I Miss Justin

Enough said. Here we are the day I flew out from Ferihegy (Budapest Airport).

Roommates

I am living with two other women this week. Alyssa lives here and teaches art at Black Forest Academy. She is really sweet and helpful, but she'll be leaving on Thursday to visit her parents who are missionaries in France. It is such a blessing to stay in her apartment.

Abby teaches kindergarten in Panama and was here last week and will be here for two more weeks. She started the PBU program this summer and I look forward to having classes with her and hanging out with her. She is also familiar with Aggies and Freebirds, so we got off to a great start! :)

This is the apartment where we are staying. It's quite nice and spacious and it's on a hill with a nice view. The hill is quite steep and a good work out, especially carrying a laptop and books. I wonder if I'll lose some weight?

Here's the view, my bedroom, and the kitchen.

Kandern, Germany

I flew into Basel, Switzerland, yesterday and someone met me there to take me to Kandern, Germany. I will be taking four graduate classes in these next four weeks. (Sadly, Justin is not with me and I miss him already and think about him all the time. That isn't too helpful for studying.)

Philadelphia Biblical University in Pennsylvania, USA, has a summer graduate program here and I am taking advantage of it. It certainly saves me money since I don't have to fly across the ocean to attend classes. The professors fly out here to personally teach the class, it's not an on-line class. Each week is a different class and professor. Monday through Friday from 8:30 am to 4:30 pm, until July 25, I will be in class. Here is a list of my classes, in order:
Curriculum Theory, Design, and Assessment
Philosophy of Education
Growth and Development of Third Culture Kids in International Context
Overview of Christian Theology

Because the classes are only one week long, there is a lot of pre-course work and some post-course work. I still need to prepare some things for Monday. So, that's what I will be focusing on today. (I started the program last year, so I've seen Kandern. So, that's not distracting for me.)

Saying Goodbye...for now...

Friday evening, Justin and I had dinner with our friends, Dave and Melissa. Dave has been our school's principal for four years. Melissa used to teach middle school Bible classes before becoming the mother of two BEAUTIFUL little girls. They have been here ever since we came in 2002 and the Lord has blessed us immensely through their friendship.

They are going to move to Moses Lake, WA, USA, on July 6. Since I leave today for four weeks in Germany, last night was the last time I'd see them before they move. We had a great time eating good food at a little italian place in Budaors, a nearby town. (Mel, I still can't get over how good that bread was! And the wine was perfect!) I didn't wear mascara because I knew that I would cry sometime that night. After dinner, we went back to their house and said goodbye to their little girls. So far, so good, no crying. So we hung out while Dave went to school for something and Mel put the girls to bed.

Justin had a brilliant idea while Mel was upstairs. He wanted to take pics of us with their stuff or just pics of us in their house doing funny things or making funny faces. Random? Very. So, we did that and I look forward to sending one photo to them via snail mail with a letter to help remind them of us and hopefully ease their transition to Washington. (Dave and Mel, if you're reading this, be prepared for some fun pics!) And it's so fun to get something in the mail. I think actual letter-writing is a lost art.

But when Mel came down, we talked about the things they need to do, memories, and family. It was fun to remember the first time we had dinner with them. Breakfast for dinner, chocolate chip pancakes! Ingenious! I had never thought of adding choc. chips to pancakes before. And most of my memories involve them with food.. Great times!

When Dave came back from school, we chatted a bit more and Justin and I wanted to pray for them. Justin prayed first and then I prayed. As soon as I started praying, the tears flowed. They prayed for us as well. I will miss them so much!

Dave and Melissa, I love you and I don't have words to truly express how much I will miss you!



(Next summer, we'll be back Texas for the summer. Does anyone know if there is cheap airfare from Houston to Seatle?)

Eger, Hungary

From Monday until Wednesday, Justin and I were in Eger celebrating 8 years of marraige. Eger is a village in the northeastern part of Hungary, about 2 hours away from Budapest.

We found a hotel, Kulacs Csarda Panzio , on-line that had a special for two nights that included breakfast and a candlelight dinner. It is located outside of the downtown area called the Valley of the Beautiful Women. There are around 200 wine cellars in this area at which you can get very cheap wine.

Here is a view from our balcony and two pics of our room.

Here's the breakfast area, right outside our room! I have heard that a Hungarian breakfast is typical of Europe: bread, sliced meats, boiled eggs, cereals, yogurt, juices, coffee/tea. I'm enjoying hot chocolate!

After checking into our hotel, we went to the city center to find the Tourinform. There we found out that a special day will be celebrated on Tuesday, called St. Ivan's Day and there will be festivities right outside our hotel! :)

After that, we walked around the city to see what was to see. We got very pretty pics of the streets. For about $1.30 each, we climbed the northernmost Minaret left by the Turks when they ruled over Hungary. It is not a feat for claustrophobics as the tower is only a staircase enclosed by walls. It is 40 meters (130 feet) high and gives a great view of Eger and the surrounding countryside.

We walked around the city some more and visited a park. We also visited a very nice mall there and discovered a Subway sandwich place, so we ate there. Don't worry, we ate great Hungarian food while in Eger too.

After a very hot drive to Eger and walking around Eger on a very hot sunny day, we pretty much crashed after dinner. We were thrilled to come back to an air-conditioned hotel room!

On Tuesday, we had a great breakfast then headed into town again. (Festivities in our area wouldn't start until 3 pm.) From the information we got at the tourist office, we knew what we wanted to see. We visited Gardonyi Geza's house first. He was a famous Hungarian writer and wrote Eclipse of the Crescent Moon about a battle with the Turks. His house is now a museum and overlooks Eger. Then we headed to the Lyceum, or university. On the top floors is located a museum about the history of telescopes. At the very top of the university is the camera obscura, or periscope, that "spies" on Eger. There is a very small opening on top of the building and a mirror and lens allows you to see the goings-on of the town. In order for this to work, there needs to be a dark room where the light reflected off the mirror can pass through the lens and onto a white table. We were amazed at how clearly the image on the table was! We could watch people from that room! Then we headed across the street to the Basilica and took some pictures. Last, we wanted to see the natatorium because of its architecture. Outside the natatorium is an interesting clock tower.

Finally, back to the szepasszonyvolgy, the valley of the beautiful women. Not much was going on at 3 pm. We wondered what the dragon building and flying models were about on the paper that we got from Tourinform. It sounded so interesting! We figured we'd find it from following the crowd. No crowd. Some people were there eating at restaurants and drinking wines, but we didn't see much going on. So, we had lunch. I had a Hortobagyi palacsinta and Justin had turkey breast with fruit and rice. Then we headed to one of the wine cellars and tried two white wines. (You could try 1 deciliter for 80 HUF, which is about 53 cents.)We tried a Le'anyka-almagyar (dry) and a Mucat Ottonel (semi-sweet). We like the Le'anyka, the Mucat was actually very sweet to us. Then we found out that the dragon building and flying things was for kids! There were 3-4 booths set up for kids and they were coloring dragons. So, off to another wine cellar. :)

(Rows of wine cellars.)

This time we tried a Merlot rose at 70 HUF per deciliter. We didn't like it. We walked around a bit more and more people were showing up. We decided to go take showers and go to our special candlelight dinner. As we walked back to our hotel, a parade of kids was walking past. They were singing and dressed in traditional clothes! On our paper that we got from Tourinform, it said they were going to do folkdancing. As it was 7 pm, and our dinner was at 8, we couldn't watch it.

Our candlelight dinner was wonderful. We sat under an area covered with grapevines. I assume that when they are ripe, the guests could just pick them and eat them. There was a gypsy band playing the violin, clarinet, bass, and another string instrument that I don't know the name for. One of the volinists would walk around and play in front of your table. For starters, Justin had cold-fruit soup and I had fried camembert with blueberry sauce. For the main course, Justin had roasted ham on a bed of beans and I had chicken breast with mushrooms and onions on a bed of roasted potatoes. I LOVED my food! We did not have wine for obvious reasons.

(the grapevine-covered restaurant)

(the gypsy band)

Around 9:15pm, we had finished our dinner and walked up to the wine cellars again. This time, in a central area, we saw people playing with fire! They had a ring, about the size of a bike wheel, and it was lit on fire. With the help of some people wearing orange, kids were lined up to roll the wheel. (Yes, I said kids.) They put on this wet glove and just pushed it along the ground. It was exciting for about 5 minutes. We walked up to the wine cellars, but were sadly too full to try anymore wines. So, we just bought a bottle of the famous Egri Bikave'r, a dry red. We walked back to the crowd and now saw people JUMPING over a fire. Again, exciting for about 5 minutes. We went back to our hotel, hoping to go back out at 11 pm for a concert in the area, but fell asleep.

Pray For the Apel Family

I'd like you to pray for the healing of Libby Apel. She and her family used to live in Budapest and work at ICSB. They now live in Florida. Lorn is her husband and taught high school math. They have a little boy and girl.

Libby was diagnosed with ovarian cancer during the winter of 2004. She has been fighting it ever since and at one point was in remission. Her cancer marker score is now lower, which is good news.

However, she developed a blockage in her small intestine and now has an ileosotomy. Her output has been high and the drugs she is taking are helping little. Lorn has said she has lost a lot of weight. Please pray that our God will heal her body and give His strength to this family.

Luke 18:1

Then Jesus told his disciples a parable to show them that they should always pray and not give up.

Grilled Pizza With the White Family

A few weeks ago I found a recipe for grilling pizza. We tried it and loved it and tonight had our friends, the Whites, come over for some. I had made the dough in advance and we all made our own pizzas. Their daughter, Samantha, said I made a really good crust! (You know you made something good when a 4-year old tells you they like it.)

Samantha and their other daughter, Nora, helped me to water my flowers. They were very helpful. We also played a game and I was the mean witch/stepmother and Samantha was Cinderella. I forgot who Nora was, but she was a stepsister. So, since I was mean, I made them "mop" and "sweep" and "clean" the house and Cinderella had to write a letter to me telling me how beautiful and nice I am and how lovely I sing and dance. Then, I gave Cinderella only vegetables for dinner, while I had really good pizza. How's that for mean? :)

When we had dessert, we stopped pretending. There's something about brownies and ice cream that quietted everything down, even with the adults!

Here the girls are drawing.

Here's the pizza before it's flipped. (We don't have an actual grill, but a stovetop grill that Justin's mom bought us. We use it A LOT! Thanks, Mom!)

Here's Dave and Mel making their pizzas. Dave seemed to take the job seriously and Mel just had fun with it. :)

Night of Museums in Budapest

On Saturday, June 21, we went into Budapest for the annual Night of Museums. Our friend and co-worker Lisa picked us up and we headed into the city to eat dinner at Arriba Taqueria. It's a great little mexican food place, much like Freebird's in College Station. There we met a recent acquaintence of Lisa's who had tried to visit the museums last year, but started around 8pm and the lines were just too long.

At around 6 pm, we walked to the first museum to buy our ticket for the night, which turned out to be a sticker. Very efficient, as all we had to do was point to it on our shirts to get in quickly to the other museums. We didn't have to wait in the long lines and felt like VIPs! We ended up visiting five museums for 1200 HUF (about $8) and stayed out until 1 am and headed home. The crowds weren't as bad as I thought they'd be. All in all, we had a really good time!

First stop was the Terror House, a museum remembering the scary time under the rule of Nazis and Communists. A very moving museum to say the least. As you enter, there is a tank in front of a wall of black and white pictures of people who were killed during that time. This is the view looking up outside the museum.

Then we went to the Hungarian Contemporary Art Museum. The current art is part of their Na Mi Van? theme. It means "What's up?" A few things on display are a pencil sticking out of the wall that has written "invisible man", a performance of music and light, and a man who takes pictures of himself "surfing" on the inside of a bus and stretching in an elevator, and a huge bear lying down with a black cube sticking out of his stomach.

Next, we went across Heroe's Square to the Hungarian Fine Arts Museum. We didn't spend too much time in there because there were so many paintings. The highlight of this museum was the jazz concert that could be heard throughout the museum. Also, for the crowd outside waiting to get in, there were street performers twirling cords on fire! That was also fun to watch.

Justin was told he could not take pictures in the museum after he took this one.

Next, we went to the Transportation Museum (our name for it because I can't think of the name for it). We don't have pictures of this one, but it was pretty cool. It was all about the history of trains, bridges, ships, cars, etc. in Hungary. (Julie, I recommend this place for Eli! We think he'd have a lot of fun there.)

Last stop was the Hungarian Natural History Museum. The displays there were pretty cool. As you enter, there is a Fin Whale skeleton hanging from the ceiling. It was captured in 1896! There were exhibits of mammals from various parts of the world, an ice age exhibit, a coral reef room, fossils and minerals. As soon as I entered the main hall, I saw a long line to the left and saw that people were getting a fagyi (ice cream cone). As I watched, I noticed no one was paying, so I got in line. :) I noticed everyone had a piece of paper and I asked the woman behind me if I needed one. Sadly, she said igen (yes), so I got out of line before I completely embarassed myself. Most of the people in line were families with little kids, so I guessed somewhere there was a place to get those pieces of paper. I never found it.

This is the fine whale. I'm not sure why Justin didn't take a picture of the skull, but it's the best picture from that museum.

Hungarian proverbs

Today I learned a few Hungarian proverbs from Zsuzsa:

Lassan j'arj, tova'bb e'rsz. = Go slowly, reach further.

Lassu' viz, partot mos. = Slow water washes the shore.

These mean if you take your time, you'll be able to accomplish what you want or accomplish more than you thought possible.

Tomorrow Justin and I will go to the once-a-year event in Budapest: Mu'zeumok E'szakaja (Night of Museums). From 6 pm to 2 am, several museums will be open to the public for only one admission. I believe you just pay at the first museum you go to and the rest of the evening that ticket will get you into all the other museums. They even have free buses that will run along the route of the museums. I've heard it's quite an experience due to the amount of people that come out. I am really looking forward to it and can't wait to tell you about it! Stay tuned for pics and comments! :)