What a busy few weeks and no, it wasn't drama free but then it wouldn't be me if it was....
Most of my time has been taken up with studying for Lecito's IGCSE exams. Having decided to take the three sciences and history, a year early, we had a lot of cramming to do. The nearest exam centre was the British International school in Budapest and with seven separate papers to sit, that meant five return trips with a two night stay for the final three papers which were on consecutive days.
The drama came on the first day. Not having GPS, I carefully printed out our route, driving instructions and blown up google maps of the city centre. We left on time, miraculously nothing was forgotten and we made good time to Budors. With one and a half hours to travel the final 10 or so miles, we stopped to pick up a drink at Tesco and were quickly on our way again. Asking Lecito to read me the directions from the route planner, we discovered that the last pages (which included the directions and maps of the city centre) had not printed and instead of step by step directions to our destination, the paper was spattered with a scattering of random lines which were clearly not going to take us anywhere.
As such, when we came to the first junction - right for Margit Hid - it was a toss up and unfortunately we chose not to turn off which was the start of a whole new journey. Quickly realising we had made the wrong decision, we tried to correct ourselves and after 15 minutes, amazingly, we appeared to be back on track, driving along the side of the Danube. Being forced, by the one way system, to hang a left, we soon found ourselves having to make another right or left gamble - doesn't help when somebody is sitting up your backside and angrily tooting their horn urging you to get out their way - and that was when we made the fatal decision to turn left, entering a one way - no u turn - lane straight across the bridge to Pest.
Panic hadn't yet set in as we still had nearly an hour before the exam and the school was only a few miles away - albeit on the other side of the river. In theory, it was simple, turn left as soon as possible, drive back over the bridge and go right instead of left. In practise, it was a nightmare! Could we find a left hand turn? The only sign, falsely claiming knowledge of such a turn, had an arrow which indicated you should go up, down, left, right and round about before eventually landing on the opposite side of the road. Before we knew it, we had went past the train station and were heading out of town. Watching the minutes tick by, panic set in with about 25 minutes to the exam and still no idea how to get back to a bridge. We asked pedestrians for directions and twice we were directed to turn left only to discover it was one way and not our way. Desperation started to kick in and with ten minutes to the exam, Lecito had to restrain me from accosting a police car in front of us to demand a personal escort to the school. Sensing the river getting closer, several red lights were shot and like a mirage in the Sahara, a bridge appeared before us - thankfully though, the bridge was real and soon we were transported back to the Buda side of the Danube. An illegal u turn was closely followed by driving the wrong way down a one way lane - by now the exam had started and all reason had been left in Pest. Finally, five minutes after the start of the exam, we arrived in the school's car park. Naturally, it wasn't that easy (it's us, what do you expect). We had parked in the bottom car park and the entrance was at the top car park which was separated by a large security gate (later we discovered there was another entrance!) which only opened on the approach of a vehicle leaving the top car park. Spotting the school's minibus heading in the direction of the gate, we started to run believing this was our only chance of gaining entrance to the school. Having successfully slipped through the gate, gaining access to the inner sanctums of the school, we carried on running up the hill - now hills and me do not go together - my hip protested and my lungs were cursing me for the years of smoking they had endured - thus, I arrived panting, stressed and barley able to speak. We're... pant pant pant... here for ... pant pant.... the.... pant pant....exam...pant pant. Lecito was quickly whisked away to the exam room and I was given a cup of tea to calm my nerves.
Thankfully, the rest of exams went without a hitch due to our very generous friends Pam and Glyn who donated us their old GPS, I couldn't have done without it and will be eternally grateful to them. Thanks also goes to the staff at the British school, they were absolutely wonderful, helpful and accommodating and were we in a position to pay for our children's education, I would have no hesitation in sending them there.
During our three day stay, for the final exams, we managed to fit in a quick visit to the Hungarian outdoor museum in the town of Szentendre - the rest of our free time was spent trawling the town centre to Treehugger Dans and The Red Bus book shops, where Lecito was like a kid in a sweetshop.
The museum is definitely worth a visit and plans are already being made to spend a day there during the summer. The museum comprises of historical houses from most regions of Hungary as well as workshops, a tannery, windmill, water mill and wine press. Sadly, we only managed to see the tannery, a smallholding and two thatched farmhouses. - as well as some Roman ruins that paled somewhat in comparison to the Roman excavations a few miles down the road.
Apparently, on Sundays, they hold workshops including indigo dying and pottery making. There is ample car parking on the site - 700ft, entrance fees are 1200 ft for an adult and I think, 700ft for a child.
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| Small holding |
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| Living area of small holding |
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| Hungarian cattle |
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| Ancient wine press |
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| The tannery with wooden slatted upper floor - for drying the hides? |
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| Traditional farmhouse |
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| Wonderful antique painted furniture |
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| Work room in the farmhouse above |
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| This was amazing, behind an arched hallway, there was a bread oven on either side but no chimneys. The smoke is drawn up through a hole in the roof. |
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| Great Market in Budapest |
On our return to the countryside, I barley had time to gather my
thoughts before it was time to turn my attentions to the Brits jubilee
party. Hosted by Bronya & Brian, there was to be a fancy hat competition as well as a cake
competition. Originally, I hadn't planned on entering the cake
competition as there are some wonderful bakers amongst the club members
but realising the party was the same day as the twins birthday and that I
would be making them a birthday cake anyway, we decided to give it a
Jubilee theme. It actually turned out better than I had anticipated
though it didn't travel well and arrived a bit worse for wear. The
"Queens Breakfast" hat looked really good having been made by Sprint out
of salt dough and a print out of The Telegraph from the day of the
Queens coronation.
We were genuinely stunned and delighted to win both prizes and it was a really good day with everybody enjoying themselves.
Over the next couple of weeks, I hope to update the property blog as
there are a couple of properties in our village which the owners need to
sell urgently. The owners, knowing I sometimes help British people find
properties, have asked for help before they are repossessed. One owner
recently lost her husband and can no longer afford the small loan they
took out to extend and renovate the house, I wish I could magic up a
buyer for her but sadly it doesn't work that way....
Final update, the village shop now has wooden tables and benches outside
- I'm sure it had nothing to do with the comment I wrote on google
maps! Old habit's die hard though and the regulars still seem to prefer
sitting on their tree stumps outside the entrance to the shop - though I
have noticed the benches being used more frequently.
That's it for now, I'm going to
de stress
and spend some time in the garden - oh, I forgot to mention the late
frost.... Last month, we suffered an overnight frost, only seemed to
affect the villages in the hills. Potatoes and
paprikas,
as well as some trees were badly affected and many lost a large portion
of their crops. It's been a bad year for late frosts with the village
losing all the marigolds that normally brighten the verges throughout
the summer - not good when many villagers rely on the crops to sustain
them through the winter!
Picture of a
szarvasbogár - stag beetle, found in the garden by the children, it was huge!
