New week in Tata

I’m starting to get in the swing of things here.  Though that was all thrown off on Monday morning (when I was really tired) and I had to sub for another teacher.  I normally don’t have to go in until 10 on Monday and Tuesday- which is super nice by the way – but Monday I had to sub for Maria.  I got to school early, and thought I knew where I was going, but the room they were in was in a totally new part of the school.  Also, the first two periods were the same group- and I didn’t know that either.  So I had planned one lesson, what do I do the second period?  Sheesh.  They were very understanding and think I’m funny – so it was okay.  But really, how come I have no idea what is ever going on?  Oh well. 

My other classes were good – the 9^th graders are preparing for their “initiation” celebration.  Initiation.  Hmm… from what they are describing, they get hazed by the older kids – and they think it’s great fun.  I told them that it was illegal to do that in the United States, and they were surprised.  Evidently I will be part of this show – we are rehearsing tomorrow.  I’m not sure what exactly we are rehearsing for, or when the show will be – but I’m just going with the flow I guess. 

I got up and got some things done today- cleaned a bit, did some laundry (at an appropriate time) and made French toast.  I don’t have syrup and didn’t think of that until I was deep in the throes of the process, but oh well.  Whatever. 

School was good today.  I talked about the idea of Homecoming, as it’s homecoming at BHS this week.  I am a little bit sad that they don’t have any celebrations like this here, but I was assured that there is a school song that they sing on the namesake day of their school – and I was promised a scarf.  Yeah… a scarf?!  The scarf is the only form of school affiliated clothing they have.  I have more Burnsville stuff here than the school has produced in terms of spirit wear.  Oh well –they are more concerned with studying (some of them), not with dressing in black and gold I guess. 

At any rate – I have a bit of quasi-celeb status as the “native teacher” at my school.  I think I’ve written about this before, but I’m beginning to see the effects of my presence at the school.  Namely, I am causing an identity crisis among many of the students and teachers at Eotvos.  It is part of the culture to respect teachers, so the students regularly greet teachers every time they see them.  In hungary, there are very distinct greetings for morning, daytime and evening- but I haven’t figured out exactly when each is used.  It appears that at approximately 9:13 people switch from the good morning phrase to the good day phrase.  So, I cause problems if I say “Jo reggelt” after this non-official 9:13 time.  When do you technically switch?  Who knows – but if I start with “Jo reggelt” and they come back with “jo napot” it makes for a couple seconds of awkward moments.  Also, they use “halo” (which sounds like hello) so when they say this to me, I immediately assume they are in fact speaking English to me (which 10 times out of 10 they are not) and then I throw things off by saying “good morning.”  Then you have the other students who try to speak English to me, and as they start their phrase in English, I am starting the Hungarian equivalent, so we both kind of pause mid-sentence… it’s just awkward.  It’s nice that students are respectful and want to greet you, but at the same time, it causes me stress.  They also wait for you to go through a door way, or let you go in front of them into a building – they are very aware of the presence of teachers.  It’s just so different.  I used to have to yell “hot coffee” just to get through the halls at BHS. 

After school I had an interesting experience.  One of my senior boys – Gabor – invited me to see part of a Japanese art exhibit at the Castle.  I had seen part of it when Megan and I visited the castle, but there were parts that I missed, and they were taking it all down today.  So I met Gabor after classes let out and we headed over to meet some of the artists and to check out the “dungeon” of the castle.  Gabor is one of the top students, though he is a bit lazy.  He lived in Belgium for 4 years, and attended an international school, and a French language school, so he’s fluent in Hungarian, French, English and is currently trying to take on Japanese.  I’m not sure what his draw was to this particular exhibit – as he doesn’t seem interested in much other than razzing me during class (which is fine – I give it right back) but he took on a keen interest when telling me about the exhibit.  He had met the artists and had struck up a nice relationship with them – while conversing in Japanese.  The art was very cool – my favorite exhibit was one in the very lowest part of the dungeon that was all bugs coming from a bucket in the center of the dungeon.  The bugs were black coming out of the bucket, and as they got farther and farther away from the bucket, they shed their blackness and became colorful beautiful bugs.  The artist gave Gabor some of the bugs as gifts, and one to me as well.  I’ve included a pic of the two bugs I got.  So this wise guy kid really had a nice interest in sharing this with me, and in learning more about the Japanese culture and art – it was nice.