The Hungarian bit

Now the Hungarian bit of the story.

I went to Budapest to visit a friend. He is the legendary and elusive Mate. I have him as supervision partner this year for all 3 of my supervisions. Other than making me look incredibly stupid during supervision, he is a very nice person. Very quiet, but great to talk to and very enthusiastic about Physics.

He has kindly agreed to let me stayed in his house, and also offered to pick me up from Keleti train station. However, there was a small drama before we met. I was sleeping during most the train ride. Subconsciously I knew I need to be alert and not miss my stop. So when I suddenly heard Budapest something, I just grabbed my bag and alighted. The place look surprisingly run-down. Mindless graffiti and wall posters are very not European like. Is Budapest so different from Vienna even though they are just two and half hours apart? After wandering about for a while, and not seeing a sign of him, I finally came to realize I'm at the wrong stop. It was Budapest Kelenfold. Oh what a start! Luckily I met a kind soul who spoke perfect English, and he told me the directions to Keleti by other public transport. Finally after 2 more transfers and an hour late, I arrived at Keleti to be warmly received by Mate.

I was first brought to his house. He lives in what looks like a suburb area. It is very peaceful and quiet, and very beautiful with all the snows. His mum was in to receive us. However, she doesn't speak much English, so the initial meeting was kind of awkward. Mate then showed me around the house and my room. It was not a very big place, but very cosy. His room is full of the medals and certificates he won in high school, and there are seriously loads of them. His brother and sister are living upstairs, and strangely they had a kitchen to themselves! As this is the case, I hardly saw two of them during my stay. We then had lunch prepared by her mum, and after a short rest, and went out.

Mate has to be the best tour guide in many ways. He knows the place at the tip of his fingertips. The history, the story and how in some ways he is connected to them. Throughout the 4 days, he showed vast knowledge of Budapest. Honestly, if I am supposed to do it, the only city I can possibly do a half decent job is Cambridge. I seem to have lost touch with Singapore, Shanghai, and my hometown. If there are any serious connection to begin with. Haiz this has set me to some pondering.

After a brief tour of city centre and then Margaret Island, we went back to home early. His mum was preparing a very Hungarian dinner for us. It was some sort of beef stew and was absolutely delicious. This has to be the first time I have eaten in a traditional meal in an European family. We played lots of puzzle and games after dinner. I have never seen so many of them in my life. They were intellectually challenging and interesting.

The rest of the days were pretty similar. There was touring the city with Mate's extraordinary explanations and the quiet evenings of puzzles. I have learned a huge amount about Hungarian history and random facts. It was also a very culturally enriching trip. Very grateful for Mate's family for hosting me and it was a very special trip.

Tour of Austria-Hungary Empire

Disclaimer: The union of the Austrian Empire and the Kingdom of Hungary back in the 19th century created a united land that spawned a big part of Central Europe. I have not, in this short month, travelled even a fraction of that. I just thought it is a cool name and was not meant to be misleading in any way.

I first landed in Vienna on... I think the 7th December. I can't remember the exact date, but I knew I stayed back after term ended to finish up that bloody report. Had a complicated room arrangement and then went to Zhengjie's place for a night in London. Anyway the reason for me being in Wien is that my uncle is here for a post-doc position, and I am here to see him, have a holiday and save some rent.

Vienna at first reminded me of Lyon. I think continental Europe has similar architecture. It is peaceful, and I could not understand anything just like in Lyon. Before I could begin to explore the city, I tracked the progress of "The Great, Greater and the Greatest" (ie the 3 greats) on Facebook. They happened to be travelling in the region and I met up with them for a day to tour the Schonbrunn palace. It was the first major tourist attraction I went. Other than all the fun and talking the most memorable part was the cold. It was really very cold with temperature around -10 degrees. As it was a Sunday, which has a special significance in Austria. After labouring very hard to locate the restaurant "The Great" was interested, it was closed, just like all the other shops. Luck for us, there was a Vietnamese restaurant open for business nearby. It was such a relief to be indoors. We went in and "Greater" used his Cantonese to help us order food. It was very hilarious in that moment as we were trying to find out exactly what we were getting. It was a super long lunch. When we were done with the main course, we ordered dessert, and then another round of dessert by the "The Greatest". We well achieved our purpose of defrosting and filling our stomach before we left.

Oh well that was a nice day. But for quite a number of days I followed my uncle to Technische Universitat Wien to study. My first few days were embroiled in the bitter struggle to finish the Math Computer Assignment. After that it was the math example sheet, and optics. I was quite alarmed by the amount of things I did not understand in term time. Even now I still have loads of overdue work and a significant chunk of the syllabus to revise. Anyway I became quite familiar of the place after a while. The buildings and facilities are very new, and it is located in the city centre. I got to know one or two persons. I also attended a Masters student's graduate party, and then a Christmas party of the department. It was not easy to talk to anybody as it was firstly very weird and also they speak German. Feuerzangenbowle was the main thing I remembered, as well as a very delicious beef stew.

Another noteworthy thing is the underground system. There are no gantries, so everybody just walk in and out freely. There's a ticketing system but from the look of it much self-discipline is needed. There are people conducting random check though, and I was checked on Christmas day itself. That day I went to the central cemetery Zentralfriedhof. The graves of Mozart, Beethoven, Schubert, Strauss, Brahms and most importantly Boltzmann are there. It was kind of like making a physicist's pilgrimage to visit Botzmann's resting place. It took me quite while to find but I think it was worth it. Luckily I had my tickets.

Vienna's beauty are undeniable. The city centre is full of palace, church, museum, theatre and other places that are just pleasant to look at. The city layout is awesome and everything just seem to fit with each other. The transition of modern and medieval is smooth, especially with the old fashioned tram and subway going around. It was like a old photo with most of it frozen in time and some parts slowly developing using modern technology. With the Danube flowing through it, it is perfect.

However it is such a pity that the cold spell has to arrive so early. From the first day until the end of 2010 I never saw wien without a significant amount of snow. I love snow as it makes everything look so ever pure and angelic. But the love so often are in contention with the welfare of my ears, hands and feet. So I ended up spending a significant amount of time indoors talking with my uncle and aunt. As a (extended) family tradition, the topics is always on China and the academia. It often extends to human nature. Sometimes I wonder why nobody in my family ever studied social science? We could have potentially write many thesis on contemporary Chinese culture and politics from such talks alone. It was great discussing these issues with them, as it made me more aware of how things are done in China, and its various issues.

And of course there are my two lovely cousins. I don't know many adjectives to describe them but they are just adorable. Lele is very eloquent and curious. He always takes his own time to do things though, and doesn't eat much during meal time. This, coupled with his whys can really drive me "mad". He loves Thomas and makes me watch it with him. The one achievement I have over this holiday is that I can recognize most of the tank engines in the series now, having watched none of it previously. I also read stories to him and he likes me to brush teeth together with him. LOL. Songsong is not yet one year old, and he is as chubby as my brother when he was Songsong's age. He has changed significantly during this month, now always be to stand up. There are so many things to say about kids of his age as they are always curious but can't talk.

Overall it has been a great experience coming to Vienna. Very sad to be leaving now. I shall talk about the Hungary bit next time, as this blog post is already quite long.

Lyon

Have been in this beautiful city for about a month now. The big surprise is that I have not been to many places here. A half day tour would probably bring to a person more places of interest or UNESCO sites.  Doesn’t sound like the perfect holiday plan, but that’s how it is.

It was great to be able to be around parents, especially in this far away land. They are not the terribly exciting people; my lack of activity was in large part due to them. Passively and actively they have been persuading me to put off plans to Paris. Although there was some short trips around Part-Dieu and Universite Claude Bernard Lyon 1, the rest of the city has eluded me. However the home cooked never failed to satisfy my appetite and the after dinner talk was still as good as before.

Not able to speak French is such a inconvenience. I feel really bad that I can’t respond in a proper manner to people’s greeting. There was the problem communicating with the people in the Prefecture or searching the websites. Therefore sometimes I wonder why people choose to travel to places where they can’t understand the language. They will miss so much of the culture.

For me, the main part of my life was playing with my brother. Whether or not this is a fortunate thing is debatable. He is adorable and  loves to play with me. By saying “play” I mean it strictly in a 4-year-old definition. Just hopping around or driving imaginary buses around the room. Otherwise it would be wrestling or looking at videos and photos. His boundless energy just never seems to cease. His curiosity never dies away. His playfulness irritates me no matter how calm or reasonable I want to be. As a result, 18 years of age gap cannot prevent us fighting as if we are fighting for toys.

He can surprise me with the most unexpected phrases, or how well he can respond to certain instructions or how good his memory can be at times. Most of the time he is just like a normal kid---easy to fool by small distraction. Seeing him playing in the snow and walking him along river Rhone are fun.

Talking about Rhone, it is a a beautiful river flowing past the centre of Lyon. Around it are the old districts, with buildings and churches with quite some age, although I guess nothing compared to Cambridge. Contrary to terraced house seen in UK, most people live in apartments here, which is something I don’t understand. There’s a also a nice park which in weekends will see a huge crowds with parents accompanying their children to do various activities.

It is also common to see people jogging and there are also lots of public bicycles around. I never figured out the policy behind such bicycles. And it seems time is running out for me to do it.

2 months

Finally the 2 months of vacation has come to an end. It felt very fast. Probably I've packed too many programs into this short period. Nevetheless, it's the kind of holiday I won't be able to enjoy again, as I believe I'll not have such a long break with nothing much meaningful to do any time soon. Yes I won't.

February 2001 was the last time I celebrated Chinese New Year in my grandparents' house; and I waited till this January to do it again. I saw many relatives from my mum's side as well, some of whom I could no longer recognize as they were still young when I last saw them. I managed to meet up with many primary and middle school friends for the first time in like 8 to 9 years. Although with tons of words to say, years of separation still created a barrier after all.

For the bulk of the time I stayed in Shanghai, shopping for winter clothings and other daily items too expensive here in Singapore. I tried to improve my cooking skill, without much success. Playing with my brother and ferrying him to and fro kindergarten are more fun. One month of normal life for me with family around.

Then I went to Japan. Finally get to see Lele for the first time since his birth. Cultures that the Japanese learned from China are well-preserved, despite the heavy influence from the West since Meiji Restoration. I'm stunned by the beauty of the landscape as well. Disneyland is crap, compared to the spa in natural spring water. I'm very grateful for the chance to visit there, thanks to the hospitality of my uncle.

OK, enough of recollection. Time to move on.

Amazing thailand

The half a month that I spent in Thailand was quite an eye-opener. It deserved detailed chronicling. However, as I did not bring a camera, thinking that other people would surely bring one, describing everything i saw vividly is inherently difficult with my limited vocabulary. And as I do not want to talk too much about the army, most of the stories will go into my personal diary.

Here are just some points of interest about the trip.

• When I left the house for the airport on the 10th, I was trapped in the lift at my block for about 20 minutes. It was the first time I encountered a breakdown and I was all alone. Not much drama and no rescue team as well. The lift came back to life on its own.
• I have seen a transsexual for the first time. Maybe you are wondering what was I doing all my 20 years, but seriously it was the first time. The only obvious way to distinguish them is through the pitch of their voice. There are pretty a lot of them there in Thailand.
• There was a part of a railway that runs through a small market town in Kanchanaburi, yet there was not any barrier or warning device to inform the motorists of any potential danger. Though I heard that the trains will slow down when they are reaching such junctions, the locals are taking no chance. No one ever speed past this point, even though they disregard most other traffic regulations. So the next time the traffic police in Singapore want to limit the speed of the vehicles, just build one railway through the road. Lol.
• Thailand is a beautiful country. When travelling along the roads, I have seen herds of cows grazing on the grass and birds flying about. Near the road there are the rice fields; further are the trees and houses; In the background there are mountains shrouded in clouds and mists. Actually I shouldn't have included this paragraph, as the description was no where close to the actual beauty of the landscape.
• There is no showering facility in Sai Yok Camp. Instead, there is a water tank for us to scoop water to wash our bodies. Most of the time there would be lots of insects in the water. I have dubbed them “spices”, just like in the past whereby people added flower pedals to the water when they bathed.
• When an artillery fires, the ground will shake. And you can hear the sounds of the shell as it travels in the projectile.
• Certainly Thai people are better at field deployment. When the troops arrived at their deployment sites, ninja stores were already set up to sell ice-creams, fried rice and noodles to the soldiers. And they are a daring group pf people. I have seen a small boy around the age of 10 navigating around the artillery guns and command posts to sell drinks to the Singapore soldiers.