Journal of a Sabbatical

May 3, 2001

francia krémes

Today's Reading: Urban Transportation by Zoltán Várnagy

It's still hot. The pollen count is pretty high too, and I'm starting to feel a little like I'd rather be back home.

Man with Cable came to retrieve his cable and deliver a USB hub. I guess I convinced him such an item was indeed available in Budapest. He also delivered the CD-RW we ordered awhile back. It too has a USB connection so we really really need that hub. I forgot to mention in yesterday's entry that István had forgotten that I had unplugged the scanner so the Croatian guy could use the Zip drive when we were all ignoring the holiday and when he and Karoly started working before I got in after my exciting metro ride they concluded there was some problem with the scanner. It wasn't until I arrived and they told me there was a scanner problem that István remembered my unplugging it. Yup, we definitely need this USB hub.

Zsolt somehow made all the documents on his new laptop read-only so he brought it to me at the Botanical Department to diagnose and fix. I have no idea how it got that way, but I simply selected all the documents in question and changed the Properties. Quick. Simple. All his computer problems should be so easy to fix.

Since I'm leaving tomorrow, Zsolt wanted me to say an official goodbye to his mother and take a walk along the Danube with him on the way to her house. A walk along the Danube with Zsolt is a tour of the trees: the trees he planted, the trees he disapproved of the authorities' planting, the trees he likes, the trees he dislikes. I have to admit that although I had noticed that the Colorado spruce trees looked a little weird in that little park by the river I had no idea they were planted by the Russians who knew them from the Crimea. They really do look silly in Mittel Europa.

We stopped in and disrupted Mass at a Catholic church because Zsolt wanted to show me an alcove in the church that dates back to the Turkish occupation. It was worth seeing, but I felt kind of guilty walking right past the "Tourists Stop Here" signs.

He had a notion to bring some pastries to Mom, so we stopped at a bakery. Could we just buy them and bring them to Mom untried? Nope. He insisted I order two Francia Kremés in Hungarian so we could taste them before deciding whether they were suitable for Mom. Fortunately the guy behind the counter understood English because I mangled the Hungarian. And we liked the pastries so he went and stood in line again to order some more to go.

We ran into Vince and his family in the metro station. The little baby I remember from dinner at their place two years ago is walking now. She's adorable. The two boys have grown much taller. Vince didn't recognize Zsolt at first. That was pretty funny. Apparently I had seen Vince more recently than Zsolt had.

Zsolt's Mom was glad to see me to verify for herself that I was not hurt in my crazy fall. We ate the Francia Kremés and drank fruit juice on the terrace. Zsolt pointed out to me his evergreen oak. His Mom showed me her pet turtle (apparently it's genetic - this turtle thing). I took a taxi back to the Entomologists' place.

Oh, I forgot to mention that Man with Cable got the floppy drive unstuck too so I went back and added in the pictures to previous entries.

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