2005-06-07
Twisted Metal Just Outside of Luxemburg
[This was written on an empty stomach, without any coffee in my system, and at several different points during a night's sleep. If it is grammatically incorrect or doesn't even make sense... well, it's a good glimpse into the my mind, I guess. At one point I did catch that I actually wrote "eye" when I meant to write "I." But that's the only correction I made, and after a year of being an editor, I refuse to proofread anymore. :)]
It's been a while. As far as I recall, the last time I wrote was at the end of May, a day or two before leaving for Luxemburg. Yes, Luxemburg! The tiny little Grand Duchy, the only one left in the world they’ll have you know. And I know! Now, I know why my friends Istvan and Detti are going insane there. As even though Luxemburg is quite the place to visit – majestic vistas, an incredibly well preserved medieval city with grand walls going up the side of cliffs to the city center above – it is also not a very exciting place to live. The last time anything happened in Luxemburg was when the Germans invaded – at least according to one monument facing on of the city’s two rivers, the river that one can step across it is so small. And the Germans invading wasn’t much of a story in and of itself, as a country of only 300,000, probably 200,000 back then, couldn’t collectively scream loudly enough to even get a blip in the Western press. And now Luxemburg is just a land of the super rich bourgeoisie with a bunch of Portuguese imports to work the stores, some Italians for the restaurants, a bunch of French, and a few, though very few, Germans. Oh yes, and a handful of Hungarians working for the EU, many of whom I met, some of which I went to see an Iron Maiden concert with this past weekend. But more soon…
Like right now. So the story is this. I spent the entire day, Tuesday, May 31st, helping to wallpaper Krisztian’s apartment with the family minus Adi, who had to work. It was exhausting. I was only there half a day, but afterward I was beat. My parents woke up at 4:30 in the morning and started working on the flat in Budapest at 7:30 in the morning. (It’s a two hour drive without traffic, not counting rush hour in Budapest.) Afterward we had all planned to go to have a few pints at a pub, but we didn’t finish until darkness forced us to stop and we were all so beat there was no way anyone was going sorozni (to drink beer, infinitive). My parents stayed at my place that evening. This was really a unique chance for me to host the two people that have put up with me crashing at their house about four-hundred times (no embellishment) over the past 12 years. The only problem was, I didn’t – and don’t – have any sheets. So what happened was they had to share a Darth Vader sleeping bag I brought for Adi and Krisztian. I slept in Sanyi’s room, my roommate who disappeared for the summer most unexpectedly. I’m certain my parents couldn’t have slept too well, though my Anya noted she went out like a rock as soon as the lights went off. When I asked Apa how he slept, he replied “Szar (Shit!).” But they seemed pleased to still be in Budapest, as it was now only 6:20 in the morning and everyone was wide awake. They wanted to work in Krisztian’s apartment some more before returning to Miskolc later that afternoon for a business meeting. However, I realized that they might want to use my keys the weekend I was gone, as Adi and some of his friends were supposed to come into town to rewire the entire apartment with spare parts from the Nokia factory where they work. (That was a bad joke.) So I had to leave with them so that they could take my keys. I was off to Luxemburg. Of course, my flight didn’t leave until 10:45, but a coffee or two before a flight, albeit a short one, after the worst night of sleep I’ve had here yet due to a squeaky bed and my accidentally reaching under Sanyi’s pillow and finding a used Kleenex in the middle of the night, would do me well, I figured. Besides, I was on fire – the day before I went to the school where I will begin relearning Hungarian next week, and I did so well introducing myself and during a sit down verbal/spoken test, that they are making me skip the first book and a half and putting me in the advanced group! That fact gave a me a plethora of energy. So much so that for the next two days I could speak and understand Hungarian near perfectly – in my own little delusion of grandeur but it felt great!
I packed quickly that morning and wandered Budapest with a blue duffel bag weighed down by a down sleeping bag, five pairs of undies, socks, t-shirts, and a pair of trousers. I realized that many of the places selling coffee weren’t open yet at 6:45 in the morning, so I wandered the city a bit, giving a pathetic search, before hopping on a metro stop about kilometer or two away from my apartment and heading to the airport. This turned out to be a bit of a mistake, as the restaurants in the Budapest airport rip people off ten times more than any other airport I’ve ever been to. A coffee for five Euros, a Danish roll made down the road for 5 cents sells for five Euros too. 2500 Forints later (~$15) I had my breakfast. I checked in and went and waited, nodding off while waiting for the plane. Eventually we took off, but my plan to sleep was thwarted by a three year old sitting in front of me having an hour-and-a-half tantrum with his sister shrieking at the top of her lungs to add her two sense. I felt sad for the Mum, and wanted to threaten the kid with a cold stare, as sometimes I remember strangers doing that to me when I was a wee-tyke, and it really worked to shut me up. (It was all the attention I needed!) But I couldn’t get a good clear eye-shot at him. He was moving so much and thrashing about that my tray kept falling down and then I got in trouble for having my tray down after the attendants told us to put them back in the upright position. It fell down twice more after my warning.
The guy sitting next to me was fascinating. A crazy Hungarian guy, mid-40s, reading the Magyar Nemzet Newspaper (FIDESZ political party paper, Center-Right). He didn’t feel like talking but was jolly nice anyway, buying me an Asvanyviz for 4 Euros, even though he didn’t have to. Just a really jolly guy. Bought me the water. Said to forget about it and then went back to reading his paper. I’m convinced it is because I was a foreigner speaking Hungarian to him when I got on the plane. I did get out of him that he works in Germany, but he was definitely Hungarian. No doubt… he was no German. Somehow you could just tell the difference on the plane… Hungarians looked more wild somehow. Like they were going on vacation. Germans looked like they were excited to go home. (Again, a tasteless joke, especially considering I love it here more than Germany. I’m just remembering some topics of discussion that Istvan, Detti, and I spoke about this weekend (e.g., how dirty Budapest is compared to the West, how low the pay is, how high the taxes are (44%), and how the mayor (for 10 years) hasn’t done shit but steal money). Were these a lot of parentheses or what?)
I flew on Wizzair to the Frankfurt-Hahn Airport, which is closer to Luxemburg than Frankfurt by almost 50 km. This airport makes Duluth’s look large in comparison. Yet, it was bustling, as it is a major hub for British soccer hooligans to flood into the country via Ryan Air and for Hungarians to pour into the country to be exploited as cheap labor. All in all, it is a great place. Pisti had sent a text message to me noting that he would be there in half an hour. So I got a coffee (which was only 1Euro80Cents in Germany) and some bread thing with cheese to eat. A Russian Aeroflot flight had just come in, so I watched the Russian pilots smoke and chat, not understanding a damn word but not really caring either.
I don’t speak German anymore. I’m not sure I even understand it. It’s only been two weeks of Hungarian learning, but German came to me like the Lord’s Prayer to an atheist. At times it made sense, but I was incapable of communicating back except in Hungarian, as it automatically spurts out now, and since Hungarian is only spoken by 0.23% of the world’s population – I just figured that out on my calculator, I’ll have you know – it did not do me much good except to get sympathetic stares back. Seriously, I couldn’t even figure out how to order a coffee, and eventually I settled for pointing and mumbling like a hung over Russian sailor.
I sat outside in the sun waiting for Istvan. Eventually I looked behind me and saw Istvan looking for me. So I hailed him, we greeted, and then went for another coffee at an outdoor café.
First of all, I have to say I had a brilliant time with Detti and Istvan! They may hate Luxemburg, but I will have nothing but fond memories from there. It was so great hanging out with my old friend again (we were dormitory mates in college), and I am really happy to see he has ended up with such a great person. Detti is really cool. From the airport we hopped into his and Detti's new Ford Focus V8, 6-speed station wagon. I love that car! Wow!!! The road between Frankfurt-Hahn and Luxemburg is a two-lane dingleberry curving around hills, forests, windmills, and bogged down in semi-trucks going five miles per hour up and down the hills. Istvan maneuvered these obstacles with the skill only a Romanian learning how to drive in the mountains of Transylvania would – slamming the pedal to the floor and whizzing around these obstacles like a videogame he could finish in his sleep.
We got to Luxemburg. Istvan had to go back to work for an hour or so, so he dropped me off in the city center. (A much safer place than the tower where Istvan works, as the police unfoiled and middle eastern terrorist plot to blow his tower, and the one next to it, up last year.) Luxemburg’s city center isn’t very large. There are only 80,000 people living in the city; there are only 300,000 Luxemburgians left in the world, I guess, making the language represent but a paltry 0.005% of the world’s languages. I quickly discovered that relatively few people in Luxemburg speak Luxemburgese. Everyone spoke French or German in the stores, or even English, but never Hungarian, before speaking the local tongue. It was always a bit interesting to go into a place and see what language they would embrace you with. I found an Internet café and wrote Birgit, I think, maybe some other peeps. Wandered the inner city – no different than any other inner city in the world, except the buildings were nicer than most and there were more cafes per block than in many cities.
Istvan picked me up and we went and met with Detti, Istvan’s spouse. I didn’t really know Detti that well before this trip, having only met her once at Birgit’s and my wedding in Germany. I’m glad I got to know her now, as she is a perfect match for Istvan in my mind, and I had so much fun with the two of them together! She, as Istvan was, is a translator for the EU courts or something. Istvan now oversees the outsourcing of translations or something… Anyway, we went to the grocery store, bought ingredients for paprikas krumpli (paprika potatoes), came home, and then Istvan and I began sipping some Luxemburgian beers. We ate a ton of food – it was really good, even though they don’t have real, true Hungarian paprika or sausage in Luxemburg!
We just sat and talked and talked and talked, about politics, men, women, marriage, infidelity, psychology as product of environment or biology, families, how much Luxemburg sucks, liberalism, socialism, communism, the French “no” vote, the misguided nature of university Marxists, music, and then the most dominant theme, Hungarian politics (and personally, I was trying to explain my research to them). The Hungarian political discussions were incredible. I learned so much from watching my friends disagree with one another and provide alternate viewpoints to various issues. Stuff I would never find in journal articles or news reports. Plus, it was really great to just hear what my friends are thinking and that being disheartened with politics is not solely a U.S. phenomenon right now – Hungarians may be even more pissed off.
[Tangential side note… I just turned on some music, it’s sunny outside, and I’m debating heading toward Nyekladhaza to do laundry as I’m down to three pairs of clean underwear… I’ll have to decide by 5 p.m.]
So we went to bed way too late, after talking and drinking Hungarian Unicum at a local pub in the village wear Detti and Istvan live. We woke up and went to the city… I wandered around some more, wrote some postcards, and was then picked up at the same corner where Istvan picked me up the day before. The cool thing was, we had a dinner party to go to that Istvan had forgotten about. A bunch of Hungarian translators Istvan had worked with before were getting together. So we went to Viola’s apartment, where we were greeted by six Hungarians (one that was only one and a half years old). It was fun! We ate, sampled some Hungarian wines, and ate more… it was a full on multi-dish meal. It provided great insight into the everyday confusion confronting ex-patriot Hungarians working for the EU, an organization they universally seemed to see problems with, in Luxemburg. None of them seemed to want to stay in Luxemburg forever. Yet, I think the pay is too good to pass up – about six times what they would earn in Hungary for doing the same job, on top of the fact that they only pay 4-5% income tax, have about five weeks paid vacation a year, and get good kickbacks like rebates on new cars. The downside is that one could never afford to buy a house in Luxemburg – we’re talking over half a million Euros for a small house – and it is a really dead place to live. Nothing going on, no real concerts, and… well, yeah, I didn’t meet anyone who loved living in Luxemburg.
I also realized something. That it is not just in America that people have to pass off formal style dinners and parties with good acquaintances as “socializing.” For the past couple of years I have been struggling with the fact that, though I have friends in Minneapolis, I often don’t feel very comfortable hanging out with them. I like them. I enjoy their company, but I don’t always feel that I can be my true self with them. This was the same feeling I felt at this dinner. These people were friends but perhaps not life long ones with Detti and Istvan. I’m not anyone to judge, but this is the feeling I got. And even though I had a blast, it paled in comparison to the fun I had just hanging out with Detti and Istvan alone and shooting the shit, honestly and openly, often times confrontationally. And in a way, I was relieved, as now I know it is the same everywhere, as I often find myself wanting real conversations at get-togethers in the U.S. and being heavily disappointed. Perhaps this is a problem with growing up… we hang out with people because we need to socialize, but finding life long friends is more difficult.
We stayed at the Hungarian translator’s house quite late, until around midnight I believe, and then went home to sleep. Detti and Istvan just spent three weeks in the U.S., so they have work to do. They went into work for a few hours on Friday, and then they came to pick me up and we went into town to buy some groceries and a tent. They went back to work for two hours that afternoon, and I found a pair of 15 Euro shoes that I wouldn’t mind trashing at the rock festival we were about to head off to. (It just occurred to me that I didn’t mention this yet. Yes, we were off to the Rock am Ring festival at a Formula One race track somewhere in Germany. Three days of camping and rocking to bands, some I never dreamt I would ever see in my life – Iron Maiden, Marilyn Manson, Slayer, REM, Green Day, Garbage, the Hives, the Prodigy, Thievery Corporation, Sonic Youth, Tocotronic, Walking Concert, and a bunch we missed because there was just too much to see, Papa Roach, Motley Crue, etc. How Thievery Corporation, really the only electronica band out of 100, fit in I will never know. But more on that show later!) We found a 10Euro tent produced in Central Europe – as the box had Hungarian on it – loaded the car, picked up two more Hungarians I hadn’t met before, Zsofi and Robi, a four pack of Belgian beer, and we were on the road to Germany at around 16:00. I’m not sure how legal it was, but everyone had a beer in the car except for Istvan. (It is legal in Luxemburg, but I’m not so sure about Germany.) Not that it mattered about an hour later, as we hit a massive traffic jam leading up to the festival, with beer bottles strewn about the countryside roads, people peeing on the side of the road, hoards of people hauling camping gear by foot and walking past our cars screaming, drinking, and smoking various chemicals. We made it to the festival site in one hour, and then spent two hours in traffic, and one hour finding a parking spot and setting up the tents. Leaving at four o’clock, I would never have guessed that we would only catch the end of Green Day’s set that began at 8:15. Nonetheless, I was thrilled that they saved the best for last, with Boulevard of Broken Dreams, Time of Your Life, a cover of Queen’s “We are the champions,” and “Majority” all coming at the end. It made my whole weekend!
The rain started coming down about an hour or two later. Just a massive down pour. I’ll never forget looking at Istvan and seeing his wide grin – “Everyone is hurrying but to where? No matter what, we are going to get wet!” He laughed maniacally at that… and he was right. For being in Germany, this festival was one of the worst planned ever! I was shocked! There were honestly only 20 toilets for each sex at for 100,000 people! People ended up peeing everywhere and anywhere, which was largely disgusting. Moreover, there were absolutely no official garbage cans! 100,000 people were eating food and just dumping the plates wherever. Occasionally we would find a Hefty garbage bag tied up next to a restaurant, but it was normally overflowing and definitely wasn’t official. The most confounding thing to me, though, was that there was nowhere to take cover from rain. And it has never not rained at this festival, this being its 20th anniversary. There were no tents set up to get out of the freezing downpour. So people crowded under the grandstand in the one place they could. But it wasn’t big enough, and it looked like the people in there were in danger of asphyxiation like being in the front row of a British soccer match. Logistically, the festival was a disaster in many ways… there weren’t enough parking or camping spots, even though you are promised camping and parking spots when you buy your ticket. The German guards just shouted Lynx, Nein Rechts, a lot every time you tried to find a toilet, garbage can, or a way to get your tent to a campsite. But the festival itself was a blast!!!
The rain stopped at around midnight that night and then was off and on over the next day. We stayed for Prodigy’s show, drinking Bitbergers throughout the entire evening, which ended at around 3 a.m. We also tested out a “brain teaser” tent, which almost induced seizures and vomiting on my part – loud techno music with sunglasses blasting red lights in the eyes. I didn’t understand that you were supposed to close your eyes and let your mind relax. Instead I got heart palpitations and ended up just taking the glasses off and enjoying the dry tent. Then headed back to our campsite. The problem was, we had no clue down which country road we had parked. So we just started walking, like zombies to a certain doom. About two or three kilometers down the wrong road, sun coming up, we realized we had made and error. We walked back up the hill to the festival and found the right road. Another three kilometers down there, we found our tents. Since the sun was coming up, Detti, Istvan, and I ate some baguettes and Camembert we had brought with us. It was delicious. I fell asleep in my tent and woke up at 2:30 or so to “Judas is rising!!!” blasting from some neighboring tents. Oh man, this was a rock festival!
The second day we were a little more prepared, but it was quite a bit colder. Istvan and I bumped into one another earlier in the morning. He noted that we might not stay a second night, and I pleaded with him that we should go home. The other Hungarians, however, really wanted to stay for the whole thing. While Detti was showering, and the other Hungarians were still in their tents, Istvan and I took decisive action. We started breaking down our two tents! (Detti wanted to leave early too, I believe, so I don’t think she was too upset when she got back and the tents were broken down.) Robi and Zsofi didn’t seem to mind leaving early too much, as the only decent, and I use the term “decent” very loosely here you must understand, was Billy Idol. So they agreed to come back with us Saturday night too, as long as we got to see Garbage. Istvan got the car, we loaded it up with all our stuff and found a parking spot closer to the venue than the three or four kilometers away that we were previously. On the way to the festival, Istvan and Detti bought me a rain parka, as well as several for themselves – Robi and Zsofi had smartly brought some of their own. We looked like gnomes in our highlighter colored garbage bags. But the rain started and continued for most of the day, so I’m glad we had them. It was probably about 50 degrees Fahrenheit and the rain made the whole day bloody freezing!
To warm up, we drank plenty of Jagermeister and a few beers. We also ate a ton of Crepes. We saw a bunch of good bands, but by the end of it I was freezing, Istvan and Detti wanted to go home, and even though I think we all felt slightly cheated by Garbage’s 45 minute show, even though they had two hours to play!, we were also a bit relieved. Driving out of a rock festival is even more surreal than driving in. It was like driving through a bunch of war refuges… Istvan had to manage to weave through thousands of people stumbling in the road. One woman wouldn’t let us go by, she was just dancing like a crazy lady, giving us a show through the windshield, but eventually one of her friends dragged her to the side and we got around her. We got home to Luxemburg late, late, late at night (I think at around five in the morning or something). I don’t remember much, except that he was playing Café del Mar on the stereo. I was passed out for much of the ride, only to occasionally wake up and make sure that Istvan was still awake behind the wheel. How he did it I will never know.
We slept until two on Sunday. We woke up and went to the gas station to buy food since nothing else in Luxemburg, Germany, Belgium, or France with food was open. We bought bread, salami, ham, cheese, and plethora of other supplies to feast upon! We made eggs... it was so damn good, I just kept eating and eating. We decided to go see a movie at 7:30, “Sin City.” I then fell asleep for another hour or two, as did Istvan. Detti woke us up at 7:10 or so. We raced into the city and just made the movie. The theater was nice, and I really liked the flick, though one could tell that Tarantino was a guest director. It was chalk full of gratuitous violence, samurai swords, and heads in the toilet scenes. (In fact, it seemed to rip off many of the same moves found in the Kill Bills.) But the stories were great, and I’m really happy Mickey Rourke is acting again. He was brilliant. I would like to read the comics.
After this movie we went to the pub for “a beer.” On the way, Detti gave me a brief tour of the old city walls, etc. Istvan called his mother in Romania. We went to the Gruend, deep down at the bottom of the city. We sat outside at a quaint little pub next to “the big river” – about 15 meters at its widest. We looked up at the cliffs and fortifications all around us, Luxemburg rising about 500 feet straight up. It was a beautiful night. We talked and talked and talked and talked. Two beers later it was one in the morning. Merde! Istvan and Detti had to work the next morning. We went back to their place and feasted again – eating all of the food remaining from our earlier feast. We chatted until about three in the morning. Then said goodnight. I said goodbye to Detti.
I woke up at 9:30 or so and packed my bag. Wrote an email to Birgit wishing her luck with something going on back home. Having been at work an hour, Istvan came back, picked me up, and we drove to Frankfurt-Hahn. We had coffee. He tried the airport’s goulash soup, which isn’t bad but “isn’t goulash.” I said goodbye, and hopped on the plane back to here. The flight was smooth. Took some aerial photography of my own from the plane window. Met Krisztian where he works, as he had my keys. Came home to find my apartment reeking like rotten death – that would be a great band name, actually, Rotting Death aus Australia!!! Cleaned the apartment, waited to hear from Birgit some news. Heard! Hooray!!!!! And then I went for a walk over to Buda and up into the hills a bit. I found a beautiful little park overlooking Pest. I took the metro back to Pest but far from where I live and wandered back. I finally realized I hadn’t eaten anything in hours and ordered a couple slices of pizza from some shop window at around 23:00, came home, began writing this and then passed out to CSI dubbed into Hungarian.
Now it’s 11:27, June 7th, and goddamnit, I need a coffee. I’m going to go to the little bakery directly across the street and order an espresso. Make that a double!
It's been a while. As far as I recall, the last time I wrote was at the end of May, a day or two before leaving for Luxemburg. Yes, Luxemburg! The tiny little Grand Duchy, the only one left in the world they’ll have you know. And I know! Now, I know why my friends Istvan and Detti are going insane there. As even though Luxemburg is quite the place to visit – majestic vistas, an incredibly well preserved medieval city with grand walls going up the side of cliffs to the city center above – it is also not a very exciting place to live. The last time anything happened in Luxemburg was when the Germans invaded – at least according to one monument facing on of the city’s two rivers, the river that one can step across it is so small. And the Germans invading wasn’t much of a story in and of itself, as a country of only 300,000, probably 200,000 back then, couldn’t collectively scream loudly enough to even get a blip in the Western press. And now Luxemburg is just a land of the super rich bourgeoisie with a bunch of Portuguese imports to work the stores, some Italians for the restaurants, a bunch of French, and a few, though very few, Germans. Oh yes, and a handful of Hungarians working for the EU, many of whom I met, some of which I went to see an Iron Maiden concert with this past weekend. But more soon…
Like right now. So the story is this. I spent the entire day, Tuesday, May 31st, helping to wallpaper Krisztian’s apartment with the family minus Adi, who had to work. It was exhausting. I was only there half a day, but afterward I was beat. My parents woke up at 4:30 in the morning and started working on the flat in Budapest at 7:30 in the morning. (It’s a two hour drive without traffic, not counting rush hour in Budapest.) Afterward we had all planned to go to have a few pints at a pub, but we didn’t finish until darkness forced us to stop and we were all so beat there was no way anyone was going sorozni (to drink beer, infinitive). My parents stayed at my place that evening. This was really a unique chance for me to host the two people that have put up with me crashing at their house about four-hundred times (no embellishment) over the past 12 years. The only problem was, I didn’t – and don’t – have any sheets. So what happened was they had to share a Darth Vader sleeping bag I brought for Adi and Krisztian. I slept in Sanyi’s room, my roommate who disappeared for the summer most unexpectedly. I’m certain my parents couldn’t have slept too well, though my Anya noted she went out like a rock as soon as the lights went off. When I asked Apa how he slept, he replied “Szar (Shit!).” But they seemed pleased to still be in Budapest, as it was now only 6:20 in the morning and everyone was wide awake. They wanted to work in Krisztian’s apartment some more before returning to Miskolc later that afternoon for a business meeting. However, I realized that they might want to use my keys the weekend I was gone, as Adi and some of his friends were supposed to come into town to rewire the entire apartment with spare parts from the Nokia factory where they work. (That was a bad joke.) So I had to leave with them so that they could take my keys. I was off to Luxemburg. Of course, my flight didn’t leave until 10:45, but a coffee or two before a flight, albeit a short one, after the worst night of sleep I’ve had here yet due to a squeaky bed and my accidentally reaching under Sanyi’s pillow and finding a used Kleenex in the middle of the night, would do me well, I figured. Besides, I was on fire – the day before I went to the school where I will begin relearning Hungarian next week, and I did so well introducing myself and during a sit down verbal/spoken test, that they are making me skip the first book and a half and putting me in the advanced group! That fact gave a me a plethora of energy. So much so that for the next two days I could speak and understand Hungarian near perfectly – in my own little delusion of grandeur but it felt great!
I packed quickly that morning and wandered Budapest with a blue duffel bag weighed down by a down sleeping bag, five pairs of undies, socks, t-shirts, and a pair of trousers. I realized that many of the places selling coffee weren’t open yet at 6:45 in the morning, so I wandered the city a bit, giving a pathetic search, before hopping on a metro stop about kilometer or two away from my apartment and heading to the airport. This turned out to be a bit of a mistake, as the restaurants in the Budapest airport rip people off ten times more than any other airport I’ve ever been to. A coffee for five Euros, a Danish roll made down the road for 5 cents sells for five Euros too. 2500 Forints later (~$15) I had my breakfast. I checked in and went and waited, nodding off while waiting for the plane. Eventually we took off, but my plan to sleep was thwarted by a three year old sitting in front of me having an hour-and-a-half tantrum with his sister shrieking at the top of her lungs to add her two sense. I felt sad for the Mum, and wanted to threaten the kid with a cold stare, as sometimes I remember strangers doing that to me when I was a wee-tyke, and it really worked to shut me up. (It was all the attention I needed!) But I couldn’t get a good clear eye-shot at him. He was moving so much and thrashing about that my tray kept falling down and then I got in trouble for having my tray down after the attendants told us to put them back in the upright position. It fell down twice more after my warning.
The guy sitting next to me was fascinating. A crazy Hungarian guy, mid-40s, reading the Magyar Nemzet Newspaper (FIDESZ political party paper, Center-Right). He didn’t feel like talking but was jolly nice anyway, buying me an Asvanyviz for 4 Euros, even though he didn’t have to. Just a really jolly guy. Bought me the water. Said to forget about it and then went back to reading his paper. I’m convinced it is because I was a foreigner speaking Hungarian to him when I got on the plane. I did get out of him that he works in Germany, but he was definitely Hungarian. No doubt… he was no German. Somehow you could just tell the difference on the plane… Hungarians looked more wild somehow. Like they were going on vacation. Germans looked like they were excited to go home. (Again, a tasteless joke, especially considering I love it here more than Germany. I’m just remembering some topics of discussion that Istvan, Detti, and I spoke about this weekend (e.g., how dirty Budapest is compared to the West, how low the pay is, how high the taxes are (44%), and how the mayor (for 10 years) hasn’t done shit but steal money). Were these a lot of parentheses or what?)
I flew on Wizzair to the Frankfurt-Hahn Airport, which is closer to Luxemburg than Frankfurt by almost 50 km. This airport makes Duluth’s look large in comparison. Yet, it was bustling, as it is a major hub for British soccer hooligans to flood into the country via Ryan Air and for Hungarians to pour into the country to be exploited as cheap labor. All in all, it is a great place. Pisti had sent a text message to me noting that he would be there in half an hour. So I got a coffee (which was only 1Euro80Cents in Germany) and some bread thing with cheese to eat. A Russian Aeroflot flight had just come in, so I watched the Russian pilots smoke and chat, not understanding a damn word but not really caring either.
I don’t speak German anymore. I’m not sure I even understand it. It’s only been two weeks of Hungarian learning, but German came to me like the Lord’s Prayer to an atheist. At times it made sense, but I was incapable of communicating back except in Hungarian, as it automatically spurts out now, and since Hungarian is only spoken by 0.23% of the world’s population – I just figured that out on my calculator, I’ll have you know – it did not do me much good except to get sympathetic stares back. Seriously, I couldn’t even figure out how to order a coffee, and eventually I settled for pointing and mumbling like a hung over Russian sailor.
I sat outside in the sun waiting for Istvan. Eventually I looked behind me and saw Istvan looking for me. So I hailed him, we greeted, and then went for another coffee at an outdoor café.
First of all, I have to say I had a brilliant time with Detti and Istvan! They may hate Luxemburg, but I will have nothing but fond memories from there. It was so great hanging out with my old friend again (we were dormitory mates in college), and I am really happy to see he has ended up with such a great person. Detti is really cool. From the airport we hopped into his and Detti's new Ford Focus V8, 6-speed station wagon. I love that car! Wow!!! The road between Frankfurt-Hahn and Luxemburg is a two-lane dingleberry curving around hills, forests, windmills, and bogged down in semi-trucks going five miles per hour up and down the hills. Istvan maneuvered these obstacles with the skill only a Romanian learning how to drive in the mountains of Transylvania would – slamming the pedal to the floor and whizzing around these obstacles like a videogame he could finish in his sleep.
We got to Luxemburg. Istvan had to go back to work for an hour or so, so he dropped me off in the city center. (A much safer place than the tower where Istvan works, as the police unfoiled and middle eastern terrorist plot to blow his tower, and the one next to it, up last year.) Luxemburg’s city center isn’t very large. There are only 80,000 people living in the city; there are only 300,000 Luxemburgians left in the world, I guess, making the language represent but a paltry 0.005% of the world’s languages. I quickly discovered that relatively few people in Luxemburg speak Luxemburgese. Everyone spoke French or German in the stores, or even English, but never Hungarian, before speaking the local tongue. It was always a bit interesting to go into a place and see what language they would embrace you with. I found an Internet café and wrote Birgit, I think, maybe some other peeps. Wandered the inner city – no different than any other inner city in the world, except the buildings were nicer than most and there were more cafes per block than in many cities.
Istvan picked me up and we went and met with Detti, Istvan’s spouse. I didn’t really know Detti that well before this trip, having only met her once at Birgit’s and my wedding in Germany. I’m glad I got to know her now, as she is a perfect match for Istvan in my mind, and I had so much fun with the two of them together! She, as Istvan was, is a translator for the EU courts or something. Istvan now oversees the outsourcing of translations or something… Anyway, we went to the grocery store, bought ingredients for paprikas krumpli (paprika potatoes), came home, and then Istvan and I began sipping some Luxemburgian beers. We ate a ton of food – it was really good, even though they don’t have real, true Hungarian paprika or sausage in Luxemburg!
We just sat and talked and talked and talked, about politics, men, women, marriage, infidelity, psychology as product of environment or biology, families, how much Luxemburg sucks, liberalism, socialism, communism, the French “no” vote, the misguided nature of university Marxists, music, and then the most dominant theme, Hungarian politics (and personally, I was trying to explain my research to them). The Hungarian political discussions were incredible. I learned so much from watching my friends disagree with one another and provide alternate viewpoints to various issues. Stuff I would never find in journal articles or news reports. Plus, it was really great to just hear what my friends are thinking and that being disheartened with politics is not solely a U.S. phenomenon right now – Hungarians may be even more pissed off.
[Tangential side note… I just turned on some music, it’s sunny outside, and I’m debating heading toward Nyekladhaza to do laundry as I’m down to three pairs of clean underwear… I’ll have to decide by 5 p.m.]
So we went to bed way too late, after talking and drinking Hungarian Unicum at a local pub in the village wear Detti and Istvan live. We woke up and went to the city… I wandered around some more, wrote some postcards, and was then picked up at the same corner where Istvan picked me up the day before. The cool thing was, we had a dinner party to go to that Istvan had forgotten about. A bunch of Hungarian translators Istvan had worked with before were getting together. So we went to Viola’s apartment, where we were greeted by six Hungarians (one that was only one and a half years old). It was fun! We ate, sampled some Hungarian wines, and ate more… it was a full on multi-dish meal. It provided great insight into the everyday confusion confronting ex-patriot Hungarians working for the EU, an organization they universally seemed to see problems with, in Luxemburg. None of them seemed to want to stay in Luxemburg forever. Yet, I think the pay is too good to pass up – about six times what they would earn in Hungary for doing the same job, on top of the fact that they only pay 4-5% income tax, have about five weeks paid vacation a year, and get good kickbacks like rebates on new cars. The downside is that one could never afford to buy a house in Luxemburg – we’re talking over half a million Euros for a small house – and it is a really dead place to live. Nothing going on, no real concerts, and… well, yeah, I didn’t meet anyone who loved living in Luxemburg.
I also realized something. That it is not just in America that people have to pass off formal style dinners and parties with good acquaintances as “socializing.” For the past couple of years I have been struggling with the fact that, though I have friends in Minneapolis, I often don’t feel very comfortable hanging out with them. I like them. I enjoy their company, but I don’t always feel that I can be my true self with them. This was the same feeling I felt at this dinner. These people were friends but perhaps not life long ones with Detti and Istvan. I’m not anyone to judge, but this is the feeling I got. And even though I had a blast, it paled in comparison to the fun I had just hanging out with Detti and Istvan alone and shooting the shit, honestly and openly, often times confrontationally. And in a way, I was relieved, as now I know it is the same everywhere, as I often find myself wanting real conversations at get-togethers in the U.S. and being heavily disappointed. Perhaps this is a problem with growing up… we hang out with people because we need to socialize, but finding life long friends is more difficult.
We stayed at the Hungarian translator’s house quite late, until around midnight I believe, and then went home to sleep. Detti and Istvan just spent three weeks in the U.S., so they have work to do. They went into work for a few hours on Friday, and then they came to pick me up and we went into town to buy some groceries and a tent. They went back to work for two hours that afternoon, and I found a pair of 15 Euro shoes that I wouldn’t mind trashing at the rock festival we were about to head off to. (It just occurred to me that I didn’t mention this yet. Yes, we were off to the Rock am Ring festival at a Formula One race track somewhere in Germany. Three days of camping and rocking to bands, some I never dreamt I would ever see in my life – Iron Maiden, Marilyn Manson, Slayer, REM, Green Day, Garbage, the Hives, the Prodigy, Thievery Corporation, Sonic Youth, Tocotronic, Walking Concert, and a bunch we missed because there was just too much to see, Papa Roach, Motley Crue, etc. How Thievery Corporation, really the only electronica band out of 100, fit in I will never know. But more on that show later!) We found a 10Euro tent produced in Central Europe – as the box had Hungarian on it – loaded the car, picked up two more Hungarians I hadn’t met before, Zsofi and Robi, a four pack of Belgian beer, and we were on the road to Germany at around 16:00. I’m not sure how legal it was, but everyone had a beer in the car except for Istvan. (It is legal in Luxemburg, but I’m not so sure about Germany.) Not that it mattered about an hour later, as we hit a massive traffic jam leading up to the festival, with beer bottles strewn about the countryside roads, people peeing on the side of the road, hoards of people hauling camping gear by foot and walking past our cars screaming, drinking, and smoking various chemicals. We made it to the festival site in one hour, and then spent two hours in traffic, and one hour finding a parking spot and setting up the tents. Leaving at four o’clock, I would never have guessed that we would only catch the end of Green Day’s set that began at 8:15. Nonetheless, I was thrilled that they saved the best for last, with Boulevard of Broken Dreams, Time of Your Life, a cover of Queen’s “We are the champions,” and “Majority” all coming at the end. It made my whole weekend!
The rain started coming down about an hour or two later. Just a massive down pour. I’ll never forget looking at Istvan and seeing his wide grin – “Everyone is hurrying but to where? No matter what, we are going to get wet!” He laughed maniacally at that… and he was right. For being in Germany, this festival was one of the worst planned ever! I was shocked! There were honestly only 20 toilets for each sex at for 100,000 people! People ended up peeing everywhere and anywhere, which was largely disgusting. Moreover, there were absolutely no official garbage cans! 100,000 people were eating food and just dumping the plates wherever. Occasionally we would find a Hefty garbage bag tied up next to a restaurant, but it was normally overflowing and definitely wasn’t official. The most confounding thing to me, though, was that there was nowhere to take cover from rain. And it has never not rained at this festival, this being its 20th anniversary. There were no tents set up to get out of the freezing downpour. So people crowded under the grandstand in the one place they could. But it wasn’t big enough, and it looked like the people in there were in danger of asphyxiation like being in the front row of a British soccer match. Logistically, the festival was a disaster in many ways… there weren’t enough parking or camping spots, even though you are promised camping and parking spots when you buy your ticket. The German guards just shouted Lynx, Nein Rechts, a lot every time you tried to find a toilet, garbage can, or a way to get your tent to a campsite. But the festival itself was a blast!!!
The rain stopped at around midnight that night and then was off and on over the next day. We stayed for Prodigy’s show, drinking Bitbergers throughout the entire evening, which ended at around 3 a.m. We also tested out a “brain teaser” tent, which almost induced seizures and vomiting on my part – loud techno music with sunglasses blasting red lights in the eyes. I didn’t understand that you were supposed to close your eyes and let your mind relax. Instead I got heart palpitations and ended up just taking the glasses off and enjoying the dry tent. Then headed back to our campsite. The problem was, we had no clue down which country road we had parked. So we just started walking, like zombies to a certain doom. About two or three kilometers down the wrong road, sun coming up, we realized we had made and error. We walked back up the hill to the festival and found the right road. Another three kilometers down there, we found our tents. Since the sun was coming up, Detti, Istvan, and I ate some baguettes and Camembert we had brought with us. It was delicious. I fell asleep in my tent and woke up at 2:30 or so to “Judas is rising!!!” blasting from some neighboring tents. Oh man, this was a rock festival!
The second day we were a little more prepared, but it was quite a bit colder. Istvan and I bumped into one another earlier in the morning. He noted that we might not stay a second night, and I pleaded with him that we should go home. The other Hungarians, however, really wanted to stay for the whole thing. While Detti was showering, and the other Hungarians were still in their tents, Istvan and I took decisive action. We started breaking down our two tents! (Detti wanted to leave early too, I believe, so I don’t think she was too upset when she got back and the tents were broken down.) Robi and Zsofi didn’t seem to mind leaving early too much, as the only decent, and I use the term “decent” very loosely here you must understand, was Billy Idol. So they agreed to come back with us Saturday night too, as long as we got to see Garbage. Istvan got the car, we loaded it up with all our stuff and found a parking spot closer to the venue than the three or four kilometers away that we were previously. On the way to the festival, Istvan and Detti bought me a rain parka, as well as several for themselves – Robi and Zsofi had smartly brought some of their own. We looked like gnomes in our highlighter colored garbage bags. But the rain started and continued for most of the day, so I’m glad we had them. It was probably about 50 degrees Fahrenheit and the rain made the whole day bloody freezing!
To warm up, we drank plenty of Jagermeister and a few beers. We also ate a ton of Crepes. We saw a bunch of good bands, but by the end of it I was freezing, Istvan and Detti wanted to go home, and even though I think we all felt slightly cheated by Garbage’s 45 minute show, even though they had two hours to play!, we were also a bit relieved. Driving out of a rock festival is even more surreal than driving in. It was like driving through a bunch of war refuges… Istvan had to manage to weave through thousands of people stumbling in the road. One woman wouldn’t let us go by, she was just dancing like a crazy lady, giving us a show through the windshield, but eventually one of her friends dragged her to the side and we got around her. We got home to Luxemburg late, late, late at night (I think at around five in the morning or something). I don’t remember much, except that he was playing Café del Mar on the stereo. I was passed out for much of the ride, only to occasionally wake up and make sure that Istvan was still awake behind the wheel. How he did it I will never know.
We slept until two on Sunday. We woke up and went to the gas station to buy food since nothing else in Luxemburg, Germany, Belgium, or France with food was open. We bought bread, salami, ham, cheese, and plethora of other supplies to feast upon! We made eggs... it was so damn good, I just kept eating and eating. We decided to go see a movie at 7:30, “Sin City.” I then fell asleep for another hour or two, as did Istvan. Detti woke us up at 7:10 or so. We raced into the city and just made the movie. The theater was nice, and I really liked the flick, though one could tell that Tarantino was a guest director. It was chalk full of gratuitous violence, samurai swords, and heads in the toilet scenes. (In fact, it seemed to rip off many of the same moves found in the Kill Bills.) But the stories were great, and I’m really happy Mickey Rourke is acting again. He was brilliant. I would like to read the comics.
After this movie we went to the pub for “a beer.” On the way, Detti gave me a brief tour of the old city walls, etc. Istvan called his mother in Romania. We went to the Gruend, deep down at the bottom of the city. We sat outside at a quaint little pub next to “the big river” – about 15 meters at its widest. We looked up at the cliffs and fortifications all around us, Luxemburg rising about 500 feet straight up. It was a beautiful night. We talked and talked and talked and talked. Two beers later it was one in the morning. Merde! Istvan and Detti had to work the next morning. We went back to their place and feasted again – eating all of the food remaining from our earlier feast. We chatted until about three in the morning. Then said goodnight. I said goodbye to Detti.
I woke up at 9:30 or so and packed my bag. Wrote an email to Birgit wishing her luck with something going on back home. Having been at work an hour, Istvan came back, picked me up, and we drove to Frankfurt-Hahn. We had coffee. He tried the airport’s goulash soup, which isn’t bad but “isn’t goulash.” I said goodbye, and hopped on the plane back to here. The flight was smooth. Took some aerial photography of my own from the plane window. Met Krisztian where he works, as he had my keys. Came home to find my apartment reeking like rotten death – that would be a great band name, actually, Rotting Death aus Australia!!! Cleaned the apartment, waited to hear from Birgit some news. Heard! Hooray!!!!! And then I went for a walk over to Buda and up into the hills a bit. I found a beautiful little park overlooking Pest. I took the metro back to Pest but far from where I live and wandered back. I finally realized I hadn’t eaten anything in hours and ordered a couple slices of pizza from some shop window at around 23:00, came home, began writing this and then passed out to CSI dubbed into Hungarian.
Now it’s 11:27, June 7th, and goddamnit, I need a coffee. I’m going to go to the little bakery directly across the street and order an espresso. Make that a double!
