I can't believe that I just spent 3 hours writing my CV and it is not even done! I know what you think, but no, it's not 5 pages... (It's 1,5.)
On a happier note, I think I'm going to apply to Britain!
Tuesday, 30 October 2007
Monday, 29 October 2007
And the second half of the semester started...
The second half of the semester started and fall has undeniably arrived. Not the nice, colorful, warm one, but the nasty, wet, cold, disgusting one. Seriously, simply opening your curtains makes you depressed. It's not only grey but also dark outside (even darker now that the clock has been reset). I trust myself on the three extra lightsources, the summery music and the (closed) orange curtains - these make it bearable here.
I haven't had the courage to check out the news at home yet, because I know that I would feel totally disppointed and ashamed. Yesterday I was in a very bad mood anyway, and today I didn't want to run the risk to feel grumpy again. I think the 11 hours of sleep last night did me good. So, I'm not checking the news, but I am working on things that I'm supposed to work on, which is surprising. I did my linguistics reading (a week too late, but that's another issue), I wrote my Dutch assignments, I prepared my Dutch presentation and I practised for my GRE. I am so going to fail that exam. I don't get how I managed to forget so much maths since high school. It's insane. And I was never going to know the English part anyway. Well, well, I think I need some more optimism here...
I'm not actually feeling as bad as it might seem.
I was planning to adjust stuff in my thesis experiment tonight, but Frank hasn't answered my mail, so I can't do much about it. Maybe tomorrow. Instead, I'm going to do some maths.
What a nerd I am.
(I managed to pull it off, by the way. Three days of studying and As on all my exams. Something is either wrong with me or with the system.)
I haven't had the courage to check out the news at home yet, because I know that I would feel totally disppointed and ashamed. Yesterday I was in a very bad mood anyway, and today I didn't want to run the risk to feel grumpy again. I think the 11 hours of sleep last night did me good. So, I'm not checking the news, but I am working on things that I'm supposed to work on, which is surprising. I did my linguistics reading (a week too late, but that's another issue), I wrote my Dutch assignments, I prepared my Dutch presentation and I practised for my GRE. I am so going to fail that exam. I don't get how I managed to forget so much maths since high school. It's insane. And I was never going to know the English part anyway. Well, well, I think I need some more optimism here...
I'm not actually feeling as bad as it might seem.
I was planning to adjust stuff in my thesis experiment tonight, but Frank hasn't answered my mail, so I can't do much about it. Maybe tomorrow. Instead, I'm going to do some maths.
What a nerd I am.
(I managed to pull it off, by the way. Three days of studying and As on all my exams. Something is either wrong with me or with the system.)
Monday, 22 October 2007
Still at home...
(A note from yesterday. Then Irma came and took me out :) )
It's the first day of classes after the break and I'm sitting at home, listening to some latin jazz (an album I bought for the birthday of Béla bácsi) and waiting for Irma to pick me up. We're going to a concert - I've no idea what kind but she says it's going to be good. I don't like the end-of-break packing feeling, but seeing her and Sali will make it better, I'm sure.
I am exhausted. I came home from the party at my father's rowing club at 12 today, but I only slept for half an hour before that and I tried to catch some sleep later but two hours in the afternoon just won't do it. The party was pretty good - it surpassed my expectations for sure. My sister asked me to meet at 8 and even though I told her that only losers go to a party at 8 if it starts at 8, I did go, and chatted with her outside for a while. The party didn't warm up till late, when the older generations arrived. I somehow thought that this would be the case. I tried to educate my sister that you go dance when the music is good and not when enough people are dancing (the two often do not coincide) but I wasn't very successful in that. I definitely got a whiff of the curse of the Bene girls, as my sister calls it. Whoever I was dancing with, at one point or another said something like "good that your father is not here; he would take my head", if the person knew I was his daughter. No surprise my sister has a hard time getting close to the guys in the club. At least my father didn't show up because he's leading a training camp at the moment, but Vali did come, and sometimes Viki asked me to navigate to a spot where we're out of her sight.
It was the weirdest bunch at a party I've ever seen, the age of people probably ranging from 12 to somewhere in the fifties. I met some really nice people, talked and danced a lot. It's also nice to be able to put a face to the name regarding the guys my sister was talking about. It's especially nice that I can now comment on the guy that my sister used to like, and so I can warn her. Patvaros-style, big player... I stayed till the very end and I was the last one leaving the dancefloor :)
Another lovely evening in the last couple of days was when I went out to the gólyabál with Sali. We agreed that we would dress up and go to town and then see whether we feel like going to the thing. We started out at a Gyros place (just like a Turkish pizza fast restaurant), then we moved (and on the way got a bit lost) to the surprise birthday party of his sister (it would actually be a surprise if it wasn't organized by her boyfriend every year) where we saw some old faces from high school. Then we accompanied Dia to a place where she was supposed to meet some of her friends from uni. By then, I was quite tired, but they looked so scary that I said that now we *need* to check out the gólyabál, because they were from the same university, even though from a different department. People at the party seemed somewhat more my type. At the bar I met one of the student council guys that I previously met at the Sziget, so we chatted a bit and Sali and I had a drink (me: coffee, Sali: Fanta-coffee... don't ask). Then we were dancing a bit upstairs - always fun - and my red dress ruled. Stunning evening.
I finally also managed to see Irma. We were planning to go out to dance salsa, but apparently here people go out in couples and not alone. Of course, we could have been a couple, but it would have been nice to have a guy with us :) So, we stayed at her place, we had tea, smoked sheesha, had some food and went to bed. We both had/have a cold, different types if possible, and after a night in the same bed, we both felt much worse. Cross-infection... Then I'll be back to campus with my new Hungarian bacteria and infect others, haha.
It's the first day of classes after the break and I'm sitting at home, listening to some latin jazz (an album I bought for the birthday of Béla bácsi) and waiting for Irma to pick me up. We're going to a concert - I've no idea what kind but she says it's going to be good. I don't like the end-of-break packing feeling, but seeing her and Sali will make it better, I'm sure.
I am exhausted. I came home from the party at my father's rowing club at 12 today, but I only slept for half an hour before that and I tried to catch some sleep later but two hours in the afternoon just won't do it. The party was pretty good - it surpassed my expectations for sure. My sister asked me to meet at 8 and even though I told her that only losers go to a party at 8 if it starts at 8, I did go, and chatted with her outside for a while. The party didn't warm up till late, when the older generations arrived. I somehow thought that this would be the case. I tried to educate my sister that you go dance when the music is good and not when enough people are dancing (the two often do not coincide) but I wasn't very successful in that. I definitely got a whiff of the curse of the Bene girls, as my sister calls it. Whoever I was dancing with, at one point or another said something like "good that your father is not here; he would take my head", if the person knew I was his daughter. No surprise my sister has a hard time getting close to the guys in the club. At least my father didn't show up because he's leading a training camp at the moment, but Vali did come, and sometimes Viki asked me to navigate to a spot where we're out of her sight.
It was the weirdest bunch at a party I've ever seen, the age of people probably ranging from 12 to somewhere in the fifties. I met some really nice people, talked and danced a lot. It's also nice to be able to put a face to the name regarding the guys my sister was talking about. It's especially nice that I can now comment on the guy that my sister used to like, and so I can warn her. Patvaros-style, big player... I stayed till the very end and I was the last one leaving the dancefloor :)
Another lovely evening in the last couple of days was when I went out to the gólyabál with Sali. We agreed that we would dress up and go to town and then see whether we feel like going to the thing. We started out at a Gyros place (just like a Turkish pizza fast restaurant), then we moved (and on the way got a bit lost) to the surprise birthday party of his sister (it would actually be a surprise if it wasn't organized by her boyfriend every year) where we saw some old faces from high school. Then we accompanied Dia to a place where she was supposed to meet some of her friends from uni. By then, I was quite tired, but they looked so scary that I said that now we *need* to check out the gólyabál, because they were from the same university, even though from a different department. People at the party seemed somewhat more my type. At the bar I met one of the student council guys that I previously met at the Sziget, so we chatted a bit and Sali and I had a drink (me: coffee, Sali: Fanta-coffee... don't ask). Then we were dancing a bit upstairs - always fun - and my red dress ruled. Stunning evening.
I finally also managed to see Irma. We were planning to go out to dance salsa, but apparently here people go out in couples and not alone. Of course, we could have been a couple, but it would have been nice to have a guy with us :) So, we stayed at her place, we had tea, smoked sheesha, had some food and went to bed. We both had/have a cold, different types if possible, and after a night in the same bed, we both felt much worse. Cross-infection... Then I'll be back to campus with my new Hungarian bacteria and infect others, haha.
Thursday, 18 October 2007
Hello tourist!
This is the title of a funny-sweet Hungarian (well, well, it's in English, but with the best Hungarian accent) song by Emil!Rulez!, and this is how I sometimes feel when I come home after a couple of months. Like a tourist. Yesterday morning, the Hungarian words on the streets unsettled my ear. It was so weird to walk and hear Hungarian being spoken around me. I was staring at the beautiful, classisist buildings, realizing again and again how nicely monumental this city is. When you are back after so long, you see your surroundings through a different filter. It doesn't always feel very homely, except because I know where things are, where the roads lead and because I understand the signs.
But then, I got on the bus and I saw a couple kissing. Yes, yes, that kind of kissing. And it made me so incredibly happy. Welcome home! I always have the feeling that in this city, love is in the air. And on the streets and buses and metros and trams and everywhere. Bye-bye, the land of "be normal, that is crazy enough"... It should be the other way around: "be crazy; it's normal".
I have to say that I haven't been up to too much in the past couple of days. I went shopping with my mother several times. She usually has this urge that now that I home she needs to contribute to whatever I do, so I got some lovely new items into my wardrobe. Minus 11 kg do show, and now now I got the jeans to show them off :) But my favorite is the little red dress that I am going to wear tonight to the Gólyabál of the university department that I might transfer to. What is a Gólyabál?, you might ask. A Gólyabál is a ball, organized especially for the freshmen of the university, but usually the rest attends it too, and sometimes even strangers wander by (like me). It is a huge party, where the entrance is 3 euros for the students of the university and 5 euros for the guests, it's in the university building and there is a dresscode, which basically states "no jeans", but you would be absolutely ridiculous if you showed up in a Prom dress. I am trying to drag Sali along but he is resisting.
Ah, now I know why I haven't been up to that much. I was ill for two days. The usual after-the-exam-period-you're-gonna-get-sick sickness...
I did work a bit on all kinds of things though. GRE preparation, bar schedule, experiment (stupid sound files), university hunt, trying to figure out whether I could be accepted to here... stuff like this. Meanwhile, only because some of this required using a computer, I talked with people on MSN whom I haven't seen or talked to for ages. It's nice to catch up sometimes.
Tomorrow morning, I will assist (or direct) the electritian who's going to put up my lamps in my flat. It's going to be just soooo cool. I am almost looking forward to living here. Even though I was told by one of the salsa guys in Utrecht that the salsa scene is not that hot over here. There are plenty of alright people, but not real pros. Anyway, the flat with the lamps is going to look stunning and the kitchen is great, so all the major things are done. I'll still have to get rid of all the paper that the kitchen furniture was wrapped into. That is a massive amount of paper for a small kitchen!
And Sunday, I'll go to the rowing club of my father (or of the whole family, basically, I think he met both my mother and his new wife in that club, he starting rowing there as a young boy and he's been working there all his life, darn, he spent his whole life in that club!) to see a race. There's going to be a big party in the evening, and this is where I will come handy for my sister because my father is very protective of her, and now I'll just say that I will keep an eye on her. So, ultimately, I can set her free(-er). She's old enough to enjoy a party properly and she is a smart girl, even though she's in that stupid period where she falls in and out of love every second week. With different guys, of course. It's very entertaining to hear her stories. She was happy that I could go.
I still hope to see András, Varga Peti, Irma and Sali. I have lunch plans with Peti and András, and I'll see how the rest will work out. I still have to call Csaba too, and I just cannot get hold of my grandparents... Weird. I shouldn't forget to bring some sweet Hungarian paprika to Jinon.
Hope you're all well.
But then, I got on the bus and I saw a couple kissing. Yes, yes, that kind of kissing. And it made me so incredibly happy. Welcome home! I always have the feeling that in this city, love is in the air. And on the streets and buses and metros and trams and everywhere. Bye-bye, the land of "be normal, that is crazy enough"... It should be the other way around: "be crazy; it's normal".
I have to say that I haven't been up to too much in the past couple of days. I went shopping with my mother several times. She usually has this urge that now that I home she needs to contribute to whatever I do, so I got some lovely new items into my wardrobe. Minus 11 kg do show, and now now I got the jeans to show them off :) But my favorite is the little red dress that I am going to wear tonight to the Gólyabál of the university department that I might transfer to. What is a Gólyabál?, you might ask. A Gólyabál is a ball, organized especially for the freshmen of the university, but usually the rest attends it too, and sometimes even strangers wander by (like me). It is a huge party, where the entrance is 3 euros for the students of the university and 5 euros for the guests, it's in the university building and there is a dresscode, which basically states "no jeans", but you would be absolutely ridiculous if you showed up in a Prom dress. I am trying to drag Sali along but he is resisting.
Ah, now I know why I haven't been up to that much. I was ill for two days. The usual after-the-exam-period-you're-gonna-get-sick sickness...
I did work a bit on all kinds of things though. GRE preparation, bar schedule, experiment (stupid sound files), university hunt, trying to figure out whether I could be accepted to here... stuff like this. Meanwhile, only because some of this required using a computer, I talked with people on MSN whom I haven't seen or talked to for ages. It's nice to catch up sometimes.
Tomorrow morning, I will assist (or direct) the electritian who's going to put up my lamps in my flat. It's going to be just soooo cool. I am almost looking forward to living here. Even though I was told by one of the salsa guys in Utrecht that the salsa scene is not that hot over here. There are plenty of alright people, but not real pros. Anyway, the flat with the lamps is going to look stunning and the kitchen is great, so all the major things are done. I'll still have to get rid of all the paper that the kitchen furniture was wrapped into. That is a massive amount of paper for a small kitchen!
And Sunday, I'll go to the rowing club of my father (or of the whole family, basically, I think he met both my mother and his new wife in that club, he starting rowing there as a young boy and he's been working there all his life, darn, he spent his whole life in that club!) to see a race. There's going to be a big party in the evening, and this is where I will come handy for my sister because my father is very protective of her, and now I'll just say that I will keep an eye on her. So, ultimately, I can set her free(-er). She's old enough to enjoy a party properly and she is a smart girl, even though she's in that stupid period where she falls in and out of love every second week. With different guys, of course. It's very entertaining to hear her stories. She was happy that I could go.
I still hope to see András, Varga Peti, Irma and Sali. I have lunch plans with Peti and András, and I'll see how the rest will work out. I still have to call Csaba too, and I just cannot get hold of my grandparents... Weird. I shouldn't forget to bring some sweet Hungarian paprika to Jinon.
Hope you're all well.
Sunday, 14 October 2007
@ home
At home again. Travelling takes up the whole day. I'm so fed up with flying... The seats on the plane were the most uncomfortable possible. I was ambitious and took my GRE prep book on board, but it was the perfect fairy tale before going to sleep and I spent the rest of the time sleeping in the weirdest positions. /Gábor was listening to his iPod, wearing a Tommy Hilfiger shirt and carrying a Lacoste bag. / I am exhausted. The moment I saw my mother and her husband waiting for me, I had this horrible feeling that it will all start again. Tonight I said that I'll apply for both clinical psychology and cognitive neuroscience and if I get a good offer for cog sci and they (my parents) don't give me any money, I'll cope with it. They won't like it. Whatever.
Wednesday, 10 October 2007
Coffee
Just as I was thinking that I was going to get my *last* coffee this week - because now I've been seriously drinking too much of it - I had to find that I can't get free coffee in the breakrooms anymore... Not that it would be expensive otherwise, but I wouldn't overdose on it so much. So, in the spirit of health and saving money (because I've been printing hundreds of pages these days) I'll rely on other means to keep myself awake. 2 more exams and I'm done with the midterms. After midterms: no more chocolate, no more coffee, focusing on my thesis and preparing for the GREs. Oh, and break.
Monday, 8 October 2007
Work harder
I should have started reading these texts two days ago. Damn. But as my mother says: "Majd lesz valahogy; olyan még sosem volt, hogy sehogysem lett." (It will turn out somehow; it has never happened that it had not turned out in some way.) After all, she did teach me something...
Work hard, play hard
I promised myself that I wouldn't write till I got through chapter nine of the Psychology of Aging, an endless discussion of speed of processing and its relation to age. I have 3 more pages to go, so maybe I should finish before embarking upon a new note. (5 minutes later.) Ok, whatever, I'm tired of this. How can an author explain new theories in the summary of a chapter? I don't like complaining about books, but this one annoys the hell out of me. The two columns just make it worse. By the time you get through a sentence you are half a page lower. But at least there is a lovely study atmosphere in Voltaire. I discovered Last.fm as my new Pandora substitute in the group of internet radios, since you cannot listen to Radiocafé in the academic buldings. I don't like the new firewall settings.
Work hard, play hard. Recently, I've been doing both. I wasn't willing to give up dancing because of the midterms, and so far it seems that I'll make it. 3 more exams and then I'm done. (The Dutch grammar test was an A, which makes me happy because Dutch word order is the weirdest thing I ever had to develop a feeling for, and my Language Acquisition Device seems to be a bit rusty.) I've been chiefing like everybody else, I've been supervising some ETSI sessions, I've been reading and I've been hanging out with friends a bit too... I was chiefing at the Octoberfest on Friday, which was the best party in the bar this semester, even though it started slowly, and Wouter was also celebrating his birthday that night, so the bar was full of alumni. Literally, everybody was there. It really felt as if we went back in time. After my shift, I was dancing with Paul and Dávid the whole night till closing time. A wild night - I wish I had some pictures... :) I've also spent some time with Frerk; maybe I'll join in once again when they are playing poker in his unit.
I've been quite bad with e-mailing the past weeks - apologies to everybody. When the exams are over, I'll catch up with all of you. I'm looking forward to Thursday: two exams, then chiefing for the College Hall drinks and then salsa at Le Noir. I'll be a bit dead by Friday, but quite pleasantly, I'm sure.
Keep dancing!
Work hard, play hard. Recently, I've been doing both. I wasn't willing to give up dancing because of the midterms, and so far it seems that I'll make it. 3 more exams and then I'm done. (The Dutch grammar test was an A, which makes me happy because Dutch word order is the weirdest thing I ever had to develop a feeling for, and my Language Acquisition Device seems to be a bit rusty.) I've been chiefing like everybody else, I've been supervising some ETSI sessions, I've been reading and I've been hanging out with friends a bit too... I was chiefing at the Octoberfest on Friday, which was the best party in the bar this semester, even though it started slowly, and Wouter was also celebrating his birthday that night, so the bar was full of alumni. Literally, everybody was there. It really felt as if we went back in time. After my shift, I was dancing with Paul and Dávid the whole night till closing time. A wild night - I wish I had some pictures... :) I've also spent some time with Frerk; maybe I'll join in once again when they are playing poker in his unit.
I've been quite bad with e-mailing the past weeks - apologies to everybody. When the exams are over, I'll catch up with all of you. I'm looking forward to Thursday: two exams, then chiefing for the College Hall drinks and then salsa at Le Noir. I'll be a bit dead by Friday, but quite pleasantly, I'm sure.
Keep dancing!
Monday, 1 October 2007
New chiefs!
We initiated 3 new chiefs in the last couple of days: Fiona, Coosje and Max. It's always fun to do it - especially now, as BarCo. I cannot make the details public, but it's always some kind of prank, and this time it was a bit stressful but short at least :) And of course, it contained the compulsory ice pitchers! They all accepted their position and that was good to hear, as we were very much looking forward to getting the new chiefs to alleviate the strain on the chief group. 30 shifts per week with 16 chiefs is far too hard to handle. Now, with 19 of us (and soon 20, when Karin starts chiefing again) it will be much better. And I'm positive that they'll be good chiefs. I'll add some pictures later.
Something bad (laptop) and something good (Max's initiation) in a day - these kind of equal each other out. Plus two positive events: a short e-mail from Sali, which hardly ever comes, but it makes you appreciate it even more when it does, and an e-mail from Caro, who's now on exchange in England. She sent me the link to her blog and I read her posts - ah, I like her :) I put the link on the right under the "Blogs that I read" heading.
I'm now in Voltaire with the intention to study. Without a laptop I am again forced to move to Voltaire whenever I need a computer. I miss my music. And this time I actually did lose quite some files. Whatever, there were worse things that have been lost in the history of mankind.
Something bad (laptop) and something good (Max's initiation) in a day - these kind of equal each other out. Plus two positive events: a short e-mail from Sali, which hardly ever comes, but it makes you appreciate it even more when it does, and an e-mail from Caro, who's now on exchange in England. She sent me the link to her blog and I read her posts - ah, I like her :) I put the link on the right under the "Blogs that I read" heading.
I'm now in Voltaire with the intention to study. Without a laptop I am again forced to move to Voltaire whenever I need a computer. I miss my music. And this time I actually did lose quite some files. Whatever, there were worse things that have been lost in the history of mankind.
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