08-30-2016, 09:06 AM
Tuesday Aug 16th Coda
Some memories bubble as I sit around the house, including this one.
I mic’ed up Xenia for the Szepesi interview. I had one mic on Szepisi and one on her so I could hear what she said as she interpreted. Something in her mind always made her speak away from the placement of the mic. I put it on the HK side of her chest so when she turned to him to speak, I would hear her. But she decided she should speak to me. I eventually just started pointing at HK so she would speak in his direction and the direction of the microphone.
However, her aim was un-erring whenever she had to cough. She would blast full throated into the microphone every time she coughed. Szepesi laughed as I yanked the head phones from my head. It took Xenia a few looks around the room until they rested on me to realize that she had tried her best to deafen me.
Wednesday Aug 17th
Okay. I’m going to pretend I know what happened in the morning of this day. I think this was my first interaction with the Budpaest Metro system. Our Hotel Nemzeti sits atop the Blaha Lujza Ter Metro station. I’ve been making my through it’s dirty corridors to cross the streets for quite some time, but it finally clicked in my head that I could actually pick up the subway car down there, too.
To save time, I decided rather than walking all the way to Buda, I would just pick up the train and take it over. And the trip was going to cost me about $1.35 each way, so I knew I was reaching the limits of my travel budget with this trip.
I got off at the Batthyány tér which sits right across the Danube from the Budapest Parliament building. My initial thought was to also take the Funicular up the side of the steep hill to Buda proper but I got to walking and just climbed up the stairs to the Castle.
My first big find was the Hussar statue from which all the small statues are based. Then I wandered the grounds of the castle looking at the preparations for the upcoming Folk Festival. HK and I’s big plan for the weekend was to get some b-roll footage of the festival to show some Hungarian culture.
Buses started to disgorge their morning tourists and the streets of Buda slowly filled with tourists. In my world view, it was time to leave.
I made my big purchase at the pharmacy. I broke down and decided it was time to take some medicine for my foot. According to google, the best cure for my self-diagnosed heel problem was stretching and ibuprofen. It’s a big leap of faith taking the proper dosage of medicine where the instructions are all in Hungarian. It seemed to work out okay.
I also made the tragic mistake of visiting the House of Houdini, which wasn’t Houdini’s house at all, just a house to shelter a very poor collection of Houdini artifacts. Most of the artifacts were reproductions. A couple of them were props from the most recent Houdini movie. I took the tour with a very shy flower who really wasn’t up on her Houdini facts. After she finished her spiel, I chimed in with the bit I knew from my years of interest.
The capper for the House of Houdini visit was the magic show. You know it’s going to be bad when the magician starts with the rope of three different lengths trick. Since the audience was small, me and four Germans, I got to help with a card trick. Woohoo. It was all pretty sad. I think we applauded mainly to keep the magician on stage from spiraling into depression.
I walked back through Buda by the Vienna Gate and down the hill. I figured as long as I was descending towards the river I could eventually find the Metro station. It also didn’t hurt that the street I was on had the same name as Metro station. Sure enough, turned a corner and I was back at my subway station.
For the afternoon, we interviewed Dr. Szakály of the Veritas institute. My original plan was to rearrange Dr. Szakály’s office, but HK balked a bit at trying to move some extension cords. I asked Szakály if there might be another office or conference room we could use. We ended up pushing everything out of the deputy director’s office.
Our interpreter showed up late as is to be expected at this point.
Again the content of the interview has yet to be determined but it seemed good from behind the cameras. I had intended to take the Dr. for dinner but I guess our wires were crossed or he had had enough of our shenanigans. The restaurant that we were supposed to go to was ‘The Fighting Squirrel’
Some memories bubble as I sit around the house, including this one.
I mic’ed up Xenia for the Szepesi interview. I had one mic on Szepisi and one on her so I could hear what she said as she interpreted. Something in her mind always made her speak away from the placement of the mic. I put it on the HK side of her chest so when she turned to him to speak, I would hear her. But she decided she should speak to me. I eventually just started pointing at HK so she would speak in his direction and the direction of the microphone.
However, her aim was un-erring whenever she had to cough. She would blast full throated into the microphone every time she coughed. Szepesi laughed as I yanked the head phones from my head. It took Xenia a few looks around the room until they rested on me to realize that she had tried her best to deafen me.
Wednesday Aug 17th
Okay. I’m going to pretend I know what happened in the morning of this day. I think this was my first interaction with the Budpaest Metro system. Our Hotel Nemzeti sits atop the Blaha Lujza Ter Metro station. I’ve been making my through it’s dirty corridors to cross the streets for quite some time, but it finally clicked in my head that I could actually pick up the subway car down there, too.
To save time, I decided rather than walking all the way to Buda, I would just pick up the train and take it over. And the trip was going to cost me about $1.35 each way, so I knew I was reaching the limits of my travel budget with this trip.
I got off at the Batthyány tér which sits right across the Danube from the Budapest Parliament building. My initial thought was to also take the Funicular up the side of the steep hill to Buda proper but I got to walking and just climbed up the stairs to the Castle.
My first big find was the Hussar statue from which all the small statues are based. Then I wandered the grounds of the castle looking at the preparations for the upcoming Folk Festival. HK and I’s big plan for the weekend was to get some b-roll footage of the festival to show some Hungarian culture.
Buses started to disgorge their morning tourists and the streets of Buda slowly filled with tourists. In my world view, it was time to leave.
I made my big purchase at the pharmacy. I broke down and decided it was time to take some medicine for my foot. According to google, the best cure for my self-diagnosed heel problem was stretching and ibuprofen. It’s a big leap of faith taking the proper dosage of medicine where the instructions are all in Hungarian. It seemed to work out okay.
I also made the tragic mistake of visiting the House of Houdini, which wasn’t Houdini’s house at all, just a house to shelter a very poor collection of Houdini artifacts. Most of the artifacts were reproductions. A couple of them were props from the most recent Houdini movie. I took the tour with a very shy flower who really wasn’t up on her Houdini facts. After she finished her spiel, I chimed in with the bit I knew from my years of interest.
The capper for the House of Houdini visit was the magic show. You know it’s going to be bad when the magician starts with the rope of three different lengths trick. Since the audience was small, me and four Germans, I got to help with a card trick. Woohoo. It was all pretty sad. I think we applauded mainly to keep the magician on stage from spiraling into depression.
I walked back through Buda by the Vienna Gate and down the hill. I figured as long as I was descending towards the river I could eventually find the Metro station. It also didn’t hurt that the street I was on had the same name as Metro station. Sure enough, turned a corner and I was back at my subway station.
For the afternoon, we interviewed Dr. Szakály of the Veritas institute. My original plan was to rearrange Dr. Szakály’s office, but HK balked a bit at trying to move some extension cords. I asked Szakály if there might be another office or conference room we could use. We ended up pushing everything out of the deputy director’s office.
Our interpreter showed up late as is to be expected at this point.
Again the content of the interview has yet to be determined but it seemed good from behind the cameras. I had intended to take the Dr. for dinner but I guess our wires were crossed or he had had enough of our shenanigans. The restaurant that we were supposed to go to was ‘The Fighting Squirrel’
As a matter of fact, my anger does keep me warm