Just as I was about to go to sleep, in stumbles a drunken Brazilian and collapses on the lockers. After a moment of me staring quizzically at him, he raises his head and says, "Do you know what I think is funny? All your clothes are white (referring to my garments hanging to dry in the room I was supposed to have to myself), and all mine are dark." After another moment, he said, slightly confused, "I don't sleep here." He did however, have all of his stuff in a locker in my room...maybe he was drunk when he checked in, too. I told him I was going to bed and he said he would leave, and came to kiss me goodbye. This concerned me for a moment, till I realized he's Brazilian, so I gave him his kiss on the cheek and he dutifully left. I hate drunks. Paul and Leo in Tallinn would have been fun drunks, if they hadn't woken everyone up so early, but their friends were jerks. My no-name drunkard Prague roommates were a pain in the butt. I hate drunks. Anyway, when I left this morning he was here, and I don't think he had gone to bed yet, and it didn't seem like he remembered meeting me.
Since arriving in Europe, I've gotten myself into this awful cycle. Even though I taught five days a week at 8 am last semester and had 8:30 church, even though I tried very hard to become a morning person for these obligations, I failed. And I failed miserably. The jet lag, however, has made it so I can't sleep past 6:45. This means that I leave the hostel early, get tuckered out early, and that just makes me get up earlier the next day. Today, I was out the door by 7. I then proceeded to walk around Budapest for 11 hours, with two one-hour breaks. Even if I only averaged 3 mph....that's a lot of miles. One of those breaks was sitting on a shady park bench beside the Fisherman' Bastion,
reading my beloved Nook, and listening to wonderful live music from the nearby cafe.The other break was spent sitting on the lawn, eating and reading by the parliament building.
What a charmed life I lead.Budapest sure does have beautiful things to see. Beautiful parks, a wee bit of hiking, birds singing all morning long, and some stunning architecture. My favorite part, though, was probably making friends with some Canadian girls. They were too scared to explore the Buda Castle Labyrinth (underground tunnels and chambers) alone, so they declared the only other person around (me) their leader, a challenge that I fearlessly accepted. It was super funny when, passing an especially dark void to the side of our path, I started to whimper and said, "Oh my gosh!" It freaked Caitlyn out so much that she squealed, and pushed me to get past it faster. Good times.
I liked Prague a lot more, but I still had a great day. I'm not sure that Budapest has enough stuff to keep me occupied for the remainder of my time here (I covered pretty much everything today. I really did walk A LOT), but maybe that's a good thing, because I really need to buckle down and plan a bit for Italy. I can' believe that chapter is so close already. Time flies!
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