Szerencs - with Laura and Reagan

in the american halloween spirit we carved a pumpkin! first we walked to the store to see if they had any pumpkins. along the walk we met one of laura's students (i forget her name, sorry little girl!). we asked her if there were pumpkins at the store and she said yes, so we continued on - with her in tow. when we walked in the store there was a nice fall display with beautiful orange pumpkins! but they were not for sale. and there weren't any for sale in the store. :(
luckily, the little girl's grandpa has a garden and she said we could have one of his pumpkins. and she was right! oddly, the pumpkin was light green... oh well, it'll do.
it starts...


laura assumed the task of carver while the rest of us excited girls just watched. it took a really long time to cut the top off because the rind of this particular pumpkin was like 1.5 inches thick!

when she got it off she was VERY excited! we all were! that's real joy in that picture.

an eye!

xander was watching me watching the carving. reagan made him a little bed out of a bucket and a blanket. he was happy in there, but still really cold.

the hungarian girl and reagan

two eyes!

and a nose... i see where she's going with this...

oh yeah, we all helped gut it


that's pride and joy as they took pictures of the newest member of their household was born...

the jack-o-lantern! (no hat in this pic)

the surgical equipment...

hat-less jack and Laura
awww, he has his hat on and a candle inside now! little sweetie!!
trick or treat, happy halloween, etc... from hungary. :)

Eger - with Laura and Reagan

there is another CETP teacher in a town not too far from mine. she, laura, and her 11 year old daughter, reagan invited me to spend some time with them on our fall break. here's what we did. we took a train to another city/town, eger to see what we could see.
(NOTE: the pictures are in reverse chronological order because ... well, they just are)

laura and reagan (at dinner)

we took a tour of a somewhat well-known castle in eger. there were people dressed in costume to add ambiance. we took a few pictures with them and asked them some hungarian vocab.

you gotta have drummers in the castle yard, right?

this is a view of the big church from the castle, pretty at night, don't ya think?

she did that all on her own.

aw, i'm so cute in the castle yard. too bad there's a car behind me. also, we didn't wear the same outfit on purpose; that would be weird.

laura with some costumed guys

reagan with a costumed guy, who incidentally asked HER to take a picture with him

splendid!

there weren't too many people, but it was a nice night. here is what we saw when we walked to the top of the castle's hill. some unexplained buldings, pretty trees, and costumed men.

the entrance to the castle property... ooooh.

a wine store i popped in while laura was getting some must (moosht)

the must (moosht) men... ok so we wanted to taste the "hot wine" they were serving from that big crockpot looking thing. we did. it was gross and kinda pricey. we were tourists, though. that's what we're supposed to do.

they took a lot of pictures, so i took pictures of them taking pictures because that's what i remember about the trip. yay for pictures!

the big church in the day time

down the street in the city center in eger

up the street in the city center of eger

ok, this takes some real explaining. we went on a tour of the "city beneath the city" in eger. i'm not too sure what it was built for, but there was a maze of cement/rock under a basillica and under the town(?). we paid a little and went on the cave tour. it was creepy and dark in there, there was about a foot of water throughout most of it due to faulty construction. we had a tour guide but he spoke in hungarian on the tour. he offered to take us through alone after the tour, but we were already kinda bored and wanted to see the rest of eger. so he pointed us to the castle and off we went.

there were some old-timey contraptions in the underground city. this is a loom. when he talked about it he said my last name because my last name means weaver. that's the only reason i took a picture of this creepy old loom.

see those little jar things? on top of them were tennis balls and we were supposed to throw a big rock at the tennis ball and knock it off. i don't know if the medieval people had tennis balls, but this was what they did for fun.. i think.

some parts of the cave-maze were poorly constructed which lets water into the place. thirsty trees somehow found out about the water and they started sneaking in to drink it.

this was our tour guide. i forget his name because all i could think about was the very large, very noticeable lump on his forehead. laura said i shouldn't talk about it or stare. couldn't help it!

some stuff - maybe tools?

some of the other tourists. they're happy, you just can't tell. hungarians don't smile for pictures

see? water! lots of it. made it very musty and damp and humid and dank and creepy down there

this was one of a billion tunnels. some had wooden sidewalks over them because the water was so high in the cave.

this is what most of the halls looked like. i'll spare you the other 20 pictures of them.

this is the entrance to the cave-maze which lured us underground.

the basillica above the cave-maze.

the ZOO!

this is said to be the best zoo in the country because it's situated in a forest. plus, there are hundreds of animals, a very wide array and they are so CLOSE! i apologize because my camera died about after only 1/3 of the zoo. i'll go back some time and show you the wolves, snakes, alligators, free-running chickens, elephants, giraffes you can TOUCH, hippos, rhinos, tigers, white tigers, panthers, lions, brown and black bears, camels, llamas, sharks!, and the money forest!
this is aniko', my private student turned friend. she helped me find a bookstore and atm, then took me to the zoo where she worked in high school. we went on a weekday so there was NObody there, no crowds, no kids. it was our own private zoo for about $5.



this bird can say hello.

i have no idea what this is. it looks like a cow or bull in the face, but it has a tail like a horse and is as big as a buffalo. i don't know the word for it in english or hungarian, but it exists.

empty rides
empty zoo
we saw some other people!
this is not a zoomed picture - aww, how can they have penguins!?
in an aquarium
one of my favorite hungarian words is "teknusbeka" : tek-noosh-bay-kaw which means turtle.
um, polar bears?!
reindeer!
this was supposed to be a picture of a seal which aniko' used to feed when she worked there. instead, i like this picture because you can see her happy reflection.
not zoomed. i played with him for a while because he was so sweet and cute.
see, i was trying to get him to take the leaf...
and he did! (good pic, eh?)

lemurs

after the zoo we went to the so'sto' - the salt lake. of course me and my dead camera have nothing to show for it, but i'll go there again because it was very scenic and calm. people were running, renting boats, sitting around, fishing, eating, and walking. we were the walking type.