Thai food and postcards and porn stars -- oh my!

So last night some of us decided to go to the touristy part of Budapest, because we realized that none of us have Budapest postcards yet! They're hard to come by in our very non-touristy village of Diosd, so we took the tram into the city, where we browsed the souvenir shops and looked for a relatively cheap place to eat that did not involve Golden Arches. We finally settled on a Thai place, which had a hostess named Dominique who spoke English very well. And speak she did, pretty much non-stop! But she was fascinating. She moved away from Hungary at 12 and lived in Paris and Moscow, so she speaks four languages fluently. She just moved back to Budapest and was very willing to tell us about all the changes she has noticed. The biggest, she said, was the girls. When she left, women were more modest, but now porn has become a huge industry in Hungary. As if to prove her point, not five minutes later, she alerted us to Hungary's most famous porn star, walking arm in arm with a sketchy looking guy and followed by several men. Interesting. and a little gross.

I am a little disappointed, though, that I chose to go downtown rather than stay in Diosd. The village had an open-air festival last night featuring live entertainment. Some of the teachers went, and apparently I missed the hilarious Hungarian renditions of American hits such as "Don't tear my heart, my achy-breaky heart" and "Stand up by me." I'm told that Sweet Home Alabama was particularly unintelligible, while the Metallica song was passable (although they pronounced the band name as Met -a- LEAK -a) One of the teachers caught the eye of an inebriated Hungarian, who wrote down "Girl blue shirt, janna dance wit me?" Next year, I HAVE to go to this! so funny.

Church was awesome today, as I walked in and saw 5 different people, all non-teachers, that I've met while I'm here. It's nice to feel like I'm starting to feel comfortable. Plus after church we hit a Greek restaurant and a really cool coffeehouse, all for the bargain price of $5.

On the tram on the way back, we crossed the Danube and rode past all these amazing buildings. I was thinking about how much I love Budapest, when Lisa B turned to me and said, "I really love this place." Seriously, this is a beautiful, beautiful city. and I am absolutely thrilled to be here.

so start making plans! Come visit!