Athens!

Athens is magnificent!

We wander around a crowded city of millions, reminding ourselves that it's Christmas, stumbling upon the foundations of Western civilization!

That's good stuff! Weather is less than mild, but the sun feels good. Green trees, plus plam trees. Saving Greek islands for a sailing vacation some time in the distant, but enviable future, headed next to a seaside town for listening to waves, eating along the shore, and hiking the hills.

Ding.

Part 3. War and Peace and the Human Heart

Exactly two months, to the day, after I brought it home, I finished War and Peace last night.

I know...I'm a journalism major, the son of a librarian and an English teacher, literary greatness should be expected of me. But I didn't think I'd ever pick up that book. It, more than any other, is the one book that people don't actually read. Some might own it, put it on a shelf, and the declare themselves more cultured for having bought it. But to actually sit down and read War and Peace? Goodness, a non-option.

A non-option, that is, until you come to live, by yourself, in a land with only Austrian MTV. Then you'll appreciate any English books on the local library shelf.

1,444 pages. 61 days. 23.67 pages a day. 6 bottles of wine.

And I loved it.

I've had a tremendous run of good literature here in Hungary, and strangely enough all of the books echo the feelings and experiences I'm going through, almost to a tee. Or at least I'm reading into each book the exact feelings and experiences I want to commiserate so badly with someone. One of the joys of fiction.

"On the Road" had the same wandering urge to explore that I had when I first got here. Frankenstein's monster's awakening and existential questioning either followed or instigated my own exploration of those tendencies here. Intrigued by Ukraine, "War and Peace" gave me a taste of the depth of all things Russian. Conscious of war and peace in the world and love in the heart, it broaches all three.

In the spirit of Christmas, I offer to you this 10th-grade-esque book report on War and Peace and the Human Heart:

War and peace are to all of mankind as destiny and freewill are to each man.

The two fundamentals of human history are war and peace. You can have one or the other, but not both. But at the same time, you can never really have just either. The tide of history is simple the ebb and flow of more war, or more peace, for just a period of time.

"The two fundamentals on which man's whole cosmic philosophy is constructed," destiny and freewill, are the essence of life (1438). Can there be an interplay between the two, could there possibly be a right answer other than the extremity of either? We must certainly either have no control or complete control. But again, only in their synthesis do they define each other in form and content, hints the author.

When Tolstoy tells of war, he tells a story of destiny from a broad viewpoint. Individual actors have no control, no freewill, there is no importance or greatness to even the leaders. The struggle and will of entire nations is the thing of destiny.

But when Tolstoy writes of peace, he writes of love. The actors, their free will, their desires, is the story. His greatness as a writer, as I took it, was the ability to capture completely the emotion of one particular feeling in a single chapter.

Within these questions, as big as they get, Tolstoy is also a puppeteer above his characters, tugging at the heart-strings of those under his control for 12 years of Russian and human history.

With only five main characters of marriageable age and 1444 pages to work with, he has no choice, I suppose, but to introduce intertwining, interdating and interbreeding. I suppose old high school friends work the same way. (Congratulations, by the way, to RJ and Gaby on their recent engagement.)

The love he writes of is epic, monumental; a love encompassing all of a person's soul, if for just a moment in time. Princes and princesses, swept away, in the royalty of love and the love of royalty.

Read for yourself. War. And peace. Pain. And love. Good. And bad. Yin. And yang. Duality to everything.

Part 2. Love in Hungary

For simplicity's sake, I must boil love down to simply the lustful longing for, the passionate pursuit of, and the energetic execution of touching another human being. If you're willing to be that masculine-ly insensitive to any more grandiose notion of love, all of a sudden, there's a lot to consider after four months in Hungary.

We should state the obvious at this point: Hungarians are hungry for love.

But not hungry as in "I'm starving and can't wait to eat anything in sight." But rather that kind of hungry you feel a bite or two into a really big meal, laid out in front of you, that will manage to tide you over for at least a day to come.

Everyone -- every man and woman (or child) of marriageable age in Hungary -- has a lover. Often that boyfriend or girlfriend lives in a far-off village. That's made it fairly difficult for the dozen Americans who landed here, in the prime of their vitality.

Your first step onto Hungarian soul, whether by plane, train or bus, you will notice Hungarians in love. Making out before, during and after using public transportation is a particular favorite in these parts. When you have a lover half-way across a country the size of Indiana, apparently the best option to spend a Sunday is by lingering over a goodbye conveyed with lips, not vocabulary. And Fridays? What better way to end a 5-day-love-fast than by greeting your lover with your tongue at that same bus station? And in between? Just go at it on the subway, it's cool.

So they're crazy in where they make love, but I must admit I have very little (fine, none) evidence if there's a craziness in how they make love. But with whom? Yup, crazy.

In America, we're rather static with our definitions of good and bad. We expect that a man might be a little older than his love interests -- there may even be biological reasons to explain the preference of an age gap of a couple years -- but couples more than a couple years apart? Goodness, get ready to become a pariah.

I became a high school German teacher, and undoubtedly I am here in Hungary at this very moment, because a 23-year-old teacher fell in love (again, we draw no distinctions here between love and lust should it be necessary in this, or any, instance) with a 17-year-old student. Five big years of separation, and the firm statutes of legal and professional limitations.

So I was a little surprised, maybe even uncomfortable, the first time I was encouraged to enjoy the company of the students in that whole "hey, what do you think about this girl or that girl?" with a wink and a nod sort of way.

Here I must admit that I am a young man of no noteworthy moral superiority and no immunity to the thoughts natural to my age and gender. I've had to work hard to suppress the thought that the children under my tutelage are anything more than students. But here comes Hungary, bursting through the door of that mindset, shouting "I'm freakin' crazy in regards to love!"

Colleague Peter is one of the instigators. Then, one day, I found out why. His finance is a ripe ten years younger than he is. I'd always thought the was in his upper 20s, but that must not be the case.

Felicia is one of my 11A German speakers, although she doesn't boast much proficiency in the subject. We took to talking in class one day on how the 17-year-old would spend her weekend. Out popped the answer: she would spend the majority of it with her 27-year-old boyfriend. Attila.

One of my other German students, a rather uninterested-in-paying-attention-to-me type of boy, was sitting next to the most beautiful woman at a Heves bar one night. Curiosity besting my shyness, I went up to him, to them, and asked in German what he was doing sitting next to the most beautiful woman at the bar. I smiled at the answer: older sister.

I thought things were looking up for Jeremy when she bought me a beer in hopes that "du musst meinem Bruder einen Funf geben!" I said that I would gladly give her brother a 5, the best grade possible, if he spoke as wonderful German as she did.

She smiled and our conversation continued on, in German, to the point of me smiling, too. Not that that's hard to do. It's not every day you find a beautiful 20-year-old German-speaking girl who studies at a first-class Budapest university in Heves. I suppose that's because they're away studying at that first-class Budapest university. (And I'll admit to desperation here. That long-demanded English-speaking standard has slipped to "English? German? No problem.")

Finally, she turned to the man at the far end of the table. A rough translation of the German dialogue would look like: "And that is my 28-year-old boyfriend," but my heart translated the sentence as a dagger to the heart:

"I'm a normal crazy Hungarian girl who can only tempt you with my beauty because I would prefer to date an older Hungarian man who may or may not have a high school diploma, may or may not have a shitty job fixing things, and who, most certainly, has really, really bad teeth."

But I guess there's nothing I can do other than observe and laugh. Kat, Harpswell and I are holding out much hope for Greece. Or until then, I could always fall into the trap of the "Hungarian normalcy."

I subbed for a teacher, I think it was Peter, last week. A group of 11th-graders I hadn't met before. They cheered when I walked in the door.

They went around the room introducing themselves to me. Conversational English is an easy career the first few lessons with a group. They're curious. After they finished, I let them ask me questions. As always, the first question was age. They smiled when I said 25, although I'm not convinced the answer has any practical application in Hungary. The second question, invariably, "have you got a girlfriend?" As usually, I blush slightly and say that I don't. My hair's at the length at the moment where I have to brush it out from over my eyes and tuck it behind an ear as I say that.

They smiled and giggled, like usual, but then a new phenomenon happened. Instead of questions, they started to formulate sentences.

A boy in the back shot his hand up. He pointed to a girl in the front, a girl with blond hair who had spent most of the class smiling at me, and who I'd often seen in the halls.

"Klaudia is a nice girl," he said, with the confidence of a used-car salesman offering up the finest car on the lot. But the sentence was right-on in grammatical nature and content, both. What was I to do?

I laughed. "Yes, she is." Then she and I smiled at each other.

Another girl raised her hand. She pointed to the girl next to her.

"Barbie is a nice girl, too!"

The auction of class 11E to Teacher Jeremy, apparently, had begun. Just an everyday, normal happening in Hungary...

SZALAVAGATATAVAGATO

Okay, folks, that was AWESOME.

Last night, the champagne was in Russian. So I asked one of the teachers what it said. (They all, grudgingly, learned Russian here years ago). He said it means "change." I'm like, okay, that's a weird thing to name the champagne. Then he pronounced it. Per-e-stroy-ka. And I was like, dude, that's awesome! I know perestroika! I know Michael Gorbachev! This is awesome! I love perestroika!

So we continued to toast the graduating seniors. They call them school-leavers here. Then I was told, by the woman who is akin to my mother here, that I should hurry and go to the bar with all the students. She gave me explicit directions that I must do this, so I said okay. This is after the power went out, and the teachers sat in the teachers' office drinking around candle light.

It's not like we didn't earn this privilege. the school-leaving ribbon ceremony was long, and rather heavy on the Hungarian. I understood only the dancing to "tutti frutti." All the kiddies dressed up and danced. Some waltzing, some rock and roll, some salsaing.

So I went to the bar with the students. I played foosball! I was destroyed each time, I think because I picked students to be my partner. And I played "Otherside" and "It's my life!" on the jukebox, it was awesome. I must repeat that. It was awesome!

And the sun is out now!! It's kind of attacking me right now, but it's so awesome!

Part 1. Love in that Room

Four months into our stay, Budapest is becoming a bit like home for us American teachers.

We're able, with very few glances at the map, to navigate the city streets. Public transportation, especially the subterranean metro, is getting easy. We have learned when it is necessary to buy tickets and when you can skimp the system and ride for free. And even the recorded voices on the Metro loudspeakers, announcing each stop along the way, are beginning to slow down and become understandable.

And even in Budapest you can still fall back on the good ole standards of American (err, collegiate) culture. Friday night, I revelled in the glory of a real hamburger at a Mexican restaurant. Saturday night, we ordered seven Pizza Hut pizzas to compliment our beers. And in the aftermath, Sunday morning, we took comfort in hand-delivered Burger King. Of course the hand-delivery process looked like Janos walking an hour and a half with four bags in his hands.

Saturday night we celebrated three birthdays (Harpswell, Kat and Mariah) in traditional Hungarian manner...a disco. We've taken a liking to the traditional Hungarian manner. But this evening evolved differently than most of our adventures in a disco or bar. It appears that four months in Hungary had gotten to us. This is where theories enter.

You surely have seen Jurassic Park. The scientific crux behind the unexpected problem in the movie is a theory about frogs (and supposedly dinosaurs). When only one sex of the species is present in a given location, an unnatural process happens and some frogs develop the sexual characteristics and abilities of the opposite sex.

Perhaps that explains -- and I hope there could be some explanation for it -- the evening. As if Janos, Chad and I were brotherly non-options, some of the girls turned to each other. Much to the amusement of the Hungarian men at tables around us, they began kissing each other. We boys could only look at each other as their game of playful pecks evolved. Hungary, eh?

And in the other corner, another American girl, only one, but coupled with a Hungarian boy. People dance in discos. The laws of friction insist that two pieces of wood, rubbed furiously enough for long enough time are bound to ignite. And the same laws demand that two bodies, ground against each other for the length of an evening combust. Alcohol, rather than a lubricant, only acts to lower the requirements for immolation.

With girls gone wild with other American girls on one hand, girl gone wild with Hungarian boy on the other, I escaped. I vowed to walk home, from the center of Budapest, across the river to a northern section of the city, alone...in the dark...in the middle of the night, seeing as "I know which direction the river flows."

The only problem was that my nearly two-hour walk left me alone with thoughts on love in Hungary, War and Peace, and in my mind. Places with perhaps an even greater craziness of love than in that room.

The post-script to the story, allowed because it took a week to write, is just as humorous: everyone is sick. What started as one case of a sore throat has spread. And it seems there's a particular danger in the popped-collar, ladies beware. Not only can it hide the status of "potential tool," but also tonsilitis can lurk behind the up-turned-downturn-of-the-formalized-male-attire.

Comfortable With Self

Eva slid me a stack of old Newsweeks last Friday, across her desk at the Ministry of Defense. I took them with a smile. She had finished them, fine-tuning her English, and was now offering them to me as a gift from the MOD. They are quite the gift to be appreciated in these parts.

I blew through them, thirsty for information about the world larger than Heves. One quote, from Oprah Winfrey, interviewed in a November edition, made me think. I thought so much I wrote it down.

"...the things that matter:

How do I accelerate my humanity?
How do I use who I am on earth for a purpose that is bigger than myself?
How do I align the energy of my soul with my personality
and use my personality to serve my soul?

My answer always comes down to self.

There is no moving up and out into the world unless you are fully acquainted with who you are. You cannot move freely, speak freely, act freely, be free, unless you are comfortable with yourself."

Sometimes, being or perhaps becoming comfortable with yourself looks like walking alone, for almost two hours, down the streets of a dark and deserted European capital at 3 o'clock on the morning, wandering your way home

My state of mind is almost always reflected by a song, a dizzying tune stuck in my head for moments or days or weeks. Finding both an outlet, but also a constant reminder of state-of-being, I've latched onto and belted out lyrics like "I'm sending an S.O.S. to the world," "How long, how long will I slide," and "When the world gets in my face, I say Have a nice day" this year. Message in a bottle, Otherside and Bon Jovi's latest hit have all made my Hungarian soundtrack.

But another phenomenon, not simply the reflection of mindset, is the creation of mood by a song. It's not as common in my universe, but might be even more powerful. Saturday, it was sxz frdxHaddaway's chance to haunt.

The song pulsates. You know the one. Haddaway is a one hit wonder. You can feel it, from the moment the DJ blends it into the previous song. Your head starts to bob, side-to-side. Gently at first. Then, as a smile creeps onto your face, the bobbing becomes borderline violent. Before the words even come to play, you're swept into the song.

Haddaway certainly has pursued advanced degrees in psychology, theology, sociology or living. The questions he asks, the lines of though he traces are profound to the core of humanity.

Oh, I don't know, what can I do?

Like an archaeologist, he digs deeper, until he finds the remnants of truth, the foundation of so much more:

What is right and what is wrong?

And reconstructing his way back to questions and answers that are timeless and ageless and unanswerable and haunting and captivating and still somehow eternally relevant and contemplatable:

What is love?

And the only answer that philosopher Haddaway gives?

Whoa whoa whoa, oooh oooh

I was left, after three minutes, a little unhappy - exhausted from sideways-head-bobbing and completely unfulfilled with settling upon "whooooooaaah" as an answer to that question "what is love?" I took to thinking, horrors, and could understanding nothing more than shades of craziness in my surroundings and love. So I was left with no choice but to walk the Danube, upstream, for long hours on end. And write.

There was a craziness to love in that room. A lot.

There is a craziness to love in Hungary. A lot.

There is a craziness to love in War and Peace. A lot.

And there is a craziness to love in my mind. A lot.

That's why this will be a four-part story...

Three Sentences

I get "one of the best e-mails ever" about two or three times a year. A simple message from a friend, oftentimes just a sentence or two, that summarizes -- to an exact precision that amazes me into admiration -- someone's position in life in a well-turned phrase.

This week it was Katie Stubbendick, a friend from back in Madison, back in the ALPs days. We worked together for a semester, then I left to adventure. She just recently graduated to adventures of her own, she's now teaching English on the Reunion Islands of the Indian Ocean.

Brave soul.

In one e-mail, just a three-sentencer, she rocked herself from "old acquaintance" friend to "embarking on some of the same adventures and same thought-processes" good friend.

hey buddy
how do you deal with lonely?
i am frustrated with my reactions to myself.

Wow. Boo-yah. In three sentences, folks, there's the question of life, when you boil life down to being a native-speaking-foreign-language-teacher-teaching-as-a-foreigner-living-with-only-the-comfort-of-your-own-mind.

The way she builds those sentences! Anyone, thousands of miles away in a different reality starring at thousands of glowing dots becomes as intimate as "buddy." How do you deal with "lonely," as if lonely is a companion, a friend, a pet, a person. It takes life. It's more than simply being lonely, it is a disease to be lived with. How do you deal with John, how do you deal with cancer, how do you deal with hornets, how do you deal with smoke around the campfire?

I am frustrated...with my reactions...to myself. Break down the pieces, there's an elegance, a simplicity, a beauty. I am frustrated -- not happy, not content, but willing to work at it. With my reactions -- the understanding that it's a dialogue, it's a conversation, it's a process, it's a relationship between so many different parts of the same whole. To myself -- because that's who it is, that's what does the haunting and that's what does the happinessing. Myself is who I am where I am, and there are so many different who's to each where and each when.

To her I wrote (among other things):

Wine helps.
I've found more pleasure in reading than ever before.
Fiction.
My Message-in-a-Bottle campaign.
Invention.
Routines.
Buying things.
Infatuations.
Mail.
Walking.
Sunshine.
Smiling.
Thinking.
And then more wine.

Who is set to receive those messages in bottles forthcoming?

Gaines Greer - All-Time Winner

Dave Lund - Wine and Conversation (and Sometimes Women)

Jenny Reidy - Part 2 of Wine and Conversation

Ann Carlson - The Laughter of Living

Shawn Stephany - Part 2 of The Laughter of Living (Wedding Edition)

Sam Myers - Companionship and Loneliness

Brian Vest - The Poetry of People

Sarah Patschke - The Learning of Teaching and the Teaching of Learning

Aaryn Joyner - Between Fiction and the Truth

Roll Over, Gaylord!

Etelka asked me several weeks ago to work with the 12th graders on two specific topics, environmentalism and computer technology, to better prepare them for their end-of-year examinations. It seems that recent tests have leaned heavily on those two subjects and, luckily enough, the school landed an expert in both when they drafted me.

After pampering 12B with state highway maps and pictures of my travels out west last week, I felt like I had primed them to appreciate natural beauty. Seeing pictures of the Grand Tetons, of the Grand Canyon, of me standing on Longs Peak with one fist raised above my head in a triumph, how could they feel anything other than a deep appreciation for the grandeur of the world around us? Apparently I was wrong.

Apparently I am a dirty-hippy of an American.

Apparently they are Hungarians.

Apparently those things are different.

I walked into second hour with a smile. Today would be the day that I tried something big, something grand, something epic. It's a class that likes me, we know each other a bit. In my back pocket, I had a stash of 20 trash bags. I wasn't going to stand in front of them and lecture them for 45 minutes about how environmentalism is important in America. I wasn't going to preach the gospel of the way I think before a congregation of the un-converted.

Nope, I had more experiential plans.

The class was smaller than usual, some kids were gone. Perfect, I thought, this will work even better. Monika and Erika, two girls who sit in the front and spend most of the class period flirtatiously proving their English knowledge to me, were two of the missing. I think they're the opinion leaders of the class.

With a flourish, I drew the planet earth on the board. They successfully identified it as 'earth,' but hadn't heard the word 'planet.' I smiled and caressed my beautiful drawing gently. I love the earth, I said, probably purring. In English, in America, we call it 'mother earth.' Apparently the phrase didn't cross the language border well.

I looked out the window, the kids had no idea what was going on now. So I said, "Hungary makes me sad sometimes, it is dirty. I want it to be beautiful." I handed each of them a bag.

"Put on your coats, kids, we're going outside!" I shouted in a feigned burst of immaculate conception of an idea of the grandest nature. They weren't impressed. No one moved.

"Hol van coat?" I asked playfully, as I tugged at coats hanging in the back of the room. Maybe if I was silly enough they'd latch onto this ridiculous idea concocted by a foreigner. Again no one moved.

For a minute I danced around, until desperation set in. I knew that either they all would follow me out the door in a moment of to-be-told-later-in-story-form brilliance, or not a single student would stand up. One or the other.

So I laid my book bag on the table, and held my blue trash bag high above my head, in a bit of dramatics. A bit Braveheart-ian, I dare to say. I didn't quite roar, but proclaimed to the befuddled class:

"Well, folks, I'm gonna go pick up garbage on the street for the next 30 minutes. If you'd like, you can join me." And then I walked out the door.

The only thing following me out of the door was the long string of blue bags hanging out my back pocket. The halls were silent except for the click of my Euro shoes.

I took the long way out to Armos Street, blatantly walking past the 12B classroom's windows. I didn't look up. I was feeling a little martyr-esque. I wasn't wearing a coat; Hungarians as a breed are always cold. I was being a blatant un-Hungarian, and hoping, just maybe, to teaching them something about anything in the process.

It's not the first time I've ever walked down a street, even a street that wasn't my own, picking up garbage. Doing a little good deed. In fact, it's rather common. I'm usually thinking when I'm doing it. There's a good story of the same from Pecos, New Mexico buried somewhere.

I stooped for a cigarette, I bemoaned Hungarians. I swung low for a soda can, I cursed apathy. I dove for a wrapper, I disdained selfishness. But mostly, rather than angry, I was proud of myself, with the contentment that comes from doing good in spite of the laziness of others. The sun was shining, and I was doing something tangible to make the world -- if only a short stretch of my walk to and from school -- a better place.

After half an hour, and two bags of trash and one of recycling, I walked back to school. I walked straight up to the second floor and into 12B. The kids were still there, they looked at me as if I had come back from the dead. I set all three bags on the table. (I had doubled bagged them, so as not to make a mess.)

Without saying a word, I picked up the chalk. I went to the board and scrawled:

Because of me, the world is a little bit better of a place.
Are you able to say the same?
Make sure the answer is yes.
Become.

I underlined the word become, as I've taken a liking to the verb. Especially as a charge to young people. Underneath I wrote, "P.S. Please make sure the glass is recycled."

I set the chalk down, turned around, picked up my book bag, and walked out of the room. I was smiling, but I don't know if they were able to see it. I didn't answer the kids as they called in wonder, "Aren't you forgetting this garbage?"

I'll let them learn some of the answers themselves.

Loving the Love

Yesterday was one of the greatest days in my existence. After walking home in the rain, so content in an excitement to begin to write, it suddenly got even better. Neighbor lady Erika handed me not a single Christmas card. Not two Christmas cards. Not three Christmas cards. Not even four Christmas cards.

Yesterday, I received five Christmas cards.

Unbelievable, simply heartwarming. I set the Heves city record for postage received in one day. And with apologies to the Carlsons and the Hinkleys and even my best friend Shawn, there was one card that stole the show:

A big white Noel card, with a bright red cardinals staring at me on the outside.

Inside, holiday greetings from the kids that had to sit through me learning how to become a German teacher last year. Ana, Emily, Natasha, all alive and well. Matt and Tony, as ridiculous as ever. Little Lindsey and Brittany and Kylie, now a little less little. Randi and Justin daring to write in German, a German I probably didn't teach them. Nicole and Floyd and Carley and Molly and Steph, just like the old days. Shawn reminded me of a story left unfinished, Kaythong arguing that German was no fun without stories. And Zsanett writing in Hungarian.

That's when I started to cry, that wonderful crying that comes complete with a shit-eating grin on your face when you know that life is far too wonderful, far too deeeeelighful to ever bemoan as much as we do in the moments when we forget.

(I did feel a bit guilty, too, because all fall my Hungarian children of all ages have been writing letters, in both English and German, to students back home. I have yet to send a single one across the Atlantic, but fully intend to before Christmas.)

I loved that moment. I love loving the moment you're in.

I celebrated with wine, as Hungarians do. I unplugged my tv, I have no urge to plug it back in until the Olympics begin. I finished the bottle, so I openned another. And I sat down on my bed, faced the large sheet of paper that lays next to me in companionship, and began to write.

Slowly Going (Good) Crazy

Gosh, folks, allow me to gush for just a moment. This place and this time -- even with the rain --  makes me smile.

It started yesterday, Sunday, when the sun came out at about two in the afternoon. I figured it was finally time to get out of bed, disengage from War and Peace, and put on some pants for the first time that day. I set out for a walk, headed in a direction I don't usually go.

Sometimes the fences of Hungary make me sad. Why do these people feel the need to lock themselves into their own little surrounding, and at the same time lock others outside of it? But as I walked past the fences -- they're all different and all shroud different homes and yards and gardens -- I appreciated them as simply something pretty to look at and nice to wonder about.

Lost in the moment of attempting to understand a home, and a people, by a quick glimpse through rusty metal or long-ago painted wood, I found myself in a new part of Heves. I was amazed in wonder, I hadn't know that Heves had different neighborhoods! My boots got muddy, but I liked the exploration.

(I have no idea what's happening...the elderly woman who just sat down at the computer next to me speaks perfect English...?!? It turns out her daughter and son-in-law live in Edinburgh, Scotland. And she just invited me to her house to be her friend.)

I was strangely enamoured with the differences between here and there, and impressed with myself for being so far from where I came from.

And today, after a Monday of teaching, I'm in love with the Green Club, which we can pare down to three 9th graders: Bagi, Janka and Winnie.

Bagi is some sort of boy wonder. He can recite pi to 33 places. He used to be able to do a hundred, but is apparently losing magic in his old age. I did become a little concerned this afternoon when he told me his life goal was to become a terrorist.

Janka's great. So willing to make her my little sister. And I've already made her the president of the Green Club in my mind, so she's pretty much the president of my universe.

And Winnie is such a sweetheart, in a wonderful, hardworking introverted way. She's a Harry Potter-fiend, just loves it. For her "Vak Randi" last week, she drew a picture of Emma Watson, the actress that plays Harry's best friend in the movies. She thinks Emma and I would be perfect for a blind date and has done everything short of naming our love-children.

This afternoon, she handed me a thick packet of paper with a smile, telling me she had some "extra time" last weekend. In my hands was the second paper-clip I had seen in this country and 11-pages worth of nearly flawless English prose as to why a Jeremy-Emma union was a perfect idea, along with pictures as proof. Half of the briefs before the Supreme Court are less praiseworthy in content and style.

"I think Miss Watson would be the perfect girlfriend for you (or later perhaps a wonderful wife) because she's beautiful, clever, talented, famous and very-very rich!"

It's almost like Winnie knows what I'm looking for in a woman! Winnie's efforts come despite the fact that Miss Watson is just 15. She's six months older than Winnie and Janka, but she couldn't be more perfect for me in Winnie's world.

And here, another confession: I'm pregnant. I'm pregnant with thoughts on life and love and fiction and Hungary. I can feel them bubbling inside of me, trapped in a mind forced by an adventure into isolation and contemplation. I can't escape this urge to write and tell and speak and say and laugh and create and cherish and explain. To write. To story-tell. There's a life, a story of some sort, inside of me, demanding to be born onto paper.

I don't think the labor will be easy, and it certainly shouldn't be to live up to that name. I don't think it will be easy because I don't know what it'll look like, I don't know what the process will look like, or can look like, or what the final result will be. I think that'll be half the fun. Simply inventing an invention that explains the invention of inventing. Simply telling a story that tells the story of why telling a story tells the story. On the fiction of fiction as a fiction to fiction.

If you can understand any one of those sentences, you know what I'm feeling like. But if you don't, perhaps reading the book will help. Imagine that. I run off to Hungary and get myself pregnant.

Braving Another Weekend in Heves

Heves has hung up beautiful Christmas lights!

I think I should admit to being desperate when I assigned the children the task of finding a blind date for me. (The phrase translates, roughly into vak randi in Hungarian.) But alas, it's been something that's humored me for two years, on two continents, in two languages now.

For the most part, the kids were fairly generous. Just about all the ladies that they drew were in the right age-range, and all were wearing dresses. One young whipper-snapper decided that my date should come from "Cseranobol" (the Hungarian phonetic spelling of Chernobyl). She had nine eyes and four hairy legs.

The best though, was ninth-grader Barbara, a little blonde-haired sweetheart who's not too good at English. She drew a very lovely lady, and then set out to describe her in English. Everything was pretty good until she started to talk about my date's hobbies. "She likes cocking." Freudian slip?

I convinced Gitta to see Wedding Crashers Friday night. Apparently Heves is a cultural wasteland that fails to appreciate the brilliance of V. Vaughn, O. Wilson and W. Ferrell...we were the only people standing in the lobby to get in at 6:00.

We were given a choice, an ultimatum. We could go home unhappy, or we could buy four tickets. They've got a quorum of four in this neck of the woods. Really was there any choice in the matter? I gladly bought four 2-USD tickets to get in the door. (It was awesome, it really inspired me to change my lifestyle.)

And then I met the football-playing teachers back at school. For palinka. Lots of palinka. Maybe even too much palinka.