Blog Update- Budapest Last one!
Well...it took me a few months to finally update my last blog from Europe. And this is the one where my family came to visit. Yaaay! :D I've also printed out pictures from my various travels and I have also created a photo book through Costco as well as a calendar which will eventually be printed out. I need to do that before I leave for Sacramento too...and so I decided I should finally update before I head back to Sacramento a week from today. I'll be living in the dorms again because it's just easier that way (and considering I haven't been there since last May...) and a whole lot of convenience. And I'm not sure how busy I'll be this semester since it's MY LAST ONE!! Yay! That's right...I'M GRADUATING IN DECEMBER!!! woohoooooooo!!!!
But anyways, no I don't know what I want to do after I graduate, don't know what job I want or anything like that. I just want to get this semester done, get some sort of job and an apartment so I can relax for a little bit, sit down and figure out what exactly would interest me for a few years (or more).
And on that note, let me finally post my lovely blog. haha So you can actually read it. But I'll still continue blogging...just not of Europe...obviously :D
Soooo without further ado!
BLOG! :DD
Monday May 27th
Today is my besties birthday! YAY! :DD anyways, I got up kind of early (7am but then snoozed until 8am) then ate some breakfast, finished writing in my journal (yay!) and then took a shower. Then I went and bought public transportation tickets so I could have one for when I ride the metro and bus to the airport today and for when we ride the metro to the train station tomorrow. You can get a booklet of 10 so I got two of those…can always buy more. It was just easier to buy that and was about the same cost as buying a two week pass. If we were here consistently for two weeks, would work but since we’re leaving for about two weeks…not going to work. ANYWAYS, now I go eat my lunch and get ready to go pick my parents and brother up from the airport. YAY!
Tuesday May 28th
Beginnging of the trip of family vacation outside of Europe with the family! Woohoo! Took the train to Vienna (Wein), Austria. It was a three hour ride to get there and then when we finally arrived, we weren’t sure how to get to the apartment house (instead of hotel) that we were staying in from the train station. But eventually, the people at the train station information counter (who spoke English!) helped us on our way. It was an adventure riding the bus to where we needed to get to because it was easier riding the bus all the way to the end of its line then having to pay for public transportation tickets (had to validate Vienna Card at the Tourist information building). But we finally got to the city center and got to the Tourist info place, got our cards and made our way to the apartment building…we also got city maps. Woo! Once I have a map, I can get around pretty much any city that way. As long as the streets are all labeled. Haha! Any who, we had lunch and then we went to the apartment building-because we were all hungry. And man! The apartment building was NICE! Loved it :D sooo what did we do next? Went out to St. Stephen’s Catherdal, Hapsburg building, St Peter’s Church, Parliament building and in the process stumbled upon a celebration of the Vienna soccer (football) team winning. So it was a fun day!
Wednesday May 29th
Welp! Another fun day. We had breakfast at this one little café/restaurant for breakfast where the owner/waitress/cook spoke a little bit of English BUT! The food was delicious. And after that! We went to the Imperial Palace/Schönbrunn Palace which has HUGE grounds. OMG, no wonder this place is so popular for crap load of tourists to come to. But any ways, it was a fun time taking the tour through the palace and learning about the history. But it’s a good thing they had it all laid out because otherwise would have gotten lost. The Palace was fucking HUGE! Seriously! It had like over 20 rooms. But considering that’s where the royalty lived, no surprise. But STILL! >.< Any ways, we had some lovely lunch where our waiter was from Budapest, Hungary and studying in Vienna. Was entertaining talking to him haha After that, we wondered around the grounds before heading over to the STRUDELSHOW! OMG! It was so fun to watch! And the lady that was demonstrating on how to make the strudels (we had a sample, yummies!!) asked how they moved the dough from this turn table to the main counter top and my mom answered…soooooo she got to help! Haha That was entertaining. Then next we wondered some more around the grounds and headed towards the zoo which was pretty awesome as well. And they had baby animals there too! Like a baby reindeer and wolves! So adorable!!
Thursday May 30th
So! Next day! We found out it was an Austrian holiday…like USA Thanksgiving. So majority of the places were closed. Oh and the even best part? IT WAS RAINING! Yeah that was an amusement to say the least…any who we went to Belvedere Palace, smaller than the first one but just as impressive. It was fun! We also had lunch at Belvedere and decided to head back to Vienna city center and figured out what we wanted to do next. I wanted to take pictures of the Opera house so we took the metro there and tried to stay dry. Ahaha We then hung out for a bit at Starbucks, had a drink and then wondered through a couple souvenir shops. Was trying to find a decently priced keychain but that didn’t really happen. BUT! Did find an awesome keychain though :D we then headed back to the apartment to catch up on some rest and found a pizza joint to have dinner at. Was hanging out with the family in a relaxing moment because for those few minutes, didn’t feel like we were going and going and going and going…we were relaxed and just enjoying ourselves. And it was nice being able to hang out with my brother too considering I hadn’t seen him since Christmas 2011.
Friday May 31st
SO! To Zurich we went! It was a very interesting train ride and LONG! Didn’t realize that Zurich, Switzerland was so far from Vienna, Austria. But before we got on the train we wondered around a little bit in Vienna before heading to the train station. And my brother had to buy new shoes because his old pair was falling apart…like the bottom sole piece was coming off and side pieces near the toe of the show were pealing so the water could get inside. After that we bought some sandwiches for our lunch/dinner and headed to the train station where we ate our lunch and waited for our train. We got onto the train and left around 1:15pm. We got into Zurich around 10pm and then we had to figure out HOW to get from the train station to our hotel. And it was a good thing I have a friend that lives in Zurich so she helped us get from the train station to our hotel. She told us which suburban train to take and then which bus to take to get to our hotel. Then we asked how exactly how we got from our hotel to the meet up point for our mountain tour the next day.
Saturday June 1st
WOOO! MOUNT TITLIS! OMG this mountain tour was AMAZING! 10,000 feet in the air and took three gondolas up to the very tip, top. Which was sooo much fun. Totally enjoyed it! But back to explaining the fun gondola trips UP! The first one was a six person one. That was a fun one because there weren’t so many people…just six! And the couple we rode up with were super nice. The next gondola up held about 20 people or so, so it was packed. And omg, it was horrible. Don’t want to be mean or anything but found out another group besides Chinese/Japanese tourists that are horrible. Indians! (from India). Omg they are all about “Me, Me, ME!” Horrible *head desk* Especially in the last gondola…the 360® gondola because the center moves and you’re not supposed to hold on to the ‘railing’ that is on the outer inside. And the person driving even says “DO NOT HOLD ON” because it FUCKING ROTATES!! But the Indians that were next to my brother couldn’t get that through their head and kept pulling into us and we kept saying “LET GO!! STOP HOLDING ON!! LET GOOOOOOOO!!” OMG it was sooo frustrating. But we finally got up to the top and then were bombarded by so many Indians that didn’t give a shit about others (ALL OVER THE PLACE) and Chinese/Japanese. Ugh, but we went outside in the snow and enjoyed ourselves. It was raining down below so it was snowing pretty good and we could only go to certain areas. But that’s ok because we still enjoyed ourselves. And that was about all that we did for today.
Sunday June 2nd
Woo! Toured old town Zurich :D It was a fun adventure annnnnnd! IT WASN’T RAINING!! But it was fun walking around the city and getting to see the sights and listening to everyone (and different languages) talking. We eventually figured out where we wanted to get fondue (Hotel Adler) to try from and HOMG it was soooo delicious! And that was pretty much all that we did today :)
Monday June 3rd
Well! Met up with my friend who lives in Zurich and she’s so sweet and nice! Hope we can meet again because we had just the greatest time chatting! And then we got on a plane to Prague…because it was cheaper and quicker to get to Prague from Zurich. And once we got there, we had to take back streets because they just ‘finished’ with a flood from the day before. The floods starting in Germany were streaming down the Danube River all the way to Budapest (which I’ll discuss later). Anyways, we got to the hotel that owned an apartment building that we were staying in and checked in and told how to get to our apartment which was only a few feet away. But the place we were staying in was super nice and it was super quite even if we did butt up against a main street with a bridge just down the way. But that’s ok, it was a cool view.
Tuesday June 4th
Well today was the day of touring around Prague. And man, what a city! It was so interesting to be walking around everywhere because it’s just that amazing of a city. I don’t like it as much as Budapest but it’s still pretty amazing. And being able to see all the old architecture was thrilling considering I’ve never seen so many old buildings (and know that some of it has been used in movies). And we just wondered around the city and saw some historical points. Like the Prague castle, saw some changing of the guards there and the astronomical clock they have in Prague. And they also have this building called the "dancing house" because of the way the architecture has been formed.
Wednesday June 5th
This was an interesting day. We waited in the Prague train station for about 3 ½/4 hours. Because of the floods that were happening in Germany at the time, they were delaying the train arrivals all over Europe. Especially the ones coming from Germany and along the Danube River. But anyways, we were waiting there and if there wasn’t construction being done on one of the platforms, we would have been sooooo bored out of our minds, not even funny. But eventually we got onto the train and we didn’t know how the train system worked so we got off at this Shit-Hole in the Wall border train station between Czech Republic and Slovakia were we had to wait again another 220 minutes *sighs* So eventually we got into Budapest around 2:30am Thursday morning…and then we had to wait for the night bus to pick us up at 3:05am or something AND THEN we had to walk about 15 minutes form the bus stop to my apartment. So we didn’t really go to bed until 4am or so haha
Thursday June 6th
Today was just a relaxing day, especially after yesterday’s adventure. So we only did close by, minimal stuff. Like going to St. Stephen’s Basilica and I took my family to the 360® that was at the very top where you can pretty much all of the Pest side and some of the Buda side. But it really is an impressive sight and my brother got some pretty awesome photos :D But we didn’t go inside; we decided to go Sunday when the entrance fee was free :D And then that night we went to an organ concert at the Basilica. Woo! That was super cool. Also, I was able to see how bad the floods affected Budapest and holy cow, was the river high!
Friday June 7th
Well I was going to have my parents and brother do a Parliament but they were all sold out of all tickets so we went to the Grand Market Hall and I then just showed them around Budapest itself so they could see where I had been living for the past few months. So we had some entertaining adventures people watching and my gawd, I forgot how amusing my brother could be in his sarcastic comments. Though it really wasn’t that hard with all the various tourists around.
Saturday June 8th
So since the Parliament tour from yesterday was full, the parents and brother did it yesterday. And what did I do, you may ask? I just wondered around along the Danube River and people watched. That was about it. And we also just wondered around the city…again. I’m kind of guessing that my family was a little bored about seeing the same things but I tried to take different routes to and from my apartment so they could see various ‘old’ stuff. Hah!
Sunday June 9th
So…since Sunday is “enter church” free day, too the family to the church in a cave and then we went to the top where the Citadel was located. It was certainly entertaining to people watch. And then after that, we wondered on to the Buda Castle and I took them all around. And then took them to see Matthias Church and the Fisherman’s Bastion. It was a long day and was quite exhausting at that. But we got through it…again haha And I knew it was almost time for me to come home too. Which I was excited for.
Monday June 10th
So in the afternoon of today, after just hanging out and wandering around, took my parents and my brother to the Opera House for a tour. And I just hung outside, people watching. It was quite entertaining to say the least. And we just wondered around after that, waiting until dinner time.
Tuesday June 11th
So I wanted to go to Hero’s Square or Hősök tere and show the family what it was all about. And then we also went to Vajdahunyad Castle which is where I would walk to a lot and take a bunch of photos.
Wednesday June 12th
Just wondered around, took it easy and went back to the Grand Market Hall to get the rest of the souvenirs that the family and I wanted to get before heading back home on Friday. And that was about it really. My brother wasn’t feeling too good so we just made some food for dinner so he could sleep the rest of the afternoon and the night. Also did a little bit of cleaning since my property manager was coming the next day to ‘check me out’ of my apartment.
Thursday June 13th
Was a fun day because we were cleaning the apartment and getting it already talk to my property manager. And then after that, we just wondered around until we had to go to sleep since we had to wake up early for my flight in the early morning. And like pretty much all the other days that was about it. Hah!
Friday June 14th
OMG, flying home and at 6:30am no less!! But that’s ok because I got to Frankfurt, Germany just fine. And I had a long layover so I was able to get breakfast AND coffee! And it was interesting sitting around and waiting because there were so many people who were speaking English o.o And then I had a very interesting 8/9 hour flight across the Atlantic Ocean to Boston…and the three guys I was sitting with were actually pretty nice. The two on my left were interesting (well especially the one I was sitting directly next too) but apparently they knew the same co-workers because if I remember right they both worked for IBM…but in different departments. Aha so it was interesting listening in on their conversations :D And then the guy next to me on the right was nice but we didn’t really talk that much…which is ok because it was such a long flight. Then finally got into Boston and I was talking to a couple guys because they mentioned being gone for 2 weeks and I said “How about trying 9 ½ months” and they kind of gave me this stunned look. Yeah that’s right. NINE AND A HALF MONTHS. Take it. Lol anywho, departed the plane and then I had to wait for lovely passport control which was actually a whole lot easier than when I went through San Francisco airport coming back from Thailand. Was so much easier! Then I got to the baggage claim and the two guys I was talking to before we departed the plane were waiting in the same spot too. So we started talking about what I was doing in Hungary and what they were doing in Germany. Finally got my bags so I moved on to my next step of the journey because I had to check in for my national flights (Huston then Sacramento >.<) and then find something to eat because I doubted I would have time when I landed in Huston to get something to eat before flying to Sacramento. Anyways, when I walked in to where I had to check in for my national flight first two things I saw? USA flag (welcome home!) and a Dunkin’ Donuts. Haha Oh the hilarity of it all. But everything worked out fine, got through security, got some food (Panda Express fo’!) and then find which gate I needed to wait at. Annnnd then finally got on the flight from Boston to Huston and was sitting next to two guys; a father and a son. And the father was very interesting to talk to because he was in the Air Force before and we were talking about a whole variety of topics. From European history to aerodynamics to airplanes themselves. It was actually pretty cool. And then landed in Huston, I made my way through to the next gate where I waited for my flight to Sacramento where I sat next to a lady that just came back from Mexico (I think) and was heading home with her daughter’s family who was from South America (can’t remember which country) and they were staying for a bit. And eventually arrived in Sacramento, went to baggage claim, got my small carry-on bag (had to check it in, was free and easier that way). But no big bag! :( so waited for the parents to finally arrive where I then grabbed all their luggage, then went to the baggage ‘complaint’y place where you say you lost your luggage or what not and told them I didn’t get mine. Ends up it was taking a mini-vacation in Huston so I asked for it to be shipped home (got it on Sunday!).
Saturday June 15th
Well…that concludes my 9 ½ months in Europe, Hungary and any other places on that continent. I AM happy to be home…mainly because I missed what I knew-being able to understand people because the language barrier usually left me uncomfortable >.< But…yeah. I’m home, I’m happy and I survived. I will remember everything that I experienced, the memories and moments I have had and everything else that was included in the 9 ½ months of being away from the USA and my family/friends :) Oh and the other great part about today…my birthday! And when I got home, my best friend was house sitting while we were away and she made me a birthday cake! It was a wonderfully awesome surprise and I totally enjoyed it! And that concludes, my very long, lovely blog :)
But anyways, no I don't know what I want to do after I graduate, don't know what job I want or anything like that. I just want to get this semester done, get some sort of job and an apartment so I can relax for a little bit, sit down and figure out what exactly would interest me for a few years (or more).
And on that note, let me finally post my lovely blog. haha So you can actually read it. But I'll still continue blogging...just not of Europe...obviously :D
Soooo without further ado!
BLOG! :DD
Monday May 27th
Today is my besties birthday! YAY! :DD anyways, I got up kind of early (7am but then snoozed until 8am) then ate some breakfast, finished writing in my journal (yay!) and then took a shower. Then I went and bought public transportation tickets so I could have one for when I ride the metro and bus to the airport today and for when we ride the metro to the train station tomorrow. You can get a booklet of 10 so I got two of those…can always buy more. It was just easier to buy that and was about the same cost as buying a two week pass. If we were here consistently for two weeks, would work but since we’re leaving for about two weeks…not going to work. ANYWAYS, now I go eat my lunch and get ready to go pick my parents and brother up from the airport. YAY!
Tuesday May 28th
Beginnging of the trip of family vacation outside of Europe with the family! Woohoo! Took the train to Vienna (Wein), Austria. It was a three hour ride to get there and then when we finally arrived, we weren’t sure how to get to the apartment house (instead of hotel) that we were staying in from the train station. But eventually, the people at the train station information counter (who spoke English!) helped us on our way. It was an adventure riding the bus to where we needed to get to because it was easier riding the bus all the way to the end of its line then having to pay for public transportation tickets (had to validate Vienna Card at the Tourist information building). But we finally got to the city center and got to the Tourist info place, got our cards and made our way to the apartment building…we also got city maps. Woo! Once I have a map, I can get around pretty much any city that way. As long as the streets are all labeled. Haha! Any who, we had lunch and then we went to the apartment building-because we were all hungry. And man! The apartment building was NICE! Loved it :D sooo what did we do next? Went out to St. Stephen’s Catherdal, Hapsburg building, St Peter’s Church, Parliament building and in the process stumbled upon a celebration of the Vienna soccer (football) team winning. So it was a fun day!
Wednesday May 29th
Welp! Another fun day. We had breakfast at this one little café/restaurant for breakfast where the owner/waitress/cook spoke a little bit of English BUT! The food was delicious. And after that! We went to the Imperial Palace/Schönbrunn Palace which has HUGE grounds. OMG, no wonder this place is so popular for crap load of tourists to come to. But any ways, it was a fun time taking the tour through the palace and learning about the history. But it’s a good thing they had it all laid out because otherwise would have gotten lost. The Palace was fucking HUGE! Seriously! It had like over 20 rooms. But considering that’s where the royalty lived, no surprise. But STILL! >.< Any ways, we had some lovely lunch where our waiter was from Budapest, Hungary and studying in Vienna. Was entertaining talking to him haha After that, we wondered around the grounds before heading over to the STRUDELSHOW! OMG! It was so fun to watch! And the lady that was demonstrating on how to make the strudels (we had a sample, yummies!!) asked how they moved the dough from this turn table to the main counter top and my mom answered…soooooo she got to help! Haha That was entertaining. Then next we wondered some more around the grounds and headed towards the zoo which was pretty awesome as well. And they had baby animals there too! Like a baby reindeer and wolves! So adorable!!
Thursday May 30th
So! Next day! We found out it was an Austrian holiday…like USA Thanksgiving. So majority of the places were closed. Oh and the even best part? IT WAS RAINING! Yeah that was an amusement to say the least…any who we went to Belvedere Palace, smaller than the first one but just as impressive. It was fun! We also had lunch at Belvedere and decided to head back to Vienna city center and figured out what we wanted to do next. I wanted to take pictures of the Opera house so we took the metro there and tried to stay dry. Ahaha We then hung out for a bit at Starbucks, had a drink and then wondered through a couple souvenir shops. Was trying to find a decently priced keychain but that didn’t really happen. BUT! Did find an awesome keychain though :D we then headed back to the apartment to catch up on some rest and found a pizza joint to have dinner at. Was hanging out with the family in a relaxing moment because for those few minutes, didn’t feel like we were going and going and going and going…we were relaxed and just enjoying ourselves. And it was nice being able to hang out with my brother too considering I hadn’t seen him since Christmas 2011.
Friday May 31st
SO! To Zurich we went! It was a very interesting train ride and LONG! Didn’t realize that Zurich, Switzerland was so far from Vienna, Austria. But before we got on the train we wondered around a little bit in Vienna before heading to the train station. And my brother had to buy new shoes because his old pair was falling apart…like the bottom sole piece was coming off and side pieces near the toe of the show were pealing so the water could get inside. After that we bought some sandwiches for our lunch/dinner and headed to the train station where we ate our lunch and waited for our train. We got onto the train and left around 1:15pm. We got into Zurich around 10pm and then we had to figure out HOW to get from the train station to our hotel. And it was a good thing I have a friend that lives in Zurich so she helped us get from the train station to our hotel. She told us which suburban train to take and then which bus to take to get to our hotel. Then we asked how exactly how we got from our hotel to the meet up point for our mountain tour the next day.
Saturday June 1st
WOOO! MOUNT TITLIS! OMG this mountain tour was AMAZING! 10,000 feet in the air and took three gondolas up to the very tip, top. Which was sooo much fun. Totally enjoyed it! But back to explaining the fun gondola trips UP! The first one was a six person one. That was a fun one because there weren’t so many people…just six! And the couple we rode up with were super nice. The next gondola up held about 20 people or so, so it was packed. And omg, it was horrible. Don’t want to be mean or anything but found out another group besides Chinese/Japanese tourists that are horrible. Indians! (from India). Omg they are all about “Me, Me, ME!” Horrible *head desk* Especially in the last gondola…the 360® gondola because the center moves and you’re not supposed to hold on to the ‘railing’ that is on the outer inside. And the person driving even says “DO NOT HOLD ON” because it FUCKING ROTATES!! But the Indians that were next to my brother couldn’t get that through their head and kept pulling into us and we kept saying “LET GO!! STOP HOLDING ON!! LET GOOOOOOOO!!” OMG it was sooo frustrating. But we finally got up to the top and then were bombarded by so many Indians that didn’t give a shit about others (ALL OVER THE PLACE) and Chinese/Japanese. Ugh, but we went outside in the snow and enjoyed ourselves. It was raining down below so it was snowing pretty good and we could only go to certain areas. But that’s ok because we still enjoyed ourselves. And that was about all that we did for today.
Sunday June 2nd
Woo! Toured old town Zurich :D It was a fun adventure annnnnnd! IT WASN’T RAINING!! But it was fun walking around the city and getting to see the sights and listening to everyone (and different languages) talking. We eventually figured out where we wanted to get fondue (Hotel Adler) to try from and HOMG it was soooo delicious! And that was pretty much all that we did today :)
Monday June 3rd
Well! Met up with my friend who lives in Zurich and she’s so sweet and nice! Hope we can meet again because we had just the greatest time chatting! And then we got on a plane to Prague…because it was cheaper and quicker to get to Prague from Zurich. And once we got there, we had to take back streets because they just ‘finished’ with a flood from the day before. The floods starting in Germany were streaming down the Danube River all the way to Budapest (which I’ll discuss later). Anyways, we got to the hotel that owned an apartment building that we were staying in and checked in and told how to get to our apartment which was only a few feet away. But the place we were staying in was super nice and it was super quite even if we did butt up against a main street with a bridge just down the way. But that’s ok, it was a cool view.
Tuesday June 4th
Well today was the day of touring around Prague. And man, what a city! It was so interesting to be walking around everywhere because it’s just that amazing of a city. I don’t like it as much as Budapest but it’s still pretty amazing. And being able to see all the old architecture was thrilling considering I’ve never seen so many old buildings (and know that some of it has been used in movies). And we just wondered around the city and saw some historical points. Like the Prague castle, saw some changing of the guards there and the astronomical clock they have in Prague. And they also have this building called the "dancing house" because of the way the architecture has been formed.
Wednesday June 5th
This was an interesting day. We waited in the Prague train station for about 3 ½/4 hours. Because of the floods that were happening in Germany at the time, they were delaying the train arrivals all over Europe. Especially the ones coming from Germany and along the Danube River. But anyways, we were waiting there and if there wasn’t construction being done on one of the platforms, we would have been sooooo bored out of our minds, not even funny. But eventually we got onto the train and we didn’t know how the train system worked so we got off at this Shit-Hole in the Wall border train station between Czech Republic and Slovakia were we had to wait again another 220 minutes *sighs* So eventually we got into Budapest around 2:30am Thursday morning…and then we had to wait for the night bus to pick us up at 3:05am or something AND THEN we had to walk about 15 minutes form the bus stop to my apartment. So we didn’t really go to bed until 4am or so haha
Thursday June 6th
Today was just a relaxing day, especially after yesterday’s adventure. So we only did close by, minimal stuff. Like going to St. Stephen’s Basilica and I took my family to the 360® that was at the very top where you can pretty much all of the Pest side and some of the Buda side. But it really is an impressive sight and my brother got some pretty awesome photos :D But we didn’t go inside; we decided to go Sunday when the entrance fee was free :D And then that night we went to an organ concert at the Basilica. Woo! That was super cool. Also, I was able to see how bad the floods affected Budapest and holy cow, was the river high!
Friday June 7th
Well I was going to have my parents and brother do a Parliament but they were all sold out of all tickets so we went to the Grand Market Hall and I then just showed them around Budapest itself so they could see where I had been living for the past few months. So we had some entertaining adventures people watching and my gawd, I forgot how amusing my brother could be in his sarcastic comments. Though it really wasn’t that hard with all the various tourists around.
Saturday June 8th
So since the Parliament tour from yesterday was full, the parents and brother did it yesterday. And what did I do, you may ask? I just wondered around along the Danube River and people watched. That was about it. And we also just wondered around the city…again. I’m kind of guessing that my family was a little bored about seeing the same things but I tried to take different routes to and from my apartment so they could see various ‘old’ stuff. Hah!
Sunday June 9th
So…since Sunday is “enter church” free day, too the family to the church in a cave and then we went to the top where the Citadel was located. It was certainly entertaining to people watch. And then after that, we wondered on to the Buda Castle and I took them all around. And then took them to see Matthias Church and the Fisherman’s Bastion. It was a long day and was quite exhausting at that. But we got through it…again haha And I knew it was almost time for me to come home too. Which I was excited for.
Monday June 10th
So in the afternoon of today, after just hanging out and wandering around, took my parents and my brother to the Opera House for a tour. And I just hung outside, people watching. It was quite entertaining to say the least. And we just wondered around after that, waiting until dinner time.
Tuesday June 11th
So I wanted to go to Hero’s Square or Hősök tere and show the family what it was all about. And then we also went to Vajdahunyad Castle which is where I would walk to a lot and take a bunch of photos.
Wednesday June 12th
Just wondered around, took it easy and went back to the Grand Market Hall to get the rest of the souvenirs that the family and I wanted to get before heading back home on Friday. And that was about it really. My brother wasn’t feeling too good so we just made some food for dinner so he could sleep the rest of the afternoon and the night. Also did a little bit of cleaning since my property manager was coming the next day to ‘check me out’ of my apartment.
Thursday June 13th
Was a fun day because we were cleaning the apartment and getting it already talk to my property manager. And then after that, we just wondered around until we had to go to sleep since we had to wake up early for my flight in the early morning. And like pretty much all the other days that was about it. Hah!
Friday June 14th
OMG, flying home and at 6:30am no less!! But that’s ok because I got to Frankfurt, Germany just fine. And I had a long layover so I was able to get breakfast AND coffee! And it was interesting sitting around and waiting because there were so many people who were speaking English o.o And then I had a very interesting 8/9 hour flight across the Atlantic Ocean to Boston…and the three guys I was sitting with were actually pretty nice. The two on my left were interesting (well especially the one I was sitting directly next too) but apparently they knew the same co-workers because if I remember right they both worked for IBM…but in different departments. Aha so it was interesting listening in on their conversations :D And then the guy next to me on the right was nice but we didn’t really talk that much…which is ok because it was such a long flight. Then finally got into Boston and I was talking to a couple guys because they mentioned being gone for 2 weeks and I said “How about trying 9 ½ months” and they kind of gave me this stunned look. Yeah that’s right. NINE AND A HALF MONTHS. Take it. Lol anywho, departed the plane and then I had to wait for lovely passport control which was actually a whole lot easier than when I went through San Francisco airport coming back from Thailand. Was so much easier! Then I got to the baggage claim and the two guys I was talking to before we departed the plane were waiting in the same spot too. So we started talking about what I was doing in Hungary and what they were doing in Germany. Finally got my bags so I moved on to my next step of the journey because I had to check in for my national flights (Huston then Sacramento >.<) and then find something to eat because I doubted I would have time when I landed in Huston to get something to eat before flying to Sacramento. Anyways, when I walked in to where I had to check in for my national flight first two things I saw? USA flag (welcome home!) and a Dunkin’ Donuts. Haha Oh the hilarity of it all. But everything worked out fine, got through security, got some food (Panda Express fo’!) and then find which gate I needed to wait at. Annnnd then finally got on the flight from Boston to Huston and was sitting next to two guys; a father and a son. And the father was very interesting to talk to because he was in the Air Force before and we were talking about a whole variety of topics. From European history to aerodynamics to airplanes themselves. It was actually pretty cool. And then landed in Huston, I made my way through to the next gate where I waited for my flight to Sacramento where I sat next to a lady that just came back from Mexico (I think) and was heading home with her daughter’s family who was from South America (can’t remember which country) and they were staying for a bit. And eventually arrived in Sacramento, went to baggage claim, got my small carry-on bag (had to check it in, was free and easier that way). But no big bag! :( so waited for the parents to finally arrive where I then grabbed all their luggage, then went to the baggage ‘complaint’y place where you say you lost your luggage or what not and told them I didn’t get mine. Ends up it was taking a mini-vacation in Huston so I asked for it to be shipped home (got it on Sunday!).
Saturday June 15th
Well…that concludes my 9 ½ months in Europe, Hungary and any other places on that continent. I AM happy to be home…mainly because I missed what I knew-being able to understand people because the language barrier usually left me uncomfortable >.< But…yeah. I’m home, I’m happy and I survived. I will remember everything that I experienced, the memories and moments I have had and everything else that was included in the 9 ½ months of being away from the USA and my family/friends :) Oh and the other great part about today…my birthday! And when I got home, my best friend was house sitting while we were away and she made me a birthday cake! It was a wonderfully awesome surprise and I totally enjoyed it! And that concludes, my very long, lovely blog :)