Last week I spent my first Thanksgiving away from home. Seven American and one Canadian teachers got together in Gyor, Hungary (west of Budapest) to celebrate a holiday with food! We did our best to make dishes from home. There was no turkey, cranberry sauce or pumpkin pie. We did have homemade noodles (thanks to me), mashed potatoes, stuffing and apple pie! I know we all missed our families but we had a great time being with good friends and stuffing ourselves full of the most American meal any of us have had in months! We even went around the table and gave thanks; it was mostly that we had each other!
I attempted to make homemade noodles for the first time according to Grandma Rosie’s recipe. There was flour everywhere and I traveled 4 hours by train with noodles for twelve, haha! Though they weren’t as good as either of my grandma’s ever made them, or Uncle Milton, they weren’t bad for my first time at the rodeo (I don’t think I cooked them in enough broth). People ate them and even took seconds so they couldn’t have been terrible. None of them had ever had noodles like this before, which is a completely foreign idea to me, I mean what is Thanksgiving without noodles? Also, as I was leaving to catch my train the mail man came with a package for me. Who was it from and what could it be? I had mentioned how I missed pumpkin flavored things in an e-mail to Aunt Sharon about a month ago and apparently she felt my pain. She sent me pumpkin fudge and the timing was impeccable. It was a perfect addition to our Thanksgiving meal.
Wednesday night I stayed in Budapest in route to Gyor. I got to meet up with Amy Atwood, close family friend, in the city for dinner! It was so good seeing her, as it had been quite some time, and really cool that we could meet up in Budapest of all places! She is traveling with a friend’s family. I enjoyed a great meal with them and really enjoyed getting to see someone from home, even if only for a couple of hours! I stayed with my friend Celia in the city and we headed to Thanksgiving together the next day.
On Friday Celia and I headed back to Budapest. Due to late trains and missed connections I ended up staying in Budapest on Friday instead of heading back to Nyírbátor. We decided to head to the Christmas market and I’m glad we did! There were stalls set up in the square with food, hot wine, crafts, hats, etc. and it felt like Christmas! We walked around for a while and got food, but mostly just enjoyed the generally merriment! That night we watched Home Alone, more Christmas spirit, and went to one of Celia’s friend’s place. It snowed in Budapest on Friday, the first snow, and it was quite a first snow. I’d say there was probably an inch or two on the ground. It was good packing snow, so we had a little snowball fight.
Saturday I made my way back to Nyírbátor and got ready for the teacher’s ball. It was retro themed so there were many bouffant hair-dos in the room. We had been practicing for a little more than a month to do a dance and I think it went brilliantly! I had so much fun at the ball. The atmosphere was much like a wedding reception, without the bride and groom. We danced away the night to retro Hungarian music, let’s just say my feet hurt a little bit today!
I posted new pictures under the "Life as a Magyar" link!
Sunday, November 28, 2010
Sunday, November 14, 2010
Sör, Pivo, Bier, Beer
Last Sunday I arrived back in Nyírbátor after a week of traveling. The school was on fall break as it fell over a holiday, All Saints Day. After a difficult journey home, due to missed connections at the train station, I crashed! Monday morning I difficultly got up to teach. Vacation was over.
I traveled to Prague and Munich with fellow CETP teachers (aka English speaking). The Czech Republic is known for its beer and Munich for its beer halls. We of course tried the beer in each of these places. ;) Also, staying in hostels in both cities allowed us to meet young people from all over the world. We met people from France, Spain, Brazil, Australia, Austria, New Zealand, Norway, and obviously from Germany and the Czech Republic. It was really interesting to hear why they were there and intimidating at the same time because most of them spoke at least two languages fluently, usually three.
They are both extremely beautiful cities. Prague was on my to-do list, so check. Everything is older that you can even imagine. It makes you want to go back in time and walk on the cobblestone streets wearing boots, bloomers and most likely a girdle. We didn’t really go on tours or anything like that in either city we just walked around and enjoyed the cities, often stopping somewhere to enjoy the view or the people watching.
In Prague we walked on Charles Bridge (which was finished in the 15th century), went to the top of the hill to see the castle and changing of the guards, and Old Town square and the clock tower (famous astronomical clock, apparently the designer’s eyes were cut out so it could not be replicated). Prague was filled with tourists; I can’t even imagine what it’s like during peak traveling season.
Our first night in Prague we ate a traditional Czech meal. I had a beef roast covered in mushroom gravy with bread dumplings, it was delicious. We also ate at a Mexican restaurant one night, it wasn’t too bad. We went to The Pub our last night which had the beer tap in the middle of the table. A computer kept track of how much beer was poured and each table competed to see who could drink the most.
When we arrived in Munich it was quite the time to actually get to the city. The bus dropped us off at a bus station outside the city with no ATMs and hardly any people. It was quite the adventure; we walked for a while through an industrial part of town getting strange looks with our luggage in tow. That night we went to a beer hall and had a traditional German dinner and of course German beer, fabulous! The next day we went to Dachau, which was the first concentration camp under Nazi rule. It started as political prisoners, mostly communists and Catholic priests. We were there for almost five hours.
That evening we went to the famous and original Hofbrauhaus. This beer hall opened in the 1500s. We drank our liter beers and ate homemade pretzels as we listened to the band (wearing lederhosen) play good German drinking songs. Apparently German men come here three days a week for around (can’t remember exact amount) 15 years. They then get their own locker for their beer stein and their name posted, it’s a pretty big deal and of course the whole time they’re wearing lederhosen. If you ask me that’s dedication.
As you can see this trip had a lot of beer in it, which is why I titled this entry beer in Hungarian, Czech, German, and English. We got to see some very cool places. I believe Prague is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. It was also really interesting to see so many people from different races, something that is very rare in Hungary. You have the Hungarians and the Roma (gypsies). I had so much fun and got to meet a lot of really interesting people. Now it’s back to work and teaching not American, but British English. I added another link for pictures as well.
I’ll end with a couple of interesting anecdotes from school this week. I sang the little Indian song with my fourth graders, it was in their book (one little, two little, three little Indians). It was part of learning how to count! Also, on Friday while I was with second graders the fire alarm went off. I had no idea what was going on or what I should do. It was just a false alarm. Needless to say my lesson was pretty much a wash from that point on. I had to calm down two girls who were crying, I think they thought the school was going to burn down, and try to get the students not to watch the firefighters from the window. Ah what a day!
I traveled to Prague and Munich with fellow CETP teachers (aka English speaking). The Czech Republic is known for its beer and Munich for its beer halls. We of course tried the beer in each of these places. ;) Also, staying in hostels in both cities allowed us to meet young people from all over the world. We met people from France, Spain, Brazil, Australia, Austria, New Zealand, Norway, and obviously from Germany and the Czech Republic. It was really interesting to hear why they were there and intimidating at the same time because most of them spoke at least two languages fluently, usually three.
They are both extremely beautiful cities. Prague was on my to-do list, so check. Everything is older that you can even imagine. It makes you want to go back in time and walk on the cobblestone streets wearing boots, bloomers and most likely a girdle. We didn’t really go on tours or anything like that in either city we just walked around and enjoyed the cities, often stopping somewhere to enjoy the view or the people watching.
In Prague we walked on Charles Bridge (which was finished in the 15th century), went to the top of the hill to see the castle and changing of the guards, and Old Town square and the clock tower (famous astronomical clock, apparently the designer’s eyes were cut out so it could not be replicated). Prague was filled with tourists; I can’t even imagine what it’s like during peak traveling season.
Our first night in Prague we ate a traditional Czech meal. I had a beef roast covered in mushroom gravy with bread dumplings, it was delicious. We also ate at a Mexican restaurant one night, it wasn’t too bad. We went to The Pub our last night which had the beer tap in the middle of the table. A computer kept track of how much beer was poured and each table competed to see who could drink the most.
When we arrived in Munich it was quite the time to actually get to the city. The bus dropped us off at a bus station outside the city with no ATMs and hardly any people. It was quite the adventure; we walked for a while through an industrial part of town getting strange looks with our luggage in tow. That night we went to a beer hall and had a traditional German dinner and of course German beer, fabulous! The next day we went to Dachau, which was the first concentration camp under Nazi rule. It started as political prisoners, mostly communists and Catholic priests. We were there for almost five hours.
That evening we went to the famous and original Hofbrauhaus. This beer hall opened in the 1500s. We drank our liter beers and ate homemade pretzels as we listened to the band (wearing lederhosen) play good German drinking songs. Apparently German men come here three days a week for around (can’t remember exact amount) 15 years. They then get their own locker for their beer stein and their name posted, it’s a pretty big deal and of course the whole time they’re wearing lederhosen. If you ask me that’s dedication.
As you can see this trip had a lot of beer in it, which is why I titled this entry beer in Hungarian, Czech, German, and English. We got to see some very cool places. I believe Prague is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen. It was also really interesting to see so many people from different races, something that is very rare in Hungary. You have the Hungarians and the Roma (gypsies). I had so much fun and got to meet a lot of really interesting people. Now it’s back to work and teaching not American, but British English. I added another link for pictures as well.
I’ll end with a couple of interesting anecdotes from school this week. I sang the little Indian song with my fourth graders, it was in their book (one little, two little, three little Indians). It was part of learning how to count! Also, on Friday while I was with second graders the fire alarm went off. I had no idea what was going on or what I should do. It was just a false alarm. Needless to say my lesson was pretty much a wash from that point on. I had to calm down two girls who were crying, I think they thought the school was going to burn down, and try to get the students not to watch the firefighters from the window. Ah what a day!
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