the idiot's guide to how not to sleep. ever.

Yep, NYC is the perfect place not to sleep. I don't even know why I wasted money on a hotel room. Alright, I did get some sleep, like 5 hrs but believe me it's not even close to what I'd need after 32 hrs of exciting awakeness. :)

And just when I wanted to upload the next batch of pictures my camera's battery went dead. So I'll just have to make up for this later.

Anyway, yesterday was really busy. Once I landed and settled in my hotel room, I realized I haven't eaten for quite a time. So I thought it would be the best reason to explore some parts of the city. The first obstacle to be tackled was to find a subway station. I picked one out on Google maps but when I got there it turned out it was closed down. I learned later that it's pretty common in NYC that public transportation doesn't operate the way the books and websites have it. It constantly changes so it teaches visitors a lot of flexibility. When I was pacing around to find another station a guy asked me for directions to ... the nearest subway station. :) We then joined forces and asked another guy who was a local Jamaican guy (as this part of town is called Jamaica) and could give us some hints. We had to walk through like 10 blocks. It turned out that this guy asking for directions actually lived in NYC just in the Bronx part. Once we found a station he was very helpful and told me how to get to where I wanted. I never imaged that people would be this helpful. Definitely not Budapest.

I was asked to bring some stuff to an ex-colleague so we agreed to meet around 10pm. I told her to just give me the place and I'll figure out how to get there. I ended up getting to know the Friday night Manhattan even though it wasn't my plan. First I couldn't even find the subway station she gave me and I thought there was a typo in her message. So I got off at a station similar to what she said and tried to walk to the junction we agreed. I walked halfway through Manhattan by the time I realized I wasn't even in the right neighbourhood and saw most of 5th ave, the UN HQ ad lots of interesting stuff, it's just that I planned to do that the next day. Finally I got to W8th street and 6th ave. I gave her the stuff and we went on to a party one of her friend was hosting. Apparently we got there too early as the guy was in some T-shirt he seemed to quickly put on when answering the doorbell. So until he got ready he introduced us to his neighbours (!) who were having another party on their balcony. We had a really good time there since the guys were already high on some beer and it was fun watching them doing pranks on each other. Later another friend of my ex-colleague joined us who was from Brussels and have been working in NYC for about a year. We then went to a place called Niagara Bar a couple of blocks away and had the best of times despite the worst choice of music I even heard. A real DJ never plays ABBA's Dancing Queen before 5am. Ever. And they don't just play songs simply one after the other. They mix them. Well, we had enough of it and then went on to explore a place in Brooklyn, which was a true gem. It was a little bar where this girl's friend was bartending (so much for spending more on drinks...) and they were playing reggae when we got there. Then they turned to trip-hop. I'll just have to get my hands on those records. As usual, I got "home" early. Early in the morning that is. :) I'll now have to work on not screwing up my timezone adjusting.

Today I tried to visit as much of Manhattan as I can. It's a pity that I couldn't fit in any other part of the city. So I guess I'll just have to come back sometime. Maybe I'll come back a couple of days before my flight for Budapest would leave in next May.

As I said, pictures will follow once I get new batteries to my camera.

knots landing

Finally, I'm here in good old NYC. Checked into the hotel and pulled myself together after an 9.5 hr flight.

But how did it start?



Got to Ferihegy 2B around 8.15am Budapest time, checked in, waited for some 3 hrs to board.



Once on board the plane, it turned out that "due to the crowd in Austrian and German airspace" our flight did not get the clearence to take off for half an hour. Luckily, our German speaking friends decided that the crowd sat down enough for us to finally take off. I had no idea that it would take about 20 minutes to get over Vienna from Budapest. And that wasn't even a Concord I flew onboard. Talk about small countries... :)

Anyway, my seat was next to a guy from Austin, TX and it took me about 4-5 hours to get to know this information. Neither of us was too talkative. :) But when we both realized that Texas is one thing we have in common I got to learn some interesting things. He is a cinematographer so he is shooting movies and is responsible for the visuals, if I understood it correctly. Anyway, we shared some silent laughs on people strolling through the aisle for hundreds of times appreantly because they could not take sitting still for over 3 hrs. I tried to watch the in-flight movie and these people kept pacing aroung at least one of them constantly blocking the picture. Good thing I've seen the movie already.

So, after a 9 hr long flight we landed on JFK and even made up for half our initial delay. Then came the check at the border which went even more smoothly than I expected. Once having finished with all these things I boarded the AirTrain running from JFK terminals to Jamaica in Queens.



This was how a part of the city looked like from the AirTrain.



Once having got off from the AirTrain at Jamaica Station in Queens I went to find the hotel where I had a room booked. It was about a ten minute walk from the station, but at first I walked in the wrong direction on Jamaica Ave. Luckily, I soon realized that this would not help as worse and worse buildings started to pop up on the sides of the street. So I turned around and tried to avoid looking anyone in the eye. People did not seem too trustworthy and if I appeared as if I had no idea where I'm going I might have not been as safe as I wanted to be. I guess my size also helped a bit. I've seen some guys measuring me and then they seemed to decide it's not worth messing with me. :)

So, I got to my hotel. Pretty decent for its price.



I even have flat-screen TV. Cool!!! :D



But I don't think I would watch it too long. There's a whole city just outside my window.



OK, it's not exactly the Empire State building or Brooklyn Bridge. But all I need to see those is my newly purchased MetroCard.

I guess others can do it a lot better.

and still not from across the big pond

Getting together stuff for a whole year can be exhausting. Especially when you decide to take the least of things with you, since military intelligence has it that they have shops and supermarkets in the US as well. So I decided to use up only one bag for checking in and another as carry-on. I wonder if it is physically possible to press everything into this mid-size piece of luggage.

Yesterday I had to run some errands in Budapest, and finally I had my (probably fifth) farewell lunch with colleagues. Also, I had a bon voyage dinner with a friend which obviously turned into an drinkfest after a certain point. And they say the Germans can drink beer! :)

So that's all the farewell-bon-voyage-see-you-next-year-why-don't-you-finally-get-the-hell-out-of-here events I plan to have for the next one (!) day. And then come the welcoming parties. The movie previews guy would probably say something like:

"There was a time when one man chose to travel to distant shores. He had several friends. But even he could not forsee the dangers of ... farewells... let alone welcomes. This summer witness an epic fight against constant hangover simply caused by inadequate party planning. This summer become an insider to why Hungarians always want to share a drink with you and how they always find a good reason for it. Are you ready to meet the challenge? Are you ready to raise your blood alcohol to a highly dangerous level? Are you out of your mind? Farewells and Goodbyes. In theaters near you."

Still before leaving...

And here I thought I was set with everything before I leave. I couldn't be more wrong. Not only do I have to drop my former Budapest address because of the request of my former landlord and apply for an international drivers license but my sister just came up with the idea of rearranging furniture in her room for which heavy lifting is obviously needed. Well, I haven't had too much time to work-out nowadays, so I'll have to settle with this instead.

Intro

Well, I finally decided between sending countless e-mails to my friends and colleagues about this upcoming year and wrapping the whole thing up in a blog. My apologies to those who would rather read these threads in Hungarian but I would also want my non-Hungarian speaking friends to be able to follow these events.

So, I guess I might as well get started. For those of you who have not been informed about this in one way or another: I was lucky enough to win a scholarship to the United States so that I can earn a Master of Laws (LL.M.) title in US law. I will depart on July 11, 2008 first to New York for a few days (the flight will be awfully long: 9.5 hrs) then move on to Davis in California (between Sacramento and San Francisco) for a month-long preparatory course. Finally, around August 9 I plan to reach my original destination: Houston in Texas where I will be enrolled in the Foreign Scholars LL.M. program.

So much for the background, and now some (hopefully) more interesting details.

Submitting an application for a Fulbright grant (which I was lucky enough to win) generally seems to scare people away from applying. Although putting together the huge pile of papers does require some fancy footwork, it is not the defining character of the whole process. The most fun part is when you write the two essays: one about your research study objectives, which is rather a one-page reasoning why you really should get the funding, and another essay what is called "personal statement". The latter is more of a description of your achievements so far beginning with a personal background describing your motivations, dreams and then how far you were successful in realizing those dreams. It really helps to bear in mind the concept of the "American Dream", because that is probably what the decision making committee looks for in the course of the selection process. So if one is a hopeless romantic and has big dreams the strict limit of one page represents the biggest obstacle.

And then (for most applicants) comes the interview before a selection panel. Obviously it is in English and can sometimes be frustrating. When I had my interview I was sitting in front of the room where the panel was in session and asked everyone who came out about their experiences. A girl, who wanted to go the Harvard Law School to study international refuge law (or something like that), was asked how she wanted to pay for the remaining balance of the tuition (the grant would only cover tuition up to $15,000, while Harvard tuition is closer to $35,000 for an academic year). They asked her nothing else and apparently she couldn't come up with a creative solution on the spot and despite her charming British accent she didn't succeed. When I went in the panel looked at my application and saw that I wanted to concentrate on energy law. Their first question was if there is such a thing as energy law. That really came as a surprise to me but I pointed to the lighting above us and said that if it weren't for energy law, those lights would not work at all. Now they were surprised (probably because I was harsh enough to get their attention). By the end of my 40 minute interview (most people didn't spend more than 20 minutes inside) they asked me where they should erect their own wind-powered generators so they seemed to appreciate the possibilities in the industry. It also helped that I remembered some things from my high school physics lessons about generating electricity.

When I was notified that I won a combined grant of Fulbright and the University of Houston Foundation Sándor Turányi Fund, then started the sometimes tiresome but otherwise fun part: organizing the trip itself. When I finally chose an airline to take me to Houston and planned to purchase my ticket, Kriszta Dietz from the Hungarian Fulbright Comission sent me an e-mail asking if I wanted to go to a preacademic training in Davis, CA right before my curriculum in Houston would begin. When I read the part saying that all expenses are covered and I would not have to secure additional funding it took me about two hours to give it the go ahead. :) And in these two hours I already solved a slight scheduling conflict between my Davis program and Houston. Then I realized how good it was not to buy my ticket to Houston just yet.

Actually, I thought buying an airline ticket is easy. Here's the news: it not. I searched through a number of databases to find the cheapest carrier to my destination, Kayak quickly became my favorite search engine to that end. I selected a European airline and went to their website to book my flight. First I didn't realize that I need to lift some purchase limits on my credit card. When I solved that problem, the second one came. I thought the flight problem was solved by buying a one-way ticket from Budapest to San Francisco. But then an official from the airline called to confirm my booking. She asked if I was a US citizen (which I'm not) and suggested that I booked a round-trip ticket instead since I might face some additional "questions" from the immigration officers at the US border. We then agreed not to confirm my booking and again I thought the problem was solved and I should restart the booking process and opt for a round-trip ticket. However, my credit card was charged with the price of the one-way ticket even though I canceled it. It took two weeks (!) to sort this out with the airline and finally get a refund. Not surprisingly I then decided to do this the old fashion way and went to an office of the Hungarian Airline, booked a round-trip ticket to New York.

The next big problem was finding appropriate housing both in Davis and in Houston. Having found out that my stipend for Davis would probably not cover on-campus housing I decided to go through some local ads (i.e. their online versions) to find a sublease for the month I would be there. I have sent around 25 e-mails and got only 1 (!) reply. The guy, who sent the only reply, told me that he'd rather let his room for the whole summer so both of us should keep looking and get in touch if none of us found a better solution. Well, I returned to him about a month later asking if he found a tenant for the summer. Unfortunately he did but still was nice about telling me to keep on going:

"Unfortunately I have leased out my room for this summer so I am unable to help you, and wish you the best of luck in your quest for housing. May the force be with you! Always!"

I'd say the force is always with me. It's called gravity. :)

Then I somehow came across an organization that hosts a homestay program in California. The point is that people stay with volunteering America families so that they can get a closer look at how Americans live. I would have opted for this solution but their official said they could probably not find a family in close proximity to campus.

Fortunately, I managed to arrange for some extra funding and decided to go with the official on-campus housing so that the whole one-month stay could be as smooth as possible. I'm fairly certain that I'll still face a lot of other smaller problems, so why make more of them if can anticipate them.

As for Houston, I was lucky enough to get on-campus housing there as well, the lease agreement is signed and an informal e-mail message from the housing department confirmed its receipt. If they try to escape from it, I'll just point to the huge letters saying "this is a binding contract" and tell them it works both ways. It binds them too. The place where I'll probably have my room is called Cougar Place, I sure hope it really looks as nice as on the pictures.

Oh, and just that you all get really envy, this is also included in the tuition:


And if you haven't seen it yet: