Brothers?

Dad and I ended up sitting next to a table with two Spanish guys at breakfast this morning. While we were waiting for our food to come I was sitting there trying to devote at least some of my attention to my conversation with Dad, but I was also trying to eavsdrop on the Spaniards to my left. At first they were talking about the normal sorts of things, like how much this trip cost them, how it's worth it anyway, etc. But then I heard just the tail end of them talking about me and Dad. The part I heard went something like this:

1: Do you think those two are gay?
2: You mean like a couple?
1: Yeah, do you think they are a couple, or are they just father and son or something?
2: Oh, they're probably just father and son.

That's when I decided to surprise them and so I told them in Spanish that we are indeed just father and son. They got this sort of shocked/embarassed look on their face as they realized that I had heard what they thought was their secret conversation. I think it's actually the first time I've ever been able to catch someone talking about me in another language like that. It was pretty satisfying.

Anyway, after they took a minute to get over their embarassment we had a nice little conversation about being in Budapest and whatnot. I'm pretty sure that they were a couple themselves, so maybe they were just looking for some more gay companionship or something, but I enjoyed just getting to speak some spanish to them. Dad thinks that they were confused because I "look mature beyond my years and because he looks gay beyond his years." Could be... hahaha.

That wasn't the first time that someone failed to immediately come to the conclusion that Dad and I are just father and son. When we got to the hostel here in Budapest, the girl that checked us in thought that we were brothers and acted all surprised and shocked to learn that we were father and son. At first I thought she was just trying to flirt with Dad or something because I don't think we look anywhere near the same age so as to be brothers. Maybe in Hungary people have really old/young siblings or something. Who knows...

Budapest is definitely a 'grittier' city than Munich and seems to have a certain 'Former Soviet State' sort of feel to it (whatever that feels like...). I think I like it though. I can't say if I like it more or less than Munich though beause really they are just different. Munich is prettier, but Dad and I have decided that the Budapest girls are prettier. Munich has more fancy cars, but Budapest has more funky old cars that I've never seen before. Munich is flatter and has more bicycles, but Budapest is hillier and might have cooler architecture. Plus, Hungarian is a crazy language which means Budapest gets some extra bonus points.

The highlight of today was probably going to one of Budapest's many thermal pools. The one we went to was in a parque just a few metro stops out of the city center. It is kind of like a fancier, classier version of the Glenwood Springs pool if you know what that's like. There was also sort of a circular lazy river thing that you could swim in and it was kind of like bumper-bodies. It was pretty fun. Anyway, tomorrow is our last day here and then we will be taking a night sleeper train to Prague. The Spaniards said that two days is enough to see Prague, but what do they know?

The Land of Good Pizza

Last night Dad and I went to an Italian restaurant for dinner. The place was hoppin' and so we got seated in a booth with a large German man who was trying unsuccesfully to get a table for one. He quickly realized that we didn't speak German, but he didn't hesitate to try conversing with us in his slightly limited English. When the waiter came to take our order I ended up ordering a pizza for some reason. When the pizza came, the portly German man said to us, "you come from the land of good pizza, and yet you order pizza in Germany." We proceeded to explain to him that pizza isn't good in all parts of the country, but anyway I just thought it was a funny comment. So from now on the United States of America shall be known as The Land of Good Pizza.

We'll be getting on a train to Budapest in a few hours.

München

I've been in Munich (München) for about two davs now and I keep typing z's when I want to type y's because the keyboard is a little different, but that aside my time in Munich has been very pleasant. Munich is a pleasant city with charming narrow winding streets, attractive architecture, and plenty of big green trees. On the first day here we went to a huge museum featuring all sorts of technology including lots of old and different kinds of engines, planes, mining equipment, computers, lasers, and the list goes on and on. Someone told us that if you were to spend 1 minute at each display, you could be there for 33 days (and I believe it). I started feeling jetlagged pretty early in the day, but I soldiered on and we decided to go to another museum which was pretty strange and quirky (but not really in the interesting way). The whole time I kept thinking that it was the sort of museum my uncle Dwight would probably enjoy; I don't know why. Lots of people ride bikes here and Dad and I took a bicycle tour today through part of town into a huge park with a beer garden in the middle. Beer doesn't grow from trees in a beer garden, but it is served in humungous mugs. I have yet to buy a really big mug of beer, but I have certainly had plenty of beer today. When we aren't seeing the sites, we've been riding around town semi-aimlessly on the plethora of trams, buses, and subways, or sitting at outdoor cafe's drinking beer and eating sausage. I am still having a hard time with the whole not being able to speak German thing since I am more accustomed to being able to speak the language when I go places, but despite that we've been able to get around fine and stuff (although we've certainlz had our fair share of confusions). We will be taking a sleeper train to Budapest tomorrow night. I'm sure Budapest will be cool, but I could almost imagine myself living here in Munich someday if I had to; it's that cool.

Singin' In The Rain

Maybe it is too cliché to say this, but I love the rain. I love the smell. I love how it makes everything look shiny and clean. I even love how it feels to hydroplane through it on the road. It is raining right now and I think the sound of the rain on the roof of the house is probably one of the best sounds to go to sleep to. Someday in another life when I am wealthy and can build my own house I think I will build some sort of rain machine that will shower water onto my roof whenever I want for an on-demand rainy sound. But then maybe I would become too desensitized to it if I could just turn it on and off whenever I wanted to. Or maybe instead of building an artificial rain device, I could just move to Seattle (since I want to anyway). Allegedly they get lots of rain there (It has always been beautiful and sunny when I've been there). I wonder how much is "a lot" and how long would it take for me to get tired and annoyed by it. Being from Colorado I bet that my idea of "a lot of rain" isn't even CLOSE to "a lot" of Seattle rain. In Colorado it doesn't usually rain for more than a few hours straight, and then it often clears up and the sun comes out and makes everything nice again and so rain is sort of refreshing and cleansing, but I bet that in Seattle it can get to feeling kind of stifling. I guess I wouldn't know unless I lived there...

Anyway, in other news, the bus driving gig is nearing its end (sort of) and I'll be going to Europe for a month in just a few weeks (is it that soon already?!). As for summer plans, the only two suggestions I got on the previous post could be combined into one road trip to the East Coast; bring my uncle Dwight his stuff from his college days, and help my Aunt and her hubby with remodeling their house. Lately I've also been thinking that maybe I would like to try to go to Rio de Janeiro to study Portuguese for a month or two, but that is probably the most expensive thing I could do this summer. I have also been told that I can get as much work as I want driving the bus, which pays pretty well. I should probably also try to take the GRE this summer. Then, I am going to try to get a job in Antarctica for next season. So maybe I'll drive the bus to rack up enough money for a trip to Rio, go to the East Coast for a couple weeks, go to Rio, and then hopefully go to Antarctica... Yeah, that kind of sounds like a plan.

Today's video is a kind of F-ed up Antarctica-related video by Of Montreal called "Wraith Pinned to the Mist."