so budapest...great great city...Amy and i both loved it...from the beginning? ok...so we left on another overnight train on thursday night...we were both a little nervous about being the only women again and having to sleep sitting up, but i had just asked my italian teacher if traveling at night was dangerous and she said it really just depends...thankfully, the train we took was full of women and children...such a blessing...we met some nice italian kids and some canadians...and managed to get a few hours of sleep...but we awoke to gorgeous fall leaves all around us...
beautiful train ride...we eventually got to budapest after changing trains in vienna...but this train station we ended up in was ridiculously small...there was no bank anywhere nearby so we had no money...we only had like 1.80 euros on us actually...we had printed off directions to our hostel, but the tram they told us to take wasn't running...and neither was the bus...but we couldnt buy tickets anyway...no one spoke english...and no one seemed to really care that we were stranded...eventually we approached this younger looking guy (hoping he'd speak a little english) and said "bankomat?" then he kinda made an awkward expression and pulled out his wallet! ha...he was going to give us money...we told him no ofcourse...instead he said "uh, tip...you can, uh, cheat"...so we hopped on some random bus without tickets (which we are dreadfully afraid of doing ever since we got caught in Rome)...we ended up getting really lost...and took a taxi...we finally arrived at our asian/hindu/buddhist/eco-friendly/incense smelling 
hostel...showered, and then went out to celebrate amy's birthday! yep, she's a halloween baby...sadly, there were no costumes in budapest...but there was great food...and really cheap too...when we came back to the hostel that night, all the lights were off in our room...we figured other people were sleeping...but when we walked in, there was a little hooded man standing in the corner holding a lighter...he immediately broke out into this wild, throaty laughter that made me think he was not supposed to be there...creepy...but he just kept laughing...so then we started laughing...when amy asked him what he was laughing at, he said "it's just romantic (laughter)...me and my candle"...then he left...it was so funny...then 2 minutes later, he came back in pretending to be a ghost...we decided that this guy was too weird for us not to get to know, so we went and hung out with him and his girlfriend for a while...his name is Roland...he's from norway...and he and his girlfriend are beyond psycho...good times...
saturday we woke up and ate a great hungarian breakfast at a little cafe...then we headed to our new hostel...we decided to stay at two different ones, just because we can...our first night was in Buda, and the second was in Pest...just nice to see different parts of the city...and i just love hostels...the second hostel was really cool...and it was flooded with girls from vanderbilt...who knew a bunch of our friends...crazy...anyway, we spent the rest of saturday at the baths! we went to the Szechenyi baths which the second oldest one in Budapest (i think)...the most popular is the Gellert spa, but we thought we'd go for a smaller one...after we walked through the gate, the ticket guy stopped us and nervously said "go downstairs, turn left, walk straight, and don't look around"...apparently we were in the men section...oops...luckily, we managed to find the women's locker room without any real awkwardness...but let me tell you, hungarian women have never heard of modesty...and they must love food, because they were large...i saw enough naked to last me a long long time...once we had changed we went to the outdoor pools...it was so much fun...there is this whirlpool thing in the middle of one of the pools...it spins you around and around, sort of ripping your swimsuit off as you knock into all the people surrounding you...we did that for a while, then did some wandering...found a really hot pool and sat and people watched for a long time...people watching at a spa in budapest is hilarious...please go now...then we went and got massages which was a wonderful treat...amy's masseuse only had one working eye...that night we went out for some traditional hungarian food...we basically got an entire leg of a cow...it was all very good though...
we spent sunday walking around the city...we did a little shopping...walked like halfway up to the Citadel, then decided we really didn't know what it was...and we didn't want to walk uphill anymore...so we just played in the leaves...we went in one church that was having a service and listened to the choir...the feeling of God was beautifully overwhelming...the music just floods over everything and there is just no denying his presence...so good...it's just all so cool! to top the weekend off, we got to fly home! what a luxury...
this week i have two midterms...i took the first one this morning...and i have italian tomorrow...Obama is everywhere...whenever we walk into a store the italians say something about him...italians really like Obama...really...people have been asking us about the elections ever since we got here...anyway, friday morning i'm going to spain to visit Eli (my friend from home) and i am so excited! should be fun...deuces
