sethbc’s (infrequent) blog…

Right now I’m on my way from Munich to Budapest

First things first, we were going to go to Copenhagen, but we decided against it because we would have had to pay a supplement. The question then was where we should go after Paris. Paris is almost too big to get any good trains from. We decided to head to Munich and see what we wanted to do from there. We decided to head home.

I suppose that is putting the cart ahead of the horse somewhat.

London was awesome, though the weather was kind of crappy. Surprise, surprise! We did most of the touristy things in London, including a cruise on the Thames and one of the hop-on-hop-off tour busses. We didn’t eat quite as much in London as we did in Brussels, but between the Guinness, fish and chips, and bangers and mash, I don’t know that I could have eaten anything else. I really enjoyed London, though probably not as much as Brussels. Unfortunately we didn’t really have time to hit any museums, but we had a good time.

We then took the train from London to Paris, and I got one of those Su Do Ku puzzle books. The puzzles are insanely addictive!

Paris was a blast, and the weather was absolutely gorgeous.  As soon as we got in we checked in to our hotel. I’m telling you, I’ve never stayed in a smaller room. I’m not sure I’ve never seen a smaller room. Anyway, on Sunday we walked around Cité and Ste. Michel. We went inside Notre Dame, and just generally lounged around. Yes we had fondue. Yes it was excellent. That night we met Deborah at 20 o’clock for some drinks at a Brasserie. On Monday we really kicked the tourism into high gear. We took the Metro down to the Louvre with our Packs, and did a whirlwind tour of the Museum.  From the Louvre we walked through Tuleries to Place de la Concord, to the Arc de Triumph. From the Arc we walked down to the Eiffel Tower.

Newsflash, the cheese grater is still there, though the French considered dismantling it after the whole Tom Cruise/Katie Holmes thing.

After checking out the Eiffel Tower, we laid out in the park in front of Ecole Militaire for about an hour and a half. At 5 we met Deborah and Sam for drinks in Ste. Michel. Sam left for her Italian class at 7, and we stayed with Deborah until 10.

At 10:52 we got our train, and headed to Munich. I’ve got to say, its virtually impossible to sleep in one of the 2nd class train compartments. In the future, we’re going to try for at least some sleeping compartment. When we arrived this morning, we decided to just make it to budapest as fast as possible, so we could reset quickly.

Technorati Tags: Europe

Well, I met my mom and her colleague in Bruxelles yesterday at 15:30 GMT+1, and we proceeded to drink our way through Belgium. I’m kidding Okay, we didn’t really drink that many beers, but between the four of us, we drank a substantial amount of completely different Belgian beers, and all of them were excellent. I had an amazing trappiste blonde ale, and an incredible kreik among others. I digress.

Basically, as soon as we got in we checked in at our hotel and decided to make our way to the center of town known as Grande Place. They don’t officially speak English here, but their three official languages are German, French and Dutch (Flemish?). Breaking out some of my rusty restaurant French before Paris was nice, but I’m sure I sounded just like the American I am. We had some adventures on the Metro, but everything worked out fine, and we got near enough to Grande Place to walk it easily.

To put it mildly, this pedestrian square is by far the most beautiful man-made place I’ve ever been. I’ll put some pictures up, but they really aren’t going to do the place justice. It really was just incredible. After taking roughly 80 pictures of Grande Place, we decided to head up Rue de Bouchers and grab some kitschy Belgian food and drink at a restaurant. Little did we know there were literally eleventy billion places to eat there, all of them as touristy as the next. Honestly, it felt a lot like Saint Michel in Paris. It may be kitschy, but I got Croquette de Fromage and Moules Frites, both Belgian specialties. The food wasn’t really wasn’t anything special, but it was kind of neat to eat their native cuisine surrounded by non-belgians . After our roughly three hour dinner (if you haven’t discovered it for yourself, dinner in Europe is an affair much like Quidditch, it can go on for months if it isn’t put to a proper end), we walked back to Grande Place and took another 80 night time pictures. We finished the evening off with a night cap or three at a bar on the square, and took the Metro back up to our hotel.

Today was another great day, with rain and bright sunshine intermittent. We took a bus tour, which was actually somewhat dissapointing. First, we realized that all the good stuff (except for the giant atomic molecule) is pretty much within walking distance. Second, the bus gave you absolutely no orientation. In other words, you never knew where the hell you were. Oh well, it wasn’t too expensive, and it did give us something to do for the first couple hours.

Now I must confess, I know nothing about Brussels other than the fact that Shearman & Sterling has an office there. Basically, I like Belgian beers, but that was pretty much all I knew. My mom informed me that they also have a thriving chocolate and lace industry. What I did not know, is that Brussels is pretty much the operating center of the European Union, and the biggest exporter per capita in the world. Learning this, while fascinating, only illuminated the fact that I am completely ignorant of about everywhere else in the world. Again, oh well. I’ll try and somewhat remedy that this trip around Europe.

Anyway, the rest of the day, we traveled around Brussels, ate Belgian food, and drank Belgian beer. I ate like a horse today, so half of the hundred pounds I lost is probably back (not really). Seriously though, I’m lugging a 40-pound pack around Europe, and I want to go for a run because I’ve been stuffing my face. I’m sure it’ll be better. A lot of the eating and drinking had to do with the fact that I was with my mom, and wanted a nice way to spend some time. The other half had to do with the fact that I love Belgian beers.

Well, I’m going to finish up now, because we’re arriving in London right now. I of course forgot to bring my camera cable, so pictures will have to wait. I’m really going to have to make sure I upload them as soon as I get back to Budapest though. I can’t really let the pile up the way I have in the past. I’ve got like 1954 pictures in my iPhoto library, another 130 on the camera so far, and uploading all of that at once was, and will be, a real pain. I have my photos on two services right now, but I’m liking smugmug much better than Flickr right now. My only gripe with smugmug is that I can’t hide individual pictures easier. There are some pictures I’d rather not be publishing (like a picture of a blurry flower, okay so the picture was blurry, not the flouwer), that I still want to save for whatever reason, but don’t want everyone looking at. Smugmug should realize that they operate as much as a photo archiving service as a way of presenting your pictures to others.

Alright, I’ve rambled long enough. I’ll writing something down on my way from London to Paris.

Technorati Tags: Europe

At this very moment, I am on a train across Germany to Köln (Cologne). I don’t actually have internet access on the train, but I figure now is as good a time as any for me to write down my thoughts. On the train from Budapest to München I got a sleeper car. It was actually kind of expensive (21.000 HUF or about 105 USD). The train car was alright, it wasn’t really anything special though. I think I’ll probably opt for the 2nd class seats on those night trains unless I really want to get the sleeper. Right now however, we’re on one of the ICE trains in Germany. This thing is practically a work of art! It is beautiful and modern, and the 1st class cabin is absolute luxury. Right now we’re cruising through some mountains, I’m not realy sure what region we’re in. I think we’re somewhere between Ulm and Stuttgart. Regardless, we’re flying along at 157 km/h. Anyway, from Köln, we’re headed to Bruxelles to meet my mom and a colleague of hers from work. We’re going to spend a couple of days in Bruxelles, and then take the Eurostar back with them to London. After that the trip is a little more vague. We’re definitely going to go to Paris, and I’d like to go to Amsterdam and Luxembourg. I’d like to get in touch with Deborah in Paris, and maybe some CLS people if they are over there. That will probably round out our first excursion. I’m sure I’ll put some more info up on that when we’ve done more. I’ll tell you one thing though, my passport is going to be awfully full of stamps when I’m done here!

I haven’t been uploading any photos recently, I’ve definitely been negligent in my duties. Sorry, the last couple of days have really been pretty whirlwind. Let me give a little recap. We arrived on Friday, and stayed at the dorm a couple of nights. The dorm was really far away from central Pest, so we wanted to get out of there as soon as possible. On Monday we signed a contract for an apartment. The apartment itself is rather small. Its pretty much a studio with a separate kitchen and bathroom, but there is a loft upstairs with a second bed. The bed upstairs isn’t very comfortable, but if anyone wants to come and visit, t hey are more than welcome to it! The real attraction is the view. I’ve got some incredible luck with views of famous landmarks across rivers. Last summer when I lived in the shoe-box with Jackie we had a beautiful view of Notre Dame, and this year I have a gorgeous view of Buda Castle.

The other thing we did on Monday was get half finished with the stuff at CEU. We can’t register or anything yet, because they are still in their first module (from which we don’t take any classes). We didn’t yet get our CEU email addresses though. I’m hoping we’ll do that some time next week when we get back. Anyway, we moved in on Tuesday, handled our Eurail stuff yesterday, and got the train at 20:25 (that is 25 minutes after 20 O’clock).

I’m certainly going to be thinner after this whole trekking across Europe thing. I love the food over here, but the bag I’m carrying is pretty heavy, and I find I just don’t eat as much over here. Right now I’m at 90 kg, and I’m aiming for about 80 kg, thought I’m not really doing anything to get there. I’m just hoping thats where I end up . Maybe I’ll get down to a good cycling weight while I’m over here. I definitely wish I had my bike here, its just beautiful. I was thinking of possibly getting a crappy $100 bike in Budapest and riding it around. We’ll have to see.

In other news, I’m wearing a watch now. It’s just my old Nike watch, and it’s having some difficulties, so I’m going to have to get a new one. I want a digital watch, and I really like the Suunto ones I’ve seen, but I’m not sure I need something with all those features (or that expensive). Anyway, If anyone has any recommendation on a good, sturdy, full featured digital watch to pick up, please let me know.

Last but not least, I’m learning how to program in Cocoa while I’m on the trains. So far, Objective-C is an interesting language, but I’ve come across some surprises in reading the docs. The language doesn’t support overloading of operators! There are some other interesting design decisions that were made in Objective-C. Maybe I’ll go over them sometime later. Its like dejá vu sitting here reading coding docs and listening to In Search of Sunrise 3.

Anyway, I’m going to read some more docs. I’ll try and post when I can, and when I can’t post, I’ll try and blog by hand and upload the entries when I have a stable net connection.

Well, we’re in Budapest! This place is amazing. It’s just like Paris except there aren’t any French people! Seriously, the architecture is amazing. The food leaves something to be desired though.

The first day here, Friday, was pretty much a wash. I was so incredibly tired, and we tried to get into Central Pest, but the metro system got the best of us. The second day, Saturday, was some sort of national holiday. We took the metro in and watched some airshow over the Danube. It was pretty amazing actually, the planes were quite acrobatic. Basically, the whole country was just out having a good time. I can’t argue with that. I will say this though, T-Mobile and RedBull appear to sponsor this entire country. The whole thing. Yesterday at the metro, T-Mobile was handing out free Diet Coke. Don’t ask me why! I digress

Yesterday the jet lag became more of a problem. I haven’t been able to sleep through a whole night. I think our bodies are still adjusting to the time difference. We went into Pest for a little while yesterday, and had a Hungarian meal.

The apartment hunt is starting right now, and I’m a little nervous about speaking to these people via the phone. I’m afraid I might enter into a binding agreement to purchase the apartment for a goat or something. Okay, basically, if they don’t speak English, I’m not talking to them. That may seem like a narrow POV, but its really simply practical. My Hungarian sucks!

Speaking of bad Hungarian, I had to buy another digital camera yesterday, as mine malfunctioned (permanently). The lense got stuck, and the camera entered some sort of diagnostic mode and told me to turn it on and off repeatedly. That didn’t work. Anyway, we went to Mediamarkt and I got a camera there.  I managed to sputter some intelligible Hungarian phrases indicating to the salesperson that we wanted to purchase the camera. I got a camera, so everything worked out well! The taxes on the thing were a whopping 25%! Its amazing what VAT does. They set up the purchase to be tax free, but I think I have to leave the country with the camera to get my money. I’d like my refund, because it would save me 20.000 HUF ($100), but it seems like its going to be one of those ridiculously complicated procedures to get it back.

Anyway, I have to go start hunting for an apartment. The dorms are like eleventy billion miles away from Central Pest, so we’ve got to Metro in to do anything.

I’ll try and post some pictures with my new camera soon.

Well I was in Atlanta for the last couple days, and we’re back in New Jersey. Hopefully we’ll be getting ready to leave for Budapest in the next couple of days!

Well, I’m done with Shearman for the time being. Now its off to Jersey, Atlanta, Jersey and Budapest!

Technorati Tags: Work

Well I haven’t really had that much time to post, and I didn’t really get a chance to discuss my weekend, but I’ll have to be brief.

Last weekend my Mom was in town for a couple of days.  We had a pretty good time.  She lived in Chevy Chase for a time in the late 70’s, but she had not really been back to the city for long since then.  Being the inquisitive type, she naturally wanted to see a couple of museums that didn’t exist when she was here.  We went to the holocaust museum, which I had seen before.  Let me just say its depressing as hell.  Its not as bad as some people expect it to be, but its certainly not a great place to hang out.  It’s important history though, and I’m glad it’s documented.  What struck me was the text of a Letter by Eisenhower to George Marshall.

The things I saw beggar description… The visual evidence and the verbal testimony of starvation, cruelty and bestiality were…overpowering… I made the visit deliberately in order to be in a position to give first-hand evidence of these things if ever, in the future, there develops a tendency to charge these allegations merely to ‘propaganda.’

Pretty powerful stuff.  After that we went to the World War II Monument.  We went out to Obelisk afterwards, which, despite the hefty price tag, was a great meal.  On Sunday we saw the Phillips Collection.  It was somewhat dissapointing, but the Master Works were on tour.  Fortunately, they had a great exhibit up with Japanese block prints.  The landscapes were actually amazing though.  We bought a set of three of them for future decoration.  We then cruised around Georgetown, saw some of the sights, and then headed back home.  All in all it was a pretty fun weekend.

Over the next week or so I’m going to be running around like mad!  Hopefully everything goes okay.  Still looking for housing in Budapest, though I think things are coming together slowly but surely.

I cannot wait to get over there.  I’m looking forward to our traveling so much.  I’m sure I’ll be posting a ton of pictures too!

Anyway, time to work more on this research, its done printing out.

Seriously, why don’t we have the flessenlikker?

This thing is awesome!  It’s an absolutely amazing tool and I just haven’t seen them in the US at all.  I’m picking one up when we’re in Europe, thats all there is to it.

Technorati Tags: Kitchen, Random

CNN.com - Sidestepping Senate, Bush sends Bolton to U.N. - Aug 1, 2005

Not that I didn’t think this was going to happen already, but its still quite disappointing. The recess appointment power always puzzled me. It’s just baffling that the senate can go on vacation and Bush can just push someone through. It kind of thwarts the whole meaning of “advice and consent.