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Published: August 22nd 2013
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I'm here! I made it! I'm alive, Mom! My flights were super uneventful, so I'll skip over those. We took off, flew a lot, landed, blah blah blah. On the flight to Hungary, I was super nervous about customs, because I have a work permit, but I don't have a visa. I didn't know whether to declare myself here for work or tourism. This was the reality of customs: get in line, give man passport, man stamps passport, get luggage, walk through empty 'nothing to declare' room, you're in Hungary!! I met Hajni with her CETP sign, and went from there.
The reality of my trip really only hit me at the end of my second flight as we were flying over all of this beautiful farmland. It was the best.
I met up with 3 other girls and Hajni, and Hajni got us a van to the hostel. As we drove to the city, I realized that Hungarian is just flat out impossible to read. Too many letters, and too many consonants. It's just too hard. Not gonna happen.
We got to the hostel, and it's BEAUTIFUL. Oh my god. There's a little square out front with
a cafe, violins, clarinets, and a fountain. It's like a storybook. I freshened up, changed out of my plane clothes, and went out to dinner with 5 people. Liz, Joanna, Kate, Charles, and Robert. We walked around the block but ended up settling on a place that I called Prague because it said Prague all over the umbrellas. Turns out, in that group at least, I am the only one who knows even a little bit of Hungarian. They put me in charge of communicating with the waiter. We all started out getting Hoegaarden, which came in giant mugs, and then three of us got goulash (you're welcome, Antonio), and three got some chicken dish. I got goulash, of course. It was crazy delicious but SO HOT that those of us who were eating it started sweating and had to drink our beers faster (hard life). At the end, only three people paid because the rest of us hadn't converted our money or found an ATM yet.
After dinner, everyone wanted to go to the hostel bar, but I still had no forints, so Charles and I went on an adventure to find an ATM. And what an adventure
it was. We walked down the one main road by our hostel, passed by countless bars, a sex shop, and a strip joint, until we FINALLY found an open ATM. I tried my card (I've already notified my bank that I was traveling), and it didn't work. It wouldn't even let me check my balance. So Charles tries his card, and of course it lets him take out 20,000 forint immediately. I need to call my bank again. On our way back to the hostel, we walked too far and got hopelessly lost. I asked about 4 people where we needed to go. The first woman was Asian and spoke neither Hungarian nor English. The second man pointed erratically, and the third man was actually helpful. Finally we ended up in the right area, but we still weren't sure where we were. The map we were given had itty bitty print, and none of the street names seemed to be on there. Finally, we ran into an Australian couple who pointed us in the direction of the hostel. It was a good bonding adventure though.
When we got back to the hostel, we went to the bar, and I
had a victory glass of wine (bought for me because I still have no forints), met a bunch of other people from the program, and then went to bed. And now here I am.
My first stop tomorrow is breakfast, and then finding a bank to convert my cash. Forints galore!
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Dad
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ATMs
Kate, The ATM you need to find needs to have the VISA Plus symbol on it. Here is a map of ATMs in Budipest http://www.visa.com/atmlocator/index.jsp#(page:results,params:(query:budapest)) Love dad