Amsterdam Layover

                I am currently in hour seven of a layover in Amsterdam. It’s two in the morning and I have eight more hours to go. The airport is quiet. I can use the bathroom and there are no cleaning ladies hovering about the mirrors and urinals. The airport here also has the best accommodations of any I’ve visited, so I might avail myself soon of one of the lounging chairs and take a nap. But I’ve also had a couple cappuccinos and a coke today, trying to use this layover to begin my shift to Seattle time, nine hours back.

                I took the train in to Amsterdam and I walked for five hours. From the grief it’s giving me, I suspect my left hip is going to protest for the rest of the week. My original intention was to take advantage of this night without kids in one of the most popular cities in the world, and to walk all night, or participate in the nightlife. And I discovered that if I had to spend the middle of the night in a city, Amsterdam was the right place to do it, because it remained crowded and bustling and inviting the entire time. But I ended up reticent about sitting at a bar by myself—though I did it and enjoyed finally getting off my feet and having a foamy coffee—and dancing appealed less when every bouncer at the door looked like the Barcs Jobbik leader, and I wasn’t ready to entrust my backpack to anyone. And then the night started to change on me.
                The energy was terrific and there were so many joyous and attractive people, walking or flying by on bicycles; and I enjoyed absorbing the vitality of it. But as the night wore on and I passed one woman throwing up at a restaurant and a man punched out on the street and taken off in an ambulance, and as men began getting drunker and stumbling into others and into me, and beggars started following people, and as I walked towards the towering façade of a hundreds year old church and stumbled immediately onto the densely crowded red light district where women in glass cubicles either resignedly texted in their underwear or tapped and beckoned at the glass, in my aloneness the thick tang of marijuana at every corner started to smell less sweet and more menacing.
                In three or four hours the sun will rise. And in Seattle my little ones will climb into bed and maybe think tomorrow is the day their father comes home.

 

Last Night in Barcs

                Last night was a farewell dinner at Csillág Étterem. This was the place we’d celebrated Stephanie’s 40^th birthday, an evening that was one of my fondest of the year; at that time, we’d pre-ordered large plates of meat and bowls of soup, and the place was buzzing with activity; behind us, a stage with some microphones was set for even louder occasions. Last night the place was empty. They’d remodeled: the walls were patterned in brick to resemble a Tuscan taverna, and the stage was now gone. Midway through our meal the chef went home.

                G.Kata told a great story from her childhood, how she and her friends had drawn with dusty sticks that turned out not to be sticks; I made an awkward but heartfelt speech twice, the same one, about how good they had all been to me, about how every moment they made me feel so happy I was also saddened the rest of my family was missing it, how I had hoped to be satisfied by this trip and instead how the opposite was true: I feel even more strongly that I must return, with Stephanie, Sophie, Amelia and Maisie.
                The emptiness of the room sometimes spread over our table; I wanted to be a better host and tell stories and provide observations and even smile more, much more than I did, but there was too much absence in the moment: Stephanie far away, myself soon to go, all in fierce contrast to the presence of beloved friendships in the room, located very specifically in space and time. Kriszta had said that in the morning, every time she looked at me in the faculty room, she was reminded that I was soon to leave, the desk I occupied empty; I felt this too and said nothing. But the evening at the restaurant formalized our goodbye, and I am grateful for that; and I am grateful too for the difficulty of the departure, for a tearful Zoé, the strong hug from Kriszta, the ferocity of my own response to it all.
                Kata and Kornél accompanied me to Budapest again. I’m always nervous about Hungarian trains and maybe it’s ridiculous, but this time our train did indeed arrive and depart 15 minutes ahead of schedule and so we missed it. It’s the exact thing I always expect to happen, why I always want to arrive early, because I always think the train will show up and leave before we can get there, something that never happens. What it meant today was that I missed lunch in Budapest with Annamária, the dorm mom of Fulbright Hungary of whom Stephanie and our cadre of teachers are so very fond; she met us anyway, very briefly, and she treated us three to coffee (or, as I panicked on the bus watching the clock tick down to my departure, what I called in my head spaz-juice); and then Annamária accompanied me to the subway with a ticket for the bus, and I only had time to grieve the abbreviation of our meeting in advance; the departure from Kata and from Annamária was merciful and quick, the sadness only hitting me now that I am safely on the plane, 15 minutes to spare at my gate.
                It seems appropriate, really. The sorrowful wheeze of a goodbye and then the sudden rush of departure. As I told Kata, this two weeks have felt both long and fast. The slowness of it is achieved by the return of a profoundly and unexpectedly familiar world of being, these two weeks telescoping into the full year of our lives in Barcs. Yet this was only two weeks.
                After the 40 hour trip back to Seattle, I will have only half a day before I return to Roosevelt, to 110 short stories demanding careful feedback, 110 independent reading projects, meetings with parents and counselors who have patiently been awaiting my return, meetings with department chairs and meetings with various professional groups, and I don’t want to dwell on what else.
                If I hold tightly enough to my little girl Maisie, and to my wonderfully affectionate Amelia, and my sweet Sophie; if I bury myself deeply enough into Stephanie’s hair, they will all feel the loving farewells from Barcs and the hunger of my hello, and perhaps I can hide for one more night.

Last day in Barcs

                I’m in my last day here. I’m awkwardly sitting around in the teacher’s lounge because this way I don’t have to say goodbye. I’m just running out the clock. I have vacating the dorm room, but not without breaking the toilet brush, which I replaced after a failed conversation with a woman I’d not met before at the collegium during which I waved around a new brush like a weapon. However, I did say goodbye to the principal, who has always been very shy with me, and I with her; I gave her some chocolate and said something like this:

                Speaking thanking with you. Very, very fishy I am. [Be careful with “grateful,” “fish” and also “death,” hálás, hal, halál—they’re different words.] Loving the school. I am thanking you! Pictures?
                At seven last night a couple students brought me into a dorm room in which lay unpacked some audio equipment for an interview intended for student radio, DVK Sulirádió. After one of the two boys expressed his irritation that I was half an hour late, they fiddled with the equipment and did the interview twice. What do I love about Hungary? What do I love about the school, and the students? What is my favorite thing to eat here? Where is my favorite place in Barcs? How are Hungarians different from Americans? And what is a typical day like in my life in America? How is school different? Big questions; but the interview took maybe five minutes. After every answer I gave, the student, said, Cool, cool, or Great. But the questions gave me a lot to think about.  What I said at the time was that I liked being by the river or in the trees, and that in Seattle I get up at 5 am and go running and then go to work for ten hours and come home to busy children who need to go places and then we sleep; I said I liked pörkölt galuskával, and that Hungarians were very serious until you know them and then they are very welcoming; I said students were smart and enthusiastic. Is it all true? Close enough. It doesn’t matter. But how are they different? How is living in the country different than living in the city.
                Bicycling to the store today I noticed how slowly I was peddling. When did that happen? People here pay attention when I go faster, silently tracking me with unwondering eyes, but no one pays any heed when I go at a pace that would drive traffic crazy in Seattle. At Roosevelt, I charge through the halls  and count every minute, finding ways to multitask through the halls; I rush around more than most, I know; and I suspect that such behavior here would come across as even more brusk and cold than in Seattle (although I have made my peace with seeming this way at Roosevelt—too much to get done in too little time). But being in a town one can cross in a 20 minute walk with people many of whom are known all their lives does allow a different pace. Maybe it demands this too: familiarity, greeting, warmth.
                All this has translated into time for me to be with others and to be with myself, and it also translates into enormous hospitality for guests for me. The bulk of my grant went to the plane ticket and my substitute teacher, but a quarter was designated for food and lodging—and this quarter remains largely untouched. I’ve bought some apples and pastries. But the school has housed me and so have friends; and I can bring people wine and chocolate, but all my meals have been provided, either by the school or with lavish generosity by dear, dear friends.

 

 

Just Pictures

This is the lazy man's post. It's just pictures.

In our old house (Munkácsy M. utca 26), with Kata, Kata, Kata, Gábor, Tibor, Lili and Zoé.

In Középrigóc with Péter, Julia and Zsóka.

In Pécs, with Dóri.

In Vienna, with Barna and Zsófi.

In Magyarlukafa, with artisans and Gábor.

 

The Roma

When I return to Hungary, I return also to a near universal unease between the Roma and Hungarians. I alluded to this in earlier posts during our year here, in an entry comparing Hungarian with American hopes and heroes, and more extensively in an entry about Martin Luther King.

The other day a group of little kids, 7, 8, maybe 9, approached me for a match. I said in English I didn't understand, and it was true, I really didn't understand how these little guys could be smoking, but I was also timidly hiding behind a language barrier: if I were to speak any kind of Hungarian, I ought to condemn their request, because if I were to answer their question directly--No, I don't have a match--I'd be condoning their behavior. In response to my unassailable English, the lead boy kept saying, Egy gyufát? Van gyufát? Gyufa! Gyufa!

Were I to tell this story to someone here, the first question would most likely be whether or not these were gypsy children, and then I would have to say yes, and then there'd be some variations in the resulting commentary, focusing on gypsies in Barcs, or the gypsy ways, or the sad cycles of poverty -- depending on the politics.

But I don't know what my story means either.

Yesterday, the Sunday New York Times printed an article entitled, "Are the Roma Primitive, or Just Poor?" It's the reason for this post.

Veszíts el valamit naponta!

 

One Art
– Elizabeth Bishop          
 
The art of losing isn't hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.
 
Lose something every day. Accept the fluster
of lost door keys, the hour badly spent.
The art of losing isn't hard to master.
 
Then practice losing farther, losing faster:
places, and names, and where it was you meant
to travel. None of these will bring disaster.
 
I lost my mother's watch. And look! my last, or
next-to-last, of three loved houses went.

The art of losing isn't hard to master.

 

I lost two cities, lovely ones. And, vaster,
some realms I owned, two rivers, a continent.
I miss them, but it wasn't a disaster.
 
—Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan't have lied.  It's evident
the art of losing's not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.

                Good morning everyone. It’s so wonderful to see you again. I didn’t know I could come back, so this is very happy. I have wanted to come back all the time, and my family too, so I told Fulbright, Give me money to come back, and I’ll teach some poetry at the school in Barcs. And Fulbright said, And what else? And I said, And I will also teach some writing exercises. And Fulbright said, And what else? And, I said, maybe my students will write poems for the Hungarian students? And Fulbright said, And what else? And, I said, maybe the Hungarian students will write poems to the American students. And Fulbright said, And what else? And so I said some other things. I don’t know what I said. I just wanted to come back and see you all and here I am. I am very happy to be back at Dráva Völgye.
                Today we will look at a poem by a very famous American poet, Elizabeth Bishop. It is called, “One Art,” and it’s about losing things. You know this word, losing? So let’s just see. What are some things you can lose. Yes, you can lose your mind. Yes, you can lose your life too. Whoa, this is very dark! You can lose your money—yes, I think it’s better than losing your mind, no? And what else? Yes, you can lose a boyfriend; it’s not so great. Which is worse—to lose your money or to lose your boyfriend? Yes, maybe so, and then you lose your mind! What else? Your clothes? Really? How do you do that? Maybe you’re looking for another boyfriend.
                So: You can lose money and you can lose your life. You can lose your mind and also lose your boyfriend. Anything else? Your keys! Yes, you can just lose your keys, and she, she’s losing her life! It’s better to be you, maybe. Okay, it’s a good list. You can lose many things: your keys, your clothes!, even your mind. You can also lose a game, yes? So it’s a different kind of losing, maybe. The opposite of losing a game is… Yes, winning a game. And the opposite of losing your keys is maybe finding your keys, so the meaning of the word “losing” is very big, but it’s never a very happy thing to lose something, yes? Ah, losing weight! It’s true: that’s a happy thing to lose, maybe. And then we shouldn’t find the weight again, I hope!
                So, we are about to read the poem by Elizabeth Bishop. We’ll read it four times—twice in Hungarian and twice in English, and hopefully after that we can think about what it means.
                So who will read this in Hungarian? I think it’s you. Wait! Slow slow slow! It’s a poem. We want to hear how the words come together. Okay: now. Thank you. And now? Someone in English. Yes, thank you. Before you start, there’s a word in the end, “gesture.” See that? It’s j—j—gesture, yes? Gesture. Okay: now. Wait, say this part too! This is important. Thank you. Now you’ve heard this poem once in Hungarian and once in English, and what maybe is the message? Yes, you can lose many things; and what happens if you do? That’s it. It’s not a disaster! You can lose something, and you will be okay, you will be just fine. So, who will read the Hungarian the second time? A boy, maybe. It’s you. Yes, you. You can do this. In Hungarian. And as we read this poem a second time, think: what do you notice? What is she losing? What are the sounds? Is anything said more than one time? So let’s see what we notice. Ready? Very nicely done. Thank you. And the last? Who will read this a final time, in English? Thank you.
                So now you’ll need a pen or pencil. You’re going to write, right there on the poem. You’ll take some notes. You have the Hungarian in front of you, and you have the English that maybe you don’t understand yet. I would like you to look, and try to figure out some of the English from the Hungarian words you have next to them, and write yourself some notes. I see, for example, this word “megtanulhatsz,” and I don’t know it, but I know tanul, and so I think, Maybe this word means “to master,” to learn something very well. Is this true? Okay, so then I write a note to myself on the Hungarian: to master. Yes? One problem. Maybe you know, a poem is not a book. And to translate a poem, it’s not the same thing as to translate a book. If you translate a poem, and the languages are very different, like Hungarian and English are very different, you must choose: am I going to translate the words so the words are the same, or am I going to try to keep the rhyme—you know what is rhyme?—Ah yes, of course, rím! And rhythm, what’s this? Ritmus. So, to translate a poem, I must choose: Do I keep the words or do I keep the rím and ritmus and change some of the words? So, you can try to figure out the words from the Hungarian, but it won’t be perfect, yes? But try. Take notes on words you can figure out, circle words you can’t and after you can ask me. And maybe see: what else do you notice. Okay? Take seven minutes. Take notes on what you can figure out and write down questions for me.
                That’s enough. Let’s see what we have. What questions do you have? Intent? Maybe you know “intention”? It’s what it wants to do. So maybe you lost your keys. It’s okay; they wanted to do this; they wanted to go, so you shouldn’t be upset. Have a nice life, keys! Fluster? It’s like this. Yes! Maybe you know the word frustrated? Or maybe annoyed. So, if you lose your keys, maybe you get a  little upset. But Elizabeth Bishop says, you can accept this; it’s not so bad. You can get a little upset. Accept the fluster, yes? What else? Ah, vaster. It’s a very strange word. You look up at the sky and it’s very big, so big, it’s va-a-a-ast. And the universe, it goes on and on. It’s vast. Almost infinite. Not infinite, but very big. And if I say “vaster,” it’s very strange. It’s infinite, but maybe more infinite. Infinite plus one. Infinite-er. Yes? Okay. And what else. “Shan’t.” It’s a word no one uses anymore, and it’s very complicated here. It’s conditional and it’s future. It’s should and it’s will together. And you see the translation? “Ez áll.” Maybe it’s this: It’s true, yes? Even if I lose you, even then I’ll be okay—this is still true. I didn’t lie when I said I’d be okay. Another? “Realms.” It means kingdoms. Maybe Elizabeth Bishop is a queen! We’ll look later.
                Now, what did you notice about the poem? This is a villanelle. It’s a French poem. And with a villanelle and many poems, there are many rules. It’s very hard to write with so many rules. This is sometimes part of the meaning of the poem. I want to do the right thing, or I want to write the poem the way I’m supposed to, and I try, but sometimes I just can’t. I have too many feelings. And a poem also, there are many rules, but sometimes a poet has too many feelings to follow the rules. So what can you guess about a villanelle from this poem? What maybe are its rules? Előírás, maybe: is it so? So what did you notice? Here are the five verses of three and here are four lines. What do you see in them? Yes, she says “master” many times. Here and here and then here and almost to the end. What else? Yes, this is the rhyme: aba aba aba aba aba abaa. And what else? Yes, disaster. It’s here and here and here and in the very end. This is very interesting, these two words. It’s master and it’s disaster. I’m in control! I am the master! I’m the boss! And this one: Run for your lives! It’s a disaster! So: I’m in control—I’m the boss!—and now, I’m out of control—Run for your lives! What else? You see that? Wow—yes, it’s 10 and sometimes 11. It’s the same rhythm as Shakespeare. It’s called in English iambic pentameter. You know penta, like péntek, the fifth day; and these iambs are like heart beats: ba Bum! ba Bum! ba Bum! ba Bum! ba Bum! The ART of LOSing ISn’t HARD to MAS… ter—oh, it’s another syllable. So maybe, it’s sometimes the master and sometimes disaster—maybe this makes sense, that the rhythm is not so perfect, sometimes 11 syllables, sometimes 10. Do you see anything else that is said over and over? Yes, it’s the whole line! In a perfect villanelle, the first line is repeated just like this, but also the third line too. We have repeated instead “no disaster,” but not the whole line. It’s not a perfect villanelle. The poem is not in control. Run for your lives!
                So now finally we are ready to look at the poem. So: The art of losing isn’t hard to master. Losing something is an art? What kind of art is this? You lose something, it’s not so good, yes? So how is it an art? And what’s this part: So many things seem filled with the intent to be lost that their loss is no disaster. I don’t know if they have this in Hungary, but in America, there is a monster. It’s name is a gremlin. And this is what it does. It goes into your dirty clothes and it steals one sock. Then it makes a hole in the ground and it buries the one sock. So then you wash your clothes and you go to put your socks together and—Where is my other sock? You look where your clothes are drying. It isn’t there. You look in the washing machine. It isn’t there. You look in your dirty clothes; it isn’t there either. It is nowhere! It doesn’t exist. It’s because the gremlin took it, and he put this in a hole in the ground and you will never see the sock again. So I think it’s like this: some things just want to be lost. Or maybe a gremlin took them. But you know what? It’s okay! It’s not a disaster. I learned a phrase yesterday. Is it this? Az élet megy tovább. Life goes on.
                But now what’s this: Lose something every day! Why should you do this? Maybe you should have this on your wall, to remind you! Veszíts naponta! Why is she telling herself this? You should lose something—every day lose something. Yes, perfect! Maybe just this: maybe it’s practicing for a big loss. And maybe it’s good to practice. If you ice skate—do you know ice skating? Maybe korcsolyázni. So, if you ice skate, you must learn to fall; otherwise, Boom!, maybe you break your face! Or your arms come out like this and, Shwhip!, your fingers come off! So it’s good to practice. You don’t want to fall but you can fall better or worse. And you don’t want to lose something, but you can lose better or worse: you can get very upset—Run for your lives!—or not. So, on your wall: Veszíts naponta!
                And the next? Accept the fluster of lost keys, the hour badly spent. Oh I just wasted an hour! I spent an hour listening to a teacher about a poem and now my time is gone! But it’s okay. You lost your keys, but, life goes on. You wasted an hour, but you’re okay. It’s not a disaster.
                So: practice wth a bigger loss now. Places and names. How do you lose a name? Yes, you forget. Maybe you go to a place and you love this place, and you feel very good friendship with many people, but then a few years later you come back and now: I don’t remember the names! I like the people very much, but which one of you is Vivi and which one of you is Évi? So maybe you forget some names, but it’s okay; it’s not a disaster.
                And the next. I lost my mother’s watch. Maybe the mother is also lost? And this—three loved houses went. How do you lose a house? Where did I put it? Where did my house go? Yes, maybe you move. And it’s not so easy. This is the window and every day I looked out the window and saw the wind in the leaves of my tree. And this is the corner where I sat to read and where the time was all for me. And this is the place where my little brother walked for the first time by himself. And this is the smell that is my family in this house. It’s not so easy to leave a house. But, Elizabeth Bishop says, I did this, and it wasn’t a disaster.
                I lost two cities. How do you lose a city? You move. I lived in Philadelphia, and Boston, and Cleveland. Yes, of course, and Barcs! And it’s not so easy to leave a place like Barcs, not for me. But maybe it’s not a disaster. But what does this mean? Some realms I owned, some kingdoms I owned. Was Elizabeth Bishop a queen maybe? What does this mean, she owned some kingdoms? Yes, I think you are right. It’s her world. This is the world around her and this is how she sees things, it’s her world. It’s her thoughts. And she lost this too.
                So we get bigger and bigger and bigger. She loses a key, but she’s okay. She loses some time, and she’s okay. Maybe she forgets some people, and it’s sad, but she’s okay. And she moves, and it’s still not a disaster; and even her mind changes, maybe she loses her mind, yes? And still, it’s not so terrible, life goes on; maybe she’s a little upset, but it’s not a disaster. And this is the feeling in the poem too, yes? It’s not so hard, it’s not so bad, life is okay, I am the master.
                But now we come to the last verse, and maybe there’s something new here. Take a look.
                Who’s the “you”? Yes, maybe the reader. Yes, maybe the husband, or a lover. Yes, it could be a friend also. I do think it’s one of these and not the others. Look. See that? It’s called a parenthesis. It means you don’t need the information but it’s just extra, yes? That’s why she didn’t even want to read this line, because it’s just extra. But look at what’s here: Even losing you—the joking voice—Oh-wa! Oh, your voice! Oh-wa! And your gesture, the way you touch your face, like this, oh-wa! So what do you think? Is the “you” the reader? Is it you? Is it her? Does Elizabeth Bishop love her voice? No, they just met today! It’s a little early to love like that, yes? So probably the you, it’s a husband or a boyfriend or lover.
                Now, what’s going on? Have they broken up, are they together? What do you think? Yes, probably they have broken up. And how does she feel about this? Yes! Yes! It’s a disaster! The whole poem she says it’s not a disaster, it’s no problem, life goes on, but it looks like she hasn’t gotten over her lover. Do you know this phrase, to get over someone? Yes, so she hasn’t.
                What are the clues in this poem that she hasn’t gotten over him? Oh, I don’t know how to explain “clues.” Does anyone know? Maybe keys. Kulcsok. What are keys to open this, how we know she is upset? Yes! This word disaster. Over and over she says, It’s not a disaster but she could say this without saying such a scary word. Instead, she uses this word, over and over. DISASTER! Disasterdisasterdisaster. What else tells us she hasn’t mastered the loss? Yes, the “I love.” That’s a pretty big clue. And. Take a look. There is something very strange in the last line. Yes! “Write it!” What is that? What is that doing there? Here is a poem about, Don’t worry, you’ll be okay, and then this? Come on, Elizabeth Bishop! GET IT. DOWN. ON. THE. PAPER. NOW. You. Will. Be. Just. Fine!
                So maybe she knows this. In her head, she knows this. Nyilvánvaló. It’s obvious. It’s evident. But her heart, it’s not so sure. Over and over, she says the art of losing isn’t hard to master and then in the last line, well, maybe not too hard, anyway. She still loves him. And losing him feels bigger than anything else. She feels like losing anything else, she would be okay. But in this poem where she sounds so okay, so fine, every “master” is followed by “disaster,” and the real meaning is there, inside the it’s-okay-it’s-okay. We hear the real truth only in the parentheses: I love! I’m lost!
                So you must practice: Veszíts naponta!
                Now, are you ready to write a poem?


A VESZTÉS MŰVÉSZETE (Rakovszky Zsuzsa fordítása)

Veszteni megtanulhatsz, nem nehéz:

oly sok az elveszni áhító tárgy,
elhagyhatod őket, s nincs semmi vész.

Veszíts naponta! Nagy bajnak ne nézz

elkallódott kulcsot, unalmas órát,
veszteni megtanulhatsz, nem nehéz.

Majd légy még nagystílűbb vesztő, s merész:

neveket veszíts, helyeket, ahol rád
öröm várna. Mindebből semmi vész.

Anyám óráját is, sőt - vége, kész,

oda egy híján három szép lakóház.
Veszteni megtanulhatsz, nem nehéz.
 
Elhagytam két szép várost, egy egész
kontinenst, minden országát, folyóját:
hiányzanak, de mégsincs semmi vész.
 
Még rád is (gunyoros hang, drága kéz-
mozdulatok) ez áll. Nyilvánvaló hát:
Veszthetsz nyugodtan bármit, semmi vész.
Ha úgy is érzed (írd le!), túl nehéz.
 

The student dorm

                The high school has generously provided me with a room in the student dorm, a double with two beds, two desks, two chairs, two wardrobes and even its own bathroom. I’m sure there’s much to discover throughout the building, like the gym and other places students documented for me a few years ago; but for now, I am happy to collect my key, walk through the student lounge and past the computer lab, and hole up. Sometimes I’ll come out and wait for a turn to play csocsó, or foosball, and this always generates a crowd. I don’t think it’s because my game is so fascinating; the big draw, I think, is this is easy way of being together, the common ground in the drama of a little ball, the laughter in familiar little phrases we try out in each other’s words.

                At or before 10 pm, electricity in the dorms is cut off. Door and bathroom lights are still available but nothing else until 6 or 6:30 am. It saves electricity but it’s also very effective at silencing the great thrum of student activity. It’s a big party until then, music, lolling, exactly what you’d expect. Afterwards, if anything’s going on, it’s sneaky goings on, and I don’t have anything I want to say about that.
                At 6:30 the next morning, there’s a long announcement in those calm, evenly paced notes one hears in Hungarian, followed by radio. And we’re up.

 

Breakfast

 

                When the girls were in school in Szulok and started classes early in the morning, they were often served a breakfast of bread and margarine and wieners. I forgot this and didn’t know what to expect when I arrived for student breakfasts. My first meal, I was given a slice of pepper and a bowl of türo (like cream cheese) to go with my bread, and a warm pitcher of sweet tea. I was awed by the towers of bread boys were taking back to the tables with them, 14, 15, 16 slices. The next day, cans of liver spread lined the shelf next to a basket of kifli, or crescent rolls. I was given a pitcher of warm cocoa too. The last breakfast I ate in the student canteen included a plate of pale wieners, a bowl of mustard, and zsemle, a roll. Boys were carefully slicing their hot dogs and making sandwiches for themselves, stacks of them, 6 or 7, some for now and some for later in the day. Maybe I didn’t know much about breakfast in my Hungarian year: in Seattle I eat cereal nearly every day and in Hungary, I ate muesli or corn flakes on the same schedule. Kriszta laid out hot dogs and ketchup and mustard, cheeses and jams and maybe some other things after my night at their house – much more than she usually prepares for just her and Péter – and it was then I remembered the children’s meals. This morning in Vienna, Zsófi filled every available space on the table with breakfast items I might enjoy: Swiss and Havarti cheeses and brie, her sour cherry and cloved strawberry jams, pâté and honey, cured deer meat and Pick salami from Szeged and ham, yoghurt, muesli and more.

Breakfast at Gábor and Kata's

Breakfast and Barna and Zsófi's

Breakfast in the canteen, rolls and deep plate of honey.

And below are some other meals, the top three in the student canteen for lunch, the middle Gundel-style palacsinta with Kata, the bottom two with Zsoka, in the forest (mushrooms and garlic).