Replaced at Work

The safe arrived today...

21st century struggle. Man v. Machine

With the safe in place, the guys here don't have to surrender their keys to me at the end of every day, and we can maintain compliance with our access keys' security standards even without my presence. Which makes me totally superfluous. I could be recalled back home at any time.

The guys are working hard, and one of the drawbacks of working for an American company is that you have to work through every Hungarian holiday. The entire town shuts down, even our building. We have to arrange for it to be open especially for us, and the first guy who arrives has to let everyone else in. Here's a snowball one of my coworkers threw at the window to let me know he was waiting outside:

Budapest: You Guys Sure Got A Lot of Stone Here

I put the noob in Danube.

I don't think my trip to Budapest really does the city justice. First, it was still cold in Hungary when I visited, whereas in every other city I went to it was springtime. Second, I was still disoriented and not used to travel at all, I didn't even spend the night there, it was just a day trip. Budapest is only an hour away from Szolnok by train.

I love the train. Sure it may take a little longer to get places, but I don't have to worry about parking, or  getting lost, or running over somebody in a foreign country:

Poor Netflix queue choices lead to conservative travel arrangements. 

Plus I get to read and sleep on the train. The Hungarian railway system's website, http://elvira.mav-start.hu/, is an amazing site that can easily find you the most efficient routes to your destination. You can purchase your tickets and collect them with your purchase code from the kiosks in many train stations. After an hour of nervously staring out the window and holding my ticket in my hand despite it already being verified, I arrived at the western Budapest train station:

Things I saw in Budapest:

I saw Heroes' Square (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/H%C5%91s%C3%B6k_tere), an uncompromising collection of Hungary's historical badass leaders:

Something tells me this guy did not like to be fucked with. 

Notice how the copper's verdigris almost matches the coloration of the overturned apple, signifying the ultimate impermanence of both a century old monument and a day old apple. Sure, one will rot away by the end of the day, but both will eventually succumb to time's implacable embra... no, no I don't have any change. Please stop asking me for spare change.  

I also went to the art museum, which was a nice, heated respite from downtown Budapest, where they hassled me for change:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bocklin ruled pretty hard.

After a morning of walking I just sat in front of this painting and salivated. 

I also climbed to the top of Castle Hill (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Castle_Hill,_Buda), but didn't go inside to see its art gallery. It's an impressive place though:

If it was stone, and it was ornate, then it was in Budapest.

Tower of the Synogogue

Sunset over the Danube 

I love tiled roofs

Preparing to Ride Home

Bruno Mars is Huge Here

I hear Bruno Mars everywhere--on the Hotel's little boombox while eating breakfast, on car stereos when I walk to work, everywhere. 

God help you Bruno Mars if you fail to hold this concert, which has posters up for it even though it's almost 9 months away. 

How popular is Bruno Mars? Let Google translate help you to understand:

After walking all day around Budapest, I start to get pretty tired. Here's bonus clips of me trying to figure out my camera at the top of Castle Hill:

I make my way to the train station to start my journey back to Szolnok, lose my ticket (how does that happen? I never do that), buy another ticket, and get on the train home. I am exhausted, in a rear facing seat, and watching older women doze off while they have their hands bundled up in those fur coats with the big cuffs on the sleeves:

Yes you are pretty. But I am on a cold train from Budapest and I will need that coat.

I watch them nod off one by one. Watching people go to sleep is like watching people yawn, you want to imitate them, and being tired doesn't help. I do not want to miss my stop and wake up freezing on the outskirts of some forbidding village. Somehow, against all odds, I find the strength to stay awake.

A Revolution In Szolnok

On the end of my third week I am awakened by cannon fire. At this point I knew that I had made a mistake in coming here. I had signed up for Szolnok, not Sarajevo. It turns out that there was a celebration of the Hungarian revolution against its Hapsburg overlords (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hungarian_Revolution_of_1848), and the town had assembled to watch a recreation of the Hungarian army destroying an Austrian brigade:

The three horsemen of the Szolnokalypse

Yes, there were full on cannons setting off car alarms in the early morning, but being from the American south I was accustomed to reenactments:

There are roughly 7000 anachronisms in this picture. Can you spot them all?

I saw firsthand the horror of a toddler on his father's shoulders, straining to get a better look at the battle. Is there no end to our recreated hate?

Sorry guys. Even with cannon fire it was pretty lame. Let's spice it up a little:

After the battle of Szolnok, I did manage to find the train station, which was only a twenty minute walk from my hotel room. With me being deathly afraid of driving, the train station would become my gateway to the rest of Europe:

Vasutallomas is Hungarian for "too cowardly to drive".

Next stop, Budapest:

Szolnok... My Second Week

It takes me quite a while to get used to new surroundings, and my first weeks in Europe were spend solely in Szolnok. My hotel, the hotel Sohaz, borders the Tisza river, and it nearby the Mayfly pedestrian bridge that Szolnok touts on its Wikipedia page:

The Mayfly Bridge In Winter

Some mornings I wake up to go jogging, usually on the cobblstoned border of the Tisza. It's after one such jog that I notice my unintentionally jingoistic ensemble, a bright red hoodie proclaiming that the Phillies are the champions of the world, and a knit cap bragging about Yuengling, America's oldest brewery:

That's right Hungary. World Champions. You guys didn't even place in 2008. 

America's oldest brewery is basically Hungary's youngest brewery. Bragging about our beer here is the equivalent of me whipping it out in an NBA locker room. And world champions? It's not like we crushed the Szolnok mud hens. I decided that I'd have to modify my jogging outfit to fly more humbly under the radar:

Ahh...gray and Canadian. Nothing offensive at all.  This is what happens when you watch Argo at midnight. You grow very aware of your  intrusive American presence.

I spend most of my days and nights working. I did catch a show at Szolnok's local theatre. I got there late and was shown a chair by the wall. Yes it was all in Hungarian, but it was musical comedy so I caught many of the jokes:

"One Crazy Man Makes A Hundred"

During the weekends I explore Szolnok. They have public fountains connected to hot springs, its water purported to contain healing properties:

On weekdays a fountain spouting healing mineral water, on weekends a portal to the magical land of Narnia.

They also have some pretty intimidating water towers:

Daytime View v. Nighttime View

The bridge also features a lock wall:

It has become a very popular tradition in Asia and Europe for couples to put a lock on a bridge, and throw the key into water, declaring their unending love for each other (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Love_padlocks). Most of the time people put locks on the bridge structure itself, which can lead to huge clusters of locks, necessitating the building of a structure like a lock wall, which is a designated space for these locks. I kind of like lock walls because usually structures have to account for the uncaring, slovenly, or destructive parts of human nature, like iron bars or seat belt extensions. But with lock walls an engineer actually had to acknowledge that people like to declare how much in love they are with each other. Also it leads to badass locks like this one:

Saved as "most_badass_lock.jpg".

It was warm when I got here, but now it's snowy and cold, as if Hungary had heard that a big important American were coming to visit so it put on a warm and welcoming face, but then it saw that the American was me, so it went back to business as usual.

It's a Szolnok life. My First Week.

When I got off the plane I was greeted by my coworker Jason and his fiancee, Caroline. Jason is an accomplished traveler who would take his lovely bride to be on a whirlwind tour of the finest Europe had to offer. I would be doing pretty much the opposite of that.

In my first week in Szolnok Jason would teach me how to work, how to order in restaurants, and how to drive. I was like an estranged, temperamental, slow witted son reunited with his father for one magical, disorienting week. It was unseasonably warm when I arrived, with clear skies and no snow on the ground, but in a few days it would constantly alternate between rain and snow. It was like Hungary had heard that a big, important American was arriving and had cleaned up special, but once it saw me struggle to heft by sister's borrowed purple suitcase into the back of our company's rented Ford Fiesta, it decided just to let its winter all hang out.

Our company's European contingent is based in Szolnok, Hungary: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Szolnok. You can bet this Wikipedia page got torn to shreds as I looked for any information related to my impending adventures. Szolnok is actually a lovely town, and as winter melts into spring I get to see both snowflakes and blossoms fall onto its cobblestoned streets.

Work Break

Sometimes I like to take a break and talk about what I do at work. 

In addition to my regular duties as a documenter, I also safeguard our security keys, collecting them at the end of the day and taking them back to my hotel room. I keep them in a box they had been originally brought by the Hungarian team to the US, filled with candy and labeled "Hungarian Pride":

Why is the lid on the Hungarian Pride box open? Because you cannot contain Hungarian Pride.

Admittedly I only brought it back because I thought they would refill it with candy.

Most of our team sits around a large black table in the middle of our office.  Jason takes me around to introduce me to the 10 guys who comprise our day to day team. How can I convey what it's like to have a wizened guide introduce a nervous, inexperienced homebody to a foreign group of warriors with names like Csaba, Zoltan and Szabolcs?

Learning to Drive

So cars with automatic transmissions are very expensive to rent, and Jason was fine with a manual transmission. I...was...not. I had never driven a stick shift before, but what better way to learn than in a foreign, snow covered country, full of new mothers with their babies strapped to the back of their bicycles, and cops who do not speak English?

Jason takes me for a couple laps around the local Tesco, which is a super nice grocery store/Wal-Mart equivalent here. It's slow learning and a freak out a couple times, but eventually I can technically drive.

Adventures in Driving:

1. I stop at a stop light and cannot get the car to start under any circumstances. It's because I've put the handbrake on as an extra precaution, but I only learn this after like 4 cycles of the traffic lights changing. 

2. Speaking of traffic lights, I figured that driving to and from Tesco at around 8 p.m. would present the least risk to myself and my fellow drivers. But Szolnok is kind of a laid back town, and after 9 the traffic lights just flash yellow, which confuses me the first time it happens. The handbrake thing happened on the way to Tesco, the traffic light thing happens on the way back. 

3. The entrance to my hotel's parking garage is on an small incline, so I stall out a couple times when trying to drive in. The concierge is nice enough to come out and help me drive it in, which is not even that embarrassing to me because this was my first trip all by myself. 

4. Jason has to leave like 2 days after he taught me how to drive. We have his going away party at the Szolnok bowling center, and I'm the designated driver. So I drive like I'm drunk. Also they put one of the biggest programmers in the seat behind me, so I'm scrunched up and fogging up the windshield with fear breath while everyone in the car thinks it's hilarious. Also, they leave a water bottle full of bootleg booze underneath the front seat. I find this out days later, so had I been pulled over I would have had a bottle of liquor as a testament to my erratic driving style.

Found this flyer at the bowling alley. This guy is missing. He's 188 cm tall and weighs 110 kg, which is basically me adjusted  5 percent for inflation. If you see him, help him get home. 

Coming This Spring...

See me this spring as I star as Liam Neeson's no account  son, whom he tries to pawn off to dangerous people around Europe. 

FAQs About Hungary

Below are some of the questions I encountered (or had myself) before leaving the US and after the first week of arriving to Hungary.

Q: Don't they drive on the wrong side of the road over there?

A: Apparently only Great Britain does that. Hungarians drive on the same side of the road. Not like I can drive though. Automatics are hard to rent over here and my company already had a manual rented for Jason. My company's solution was that I would learn stick. In a snowy, foreign country. I'll get to that in Week One.

Q: Did you have to get your shots?

A: Not when you go to Europe. Maybe if I were going somewhere tropical or destitute. Maybe I was supposed to, and am now vulnerable to or a vector of some terrible disease that could have been easily prevented.

Q: Isn't Hungary a communist country?

A: Not since 1989, when I was 7 and couldn't drive but could speak in complete sentences. But now it's 2013, and I cannot drive and speak in complete sentences. Hungary is in the EU, and we are trying to make money over here.

Q: What's the exchange rate over there?

A: The Hungarian currency is the Forint. As I write this, 1 USD equals about 230 Forints. Things are cheaper here.

Q: How's the food?

A: I like it so far! I'll try to write about food as I encounter it. They are always worried about whether I like the food or not, but if they saw me eat a Cheeto that had just fallen out of a comic book that had been in the trunk of my car for 2 months, they would no be concerned about the food they have here. Food can be as old school or as new school as you prefer--duck neck soup, pepperoni pizza, sausage and rustic bread, Chips Ahoy. Food's fine, I try to eat new stuff. They don't have a lot of beef here though.

Q: Why no beef?

A: We have an entire state for raising beef, which is four times the size of Hungary. So if you grow a cow here, you milk it, literally and figuratively.

Q: Lol except for horses right?

A: Right now Europe is in the grips of a scandal where horse meat was found in products that were supposed to contain only beef. I'm not gonna joke about that here I don't know how sensitive they are to it.

Q: How cold is it?

A: Sweater weather so far. It was warmer when I got off the plane than when I left from Philly, and there was no snow on the ground. I'm looking forward to spring here. It did snow on 3/16 here, that blew. Hopefully that's the last of it.

Q: Is the language hard to learn?

A: Yes. I am trying to learn, but I should make a better effort. My coworkers and the people at the hotel make every effort to speak to me in English, and are perfectly understandable. English is not really spoken a lot around here.

The language is nice though, I feel. It's not harsh on the ears, and pleasant sounding. I am using google translate, a kindle app, and have signed up for online lessons, which caused me to have to warn my company that an Internet history rife with visits to sites  like hungteacher.com, hunglessons.com, and hunginstruction.com are not in this instance, a fireable offence. People have been very patient so far, and every word I learn makes life easier. 

Hiccups On Departure

Saturday at noon I woke up with sensitivity in my tooth. This tooth had been capped months before, but that afternoon I could feel the chill of the soda that probably lead to this issue in the first place. I wanted to get this checked out before getting on the plane Monday afternoon, so luckily my dentist's office penciled me in for a Monday morning appointment.

It turns out that the capped tooth had abscessed, and I was a couple weeks away from having dollops of butter yellow pus dripping from my premolar. Time for a root canal. 

Q: What's best about having a root canal the day of a 6 hour overseas flight with a 6 hour layover? 

A: Well with my mouth numbed up, I have the ability to dilate my left nostril while the other one remains normal:

Women love this. Just like Lil' Wayne says, "One nostril be flarin', and bitches be starin'"

Q: What's worst about having a root canal the day of a 6 hour overseas flight with a 6 hour layover? 

A: Everything else. 

The procedure was painless though, shout out to Dr. Eisenbrock and his team. I hope it holds out during my trip though. Just like everything in life, I try to make up for months of neglect with one afternoon of intense attention. They gave me a choice of either strong Tylenol or Percocet for the pain, but since I had never had anything stronger than Tylenol before, and didn't want my first plane ride in 20 years ending with me being detained by an air marshall for intoxication, I went for the Tylenol. 

Q: Your first plane ride in 20 years?!

A: Whoa! Be easy Mister International. Yes, as far as I can remember, my last plane ride was to Disney World. Mom says this counts as me knowing my way around air travel. I tell her that yes, as long as I have someone twice my size holding my hand the entire time, I am an accomplished air traveler. 

Liftoff

I was taking British Airways to Heathrow Airport. Plane ride was fine, I slept most of the way. I liked British Airways because when the flight attendants ask if I have any trash they ask "Rubbish?" and that just seems like a classier way to do things. Chicken curry was good. 

Expectation vs. Actual--View from the Plane at Heathrow

Throughout this travel log you'll see instances where my unreasonably high or naive expectations of international travel were met with something underwhelming. You may be experiencing these same feelings of expectation and disappointment yourself, particularly if you choose to read another post, or meet me in person. My first disconnect in what I expect and what I experience is the view flying into Heathrow. I had envisioned seeing all of London laid out for me, like Big Ben slammed right into downtown Coruscant. 

Expected view from plane at Heathrow:

Artist's Rendering

In reality, Heathrow is much too far away from London for this view this layout. Or it might not be, I wouldn't know. The entire airport was shrouded in London's famous fog:

Actual view from plane at Heathrow:

This is not an exaggeration, I could not even see the outlines of buildings until we were on the ground. 

My time at Heathrow was nice. A bunch of bustling people, bathrooms as clean as possible considering the unending crashing of wave after wave of tired travelers. I sat on the benches and nodded off during most of my six hour layover. Why so long? Well it was either a six hour layover in Heathrow or a two hour layover in Frankfurt. My company figured I needed the most time to get oriented in the most English speaking country, and for that I thank them. Any considerations that you would make for a lost, unaccompanied 8 year old child, please make for me. I was worried when I looked at the departure board and saw a plane already boarding for Budapest. I couldn't see any other flights leaving for Budapest and thought because of the time difference, there had been some confusion and that would miss this flight. It turns out that this flight was so far in the future that the board didn't even show it yet. I had plenty of time to make it to Budapest. 

Expectation vs. Actual--Passport Stamp

I have an unreasonable fascination with passport stamps. I wanted one so bad, a brightly colored, delicately filigreed decree that I had arrived on the international stage. Having never actually seen one before, I think I had placed a little too much emphasis on how cool it would look:

Expected Passport Stamp:

Badass.

Actual Passport Stamp:

A black square? Not even a triangle or something? Or at least a blue square, anything. 

I was in now in Hungary, land of a billion things I don't have a clue about. Jason, the person I was taking over for, met me at the airport with his fiancee Caroline (more about these Samaritans in the next update), and drove me to Szolnok, Hungary, where our European division (9 dudes in a single office suite) does their work. 

Here Goes...

Hi everyone! I write guides and provide documentation for my company. Currently, we have a team of developers/technicians in Hungary who are helping us while our company goes through big changes in our software and product lines. Because the technicians in Hungary have access to customer data, we need an authorized American representative to give out their USB security keys and access tokens every morning so that they can go to work. In the future we may go through the auditing process so that they'll be able to use the keys themselves, but in the meantime they need an American human to physically hand these keys out. And that human is me.

The people who initially went to Hungary for my company all had a skill that necessitated them making the trip. They trained the Hungarian technicians and ironed out the update process that our project requires. Now that that's settled, we had to bring our initial representative, Jason, home to help customers adjust to the repercussions of a huge company project. But who could we find to replace him? With training out of the way, all we needed now was an employee with a passport, a job that didn't require him to be on the EST timezone, and someone without a family that depended upon him. And that person needed to leave next week.

It sounds like a punishment meted out by cigar chewing sergeants to rogue detectives in 70s cop dramas. "Jacob, one more screw up from you and I'll have you doing documentation in Hungary!"

I had never traveled overseas before. My only other experience with international travel was a road trip to Mexico right after college. I blogged about that too, and you can read about that in

http://ourtriptomexicocity.xanga.com/

Yeah baby, a xanga blog with no pictures! Is there no greater waste of Internet space?

But now I had the opportunity to travel internationally and meet a group of fellow employees contractually obligated to keep me alive. This seemed like an ideal way to get out and see the world. My passport had remained pristinely unstamped since an CVS employee had spit into his hand and slicked back my unruly blonde hair before snapping its picture, so if there was ever a chance to travel, this was it. I think it was like Tuesday when they asked me to leave. Monday morning I hopped a plane for Hungary.