My life right now is all about getting used to things that on my surface feels foreign, weird and somewhat scary, but in reality will probably be commonplace in a few months.
For example, the cold. Yes, I was raised in a similar climate, but I've lived that past 12 years on the surface of the sun, we call Houston, so by now my blood is so thin, 60 degrees feels cold. The temps here in Budapest are consistently 4-6 degrees Celsius (or 39 to 42 degrees Fahrenheit) during the day, with a brisk breeze, especially up on the hills of Buda. I'm pretty sure I don't have enough warm clothing. The sad thing is, I really did stock up prior to our arrival. Oh well.
The driving. Driving here is intimidating. The roads, even the major ones, have very narrow lanes. Parking is ridiculously tight and there is no sense of planning in the way the roads are laid out. It's like a bowl of spaghetti got dropped on the ground and they used that as a plan for where to put the roads. The drivers are very aggressive and will take any opportunity to get ahead. The pedestrians are fearless and the motorcyclists seem to have a death wish. Nearly everyone drives compact cars, which makes sense once you think about trying to navigate the tight roads and parking. When parking, especially downtown, many drivers will turn in their side mirrors to avoid having them ripped off by a passing car. That's how tight it is. The scariest experience we've had so far was up in the hills of Buda, on what I thought was a small back alley with a steep incline and a hairpin turn at the bottom. We were heading down and just at the bottom a bus turned around the bend heading up. He was driving very fast to gain speed for the climb and I was sure we were gonna have a head-on. Our real estate agent was driving (thank goodness) and he veered as far to the right, onto the sidewalk and as close to the wall of the alley as possible and even still it was by inches that the bus passed by our left. I don't know that I'll ever get used to that!
The language. Hungarian is very difficult to master. The intonation and inflection is very specific, plus they have like 7 different possible sounds for the vowels. I've only learned a few words, like Thank you, You're Welcome, Please, Good, Milk, Shop, Flower, Yes, No, Sorry, and Where is... But the weirdest part is that even though I've said 'thank you' a whole lot and it comes pretty natural now, I still get corrected on my pronunciation. I've also been told that because Hungarian is so difficult, native speakers are only used to hearing their language spoken by other native speakers, so their ear is not attuned to picking up mispronounced words, unlike English speakers. Therefore, when a word is mispronounced, to them is sounds like gibberish, instead of the word spoken with an accent. I don't know if I will ever become conversational, but I do hope to learn more than my current 11 word vocabulary. One quick story about David and the language. He met some boys at a little play center that were Hungarian. He, nor the other boys, seemed bothered by the language barrier and played fine together. After we left, Davie asked if he would again see the boy "who spoke Spanish really fast." I told him that boy didn't speak Spanish, he spoke Hungarian. David said "no, he spoke Spanish because I couldn't understand him." I then realized that to David, Hungarians spoke English because in his world thus far, he'd met many Hungarians and they all spoke English, so every Hungarian must speak English. A rude awakening is soon to follow, I am sure.
The food. This is one that I'm still learning about. Because I've been with my kids 24/7 since we've arrived, most of our selections of where to eat and what to eat have been about meeting their needs and we haven't been seeking a 'culinary adventure'. That being said, the selection at both the restaurants and the grocery stores have been surprising. First of all, I was shocked to find that pizza joints are everywhere, as well as many sushi and chinese restaurants, which I was told I would not find. The pure Hungarian cooking involves a lot of pork and some fish and chicken, but rarely red meat. They fry a lot of their meat and do many casserole type dishes with either noodles, potatoes or rice. There are local grocery stores every few blocks or so, which are tiny by American standards, but serve the needs of those doing frequent shopping trips. Then there are the grocery stores that are very comparable to American grocery stores, but these are fewer and farther between. I was thrilled to see that these stores carry a variety of items and although it will take some getting used to, I'm feeling much more confident about shopping in general. There are definitely gaps though. No peanut butter or celery or canned pumpkin or cool whip or cake mixes or chips but from what I understand, I can get almost of those items at other specialty stores, if I'm willing to pay for it. Otherwise, it's make do or do without.
Have to run, but hope this answers some of your questions.
