red umbrella

July 21, 2003

I took a long walk this morning along the Danube and around central Pest. I visited a couple of bookstores, all ones I'd been to before. I had some vague intention of going to one I hadn't been to before, located between the Opera and Oktagon stops on the yellow metro line and formerly a well-known coffeehouse. Never got there. Walked a lot. Said that already. It's hot. So I made one last visit to the bookstore on the second floor of the building with the weird elevators that go up and down constantly and you have to jump off at your floor. I still couldn't make myself get on one to see what happens at the top.

Speaking of those elevators, they provide further proof that No Prob Bob (a.k.a. BiB) lives in a different Budapest from mine. I mentioned something about the elevators at a family gathering last year and he'd never seen nor heard of them. Szilvia, however, set him straight that they do exist and I'm not making them up. I described the location of the bookstore for him, but bookstores aren't really his thing.

I've finished the books I brought with me: The Orchard by Adele Crockett Robertson and In the Land of the Blue Poppies, which is excerpts from the writings of Frank Kingdon Ward. I finished The Hours. Hence the urgency of bookstore visits. Must have something to read on the flight home.

I emerged from the shop in the weird elevator building with St. Peter's Umbrella by Kálmán Mikszáth. Supposedly Pres. Theodore Roosevelt liked it so much that he met with Mikszáth during a 1910 visit to Europe. It is a brilliant study of mass psychology. I think one of the reasons it caught my attention, besides the big red umbrella on the cover, was the recent thing in Boston where people saw the image of the Virgin Mary in a chemical stain on a hospital window and came from all around to pray at it. Miraculous chemical stains in 2003, miraculous umbrellas in 1910 or whatever... Anyway, when István saw it he exclaimed "Oh,The Red Umbrella. I read it when I was 10!" So apparently it is a classic of Hungarian literature.

Speaking of red umbrellas, I started packing and noticed my new red umbrella won't fit in my suitcase. Guess I'll have to leave it behind.

Today's Reading
The Hours by Michael Cunningham

This Year's Reading
2003 Book List

Photos:

The Australian Restaurant ( next block down from the UNIX garage)