Culture shock and reminiscence...

Gratitude 51

I am thankful for safe travels home and being home for Christmas. :)

So...I know this is past the weekend, but it's been a jumble around here. (Plus, the internet here is as slower than a snail! I arrived back into the States safe and sound late Friday night (Eastern time) after about 24 hours of travel.

We left the Institute at 5am (Hungary time...11pm Thursday in Eastern time) and Robi took us to the airport. It was harder than I thought to say goodbye. But I knew I'd be back, too. I sat in the Budapest airport for a quite awhile then had a crazy time trying to check...they had different itineraries for me than I had. Then, since the Budapest airport was still on strike, I had to drag all of my luggage to a different terminal to check it in separately. Miraculously, I did not have to pay overload charges on my luggage! (But earlier in the morning, I had to leave unnecessary stuff at the Institute. Oh the joys of packing!)

Waiting in the long, winding line for customs, I met a nice American couple who were teachers in an international school in Budapest. They have been living there for 8 years. The weather in Frankfurt was apparently awful, so we sat on the runway for nearly an hour before taking off. Didn't really bother me...I took a nap...amazing how easily you can fall asleep on a plane in an upright position when you have slept only an hour and a half the night before and had many late study nights previous! I should have missed my connector flight overseas to D.C. becuase we were late arriving, however it was an hour late leaving, too. I didn't have the most comfortable of seats on the long plane ride, but it was alright. It was quite an interesting time, though....I had a Mormon missionary on my right side...haha!...oh boy!...and a cute little German lady on my left. She was so sweet. The conversations with the Mormon boy, though, were...interesting to say the least!

Once in D.C., I found customs to be a ridiculous joke. They pretty much just looked briefly at my passport and let me walk right through. Really? Convenient, yes, but really? You'd think in the nation's capital they'd be the strictest. Guess not! I wanted to be bumped on the earlier flight to Cleveland since I was there in time, so I ran to that gate, but it ended up full. I got some food and camped out at my gate for four hours. It wasn't too bad, though. I made a few phone calls and sorted pictures on my computer. Nem baj. My friend Crystal picked me up in Cleveland, and I stayed at her flat for the night, since I got in so late.

Being in the States felt so weird. I'm still having some trouble adjusting. It's not necessarily bad here (although I know I am not the most pro-America person)...it's just very different between here and there. I knew reverse culture shock would happen, but you can never anticipate what it'll be like. On my flight to Cleveland, I sat next to this nice man, and we chatted about our travels. He had been in Budapest a month prior, and we were discussing the difference in life. I told him I didn't really experience any big "culture shock" going there because I was prepared for it but coming back I didn't know. He put it well when he said, "Yeah, you were prepared to go there...but you weren't prepared for coming back because you didn't know how and how much you would grow, so that is the adjustment that'll be hard." It's true. I've grown so much...more than I could have ever anticipated. It's wonderful but makes adjustment different.

I turned my cell phone on when we landed in D.C. and was kind of confused. Ridiculous, I know, but I haven't had one for four months. I am still forgetting where I put it or leaving it on the counter when we leave. I noticed how much of a nuisance mobile phones can be, but they are convenient for when you need quick contact.

Then, I pulled a twenty dollar bill out of my pocket to pay for a bottle of water and wasn't sure what to do with it. That sounds completely stupid, but I was honestly confused. It was not a 1000 forint note or a bunch of coins, so it was something I really hadn't looked at in four months. I think the kid behind the counter just thought I was completely psycho when it took me a minute to hand it over to him. It is strange having to reprogram your mind of prices and how the money works. I remember how much trouble I had with that when I got to Hungary, not understanding the huge amounts. American money all looks the same. It's not all different colors. Weird.

I am having a really hard time with the not speaking Hungarian or having to think so much to have what I need to say understood. Odd, yes, but I very much enjoyed that challenge and learning the language. When I got into the States, everyone kept giving me weird looks when I answered them...then I realized I was giving them the automatic answers in Hungarian. Oops! It's just become habit, but apparently they don't appreciate that around here. haha!

I finally met my nephew on Saturday night. He's still so little! Nagyon aranyos! So adorable! :) And such a happy baby! My sister and the baby were snowed in here until yesterday. (Yay snow!!! I wish it had snowed in Kecskemét while I was there!!) They are coming over again tonight and spending the night, so they'll be here for Christmas morning! How exciting!

Now for a bit of reminiscence of my last few days in Hungary...

Tuesday was my Solfege exam. I felt quite well-prepared, but I always get nervous right before anyway. Agi was in there because apparently there is supposed to be a second person in the exams. After the very long exam, Klára spoke with each of us individually, giving us an idea of our grades and giving some commentary. She was very pleased with my progress this semester, but of course, there is much work still to be done. We also discussed some work I can do in preparation for when I return for more studies in a year and a half.

I had a lesson with János in the afternoon as normal. It went quite well. He's a very good teacher for me.

Then, I had my last conducting class. I have made quite a lot of progress in that subject! I said my "Viszlát" to Zoltán, since he would not be in again before I left. He realized I was the only one in the class that would not be returning for the next semester, but I told him not to fret because he'd see me again soon.

Tuesday night was a mad dash to make sure I had all the information I could learned for my General Music Literature exam in the morning...the one I had gotten the hand-out for on Friday, didn't have all the materials or information, the library was closed, and I had to learn it all in four days, while everyone else had till mid-January. Yeah, I kind of freaked, but it actually turned out to be my best exam.

It was Mihály, Zita, and myself, since I was the only one who needed to take it then. Zita was the second person. She was hilarious! She kept telling me, "Nyugi, Samantha!" which means "relax" and cracking jokes the whole time. haha! I ended up having to do everything orally, which meant I didn't get to write about what I knew about the listening examples but had to verbally formulate the words on the spot. Eeek! When Mihály turned his back, Zita whispered, "Don't worry...I'll help if you need it!" haha! Oh, Zita! I was on a roll, though, whipping out information so quick, I don't think Mihály could process it fast enough. haha! However, then he started asking me questions we hadn't even touched upon in class. I had not a clue, so I told him so. He handed me a book and told me to look up something, saying it'd help me out....it had the answers right there on the page! haha! Then, he was asking me the country origins of different words that described styles. Again, we never learned any of this. How was I supposed to know. It went kind of like this:

Mihály's question

Me: Italy...? (figuring that was a somewhat educated guess)

Mihály: No...there are three peninsulas off of Europe, but that is not the one I'm looking for...

Me: umm...

Zita (whispering to me across the table): Spain.

Me: How about Spain?

Mihály: Yes, that's correct.

Gotta love the ridiculousness! Guess it just goes to prove that they were right when they said they would push and pull me as far as they could through the whole semester but would also be there to catch me before I fell. :)

The rest of Wednesday was crazy studying for my three exams on Thursday morning...Hungarian music literature, Folk music, and Methodology. So much information! But I did them all and to the best of my ability. That's all I could do.

In the evening on Wednesday as a short break from studying, we went to Tom and Yolanda's flat for a little Christmas party, where we ate lots of cookies, had a white elephant gift exchange, and sang Christmas carols...in various languages.

For our last Solfege lesson on Thursday, we met only briefly and listened to a Bach Christmas cantata. Nagyon szép! Very lovely! Then, I chatted with Klára about some books she had mentioned I should work out of to keep up with my solfege work.

Before my last chamber lesson, I was trying to finish up my packing and succeeded in smacking my head on my marble window ledge in my room. Nice. Needless to say, I had a nice gooseache and walked into my lesson a half hour later with an ice pack on my head. My singing was not at all the grandest (I imagine my deprivation of sleep had some impact on that!), but I got some great last-minute imput on my Hungarian pieces.

Later in the afternoon, I had my finally lesson with János. :( It was awful, which was upsetting on top of the upset of it being the last lesson with him for now. I told him I would be back soon, and he said, "Why wouldn't you? It's a wonderful place...and Hungary is in the center of the world!" haha! Not sure how true that last statement is, but I have grown rather fond of it, and already miss it greatly.

Many of us went out to dinner Thursday night at a nice little restaurant and were also going to go out later that night but never ended up going. (Thursday nights in Kecskemét are not the most "happening," either.) Instead, we hung out in the kitchen, played some cards, and made apple-cinnamon pancakes at 1am. None of us really slept much that night, but that's okay...that's what the plane rides were for! haha! :)

Boldog Karácsonyt kivánok! :)

(I wish you a merry Christmas!)