I think at this point I'm pretty well settled into my place at the CEU Residence Center. I can't really say that I am in the rest of the city, except for at one coffee shop the girl who works there already knows my order before I even open my mouth. Despite all the odd things I've been having to get used to, such as walking around in what feels like a lot of heat, or using three different types of transportation (bus, metro, and tram) to get from Point A to Point B, or finding out that water isn't free, I still really enjoy the city. I went to lunch today with some of my peers from the Philosophy department and we all decided that Budapest is much better than Prague. So there you have it.
I'm failing miserably in my attempt to be a loner. It's WAY too easy to get to know people around here. Luckily I prefer it this way, and was only going to try to play the Loner Card because I wanted to be different than I ever have been before. I'm glad I got that out of my system. There is nothing better than walking down the street and seeing a familiar face, then running off with that person to do some task because you both have to do it anyway, and then deciding to join each other for dinner later. Everyone so far seems to be really nice. There is one thing about the people I hang out with though that took a while for me to get used to. You see, our department isn't very big, so everyone is pretty much together all the time, which is good. The greatest portion of the students are from either Serbia, Croatia, or Montenegro, so they all speak similar languages and what's not so great is they choose to use them most of the time. At first I would sit there and fume. I hated being left out of whatever conversation it was, and I thought it was a serious waste of time whenever one of the people would decide to translate for me after the conversation was finished. I think Elena, the girl from Romania, and I have bonded the most because we're the only two who can't understand what everyone else is saying and really prefer to use English at our English-speaking institution. However, at this point I've gotten so used to it happening that instead of getting upset, my mind wanders off into my own little world as I tune them out. I actually take advantage of the situation by sorting out my thoughts that like I would normally do on my own, without having to actually be alone. Basically I've found that I can make the best out of situations like these, so it's all good.
Over the weekend I joined a bus tour around the city. It was informative and helpful, because now I think I can come up with a place I want to get to and have an idea of which way I need to head. The lady who was our tour guide though cracked me up quite a bit. At one time she pointed out the largest sports arena in Hungary and told the bus that "it can hold 13 people." I guess that's progress for you. :) I didn't exactly get amazing photos during the tour because we spent more time on the coach than we did outside standing still, so I'm thinking one of these weekends I'll have to take myself on my own little tour. It'll be the perfect opportunity to learn how to use the manual camera Cassandra was so kind to leave for me. I'm sure if I wore my big hat with a "PRESS" tag sticking out from it, I wouldn't look like a tourist at all. Today I signed up for all my classes and got all the required reading material that is available at this point. I'm going to take 8 classes, which sounds like a big load but it only makes up 15 credits. One of the "classes" is a department colloquium where only our attendance (and I'm sure attention) is mandatory as guest speakers will be coming in once a week to discuss philosophical topics. I'm actually pretty excited about that. I'm also excited about my Aesthetics class, which is my 4 credit elective. The rest of my classes are mandatory core classes, which will be Logic (sure...), Metaphysics (score!), Continental Philosophy Since Kant (woot!), Philosophy of Language (ehhh...) and Academic Writing (barf). I will also be taking a non-credit beginning Hungarian language course, which I hope to be extremely helpful in getting me to not have to feel so guilty for only remembering how to say "thank you" in Hungarian. I was going to take a Political Science course as an elective, but I'll save it for next semester since my course load won't be as full with core classes then. Seems about right I think, now I just need to actually get through it with success.
I really wish Cassandra could have stayed around here a little bit longer. I think she would be impressed at how my entire school and residence center are used as photo galleries. I'm not exactly sure who the photographers are, but there is some fancy work here and I bet she could get some good ideas from it all. Maybe if we're lucky she'll get to see it all if she is able to come visit in the future. Tomorrow I don't have any meetings, so I'm going to take advantage of the time and buy groceries and check out the school's sports center. They offer classes in belly dancing and yoga...what more could I ask for? :)
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