Dear me

The start of work

2006-07-07T19:47:00.000+02:00

Monday get started with a new job. First two days are unberably long. I am given a bunch of papers to read through. No computer or telephone: from office appliances I have a dusty hole puncher and a financial calculator. Meet a bunch of CEU BS graraduates, both in pricing and accounting departments.

During a study session with my boss on the first day, after about one hour I suddenly get sleepy and simultaneously my stomach starts making quite loud bubbling noises. Feel embarassed, while at the same time trying to stay awake and not to yawn.

While handwriting these notes into a notebook, I vaguely recall a story (must have been some movie or from Dostoyevsky?) where a young guy gets kicked out from his job after notes he was taking while in bureau were found.

All colleagues around seem glued to their desks and laptops, they dont take breaks or go out for a coffee.. It does not seem there is anything like grab a laptop and go to work in a cafe nearby. Things are picking up in the second half of the week - I get a hold of a few things I have been studying, get a laptop and get to know the colleagues a bit.

Kanikula

2006-06-28T19:42:00.000+02:00

Moving Friday through Sunday. These days it is unbearably hot. Sunday going to the Indian festival. We almost get lost trying to find our way there with Magda, but then stick to some Indian guys we meet on the way, and finally make it there. Meet Naresh and Vaibhav, have lunch, try on nice Indian dresses and have my kundalini opened by a Belgian yoga woman. After the festival watch football with Mihaela and Bryan in a pub on Hegyalja utca, and then catch up with Steve on the Chain bridge.

Monday busy visiting my future employer and my pension fund. Tuesday after lunch meet Ira at Keleti, where her train is late by an hour. As we wait for a trolleybus to take us home, it turns out that there is no electricity on the 76 bus line and nobody knows when it will be fixed.

Wednesday visit Peter in the morning and go shopping with Ira. Long nap in the afternoon after which I prepare lunch, which becomes a success. The weather is changing and I am slipping into a depression.

Moving-II

2006-06-24T17:42:00.000+02:00

Drop by at Lia’s, who also gives me a big box, which spares the trouble of going to Ikea. On the way from Lia’s place, on a bus, start talking to a guy who carries several DVDs with Seinfeld episodes. He promises to lend me his copies. Friday night program: packing and moving.

Swim on Saturday morning, meet Terri at renovated Ket Szerecsen, which has nearly doubled in size after renovation. Drop by at Steve-the-painter’s gallery, where I get introduced to his acquaintance as a Russian teacher.

Moving

2006-06-23T17:21:00.000+02:00

Still no internet connection. Looking forward to moving this weekend. Packing is a mess.
To avoid unnecessary physical activity of going up and down the staircase, I am throwing things from the loft down on the couch. So far so good. But it is such a mess really that I escape and hang out at school. Go to Ikea for more cardboard boxes.

No Internet connection for a week

2006-06-23T17:04:00.000+02:00

Last Monday meet up with ex-Asylum to watch US–Czeska football match at Friday’s. Janos seems to get upset when I refuse to give him a puszi because he looks like he lost his razor. Have to rush off in the middle of the game to be on time to the Depeche Mode concert with Maka, which turns out really cool. Graduation party later last week, going up and down the river on a boat.

Get a timely reminder from Comparative Sociology about book review that was due back in May. Sticking around at school trying to read that terrible "Oil: Politics, Poverty and the Planet" by journalist Shelley, just to be convinced that a good journalist does not necessarily make a good writer. Energy in geopolitical games, resource curse, climate change and alternative fuels - you name it, all is there.

Catching up on swimming and movies. Keeping Mum with Atkinson is strangely funny, with a granny housekeeper discharging death sentences whenever she thinks they necessary for the happiness and well being of her loved ones (killing her daughter’s lover, a neighbor, and dumping bodies in the nearby pond). God has mysterious ways, indeed.

The Road to Guantanamo on Sunday is far less cheerful, but is a must to see. Monday’s Merchant of Venice with Al Pacino is a primer in Jewish studies, although a bit of a bore. Al Pacino’s jew is far more sympathetic than Jeremy Irons’ merchant or sexy homofilial Bassiano.

Diagnose me

2006-06-12T23:47:00.000+02:00

Sunday night can not sleep and start filling out an online diagnostic questionnaire “Diagnose Me” which takes about two hours. It makes me realize that I have (had) so many health problems, that the best I can do is think not about them.

Lomtalanítás

2006-06-11T22:14:00.000+02:00

The slums of district VII of Budapest are celebrating their poverty and ugliness in the annual fete of lomtalanítás.. All the rubbish accumulated during a year, dirty and ugly as it gets, is thrown out to the streets, piled up and is waiting to be picked up by the collectors. In the meanwhile gypsies are guarding their find, waiting for their folks to come over with trucks, occasionally fighting off the intruders. Hey, passerby, don’t you even try to look displeased at the nauseating sight and odor on the streets, you will get your pin from the folks. It is their weekend.

Friday skip alumni dinner but make it to a massage with Peter at the CEU sports center. It was really good – I guess more like manual therapy than massage. Watch Poland lose to Ecuador on the first night of the football world cup 2006.

Saturday it rains again. Starting at noon I am taking corporate finance exam, which lasts three hours.

Summer-II

2006-06-04T22:17:00.000+02:00

Welcome, summer. Cold and rainy, it comes together with a sinusitis and, as a consequence, hypochondria and a panic attack. Today being yet another national holiday, I am not able to get myself a painkiller and thus suffer quietly in pain.

Lunch with Oren and some new Seinfelds relieve my humeur mauvais, although only temporarily. Catching up on the news with International Herald Tribune that has kindly offered me a four-week trial subscription. No progress on the thesis.

As I decided to move out of Vera’s flat, quite miraculously things start falling apart: boiler exploding in the bathroom, gas pipe split open, shower cord falling apart. Wait to see what happens next.

Summer

2006-05-23T21:12:00.000+02:00

Still wondering what made fin-de-siecle Viennese society so liberal and accepting of very frivolous art expressions. I am pretty sure that even nowadays not every art gallery would dare exhibit certain works by Klimt or Schiele. Even today Austrians do not strike as particularly liberal, always giving me an impression of stiff conservatives who like to stick to the good old ways of how things should be (and should be done). And yet, not only Austrians did not condemn artists whose works and banish the artists - on the contrary, Klimt and Schiele were hugely popular as early as at the turn of the century.

Enjoying my little time off more and more. It feels like summer is taking over the city. I am afraid now that going back to working life in a couple of weeks is going to be difficult.

V for Vendetta

2006-05-21T22:45:00.000+02:00

Saturday see V for Vendetta (2005), a terrific movie after a script written by Wachovski brothers, the authors of the Matrix. Set in totalitarian England, the movie tells a story of a revenge carried out by V, who uses terrorist methods to expose the government and punish those involved in an inhumane plot.

The movie is a disturbing mix of good acting, excellent dialogues, and smart references to manipulation of media coverage for political purposes. Not to mention that it is very compelling visually, especially the last fight action and the closing scene in front of the Parliament. Hugo Weaving (aka the baddie Agent Smith from the Matrix) as V, whose face is hidden behind the mask throughout the movie, proves to be an amazing voice actor. Natalie Portman makes quite a good Evey, whose character, however, is somewhat contradictory and whose portrayal I found a bit inconsistent.

But the most disturbing idea around which the movie revolves is that terrorist attacks and other disasters are in the interest of the governments to such extent - because they give the government and the people a reason to unite against an enemy, a case for legitimacy, - that they get their hands dirty plotting those horrid things.

In the evening party with Business School at New Brooklyn on the occasion of Vera’s birthday. Vera manages to get almost everyone dressed in red & black, which creates a theatrical effect in the red & black interior of the pub.

Sunday David Barenboim accepts a position of the principal conductor at La Scala opera in Milano.

The weather changes every minute - it either rains or drizzles. Stay home and experiment with carrot cake, which turns out quite well after I send it back to the oven 3 times.

Another busy Tuesday

2006-05-16T23:20:00.000+02:00

Three hours of finance at the business school, French class at CEU, lunch with Yelena and badminton with Andras.

In the evening see 21 Grams (2003), a sad story that brings together a widow of a man killed in a car accident, a dying mathematician who gets the heart of the dead husband transplanted and falls in love with the widow, and a religious ex-criminal who actually murdered the husband and two daughters of the woman by accident. Sliced into countless flash-backs and flash-forwards, the movie is a powerful and moving exposé of three very tragic stories of dying, enduring the deaths of the loved ones, and escaping oneself and the feeling of guilt.

Weekend

2006-05-15T16:18:00.000+02:00

Sunday morning went swimming with Lia, who then invited me to have lunch at her place. We prepared pasta salad Lia&Rafaello style.. It turned out quite nice, even though I am not quite experienced in chopping tomatoes in small cubes, which was a must for this recipe.

Evening was coldish, and therefore, walking on Margit island with Vaibhav and looking for Mihaela and Bryan who I thought would be there with the juggling crowd, was not so enjoyable. There was so much pollen and other little flying things in the air, that by the time we got out of it all I felt as though I had fever. No comments on the kendermag fesztival.

Working on Monday, digging deeper into the debris of corporate finance. Oren's hey fever sharpened his senses, and he spots spelling mistakes in my blog. Preparing Tandoori masala for dinner, listening to Dandy Warhols.

West Balkan

2006-05-13T21:54:00.000+02:00

Started Friday at Levendula, and then had a coffee with Alex who was all high about being accepted to the PhD program at EUI in Florence. Gorgeous weather, and I feel it’s a shame to be indoors, thus having a coffee at Frager for a couple of hours.

Late night out with Mihaela, Brian, Steve and Val, ending up at West Balkan, where they actually play Balkan music. Pity I could not stay there longer because of the second-hand tobacco smoke intoxication in the dancing basement.

Saturday went to the Lehel piac for some fruit, and again could not resist turos pogacsas and coffee on the upper floor – my little reward for the effort of going to the market. On the way back home the bus got stuck in traffic on Izabella utca because of road reconstruction. I got off and tried to escape the dust and noise by taking a side street, but it appears that almost all the roads around körut are under reconstruction. Friday night we actually saw construction workers at work after midnight.

More corporate finance after lunch.

The V-Day

2006-05-10T22:51:00.000+02:00

Tuesday was busy, strating with a three hour class at the business school, then French class at CEU, and badminton with Andras. In between had lunch with Maka at Szeraj, where I envied her choice of padlizsan salata, feta cheese and a warm and doughy pita.

In the evening had a jolly V-Day celebration with Sasha and his Russian friends from the Muegyetem, Dennis and Alexei, in the terribly smoky and loud Crazy cafe. Another late night out and going to sleep late.

Thinking of going there on Sunday.

May 8

2006-05-09T00:43:00.000+02:00

Went to the CEU library to prepare for tomorrow's Finance class, but met Lia and Yelena there, and eneded up having a coffee with them, right until it was time to go off for lunch with Peter.
Later at goete institute Steve introduced me to another Steve - the painter - who has just opened a gallery around the corner. Later realised that that I saw him earlier with Rex. Budapest is such a small place, really.

Later in the evening went to see Silent Hill with Olga, for laughs (click here for a more visual link). Based on a computer game, the movie is not so creepy, really, and a couple of times we had good laughs. Even though my first idea was that both Rose and Sharon died, and that is why Christopher can not see them when they return home, I think what authors had in mind is another dimension - which also leaves the room for a sequel.

Going to link YouTube here - jolly good place.

Breakfast with Watery Fowls

2006-05-07T22:09:00.000+02:00

Late breakfast at home with Fawlty Towers. In the afternoon found out that there is a week of Israeli cinema at Örökmozgo. Well, sometimes it pays to live around the corner from the best movie theater in the city. Went to see a documentary Say Amen (2005). David, the youngest son in a large traditional family is gay. He lives away from his family, in Tel-Aviv, and his parents, nine siblings and other relatives are continuously harassing him about getting married and having children. He confesses that he is a gay and tries to convince the family that it is OK to be gay, and that it was not his choice, that he still can have a family and children. We hear all sorts of opinions from David’s relatives that reflect not only personal values but I guess also different aspects of Israeli society. The film is really centered on the family and its reactions rather than on David himself, and gives an interesting perspective of Israeli family life and a snapshot of society’s attitudes towards homosexuality.

Last week finished reading Kundera’s Unbearable Lightness of Being. Even though it is one of his most popular novels, it felt like such a drag. Guess I am already fed up with his depressing stories, depicting miserable women and cheating and womanizing men. Really, in all of his books I have read so far women are either miserable, cheated, emotionally and physically abused by men, or are whores. Even though the latter appear to be more favored by the author, none of the character types is happy. The happiest moment in the book is when Teresa and Tomas are dying together in a car accident. At the same time, the introductory part, a theoretical framework of a sort, where he is laying bare his ideas about lightness and heaviness, is somewhat shallow and obvious.

2006-05-06T23:13:00.000+02:00

Started the morning with a matiné piano recital at the Old Music Academy, where Jeffrey Hollander was playing short pieces from Liszt, Debussy, Gluck, and Gershwin. Nice and refreshing, although by the end his energetic jazzy interpretations of various pieces felt a bit too strong of a start for a day. After that went to have a haircut at a place with a bizarre name near the OMA, where after the haircut I was offered to try a massage bed.

After lunch at home met Mihaela at Goete institute (or what used to be Goete Institute on Andrassy). After a coffee there we went to check out the new location of Eclectica in Nagymezö utca, and we both agreed that now that it had been upgraded it has lost the charm and atmosphere it had in Semmelweis utca. Penne with chicken and corn is not on the menu any longer, waitresses are just a bit too neat, the whole place is too brand new and orderly, and there is nothing eclectic about the style. Walked further up the Andrassy and dropped by at Bombay express - Indian fast-food in the place of the old Bombay Palace. They have only opened yesterday, and customers are still rare and precious animals. Samosa with mint sauce was pretty good. Despite plastic orange all around, I bet this place is going to become a hit lunch spot soon. Brian joined us there after he visited an art installation at Gödör club, which he said made him dizzy. Went up to Kodaly korond where we had a drink and dinner in a pleasantly old-fashioned restaurant.

2006-05-05T17:04:00.000+02:00

Wow, already Friday!.. Last night, having done the translation, I watched Before Sunrise (1995) that Vaibhav sent me on Skype the night before. It took two hours to download it, but it was worth it – the movie is nice, and even though I would not go as far as saying, like someone did on IMDB, that it is the best movie of the 1990s, I quite enjoyed watching it. A young American guy meets a French student on the train from Budapest to Vienna. They get off the train in Vienna and spend a night walking around the city, talking, falling in love, and having their first fight, until he has to take his plane back to the States next morning. Dialogues are sensible and quite sophisticated, and not drawn out at the same time (although close to that!). Sometimes I was not sure if acting could not have been a bit better, but actually aren’t people in real life, especially when they are in love and care for the impression they make, behave somewhat unnaturally? And it was just great to see them walking in Vienna – the impression I get when I see a familiar city in a movie... I also got a bit nostalgic remembering my date in Vienna last year.

This morning had a long chat with Irina, who joined the friends who tell me that now that I have a month and a half of vacation I should do something about my thesis. In fact she was a bit milder than that, saying that at least I should decide what it is that I want to do.. But I guess my choice is manifest in my not working on the thesis..

In the evening going to see the last part of Harom Bartok at the Opera with Hristina. We saw the first two parts – the Wooden Prince and Miraculous Mandarin back in April, and both felt that three beautiful but so different pieces on one night would be too much. So today we are catching up on Bluebeard’s Castle, Bartok's only opera.

Last week I dropped by at the Musicology Institute in the Budavar, hosting a temporary exhibition on Bartok. I was quite surprised to see letters he wrote in four different languages -Hungarian, German, French, and eventually English. I knew that he grew up in the countryside, loved folk songs and throughout his mucsial career cherished his fascination with Hungarian folk music. Thus, I never thought of him as a particularly learnt man, although I admire him as a brilliant composer, painist, and musicologist. Given that perfection in music to requires sacrifices in other aspects of life, I am doubly facsinated by those musicians who manage to develop intellectually despite the high demands of musical occupation. In his Reith lectures David Barenboim shows that there are exceptions to this general rule.

The day of translation

2006-05-04T18:22:00.000+02:00

Depsite inflamed gum, started the day with good intentions. While waiting for Mark at the terrace of Vian, made a long and comprehensive to-do list, starting with a translation of the text for Peter. He sent me the response of the Azerbaijani border management authorities to his questionnaire on Monday, and I still have not done anything about it (though I opened it!). He does this project on illegal migration and human trafficking every spring, and this is about the fourth time I am doing the Russian-English-Russian translation, but I have never been so sloppy.

Meeting Mark for a coffee was invigorating, even though I complained a lot about feeling lonely and socially disoriented now that I have no office to go to every morning and no colleagues to chat and have coffee with. Mark mentioned creepy directed voice systems that can send voice messages directly into person’s head, so that a person may even not realise that it wasn’t his own thought. After talking about Asylum (I wonder if that link still works?) Mark did a couple of Tarot readings for me, and it seems that the recurring theme in all those readings he did so far is related to career and success, quite in line with my horoscope sign (even though I keep asking about relationships!!).

Went shopping to a csarnok at Hunyadi ter for the first time. When I asked the chap who was selling me bananas and lemons why he did not use claculator built in in the scale, he replied that he usually calculates everything himslef, and got all grumpy. I once again questionned my social skills, wondeing if that was an inapprorpiate question to ask not to offend people..

After lunch played badminton with Andras, who said that we are getting better at it.
Now may be it is finaly time for translation? But I have doubts.

Still on vacation

2006-05-03T15:11:00.000+02:00

Had a coffee with Oren this morning. Good old Gerloczy, good old Oren :-) Irish butter was as good as always, too, but service was a bit sloppy. I guess I am just used to going there between 8 and 9, when I used to be the only customer (except for Oren) upon whom all the attention was lavished. Nothing of this sort at 11 when waiters are busy arranging tables for lunch, and there are a lot more lazies having their late breakfasts out there.

Having a coffee there with Rex last week I was startled by a young guy, nearly a teenager, who was hanging out there with two older men about 11 am. Fatty and with a bad posture, the guy was sucking a cigar and drinking beer. The trinity was sitting just a couple of meters away from me, and I could not help turning to look at them every now and then. They did not seem to exchange a word all that time I was there, though after a while they ordered a bottle of champagne. Quite a sight.. Rex's guess was that their next move would be taking the boy to a prostitute.

Oren was cheerful and nice, even though I forgot to bring his Seinfeld DVDs. I picked him up at Asylum office (or whatever it is called now), and while he was checking his emails I had chat with Val and some robots there. Some people seem confused (understandably), but some robots are in their "business as usual" mode.. Picked up my last remaining papers, and don't expect to ever be back there. Feel a bit sad that it ended this way.

After lunch and an afternoon of hanging out in the Internet went to CEU for a French class. In the PhD lab met cheerful Tania who is defending on Friday, who told me how nice it is to be back in Canada and how good-looking guys are there, compared to Budapest. Some food for thought.

2006-05-02T18:28:00.000+02:00

What a cold spring this is! Another chilly and windy day in Budapest. In the morning went to the CEU Business School for the Corporate Financial Management class, for which I still hope to get registered. I realized last fall that I quite enjoy going to the BizSchool, for a change. People are so different from the CEU there – so chirpy and energetic. Had a nice coffee and chat with Joanna during the break, so that we were a bit late for the second half of the class (even though it is hard to outdo Anna Turner in being late!)

After late lunch enjoying the awsome Cote D'Or chocolates Peter brought from Brussels.

Brokeback Mountain

2006-05-02T18:14:00.000+02:00

April 29, 2006 – Saturday

Saw Brokeback Mountain, finally. Such a girl movie, really – who would have thought! Made me weep through the second half, and when the movie was over I saw that girl sitting next to me was weeping, too (I asked for a paper handkerchief). Even though it was a bit too sentimental, it was a beautiful and I dare say a good movie.

A story of love of two young men is actually a story of any prohibited love, love not accepted by the society and the ways in which social taboos wreak people’s lives. Both characters, cute and somewhat effeminate Jack and tough and mostly silent Ennis, are extremely likable: good looking, good natured, and surprisingly sensitive. Surprising not because as a woman I do not happen to meet sensitive men, but because this is not something one would expect from tough cowboys. I guess exactly this is a very touching combination – physical toughness and tenderness towards each other which eventually both of them express.

Even though one of the Oscars it got was for the soundtrack, I managed to miss all the music. I guess it was so good in the background that it did not bother at all. I went to see this movie with Rex, who was not so happy with the subject matter and especially sexual scenes. Sunday morning he left for the States.

Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk?

2006-05-01T20:23:00.000+02:00

January 22, 2006 – Sunday

Three murders and a suicide in two acts

In the morning went swimming to the Hajos Alfred uszoda on the Margit sziget. Water felt so good, relaxing and invigorating at the same time, that I promised myself to do it every weekend. When I met Rex at the Odeon afterwards, I realized that my skin still smelled of chlorine, though…

Went to see Shostakovitch’s Lady Macbeth of Mtsensk in the Opera House. Fascinating avant-garde piece, composed and first put on stage in 1934 in the Soviet Union by a 26 year young composer, it sill sounds so fresh and original. Three murders and a suicide in two acts – against the background of a love story and jealousy, if you like a concise summary of the plot.

As Katerina’s emotions are exposed and the story unfolds, the tragedy is inevitable. Illiterate woman from a peasant family married to a merchant family, she does not know how to occupy herself and is bored to death; the major themes of her life are eventlessness and emptiness. She longs for a baby, but her husband appears impotent. Once he is away, she takes a lover from a working class. Once her father in law, a horny old man, catches them red handed, she poisons him. When her husband Zinoviy is back, Katerina and her lover Sergey murder him too. When the crime is uncovered and both are sent to Siberia, Sergey takes another lover. Katerina throws the woman into a “deep deep lake with black water” and then drowns there herself. The last chorus is a particularly powerful scene, and the theme is very melodical and very Russian.

Generally, Shostakovich is extremely emotional, and the music is very theatrical. He conceived this opera to be the first part of a trilogy about women’s life in the Tsarist Russia, during the 1917 Revolution, and in the Soviet country. Therefore, the fatalism with which he portrays the tragedy: the murder is inevitable. In the patriarchic society dominated by men woman’s life is reduced to that of vegetation, and Katerina has no other choice but to kill. The revolt of her spirit, or rather senses and lust, is unacceptable for the traditional family and society, but she can not go back to the old ways of living. Murder is the price for her happiness.

I found this to be an interesting choice for the Hungarian Opera House, given that overall Hungarians are not too keen on playing Russian music. I usually explain this with chronic russophobia and the fact that much of Central and Eastern Europe do not bother to differentiate between Soviet and Russian. Whatever is the reason, with the exception of Chaikovsky’s Nutcracker, a darling of Christmas time matinés, Hungarians do not seem to care about beautiful classics admired by the rest of the world. But this was actually a Soviet opera, a darling of Soviet avant-garde!! I suspect Shostakovich’s opera was chosen to be put on stage of the Hungarian Opera due to its reputation of artwork banned by the Soviet regime, that made it more valuable in the eyes of those still suffering from anti-communist syndrome.

It was banned in 1936, when the opera was on major European scenes, and was on three stages (simultaneously!) in Moscow. The next day after Stalin went to see the performance, Pravda published a thrashing article, calling Shostakovich’s art “muddling, not music”. There is an opinion that the main reason for banning the opera was its satirical character, where some of the caricatured characters (gendarme chief) might have reminded Stalin of himself.. But in my view it was the music itself, so unconventional and free-spirited, so emotional and live, too rich to be squeezed in the tight frame of socialist realism, that made this opera unacceptable. It was the first and the last opera composed by Shostakovich. His next work came out with a subtitle “Soviet composer’s response to a just criticism”…

Were there with Hristina, my Bulgarian CEU classmate from six years ago, who now works at Michelin. Her main challenge at work seems keeping her desk tidy, since she keeps talking about it all the time.