My Christmas Story

My first Christmas here in Hungary was a good one! Gabi and I left Bp after cleaning the flat. We packed the gifts and put them in the car and headed for Szarvas. The weather was cold, but no rain or snow, yet. We arrived in Szarvas and soon after we had our Christmas Eve dinner, duck. Actually, before dinner we had several shots of Palinka w/ her dad :). After the dinner we exchanged gifts. I bought Gabi this Swarovski necklace and she got me these nice ass leather gloves w/ rabbit fur and a robe. I'm all ready for winter! Her parents gave us money for Ikea furniture...they found out that I really liked the Poang chair and gave us money to buy one for the flat.

After exchanging gifts we rested up before heading out to Gabi's godfather's house. When it came time to leave it had started snowing! :) The streets were covered with a small layer of snow, it was so nice. My first white christmas!! When we arrived at the house, there were more xmas cookies and sweets along with more champagne, palinka and other alcohol. I ate and drank a lot. We stayed there for maybe an hour or two and then went back home. As we left, the snow was still coming down steadily. I wasn't dressed warm enough and by the next morning I caught a cold. :( I had a sore throat and my nose was running. Not a good way to spend the holidays. Needless to say, that didn't stop me from enjoying my time there.

Christmas day was more quiet. Gabi's sister, Kata, and her fiance, Andras arrived that day and we exchanged gifts again....Gabi refers to it as Baby Jesus came by and dropped off some gifts. I got a nice nail cutter from them from Germany. We ate dinner and then just stayed in. We were supposed to visit her cousin, but postponed it for the following day. Her cousin lives in another town called Csongrad (chon-grad), about 45 mins away. On the way there, her dad (Istvan) asks me if I wanna get a beer afterwards at the local pub. Of course I say yes. It was just a guys night out. Istvan, Andras, myself and a friend of the family, Janos all go to the local pub for some beers and palinka. If I haven't already explained what palinka is, it's the Hungarian version of moonshine. Usually made in the countryside, it's now produced commercially and consumed by many Hungarians. It's strong ass shit. We decide to all have a shot of palinka w/ honey and then beers afterwards. The funny thing is, Istvan, can't speak any english, so we were using Andras as the translator. He taught me a new Hungarian phrase, "meg egyszer", it means another round! So everytime the bar maid came by, i'd just shout, "meg egyszer!"

Now I knew palinka was strong, but didn't anticipate it being that strong. I forget how many rounds we had, but it was plenty. Usually if you drink palinka you don't mix at all. We kept mixing w/ beer.....ugh...beer was a bad choice! The next morning I was sooooo hungover. It was the worst that I've ever felt and i've drank a lot before. But I couldn't eat anything the next day until 6pm. Gabi told me I'm not allowed to drink palinka w/ beer anymore. I was ok with that.

In spite of the hangover, it was a good guys night out. I missed that. I asked her dad what he really thinks of me. He said he was embarassed that he can't speak to me in english. He says we have similar sense of humor and sees I really love Gabi. I think I made a good impression.

**sorry no pics available

Christmas time is here....

So it's been a month and a half since I last blogged. School's been keeping me busy. Last month we had our intensive week where we were in class M-F. In addition to that, the weekend before we had regular Fri and Sat class, so it felt like being in class full time. It took some time to adjust to the schedule, but I managed. During the week we have regular courses in the morning and then electives in the afternoon. I decided to take a Mergers and Acquisitions class taught by a Harvard professor. By far, one of the most interesting and exciting classes. ;) For our final, we had to negotiate the acquisition of a Turkish telecom company...I represented the investment banker :D. Needless to say, I'm enjoying my education right now. Good times!

That's what's been happening since last I wrote. Not a whole lot of exciting adventures. We did have some cold weather come in early November. It got down to 28 at times and we had SNOW!! Right now its around low 30's but snow is coming back later this week. I'm getting slowly acclimated to the cold weather....and I do mean slowly. I find myself adding more layers than any of my colleagues. They're cool w/ a shirt, sweater and coat. I have to add an undershirt to that LONG SLEEVE shirt along w/ a scarf, gloves and a beanie. Yeah, slowly...

I hope everyone's Thanksgiving was good. I celebrated mine by preparing for class the next morning (refer to M&A class). I was surprised they don't celebrate Thanksgiving here. Don't all foreign countries celebrate the pilgrims? (j/k....per wikipedia, Netherlands celebrates it ;) )

I've got some new pictures, but haven't uploaded them. Wasn't able to take many b/c I haven't really gone anywhere or did anything. I did go wine tasting. Here's some pics:

in the wine cellar

with Miklos...homeboy's like 6'5"

I'm loving the wines out here. That night we tasted 5-7 wines (ranging from Irsai Oliver to Cabernet Sauvignon) At the end, the unfinished opened bottles were ours to take. My personal favorite that night was the Barrique Chardonnay and the Irsai Oliver. I bought a bottle of the Irsai Oliver for Gabi. The wine tasting was with my colleagues during the intensive week. Istvan, the one who took the pics, is planning another trip sometime next spring in another wine region here. There are so many wine regions here. When I go back and visit SD, I'll try to bring some back. From my understanding, Hungarian wines are not available in the US, at least not in SD. Which is a shame, because they're really good. I'm no expert, but I can appreciate a good wine. Many of the parties I go to here are wine tasting parties. They're mainly Gabi's colleagues and some are very knowledgable on Hungarian wine making.

So on to the topic of this blog....Christmas! I'm staying here for the holidays. The way Hungarians celebrate the holidays is different from what I'm used to. First off, December 6, St. Miklos/Mikulaus/Nicholas day, you're supposed to leave your boots out and in the morning you'll find a chocolate Santa in it. I found a chocolate Santa in mine. :D Secondly, families don't get a christmas tree until 3-4 days before the 24th and decorate only on the night of the 24th. Christmas, btw, is a 2 day holiday (25 AND 26). Lastly there are special meals prepared just for that day....kinda like Thanksgiving ;) except we're having duck here. Anyways, I hope it snows during that time. Gabi told me the river freezes over and you can go ice skating on it. :D I haven't gone ice skating since high school. Should be fun and cold.