurts are queued by expiration date first, then randomly.
• The first five yogurts in the queue fit in the space that you see. So, the yogurtometer only works in the range 0 - 5 yg. The current reading is 4 yg.
• When the yogurtometer reads low, it is time to go to an ABC (food store) and buy ten more.

Regardless of the reading, I will go to an ABC tomorrow and buy a bar of chocolate (thanks for the suggestion, and I'm glad you found yours!) and a piece of cake (or equivalent) to help with all the homework that I will need to do.

Abandonment

September 20, 2009 Bicycle death

This unfortunate bike was raped in many ways. No seat, no wheels, no handlebars. I hope I never see my bike suffer this same fate. Though, I guess I would prefer a missing tire over a missing bike. My last-year roommate had her bike stolen. :( Our campus isn't very big at all, but many people bike because it is much faster. Plus, our campus is flat (but beautiful), and it doesn't rain often. The other day a girl was biking towards me, and I braked and swerved one direction, coming to nearly a complete stop. She slowly tapped into my bike. It was amusing. I get into more bike accidents than car accidents.

Ferry

September 20 | Nagymaros - Visegrád

I guess, this is what a ferry should look like, but I only figured it out a minute or so before departure: the ramp thing floats. The ferry did not run when I was returning, since I was returning late, but there was a small boat, possible the same one - I don't remember.

The Visegrád castle and palace were interesting, especially the castle on the hill. I'll upload pictures on Facebook when I'm not falling asleep, which is almost the case at present.

Postcard

September 19, 2009| Hamburgers

People who love me send me postcards. This one is from my brother who was in Germany, until he left for Taiwan a few weeks ago. Wow...mail is kind of slow.

Szegedi

September 19 | Restaurant in Szeged

This is what I had for dinner today. The second real dinner this week, and exceptional. I persuaded the group to eat at a nice place, and I think everyone enjoyed it.

You can see turkey stuffed with something and dried plums, and bread things with apples inside (like mini apple pies). But notice the folded slice of orange, the carrot slice in the shape of a flower, and the mint leaf. Behind are slices of apple, cut in perfect right angles.

It has been a very artistic and delicious dish.

Parking

September 18, 2009 My car on a street!

Ahhhh! I parallel parked today!! It was awesome!! Literally, I haven't parallel parked since my license exam. But Peter was being late as usual, so in the meantime Tiffany instructed me on parallel parking. (We were going to UCLA's uvillage, Westwood Village, for dinner.) I was very proud of myself. Hehe. Won't be doing that again for another few years. Unless I am in a life-or-death situation.

Restaurant

September 18 | Pizzeria / Restaurant in Szeged

This is the interior of the restaurant where we had dinner just two hours ago. Food was not exceptional, but good and cheap, and considering that I have not yet had a real dinner this week, I enjoyed it.

I'm using a public hotspot in the city center. That's about 10 minutes from the hostel, so I don't think I'll come here at 07:45 tomorrow. I'll send you an e-mail with what we can do.

Stairs

September 17, 2009 | Dinner

It is possible that I had dinner at the Cheesecake factory with my whole apartment + Peter + Jen's parents. They have an up escalator! That amused me. Also, one day, I'm going to The Cheesecake Factory for the 1200-calorie cheesecakes, not for dinner. I never get around to dessert! :(

Candy

September 17 | Out of the Fridge

The contents of this Rafaello box are Russian caramels and a few confetes. I bought these when I last visited the Russian store near the college. The labels on most candies display the trade mark "RotFront", a candy factory in Moscow. Many good candies come out of there.

Philosophy

September 16, 2009 | A courtyard

The philosophy building has one of the nicest courtyards on campus. I'm jealous. I think it must be the archways. Also, Jen (who is watching me type) says there is a library in there. I suppose that means she and I will be visiting it in the near future.

Anonymvs

September 16 | City Park

Here we are, doing math homework by the Anonymvs statue in the city park. This is symbolic: Paul Erdős and his friends, some of whom became famous mathematicians, once brainstormed on problems in this park, by this statue.

People walked by us, some took pictures, one stopped to make a sketch. Needless to say, they were probably looking at the statue, oblivious to its history. One even asked us to move so he could take a picture. But a woman who spoke English passed by and asked us about the man depicted therein. One of us responded: "He was a scribe. And about 60 years ago a group of young mathematicians worked on problems here. Most of them were pretty famous." She responded: "Oh, like you guys!"

But it was more than 60 years. It was in the 30's, before the Nazi occupation. Most of Erdős's friends were Jewish and did not survive the Second World War.

Statistics

September 15, 2009 | Totoro!

Sorry about the picture quality. This bunny is sooooooooooooooooo cute! And soft and fluffy. S/he made an appearance in stats today! It was an exciting, but long evening tonight. We went to our professor's apartment for a break. She is resident faculty to the building we have stats in which functions as 1/6 random rooms and 5/6 residential suites and dorms. It's complicated.

Teas

September 15 | My apartment

These are the teas that I bought in Hungary so far. I'm experimenting with flavors, and think I like the raspberry tea the best.

Except for strawberry tea which I bought today, the boxes are almost void of tea bags. They just sit there so when the day comes, I can take a picture of them and share it with you.

Transportation

September 14, 2009 | LAUSD

Yay! Buses! It reminds me of old times when I would ride a bus to school, except the buses I rode in were typically more box-shaped and pointy. The school is right across the street from my apartment. The children are quite loud...pretty much all day. It's K-12, I think.

Party

September 13 | My apartment

This is what I came home to. Actually, most of the food was gone and the food that was left wasn't that exciting. (I bought a whole box of Ikea cookies the day before, and got the last one.) I should stop coming home late on Sundays, so I can actually eat something.

This was the fourth weekly Sunday-night dinner.

Asians

September 13, 2009 | Asians socializing

I had a party for dance today. This is a not a very good picture, expecially since practically everyone's back is against you. Anyway, there was a good amount of meeting people, and there was partaking of food. I also went "swimming" for a few minutes. Of course, the only things I can do in water are float on my back and sink. I am also an accomplished stander.

Kittens

September 14 | Tehilarska cesta
(near Štúrovo-Železničný rad, Slovakia)

I did go to Esztergom today, but never got to the basilica. Yeah. After crossing the border to Slovakia, I decided to explore and ended up going on a circa-15-mile compound loop across Slovakia. It consisted of climbing a hill, where there were nice views. I'll upload pictures later.

Slovakia is very different from Hungary, and this is something I haven't seen in a very long time: two kittens (one you see, another gray with stripes) beside a road, probably abandoned. I wish I had fish crackers to feed them...

Taiwanese

September 12, 2009 Asians having dinner

Jen loves making funny faces. The girl in white is Aly. Peter took the picture. We ate at a Taiwanese-style restaurant near the Asian supermarket where I needed to buy rice. We all had beef noodle soup because everyone is so lame and copied me. Okay, only sort of. We were in the city of Monterey Park which is about 25 minutes from school depending on who is driving. They have a thriving Asian population with a healthy number of Taiwanese people (and restaurants). ^.^

Tower

September 12 | Buda Hills

So, I didn't go to Esztergom today. At the metro I ran into two BSMers who were going hiking in the Buda hills. You know how much I like hiking.

Our fairly short hike started at the end of one tram line and ended at the end of another tram line. One the way we climbed several hills and two lookout towers: this funny-looking one was the first.

I'll go to Esztergom tomorrow.

Stray

September 11, 2009 | Stray cat!

Much like our conversations, this cat is a stray. Unfortunately, stray cats are not attracted to typical cat calls and "here, kitty!" which makes me a little sad inside. Once I saw three stray kittens (one grey, one black, one orange), but they would not play with me. I was sad.

Russians

September 11 | Jenny's apartment

Yesterday was Jenny's 21st birthday (she's the one dressed up), and today we had a birthday party. I don't know what the recently-traditional 21st birthday is, except that it probably involves getting drunk.

The others in the picture are McDaniel College students, not BSM students. The one on the right is Russian and was showing the one on the left how Russians drink Vodka. Hence, the title.

Introductions

September 10, 2009 | Apartment Door

So, when you live in dorms or school housing, they want RAs to pretend to be interested in you. They make you fill out info sheets, even if you're the last apartment in the hall and no one will ever stop by. Well, this one with written by Tiffany for our resident White girl Elisabeth. We love her. Actually, there's almost too much love in this apartment. I wouldn't be surprised if I got swine flu from her.

Erdős

September 10 | Renyi Institute

This is a room (more of a hall) inside Renyi Institute. There's math on the blackboard, noticeably non-commutative group theory, and perhaps something related to knots. (If you look carefully, you'll see strings like "abba", "aabab", etc.) There are two mathematicians discussing something: the one on the left is probably a Doctor of Science, and the one on the right looks like a grad student.

Behind the mathematicians, you see us going downstairs toward the exit. At around that point in space-time, we watched "N is a Number", a movie about Paul Erdős, a great Hungarian mathematician of the 20th century. Interesting movie, since I recognized the places in Budapest that were shown, particularly, the parks and the academy of sciences. I have yet to find the house where Erdős lived and the statue by which Erdős and his collegues brainstormed on various mathematical problems.

Bookstacks

September 9, 2009 | Earthquake/fire hazard

So, there is a library at my school that is much larger than it appears. It's really cute. You go into the library and walk behind a counter, and you would think that would be a staff area or something. But no, instead you enter the fifth floor of the bookstacks while being on the main floor of the library. You could easily get lost while looking for a book, and a map (and they do have maps) will not do you much good. There is fluorescent tape on the ground, though not here, to lead you to the elevator and the exits. The books reach the ceiling. I think you could die here and no one would know for a while...

9-9-9

September 9 | Number theory class

During a break of my number theory class (roughly 9:00 to 9:15) I captured the moment. At least, according to my watch which could have been off by a few seconds.

Desktop

September 8, 2009 | A picture of us!

Please don't say I totally weird you out with all the things I do.

Study

September 8 | Madeline's and Daniel's apartment

We've met tonight to work on problems for the classical algebra class. I ended up solving a Rubik's cube a few times (mine needs maintenance), and trying to make progress on a really hard problem. (I'm still stuck.) I'm still there. I should probably go home and sleep.

We had tea on a side, and I brought cakes that caused a reaction like nothing I could have anticipated. You should have been there.

These "study parties" were common at UW, though, having been a commuter, I rarely participated. They're a fun way to do homework at the expense of getting less sleep.

Singing

September 7. 2009 | Collegiate a cappella

Yes, definitely not classical. Our school has one all-female group, one all-male, and four mixed groups. Two of the mixed groups are pretty serious (they compete more and they dress nicely), and two are pretty laid-back (they are pretty often fun to watch).

Class!

September 7 | College International

Today was the first day of class. After an introduction by the program director who gave us lots of good advice about what to do and what not to do in Budapest some of us went here. This is "Real Functions and Measures," a very specific continuation of calculus. The professor started the class with introducing the subject, and jumped right into lecture, introducing the basic concepts and assigning a problem as an exercise.

Here's our first math topic: imagine a space where the distance between any two points is 1. (He mentioned this as an example, since such a space is indeed possible.) For 3 points it is a triangle, for 4 points: a tetrahedron, for more points, a corresponding figure in a higher-dimensional space.

Anyway, a lot of people showed up to all of the classes today. I think, many students including me are taking advantage of the 3 weeks trial period to sit in as many classes as possible. That's why classes are crowded. We managed to find space so far. In the afternoon we had a reception (to meet the professors) where we talked to the Dynamical Systems professor about scheduling a time for our first meeting. It's a reading class, and a meeting wasn't scheduled. Luckily, no conflict. Lots of classes cancelled first week, which means I'll be sitting in for other classes. Not sure what the first week will be like, except that I'll be in class.

Crazy. And fun.

Aerials

September 7, 2009 | From atop a tower

The windows weren't very clean. There was quite a nice view from the tower, even though the surrounding mountains are dry, brown, and generally tree-less. I didn't spend much time in the tower, but I'm glad that I got a chance to go up. This pretty much summarizes my sentiment towards being on a ride - as in, oh hey, I like the view from the top. The rides were fun, too, I guess. There was one pretty interesting one that had music and fire and mist and loops and turning seats. Considering students pay $26, it was worthwhile. But then, the drinks are overpriced even more so than movie theater drinks. And there's parking. And there's locker-renting. Driving takes a while. I'm exhausted.

Skanzen

Septermber 6 | Skanzen

This is where I spent the last day of my summer. No, it's not a village - it's the Skanzen open air museum, in the countryside North of Budapest. The museum features these houses, churches, furniture - basically, the lifestyle of people in Hungary somewhere in the late 19th and early 20th century. Going inside whereever was open was fun, and also taking the non-obvious trails through the park, like tht one path through the woods along the perimeter.

The museum / park was tiring. I think, though, that this long weekend was unusually productive. First, Pécs. Then, the zoo. And, finally, Skanzen.