Journal of a Sabbatical

April 28, 2001

freedom and nostalgia

Today's Reading: Budapest 1900 by John Lukacs

Train to Kaposvar. Visit. Train back. Late night. Must get up early tomorrow. Film at 11.

One of the things I like best about being in Budapest is being able to walk places. It reminds me of growing up in the 1950's in the Boston suburbs where I could walk to the corner store, the library, church, school, the ballfield, the swimming pool. Had to take the MTA (that's called the T now) to Crystal Lake to swim in lake water, but the swimming pool was within walking distance. I remember the first time I visited the West Coast relatives and found out they had to get a ride to the nearest corner store for a slurpee. I was amazed. I couldn't imagine not having the freedom to go there on my own. I continue to be amazed that my nieces have to be driven to soccer and the library and scouts and CCD etc. There are no sidewalks in their town. Everything is far apart. Once we were taking a walk, you know , just to go for a walk, and a cop stopped us to make sure we were alright. Times have changed. But here in Budapest, everybody walks. There are shops and markets and trams all over the place. I feel mobile like I did when I was a kid.

The one impediment to my freedom here is Mrs. Entomologist, who seems to think that not speaking Hungarian renders me incapable of buying a train ticket, finding the train, changing trains, getting off at the right stop... Heck, I've changed trains in the remoter parts of Hokkaido without any trouble, and it's even harder to read Japanese than Hungarian! So she insisted on taking me to the train station, helping me buy the ticket (which was actually useful), putting me on the train, and instructing the conductor to make sure I got off at the right stop. The conductor seemed to think this was a little overprotective.

I got a first class ticket (I told Mrs. Entomologist that my brother would pay for it so she would stop worrying about whether I could afford it - it's not that expensive by American standards) with an assigned seat so traveled in luxurious comfort from Budapest to Dombovar (the fast train from Dombovar to Kaposvar doesn't have classes and is really crowded). It really made me wonder why we are so willing to be seriously uncomfortable if not in downright pain to travel by air and get there sooner. Wouldn't we all feel a lot better if we slowed down and traveled by train? Of course, the airlines could make the seats in coach bigger and farther apart and not keep the darn fasten seatbelt sign on for the whole flight ... Anyway, I could get really into traveling by train. It's so much more human-scaled.

BiB met me at the train station in Kaposvar. We walked on the "walking street" sort of the central plaza of the city lined with shops and cafes and beautiful women... The downtown of Kaposvar is very compact. BiB pointed out all the major landmarks. Every city seems to have its Art Nouveau/secessionist building that exemplifies the style, and its old church, religious statues (Szent István primarily as usual). Kaposvar too is a very walkable city. BiB says it reminds him of the1950's. Maybe we are both nostalgic for our childhood. Kind of funny being nostalgic for the 50's when you realize that was the height of the Cold War and here we are in a city whose major claim to fame is hosting the first NATO base "behind the Iron Curtain". (I can't remember how old I was before I realized the "Iron Curtain" was a figure of speech and not an actual curtain.)

It was fantastic to have so much time to visit with BiB, to see his office, his apartment, all the major parts of his work place complete with maps showing the major truck routes, which reminded me of the elaborate highway systems we used to design in the dust in our backyard for the Tonka Trucks -- somehow the slogan "Attention boys, Tonka Toys are made just for you" never stopped me. We laid out yards and yards of broad highways with cloverleafs using a broom to mark them out in the dust. So somehow I expected big trucks and was disappointed when he showed me the motor pool with all its vans and SUV type vehicles. One of his coworkers suggested he take me to the maintenance garage for the big trucks, and sure enough there they were. There was the most enormous yellow Volvo truck I have ever seen. I would need an elevator to get into the cab. Very cool.

We had ice cream (banana splits -must be that childhood nostalgia thing again) in a sidewalk cafe, ate lunch at BiB's favorite restaurant, a pasta place with a map of Hungary inlaid in stone in the wall, and had tea in the sidewalk cafe again before it was time to get on the train to go back. None of this conveys how fantastically wonderful it is to have quality time with my brother, taking time out in the too-fast 24/7 pace of 21st century life to just be people who share common experience, common genetic material, and an insane taste for black coffee. Now that I'm older than dirt, family time is ever more important.

[There are pictures to go with this, but there is still a floppy stuck in the drive.]

[May 3: floppy drive unstuck. Pictures from top to bottom: Me at the Kapsovar train station, BiB at his favorite restaurant where we ate lunch, BiB on the balcony of his apartment.]

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