Hey Y’all,

So here I am in Budapest and, after about 24 hours here, my first impressions are really wonderful. It is, of course, the dead of winter so I’m not seeing the city in all of its glory but it’s still quite impressive. Today  Malinda, the admin. assistant in our dept. at CEU, took me for a walking tour and I saw some amazing building and The Danube (or Duna, in Hungarian) where huge chunks of ice are floating buy rapidly. Of course this part of Europe and Russia & Ukraine are under a deadly deep freeze these days. Today was not so bad and I found that I didn’t even really need my long underwear. 🙂 We entered a square nearby the university and I spotted a life-size bronze statue. As we got closer, I recognized old Ronnie Reagan’s face. I asked Malinda about it and she said it’s a recent addition by the current conservative gov. of Hungary. Grrrreat. I promise that I won’t participate in any anti-gov. demonstrations. Ha Ha.

The university is literally in the center of the city which makes me very happy as my job in Germany had me in suburban Munich w/ little daytime access to the city. I will be looking at flats very soon and I hope to move within a few weeks. For now this temporary apartment is just fine and all I need.

Tomorrow I will venture out on my own as I have a free day before officially starting work on Thursday. My new Russian friend Lyubov (pronounced LOO-bah) has been so helpful to me and suggested a walking route tomorrow that more or less dead ends into one of the thermal baths which she highly recommends. I hope to have time for some relaxation before starting work but I will most likely get lost.

Szia! (Goodbye)

C