August 30, 2010: First day at Ujpesti High School

August 30, 2010: At last -- my first day at Ujpesti Bilingual Technical High School! To start out my day, I woke up at 6:58, two whole minutes before the alarm would wake me up.  Good thing, too, because I learned after the alarm didn't go off at 7:00 that I had set it for 7:00 p.m. instead of 7:00 a.m. I quickly got ready and left my apartment at 8:00. I walked to Deak Ter where all the subways merge. Walking up to the ticket window I paid my 320 forint and received my ticket which I stuck into a machine and made my way down a very long escalator.

escalator leading down into subway

 It wasn't even one minute and the subway arrived to take me to Ujpesti, the very end of the line.

The car was fairly crowded. It was nice to see younger passengers stand up to give their seats to the older ones and those with small children. Through the windows I could see electronic signs and paper ones as well announcing what shows are coming to Budapest and what products to buy. I saw that Cirque de Soleil will be coming to Budapest in December. If the ticket prices are as cheap as the Mahler concert that I'm going to, I just may "break down" and buy one to see that, too.

Inside the subway car

Kati told me to go left as I got out of the underground area. (Of course she never told me left with respect to anything). Fortunately, the "left" I went happened to be the right left. I asked a gentleman how to get to Szakorvosi rendelo and I had been heading in that direction. Since I was significantly early for arriving at school, I decided to walk the four blocks instead of taking the tram. As I walked down the street I passed a decidedly poorer area of Budapest (at least compared to where I now live) but there were some beautiful buildings.

Building in Ujpesti on way to school

 I continued to walk a bit and eventually came to my school.

Ujpesti kettannyelvu muszaki szakkozepiskola es gymnasium

Ujpesti kettannyelvu muszaki szakkozepiskola es gymnasium

 I walked through the gate and into the entry way.

entry way to Ujpesti High School

The doorlady apparently knew of my arrival and led me to the Headmaster's Office to meet the assistant headmaster who was also a mathematics teacher. 

Headmaster's sitting area

Not one to waste time in expressing my hopes, I told her of my long experience in having taught mathematics which I learned is taught in the English language at Ujpesti. (I don't think she was impressed.) Shortly I met another assistant headmaster who teaches Hungarian language and English. He was very surprised when I told him that I had heard I can buy tickets to concerts, etc. through him since he has a nephew who is in the arts. Shortly an English teacher arrived and introduced herself to me as Kati (not the Kati who's the head of the department). And this is when I made my first little blunder. She said her name was "Bede Kati" which is pronounced "Beddeh Kawtee". When she said this, I said "Oh so you're the "Better Kati" and everyone laughed because it should have been "Bede", not "Better". I was told to follow her to my office where I would meet the teachers I would be teaching with besides Bede Kati.

Bede Kati and Tesber Gabor (seated in my chair at my desk)

 As I walked down the hall, I could see that the building was extremely well kept up. The halls were tiled in a dark green tile and floors were tiled as well. Student lockers lined the hallways.

Hallway at Ujpesti High School

Student lounge

Shortly thereafter, Kati, the head of the English department arrived to greet me. She escorted me to a number of places and introduced me to the financial department to take care of my permanent visa.  She also told me about the lunches I could purchase at school starting Wednesday when school begins. The menu for this week is a pork dish, bean soup, cabbage salad, and another dish on Wednesday and something equally elaborate all costing roughly 300 forints a day (~$1.50). I'm to pay 6000 forints a month for this plan and I readily agreed to do that rather than have to pack my lunches like in old days.

After that Kati introduced me to Andi, the lead teacher of one of the English teaching groups I'll be assigned to. She, Gabor, and I met to discuss the syllabus, who will teach what, etc. Typical of what I had experienced during orientation with Hajni and Maria, the Hungarian instructors, she used 500 words to tell me what 50 words could have done at JPL. (Obviously I'm adjusting to this way of working, although I have to hold myself back in speaking up to get to the point.) To add to the interest of our teachers' meeting was Andi's four year old son who played with his cars on the desk we were using going "Vrrrrroooooomm vrrrrrroooooommm" all the time getting the cars to work -- just like Han-Sol did at age four.

Andi and her son

I left the meeting learning a bit about the Hungarian educational system. For each class of students is a form teacher (much like what I was when I taught in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia). But, unlike Malaysia, these form teachers follow their class through five years of high school/college. Think of the form teacher as a surrogate parent for the students. At the meeting I also learned that there will be another Hungarian teacher who also teaches English conversation besides me. Andi and Kati have promised to send me ideas for lesson plans and things I could consider doing with my classes. It is very apparent that they are relying on me to make decisions on what I will do and they are not going to force me to do anything. Of course I will coordinate with them all to ensure that my English conversation lessons go well with what they're teaching.

I then was shown one of my classrooms. Very nice.

One of the classrooms I'll be teaching in

Front view of classroom

Another classroom (geography?)

Front view of classroom

As I walked down the hallway, I could see giant pictures of the classes that have graduated from Ujpesti.

One of the class pictures that adorns the hallway

 I also could see the outdoor break area where students can play soccer or volleyball.

Outdoor rec area

 At 12:00 it was time to go home. I retraced my steps to the subway and was in a bit of a quandary trying to find a ticket booth that sold subway tickets. At first I saw a line where people were going to a ticket booth type of window but I could see that the person there was using a stamper to stamp tickets and knew that couldn't be it. I hesitantly approached a machine that looked promising (It had "Tickets" written on it.) I could see a coin slot and a screen where I could press an entry with my finger showing "320 forint", the cost of a ticket, so I decided that this must be what I need to press to buy my ticket. I inserted 400 forint (hoping for change to be given) and pressed a Hungarian word. Unfortunately, the word must have meant "abort transaction" because all that happened was my 400 forint came out. I tried again. This time I pressed another button and voila! My subway ticket came out. But not 80 forints change. I waited and plop plop plop plop -- four 20 forint coins came out. I was in business.

So that's the news of my first day at school. But you're probably wondering about the apartment situation (as am I!). Fekete Kati told me that the apartment at the school is uninhabitable and so they're fixing up a nearby apartment for me. (I guess that my commenting that I enjoy cooking had something to do with this because in one of her e-mails she told me that my tiny kitchen would have a hot plate.) Kati seems very concerned about the food at lunch (Will it be good enough for you since I'm a "gourmet cook" -- her words, not mine). I don't know how she got that impression. All I know is that I plan on cooking to save some money to go to do things in Hungary. Anyway, long story short, my new apartment will be ready some time next week (Last I heard it would be ready this Sunday) so I guess things are still in limbo. You can be sure I'll be putting pictures of wherever I end up on my blog.

Put in a call to Ruth's dentist's friend to check in on bridge possibilities. Couldn't reach him (I left a voicemail after a message in Hungarian came on followed by a beep -- sure hope that I called the right number!) And now to get out and buy some food at the market so I can prepare my dinners. More to come.  

Later: Went to the market and got there just as some of the stalls were being closed up. Since I wanted to purchase things before everything had closed up, I hurriedly bought ground pork rather than ground beef so that I can make hamburgers this evening.  It will be great to move into my own place so I can start to make more elaborate meals, but for now, I'm going to choose the simple. Also bought some lettuce, tomatoes, a quarter watermelon, and a package of bacon. It also rained on the way to/from the market so I was a bit wet since I haven't yet bought an umbrella. Next purchase.