nawl

I am flying over the Atlantic. Everyone is asleep. I am again somewhat bewildered by the speed of my departure. Things move so quickly now.

I spent the last four days of my week in North America in Toronto.

It snowed the day I arrived. I don't consider that acceptable behavior for spring. While lovely, this looks to me like winter.

(On the subject of my whining about the cold, some random visitor left a random comment flaming me for being ignorant about Canadian culture. The access logs don't show a referrer, so I have no guess as to this person's motivation. On a similar note (as far as amusing and clueless web users are concerned), the comments on another one of my entries seem to have taken on an entirely new life of their own.)

Kevin brought me to a French-language book store where I bought a copy of Robert des noms propres and was rung up in French. We made corn soup with actual corn, went to the CN tower and looked out over the sprawl of Toronto, had mediocre Mexican food, watched Bride and Prejudice in an actual movie theater, and had a semi-failed swing outing. I don't think Lindy is my thing.

The CN tower is very tall.

You can look at skyscrapers and the lake.

And now I am leaving the land of drinking fountains, unlimited tap water at restaurants, clothes dryers, Cadbury creme eggs, active dry yeast, baby carrots, and people who smile at strangers.

It's strange what you miss.

When I was in Princeton, I bought a copy of Prague, a Gen-X expat novel set in 1990 Budapest. All of the characters are irritating. There are various things going on in the story, but the one that struck my own experience the hardest was the isolated expat universe the characters live in. The story is set in a city filled with Chain Bridges, Gerbaud cafes, and pizzas topped with corn, but the Hungarians populating the book either serve as sex objects, business transactions, or historical curiosities. Nobody learns any Hungarian. They're there to witness the fall of communism as outsiders.

It's an interesting contrast to the small collection of anglophone expat memoirs that I read while in France. In each case the authors attempted to learn French, interacted with normal people, and commented on their efforts and usual failures to fit into a different culture.

I'm not even sure there are any other "Hungary by expats" books to compare with. There must be. Then again, there is only one Hungarian textbook for English speakers, and it's mediocre.

--

Geneva is beautiful and green and surrounded by misty mountains accented with snow. People speak French. The airport terminals are round buildings with 360 degrees of windows. When I arrived at my gate I watched a young man in some sort of floor-length priest's robes negotiate something with the woman at the counter.

When the plane took off we had a nice view of the lake and the gigantic fountain.

Same fleeting thoughts, the curse of visiting Western Europe: Why am I in Budapest, again?

--

Arrival in Budapest. All of the snow is gone, replaced outside of the city by tufts of new green grass. It was at least 15 degrees. Balmy. Wonderful. Spring came and kissed the city while I was gone.

In the metro the innocent-looking young man sitting across from me was staring, so I started a conversation. Just enough English to have a stilted conversation. He carried my bag up to my apartment for me, to the massive confusion of Diane. Right. A much better start for things. Very three years ago. Now if only I could hold a baby conversation in Hungarian. We'll see about this isolation thing.