Tour Guide #1
We went to the Great Synagogue on Monday morning and took the grand tour—the sanctuary, holocaust cemetery in the courtyard, the Raoul Wallenberg Memorial Park/ Tree of Life and the Jewish Museum. The main sanctuary is very large with a double balcony on two sides for the women and children. Like other German Reform synagogues it has a large organ. But it also features twin pulpits on either side about a third of the way down from the front. The synagogue was purposely build to resemble a Christian church. Apparently one rabbi would give his talks in Yiddish or German and the other in Hungarian. If you look closely in this website picture you can see the semi circular awning over the pulpits three columns down from the front on either side. http://z.about.com/d/honeymoons/1/0/y/b/1/03interior.jpg
The tree of life in the form of a weeping willow has the names of those who perished inscribed on the leaves. The Museum had information more or less arranged by Jewish Holidays. I saw a scroll that had colored lettering and asked what it was. I was told it was a scroll containing Haftorah sections from the book of prophets that is read after the Torah portion. The museum also had a section dedicated to the history of the holocaust. Many of the Synagogue’s sacred objects and museum pieces were hidden by two Catholic priests during the War.
Afterwards we decided to go to Spinoza’s for lunch but chanced to meet our Synagogue tour guide. She persuaded us to eat at the Carmel, a strictly Kosher restaurant next to Rumbach Street Synagogue. The food was good. Refreshed we took the metro up to Hosok tere (Hero’s Square) and the wooded Varosliget City park. Hosok tere has a huge monumental sculpture of the seven mounted Magyar chiefs who conquered what is now Hungary. Behind it is a pair of semi-circular colonnades each containing statues of seven heroes of Hungary and bas reliefs of famous battles.. This was constructed in the 1890s as part of the Millennium celebration of the Magyar state. Originally five of the statues were Habsburgs from Austria. But the area was damaged by bombing in World War II and when it was rebuilt the Habsburgs were replaced. We then walked through the park with the Vajadhunyad Castle and other replica buildings. Unfortunately the lagoon had been drained to permit some construction. I remember earlier trips to Budapest where we spent some quiet time along the shore of the lagoon watching the people, the ducks and a dog diving into the lagoon after sticks.
On Tuesday we returned to St. Stephen's Basilica and went inside. It was built rather late—starting in 1851 and completed in 1906. We walked through and saw the various mosaics, paintings, and sculptures. But we passed on seeing St. Stephen’s mummified right fist. [We had seen Charlemagne’s thigh bone in Aachen and that was enough]. The women then went shopping
The girls had their sightseeing bus tour of Pest on Wednesday morning but were free for the afternoon. So we had lunch and then walked across the chain bridge to the Buda side. We took the siklo (Buda Hill Funicular) to the Castle level. We walked around a bit and then went into the labyrinth under Castle Hill. Listed as one of the seven underground wonders of the world and part of the World Heritage site in Budapest, this is second only to the world’s oldest underground tourist trap, the Cave of Zeus on Crete. Nevertheless it was worth it. The labyrinth contained reproductions of cave drawing from Europe, a section devoted to shamans and magic deer, the inevitable section on the history of Hungary, and a section called “another world” filled with mysterious objects found unexpectedly when renovating the labyrinth in the 1990s. Don’t want to give away the surprise ending.
Academic Matters
I met with several sociologists at Corvinus on Thursday morning. I had discovered them in the process of looking for English language courses that sociology and social science students from MSU could take as part of an exchange program. The current exchange was through the faculty of business which did not have matching sociology or social science courses. The people I talked with were enthusiastic and proposed that we try a pilot program of exchanging one student each as early as winter/spring semester 2010. I told them that the departments would have to approve the courses as transferable, but I didn’t see any major problem with that. The University level agreements on tuition and other matters were beyond my ability to talk about. One of the faculty members will be in the US in mid June and offered to meet with people from MSU. I told them I wouldn’t be back by then but would email the MSU College of Social Science people, see if they were interested in the exchange and whether someone could meet in mid June. I did that and it looks like something may happen.
I had a few email exchanges with Julia, the graduate student who had invited us to her home for Sunday dinner a week earlier. She had turned in her dissertation which covered the history of US health care reform efforts during the twentieth century. She had received some early comments, one of which dealt with her interpretation of American’s being self reliant. We talked and she later emailed me the question and paragraph from the dissertation. I emailed back that I thought her examples were more about family values—Americans preferring nuclear family and independent households—than with self reliance. We exchanged emails over the next few days. She had a personal question about why evangelical Christians in Europe had supported national health insurance while in the US they seemed opposed. I pointed out the differences between mainline and traditional Protestant churches in the US both of which claim the term evangelical. I wrote that if one believed that salvation comes through grace and faith, then doing good work or deeds by helping others will not bring salvation. The Mainline Protestants were more likely to carry out good deeds and work for social justice than the more traditional churches.
Friday evening we went to another salon at Bruce’s. Laszlo the historian who had spoken to us at orientation back in February led the discussion. He was frustrated that Americans and Western Europeans have distorted the recent election results as an indication of Hungarian intolerance of or enthusiasm for racism and fascism. The cause was the rise of Jobbik the far right wing nationalist party that captured over 15% of the vote. [I pointed out that if we had the same party ballot system in the US, at least 15% would vote for the right wing “Tea Party” that had disrupted town hall meetings on health reform last summer.] One of the Hungarian professors said he had voted for Jobbik although he didn’t agree with everything they stood for. He claimed that many small rural communities had supported Jobbik because the villages had no real police to prevent or investigate “Gypsy” crime—which can range from petty theft on up. They relied on the Hungarian Guard Movement to protect them against Gypsy crime. The Guard was forced to dissolve, but had tried to reorganize under a different name. [Over one hundred years ago “Jewish” crime was similarly defined and politicized. The black uniforms and red insignia of the Guard resembled the uniforms worn by Hungarians who assisted the Nazi in World War II.]
But above all he was clearly a nationalist wanting to discuss the Treaty of Trianon that divided up Hungary after WWI and left sizeable Hungarian ethnic communities in newly created countries while Germany was left pretty much intact. Jobbik called for granting ethnic and/or linguistic Hungarians in neighboring countries dual citizenship. This is a classic case of nation not exactly corresponding with statehood boundaries. The dual citizenship could range from granting easier access into Hungary for education and jobs to voting rights on the party ballot for Parliament but not the local district Parliamentary elections. Fidesz, the right center party, also favors non-residential dual citizenship. Since it won over two-thirds of the seats in the April 2010 election, Fidesz can do just about anything it wants. In 2009 Slovakia passed a law requiring that Slovak must be used in all official contacts, including the police, fire brigade, postal services and local government, with fines up to 5,000 Euros after one warning. Both are members of the EU. Stay tuned…
On the Town
We were invited to Sunday dinner at Helga’s, one of the younger professors. She, her husband and children live in a large flat located on a side of Gellert Hill overlooking the Danube. Peter was there as well. We started with Hungarian meat pancakes (hortobágyi húsos palacsinta) which were delicious, followed by chicken paprika and a cherry tart. We were able to take a few of the pancakes and tart squares home with us.
We bought our fifth and last monthly BKV transit pass. It was a reminder that we have only a few weeks left. Tari can feel herself beginning to look forward to going home. Her biggest problem here has been the food. She never considered herself a picky eater but both here and in Japan she has not been able to get to like the local food. She does like Hungarian Gulyas soup, chicken paprikas, and of course the pastries. She is not a cook and spends as little time in the kitchen as possible. Good Hungarian cooking takes time. The meals we have had at the homes of local Hungarians were wonderful. Much of the Hungarian food in restaurants tends to be a bit on the heavy side. The beef in the food stores is not good.
On the bright side, we have been losing weight eating chicken, ground turkey and fish (salmon filets) at home. But that gets so tiresome. Since we have eaten out for the past week with Emily and Pam, Tari is even more intolerant of cooking at home. She is sooooo looking forward to getting home to her own kitchen and American grocery stores. Of course there is another week of eating out here with Harry's friends and she is learning what to stay away from in the restaurants.
All in all the past four months has been a good experience, but living in a foreign country for an extended period of time really is different from a vacation trip. At the beginning it's all a grand adventure but time wears you down with those things that you find difficult. For a vacation trip you go home before it gets hard. If people stay longer (like one or two years) they learn to cope better or can justify buying those items that make life easier.
Saturday, May 22, 2010
Thursday, May 13, 2010
Budapest in Bloom
On the Town
Spring has finally arrived, albeit several weeks late. The trees are green, the lilacs are out and the pitypang (dandelions) are already turning puffy white. Statues and sculptures that were either covered during the winter or stored somewhere have appeared in squares and along the Pest side of the Danube. Many of the pedestrian streets are now half as wide as they were in early March. The restaurants have put down platform with tables, chairs, sun umbrellas or awnings. People sit, eat and drink outside in the early evening. Coats are gone and the boots of Budapest have been transformed into sneakers and sandals. The homeless have moved up out of the metro entrance passageways onto the benches in front of the street planters and sleep in doorways of empty shops. The weather is sometimes on the rainy side—clouds, drizzle, and occasionally a half hour down pour.
On Friday I went with the Fulbrighters to Eger. Tari and I had been there a few weeks earlier as guests of Helga. But Tari had to go to the airport to meet our daughter and her girl friend who were coming for a short visit. The Fulbright tour took us to the Lyceum library with the tromp l’oeil ceiling of the Council of Trent. But then we visited a second room which also had a tromp l’oeil ceiling, but this one had the four faculties in the Lyceum—law, philosophy (including natural sciences, military and political geography), medicine and theology. We climbed the stairs to the Camera Obscura, which is like a periscope that can look down upon the town. We were taken to lunch at a restaurant in the nearby Valley of the Beautiful Women (literally Mrs. Pretty Valley). They served us the famous Bull’s Blood Egri Bikaver wine (a red blend of several varieties of grapes). Allegedly the Hungarians defending Eger during the 38 day seige in 1552 had to mix the available red wines When they drank, the wine spilled onto their beards and armor. The invading Turks thought that they were drinking bull’s blood which was giving them the strength to resist the siege. It was certainly a heavy, full bodied red and I thought a little “creamy.” We then returned to Eger and went through the castle tunnel system.
Academic matters
This was the last week of classes. On Monday I gave a guest presentation for Edina on the rise of medical science from 1400-1900. I covered the early anatomists Bartolomeo Eustachi and Gabriele Fallopio who were the first to discover body parts names after them (Fallopio is said to have invented the first condom). I also discussed the first blind experiment to test Mesmerizing conducted by Ben Franklin, Antoine Lavoisier and Joseph Guillotin. I ended up the presentation with Virchow, Pasteur and Koch.
Wednesday was the last class for the English language medical students. Only four showed up. Nevertheless I gave my presentation on doctor patient relationships including some US case law concerning obligations to patients and ethical issues. The students were allowed to have two absences, so most of them had an absence to use up and took it. Several may have had a major exam on Thursday. For the class I helped teach, they are to write a short 2500 word paper in English on what they learned in our class. About half agreed to turn in the paper by May 17th and the other half at the end of June. Since they will submit their papers as email attachments I told Peter I would be happy to read them even after I returned to the US.
I spent the rest of the time plugging away at my writing assignments for articles, presentations and the case studies on social science research ethics.
Tour Guide #1
Our daughter and her girl friend are the first of three sets of visitors we expect over the next five weeks. We took them to some places that were not on the schedule of their river cruise tour. After Tari picked them up at the airport on Friday morning and dropped their bags at the apartment, she took the girls up to Nyugati pu, the western railroad station which was built by Eiffel. The did a brief tour of the large Westend mall. They later walked along Vaci Utca, the main tourist drag. That kept them awake sufficiently to begin to acclimate to European time. After Harry’s return from Eger, we all went out to dinner at the Central Kavehaz for Hungarian food.
On Saturday we walked to the central market hall which was also built by Eiffel. We crossed over to the Buda side and went into the Gellert Spa. It features two thermal baths one for men, one for women and a swimming pool in between. We then went across the street and up the hill to the Cave Church, originally home to Saint Istvan, a hermit monk who cured the sick with thermal waters that sprung in front of the cave. A grotto chapel was carved out starting in 1926 and is now taken care of by the Hungarian Paulite order of monks. We took a tram to Moscova Ter in search of a nearby street fair. We found it but it was mainly for small children. Later that afternoon we went by St. Stephen’s church but it was closed for a wedding. When the newly weds emerged, the groom was in a dark uniform with a white cap. Six soldiers held their swords aloft for the couple to pass under as they walked down the church steps. That night we attended a concert at St. Michael's Church on Vaci Utca. A small string orchestra played the greatest classical hits—Pachelbel,Vivaldi, Bach, Handel and Mozart. The acoustics were great and the solo violinist for Vivaldi’s Winter from the Four Seasons, Gabora Gyula, was spectacular.
On Sunday we had breakfast at Spinoza’s. Afterwards we went across the street and through the Gozsdu Bazaar which is open Sunday mornings during the summer and features a variety of people selling all sorts of arts and crafts as well as old books and touristy nicknacks. The three women bought a number of things. We then spent the afternoon at Aquincum, the remains of the Roman town dating back to the first century. The new museum had some recent findings from digs where the new M-0 ring highway will go. The main part of the site consists of the remains of stone walls showing the various buildings in the town. Interestingly, the Roman bath was set up exactly like the Gellert Spa (or maybe it should be the other way around—the more things change the more they remain the same). The Roman bath had heated changing rooms and thermal baths for men on one side and women on the other with a pool in the middle. We also looked at the remains of stellae/ tombstones and other statuary. On our way back we stopped at a pancake dessert house at Batthyány tér that one of the Fulbrighters had recommended. It was a nice sweet pickup after two hours at Aquincum.
More on Tour Guide #1 next week!
Spring has finally arrived, albeit several weeks late. The trees are green, the lilacs are out and the pitypang (dandelions) are already turning puffy white. Statues and sculptures that were either covered during the winter or stored somewhere have appeared in squares and along the Pest side of the Danube. Many of the pedestrian streets are now half as wide as they were in early March. The restaurants have put down platform with tables, chairs, sun umbrellas or awnings. People sit, eat and drink outside in the early evening. Coats are gone and the boots of Budapest have been transformed into sneakers and sandals. The homeless have moved up out of the metro entrance passageways onto the benches in front of the street planters and sleep in doorways of empty shops. The weather is sometimes on the rainy side—clouds, drizzle, and occasionally a half hour down pour.
On Friday I went with the Fulbrighters to Eger. Tari and I had been there a few weeks earlier as guests of Helga. But Tari had to go to the airport to meet our daughter and her girl friend who were coming for a short visit. The Fulbright tour took us to the Lyceum library with the tromp l’oeil ceiling of the Council of Trent. But then we visited a second room which also had a tromp l’oeil ceiling, but this one had the four faculties in the Lyceum—law, philosophy (including natural sciences, military and political geography), medicine and theology. We climbed the stairs to the Camera Obscura, which is like a periscope that can look down upon the town. We were taken to lunch at a restaurant in the nearby Valley of the Beautiful Women (literally Mrs. Pretty Valley). They served us the famous Bull’s Blood Egri Bikaver wine (a red blend of several varieties of grapes). Allegedly the Hungarians defending Eger during the 38 day seige in 1552 had to mix the available red wines When they drank, the wine spilled onto their beards and armor. The invading Turks thought that they were drinking bull’s blood which was giving them the strength to resist the siege. It was certainly a heavy, full bodied red and I thought a little “creamy.” We then returned to Eger and went through the castle tunnel system.
Academic matters
This was the last week of classes. On Monday I gave a guest presentation for Edina on the rise of medical science from 1400-1900. I covered the early anatomists Bartolomeo Eustachi and Gabriele Fallopio who were the first to discover body parts names after them (Fallopio is said to have invented the first condom). I also discussed the first blind experiment to test Mesmerizing conducted by Ben Franklin, Antoine Lavoisier and Joseph Guillotin. I ended up the presentation with Virchow, Pasteur and Koch.
Wednesday was the last class for the English language medical students. Only four showed up. Nevertheless I gave my presentation on doctor patient relationships including some US case law concerning obligations to patients and ethical issues. The students were allowed to have two absences, so most of them had an absence to use up and took it. Several may have had a major exam on Thursday. For the class I helped teach, they are to write a short 2500 word paper in English on what they learned in our class. About half agreed to turn in the paper by May 17th and the other half at the end of June. Since they will submit their papers as email attachments I told Peter I would be happy to read them even after I returned to the US.
I spent the rest of the time plugging away at my writing assignments for articles, presentations and the case studies on social science research ethics.
Tour Guide #1
Our daughter and her girl friend are the first of three sets of visitors we expect over the next five weeks. We took them to some places that were not on the schedule of their river cruise tour. After Tari picked them up at the airport on Friday morning and dropped their bags at the apartment, she took the girls up to Nyugati pu, the western railroad station which was built by Eiffel. The did a brief tour of the large Westend mall. They later walked along Vaci Utca, the main tourist drag. That kept them awake sufficiently to begin to acclimate to European time. After Harry’s return from Eger, we all went out to dinner at the Central Kavehaz for Hungarian food.
On Saturday we walked to the central market hall which was also built by Eiffel. We crossed over to the Buda side and went into the Gellert Spa. It features two thermal baths one for men, one for women and a swimming pool in between. We then went across the street and up the hill to the Cave Church, originally home to Saint Istvan, a hermit monk who cured the sick with thermal waters that sprung in front of the cave. A grotto chapel was carved out starting in 1926 and is now taken care of by the Hungarian Paulite order of monks. We took a tram to Moscova Ter in search of a nearby street fair. We found it but it was mainly for small children. Later that afternoon we went by St. Stephen’s church but it was closed for a wedding. When the newly weds emerged, the groom was in a dark uniform with a white cap. Six soldiers held their swords aloft for the couple to pass under as they walked down the church steps. That night we attended a concert at St. Michael's Church on Vaci Utca. A small string orchestra played the greatest classical hits—Pachelbel,Vivaldi, Bach, Handel and Mozart. The acoustics were great and the solo violinist for Vivaldi’s Winter from the Four Seasons, Gabora Gyula, was spectacular.
On Sunday we had breakfast at Spinoza’s. Afterwards we went across the street and through the Gozsdu Bazaar which is open Sunday mornings during the summer and features a variety of people selling all sorts of arts and crafts as well as old books and touristy nicknacks. The three women bought a number of things. We then spent the afternoon at Aquincum, the remains of the Roman town dating back to the first century. The new museum had some recent findings from digs where the new M-0 ring highway will go. The main part of the site consists of the remains of stone walls showing the various buildings in the town. Interestingly, the Roman bath was set up exactly like the Gellert Spa (or maybe it should be the other way around—the more things change the more they remain the same). The Roman bath had heated changing rooms and thermal baths for men on one side and women on the other with a pool in the middle. We also looked at the remains of stellae/ tombstones and other statuary. On our way back we stopped at a pancake dessert house at Batthyány tér that one of the Fulbrighters had recommended. It was a nice sweet pickup after two hours at Aquincum.
More on Tour Guide #1 next week!
Monday, May 3, 2010
A Hungarian Movie and Sunday Dinner
On Sunday we went for our bagel and lox fix at Spinoza’s. When we walked in we noticed that the back room was quite full of people. At one point a young child came out and started looking at the old victrola record player in the corner behind my chair. The father talked to her in English. We got to chatting and discovered that the brunch was for Democrats Abroad in Hungary. I told him I was here on a Fulbright and giving a talk on US Health Care Reform. He checked with the president and I was allowed to announce my talk on Monday on the Obama plan at the Fulbright Office.
Academic Matters
On Monday I presented at Edina’s class on cultural anthropology and health. She had suddenly taken ill and had gone home. I was shown to the classroom and prepared for the presentation. I was warned that the students were from all over the world. Their expectations of class ranged from a very orderly outlined lecture in which they would never ask a question to wanting to give their uninformed opinions on anything but the presentation topic. I was the true substitute teacher—the students didn’t pay much attention, and those in the back talked almost the whole time. I only spoke for about an hour for a class that was supposed to go for an hour and a half.
Later on Monday I gave the Clinton / Obama Health Care Reform presentation at the Fulbright office. Only a few people showed up, but one was a young woman named Julia. She had just finished her dissertation in history on Health Care in the US. She was a bit disappointed that she did not know I was here so she could have gotten some last minute advice for her dissertation. When she learned I was from MSU she said her father had been their in the late 1980s and she had spent a year at East Lansing High. Small world department, our daughter had been at ELHS the same time. So I sent her to talk with Tari before the talk. They got as far as perhaps getting together on the weekend but then I started the presentation. During the presentation I could see her nodding her head and talking notes. Afterwards I gave her my card in case she wanted to keep in touch.
After my successful moderation of a session for the returning Hungarian Fulbrighters, I was asked to chair a session for the current US Fulbright students who would be making their presentations. I chaired the first session and then sat in on the second. The students ranged from senior undergraduates to doctoral students doing their dissertation research. Several had run into what they considered to be unexpected difficulties accessing documents or data. Of course students everywhere run into these difficulties as well, but these students persevered. One was passed along a chain of potential data sources and finally ended up pretty much where he started with little to show for it. Another realized that she was not going to get access to information on Hungarians in Slovakia without several letters of support and introduction which were not going to come. The two math student gave presentations that non math people could understand. One did a math lesson on finding prime numbers from a “Hungarian” perspective. Essentially he asked a set of questions about how to approach the problem and develop a strategy for a proof rather than trying to logically deduce the proof. In essence he showed me how to “think” like a mathematician. The math grad student explained how computers could check and correct data streams sent in binary for typos and entry errors.
Two other students had developed a short survey on faculty and student reaction to the Bologna Process for harmonizing higher education in Europe by 2010. Bologna called for a three year bachelor’s degree followed by a two year master’s degree and then a standardized three year doctoral degree. Prior to Bologna education was a mix of three to five year bachelor that in Hungary often included a double undergraduate major befoe moving on to a master’s program. The two students had the right idea but their questions were naively worded and not synchronized with their answer foils which ran strongly agree to strongly disagree. Unfortunately many people think that all surveys can be constructed like psychology personality tests. But questions about frequency or awareness or satisfaction should have answer foils ranging from never to always, not at all aware to fully aware or completely dissatisfied to completely satisfied.
I then gave my presentation to the Semmelweis English language medical students. They have organized an international student club that put out a glossy magazine complete with pictures. They also told me they had a Facebook page featuring interviews with various faculty members. I asked if they wanted to interview me although I was only going to be there for the semester which was almost over. They said yes and sent me the ten item survey that had been approved by the dean. Here is the Facebook page. You may have to scroll down to get to me.
http://isas.hu/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2290&Itemid=314
On the town
On Thursday I worked on my last lectures—one for the medical students and the other for Edina on the growth of medical science 1400-1900. I had made good progress by early afternoon and decided to take a break. We figured out how to get to Amadeus hotel and restaurant where we had stayed the very first time we were in Budapest in 1999. Tari remembered it had great goulash soup. We took the metro and a bus. We sat outside in the shade, had soft drinks and sweets and thoroughly enjoyed the spring weather. We plan to come here for dinner with our friends and family who will be visiting us in May.
On Friday afternoon we went grocery shopping. What was an adventure in January and February has now become more of a chore. We had to go to three different neighborhood stores to get the items we wanted, and even then several were not available anywhere. If we were staying here longer, we’d have to make a list of which stores at which locations carried which items. The only good thing is that I keep on finding crunch peanut butter in unexpected places, so I no longer face a shortage.
A Hungarian Movie
We then went to a small gathering organized by Bruce, one of the Fulbright professors. He teaches and has been inviting some of his students to get together on Friday evenings for discussions. This Friday he was showing the film A Tanú or The Witness. Made in 1969, it was suppressed for over ten years and but was well received when shown at the 1981 Cannes Film Festival. Set in 1949 shortly after the Communist takeover of Hungary, a simple dike watchman on the Danube is arrested for slaughtering a pig in his basement. But the watchman, whose name is Pelikán like the bird, had helped the anti Nazi underground during the war and now has friends in high places. They get him out of jail, give him jobs that he admittedly is ideologically unprepared for, cover up his naïve mistakes that expose the duplicity of the system, and get him out of jail yet again. He is eventually asked to be a witness at a show trial for the man he helped hide during the war.
One of Bruce’s guest was a woman who had lived through it all. She gave us some insight into how life really was during that period and a few explanations that we might not have understood. One of Pelikán’s sponsors is Comrade Virág. She explained that virág means flowers or blooms and Bloom was a typical Hungarian Jewish name. One of Virág’s fellow comrades was formerly a Nazi, and they both have to work with the army general Bástya (bastion or castle). An American student asked how come no one could really stand up to the system. The older woman pointed to the scenes where Pelikán is put in charge of research to grow oranges in Hungary which doesn’t have the climate for it. Unfortunately the one successful orange is eaten by Pelikán’s son before it can be presented at the ceremony. Virag then pulls a lemon from his pocket to replace the orange. In those days a lemon was an orange and no one dared question it. She then recalled the first time she had seen an orange and that she was much older before she actually ate one. She suggested that people are unaware of how bad things are when everyone is in the same boat. It is only when looking back from better times that people realize what they lived through.
She went on to mention Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler, although the Hungarian purges were not as extensive as the Stalinist purges of the 1930s. I described the McCarthy witch hunts and the blacklisting of Hollywood writers and directors as an American example from the same period. I also mentioned the Rosenberg trials. The older woman then explained how a street in Budapest was named for the Rosenbergs during the Communist era but now it had been changed back to its original name
On Saturday we cleaned up the flat. Our daughter and her girl friend will be here next week. They will stay with us over the weekend and then go on a river cruise up the Danube to Vienna and on to Prague.
Sunday dinner
We were invited to have Sunday dinner with Julia and her family in Buda. We took a tram to the end of the line and were then picked up and driven to her home. She, her husband and two children lived in the bottom floor. We think, her parents lived on the floor above them and possibly her grandparents above them. Her father, who had been at MSU during the late 1980s, stopped by to say hello. But unfortunately we didn’t know anyone in common since I was in social science and he was in the agriculture and natural resources school doing research.
Julia prepared a meal of chicken noodle soup, chicken paprikas and cheese filled strudel. All were Hungarian specialties which take a long time to prepare. She hardly ever cooks them and when she does, she uses an English cookbook of traditional Hungarian recipes (available for tourists on Vaci utca). Once the children were finished eating we had a nice long conversation. We exchanged family histories, which included her family hiding Jews in their large cellar during the war and working with Raoul Wallenberg. We got home late Sunday afternoon and didn’t really need another meal.
Academic Matters
On Monday I presented at Edina’s class on cultural anthropology and health. She had suddenly taken ill and had gone home. I was shown to the classroom and prepared for the presentation. I was warned that the students were from all over the world. Their expectations of class ranged from a very orderly outlined lecture in which they would never ask a question to wanting to give their uninformed opinions on anything but the presentation topic. I was the true substitute teacher—the students didn’t pay much attention, and those in the back talked almost the whole time. I only spoke for about an hour for a class that was supposed to go for an hour and a half.
Later on Monday I gave the Clinton / Obama Health Care Reform presentation at the Fulbright office. Only a few people showed up, but one was a young woman named Julia. She had just finished her dissertation in history on Health Care in the US. She was a bit disappointed that she did not know I was here so she could have gotten some last minute advice for her dissertation. When she learned I was from MSU she said her father had been their in the late 1980s and she had spent a year at East Lansing High. Small world department, our daughter had been at ELHS the same time. So I sent her to talk with Tari before the talk. They got as far as perhaps getting together on the weekend but then I started the presentation. During the presentation I could see her nodding her head and talking notes. Afterwards I gave her my card in case she wanted to keep in touch.
After my successful moderation of a session for the returning Hungarian Fulbrighters, I was asked to chair a session for the current US Fulbright students who would be making their presentations. I chaired the first session and then sat in on the second. The students ranged from senior undergraduates to doctoral students doing their dissertation research. Several had run into what they considered to be unexpected difficulties accessing documents or data. Of course students everywhere run into these difficulties as well, but these students persevered. One was passed along a chain of potential data sources and finally ended up pretty much where he started with little to show for it. Another realized that she was not going to get access to information on Hungarians in Slovakia without several letters of support and introduction which were not going to come. The two math student gave presentations that non math people could understand. One did a math lesson on finding prime numbers from a “Hungarian” perspective. Essentially he asked a set of questions about how to approach the problem and develop a strategy for a proof rather than trying to logically deduce the proof. In essence he showed me how to “think” like a mathematician. The math grad student explained how computers could check and correct data streams sent in binary for typos and entry errors.
Two other students had developed a short survey on faculty and student reaction to the Bologna Process for harmonizing higher education in Europe by 2010. Bologna called for a three year bachelor’s degree followed by a two year master’s degree and then a standardized three year doctoral degree. Prior to Bologna education was a mix of three to five year bachelor that in Hungary often included a double undergraduate major befoe moving on to a master’s program. The two students had the right idea but their questions were naively worded and not synchronized with their answer foils which ran strongly agree to strongly disagree. Unfortunately many people think that all surveys can be constructed like psychology personality tests. But questions about frequency or awareness or satisfaction should have answer foils ranging from never to always, not at all aware to fully aware or completely dissatisfied to completely satisfied.
I then gave my presentation to the Semmelweis English language medical students. They have organized an international student club that put out a glossy magazine complete with pictures. They also told me they had a Facebook page featuring interviews with various faculty members. I asked if they wanted to interview me although I was only going to be there for the semester which was almost over. They said yes and sent me the ten item survey that had been approved by the dean. Here is the Facebook page. You may have to scroll down to get to me.
http://isas.hu/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=2290&Itemid=314
On the town
On Thursday I worked on my last lectures—one for the medical students and the other for Edina on the growth of medical science 1400-1900. I had made good progress by early afternoon and decided to take a break. We figured out how to get to Amadeus hotel and restaurant where we had stayed the very first time we were in Budapest in 1999. Tari remembered it had great goulash soup. We took the metro and a bus. We sat outside in the shade, had soft drinks and sweets and thoroughly enjoyed the spring weather. We plan to come here for dinner with our friends and family who will be visiting us in May.
On Friday afternoon we went grocery shopping. What was an adventure in January and February has now become more of a chore. We had to go to three different neighborhood stores to get the items we wanted, and even then several were not available anywhere. If we were staying here longer, we’d have to make a list of which stores at which locations carried which items. The only good thing is that I keep on finding crunch peanut butter in unexpected places, so I no longer face a shortage.
A Hungarian Movie
We then went to a small gathering organized by Bruce, one of the Fulbright professors. He teaches and has been inviting some of his students to get together on Friday evenings for discussions. This Friday he was showing the film A Tanú or The Witness. Made in 1969, it was suppressed for over ten years and but was well received when shown at the 1981 Cannes Film Festival. Set in 1949 shortly after the Communist takeover of Hungary, a simple dike watchman on the Danube is arrested for slaughtering a pig in his basement. But the watchman, whose name is Pelikán like the bird, had helped the anti Nazi underground during the war and now has friends in high places. They get him out of jail, give him jobs that he admittedly is ideologically unprepared for, cover up his naïve mistakes that expose the duplicity of the system, and get him out of jail yet again. He is eventually asked to be a witness at a show trial for the man he helped hide during the war.
One of Bruce’s guest was a woman who had lived through it all. She gave us some insight into how life really was during that period and a few explanations that we might not have understood. One of Pelikán’s sponsors is Comrade Virág. She explained that virág means flowers or blooms and Bloom was a typical Hungarian Jewish name. One of Virág’s fellow comrades was formerly a Nazi, and they both have to work with the army general Bástya (bastion or castle). An American student asked how come no one could really stand up to the system. The older woman pointed to the scenes where Pelikán is put in charge of research to grow oranges in Hungary which doesn’t have the climate for it. Unfortunately the one successful orange is eaten by Pelikán’s son before it can be presented at the ceremony. Virag then pulls a lemon from his pocket to replace the orange. In those days a lemon was an orange and no one dared question it. She then recalled the first time she had seen an orange and that she was much older before she actually ate one. She suggested that people are unaware of how bad things are when everyone is in the same boat. It is only when looking back from better times that people realize what they lived through.
She went on to mention Darkness at Noon by Arthur Koestler, although the Hungarian purges were not as extensive as the Stalinist purges of the 1930s. I described the McCarthy witch hunts and the blacklisting of Hollywood writers and directors as an American example from the same period. I also mentioned the Rosenberg trials. The older woman then explained how a street in Budapest was named for the Rosenbergs during the Communist era but now it had been changed back to its original name
On Saturday we cleaned up the flat. Our daughter and her girl friend will be here next week. They will stay with us over the weekend and then go on a river cruise up the Danube to Vienna and on to Prague.
Sunday dinner
We were invited to have Sunday dinner with Julia and her family in Buda. We took a tram to the end of the line and were then picked up and driven to her home. She, her husband and two children lived in the bottom floor. We think, her parents lived on the floor above them and possibly her grandparents above them. Her father, who had been at MSU during the late 1980s, stopped by to say hello. But unfortunately we didn’t know anyone in common since I was in social science and he was in the agriculture and natural resources school doing research.
Julia prepared a meal of chicken noodle soup, chicken paprikas and cheese filled strudel. All were Hungarian specialties which take a long time to prepare. She hardly ever cooks them and when she does, she uses an English cookbook of traditional Hungarian recipes (available for tourists on Vaci utca). Once the children were finished eating we had a nice long conversation. We exchanged family histories, which included her family hiding Jews in their large cellar during the war and working with Raoul Wallenberg. We got home late Sunday afternoon and didn’t really need another meal.
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