!Yo Diggity!

I am so close to havin’ that Houston phone line I can taste it!! I’ve now got a local Budapest line and today I FINALLY have internet access at home (so, yes, this means even more blog updates)!! Praise God!! So, I am one step closer to having that Houston line I’ve been talking about. I tried to hook it all up tonight and think I’m gettin’ it… but the power light won’t come on on the vonage router. Don’t know. I might need some help… but at least it’s a step in the right direction!!

Hang tight - I’m almost there!!

So you all know my friend Simone.

Once and awhile she gets inspired. This happened this Sunday to her while I was sleeping all day (I had to stay up all night to do some production system work - yes, when you work in computers on global systems sometimes you have to work the graveyard shift to get stuff done). Anyway, I wasn’t able to be there but the day was beautiful and MAN she got some good shots. I just wanted to share….

No… she’s not professional… it’s really just that pretty!!

Thanks for sharing, Simone!!

One huge lifestyle change I’ve had since I moved here is the fact that I don’t own a car. I know it’s hard for you to imagine as we live and breathe AUTOMOBILES in the States, but I’m actually enjoying the use of the Metro here in Budapest. You can get just about everywhere you want to go, at anytime! You don’t need keys, fuel, maintenance. You just need a metro pass… and somethin’ on your feet!

Here’s what it looks like:

I live right on the blue line in between Arany Janos and Nyugati Payaudvar. I can walk to either to go to work and I work 4 stops north… so I get off at Arpad Hid and walk one block to work. Not bad at all. Whenever I go somewhere new, the directions usually start with “Ok, you get off the BLAH line at the BLAH station and go left.” SO EASY. Seriously. I was only lost that one time when I went to Danube International for the first time…. and that was ‘cause it was my first time on the actual city bus. The stops aren’t marked as clearly there. But I really enjoy this public transport idea. Houston - you are WAY behind the times. Get with it!!

Once again I had a very fun weekend… nothing crazy was planned but it turned out to be quite full and quite fun, as usual!

Friday night I managed to swing out of work a bit early - a little after 5 and made my way across the river to Heidi’s flat. Heidi teaches out at the school that Valerie’s kid’s go to. She was having some folks over to make pizza - two new student teachers were here in town (they’ll be here for 8 weeks) and so they wanted to welcome them. When I got there I found that these two student teachers go to Indiana Weslyn University!!! Holy-wow. It is a small small world isn’t it? Geez - come all the way overseas just to meet a bunch of Indiana folks. We are EVERYWHERE. No joke!! They seemed like two real cool chicks and the bunch was fun. It was nice to get to hang out with some native English speakers and share about each other. Was also cool to hear about the Christian school out there. It sounds like they really have quite a ministry going. It’s not quite like the inner school schools that my friends in Houston taught at - but they do face a whole different set of challenges. Was a really good evening! On the way home… I ran across a big light:

I wasn’t sure what was going on but I snapped some pics and went on my merry way.

Saturday I was supposed to run in the Coca-cola 10k as a relay team with Valerie… but BOTH of us missed that the race was on Sunday, not Saturday. hmm… I guess we’ve been a little occupied. haha Valerie with good reason and her and her husband just decided that Tom (the husband) is going to fly back to the US to see a doctor about his back on Monday. So please keep them in your prayers too if you think about it. I had no reason to get the date wrong… so late Friday we figured it out and so instead of going running…. we went to eat Mexican! Tom and Valerie and I had a lovely Mexican dinner at Iguana, the best Mexican restaurant in town! Was good stuff!

So then Simone and I went wandering around… came across some cool stuff as usual…

… got a little lost…

… had some sushi… and ended up back at the light show!

I really am quite the ham, aren’t I? haha

It was a full moon that night…

And there was a really good band playin’… just my kind of music. They were singing in English - totally American accents. However, totally Hungarian accents in-between songs. Then, they busted out with Spanish songs!! Amazing - they sounded fluent!!

So when they were done playing, we saw the guys in the band over by the food booths and I used my usual, “Do you speak English” intro. They actually did not speak English very well, but one of the spoke Brazilian very fluently! Crazy!! So him and Simone exchanged e-mails (yes, we live in such a world of technology) and we were on our way.

Oh, wait. I forgot to mention the sausage.

They seem to eat a lot of sausage here. Sauage and FAT. No joke. The actually do eat fried fat as if it was an appetizer. Wow. I really do wonder how they stay skinny. Maybe that’s all they eat?? Maybe that’s why they seem to have bad teeth? haha Who knows.

We met up with a couple of guys that we met a couple of weeks ago: Chuck from the US and Balazs from Hungary. Balazs actually lived in the US for quite some time and his English was very good.

Sunday is when Valerie and I kicked butt…

heehe - okay, so I didn’t get any pictures of that (actually Tom’s got a snipett about the Sunday run)… but we did real good in the 10km run on Sunday!! Was a lot of fun. It is really fun to get to hang out with kids and really the whole family. Such a fun bunch. It is showing signs of winter here though… I was either blazin’ hot (while running) or freezing cold (while standing in the shade). Winter is a comin’ … and I’m SCARED!!!

… but not scared enough to stay inside… got to see some more of beautiful, beautiful Budapest….

Wow. Thanks God… for this opportunity!!!

Yep. I kick butt.

This photo was taken Saturday night. Simone and I went to the light show on Deak Ter (Ter = square) and met up with a couple of guys we met a few weeks back. Chuck, the American on the right is newer here than we are. Balazs is the butt-kickee who just moved back here from the States. He’s got the most Amerian sounding Hungarian accent I’ve heard yet. We had a fun evening… most of which we were just walking around lost. But that is the best thing about this city… you never are REALLY lost… and there is always SOMETHING cool to do!!

There will be more about the light show soon…. stay tuned….