02.20-02.26 - Mystic-Providence

Sorry guys for the late post, I was just under the vawe this weekend and week. So, let's see what happened to me.
You know what, it is really hard to think back more than a week. Anyway.:)
Since last Monday I live in a new era. Two weeks ago on a Wednesday night, when I got my first salary at Photronics, I ordered a juice extractor. And I've already got it on Friday, but because of Photronics I was not able to arrive before the campus post closed. So I picked it up on Monday and made my first juice by carrots. I know, i know: Bence do not drink juice just from carrot, because you can get sick easily, your eyes turn yellow of the carotin. But i had just carrots in the fridge and was so happy, so i had to tried out. That was my best juice I have ever made, not because of it taste but because of the feeling. I am so hungry for vitamins. Tuesday I tanked my inventory with apples, lemons, carrots, cabbage, salads, and celery. On this tuesday I bought the follwing: apple, orange, carrot, celery, parsley, radish, beetroot, kale, red salad and lemon. It is unbelievable, isn't?! That is me too! The healthy Bence! But I gotta tell you, it really doesnt mean that I am any kind of vegetarians. It means I can eat more meat to reach the vegetables/meat balance. The point because i bought this machine, because i am lazy to eat these veggies, so you just throw them into the smashing place and done! Every morning I start my day with 4-5 deciliters juice. And Jeffrey showed me a movie, that said when we eat normal food, we eat macroelement, but we our body would need much more microelements. And these microelements are in the juice I drink. So, this is enough from the speech.
I had a test in managing people and organization class last Tuesday, i was motivated to learn this stuff at least for this test, so i read it 1.5 times and looked through again, then i checked the ppt of this chapter which was posted on Blackboard (like Neptun, just it works) and it was absolutely another topic! Holy sh*t!! What have i done? I just wasted my time! OK, Bence dont worry, just sit down and look through the new topic. It was about ooo... I dont remember:) But my point is, that I got 90% on that test! Consequences: dont study for this class!
Wednesday. I went to work. It was great, i really like this job, but i cannot speak about it. After job, transportation management class strated, my lonely lovely class! It inspires me every time to draw something, so what could i do? It is a must. The midterm is due next wednesday, but i have plenty of time to open up my book and start to learn cirka 250 pages. I cannot think about it!! VAAAAA!!!
After this beautiful time spending (I'm waiting for your critics, and thank you in advance! Bence, you shouldnt write this on your blog!! What do i write? I post only beautiful things here!). Andras and I went out to the best wednesday night restaurant, it is called RedLobster!!!! Hmm, yammyy! The food is just indescribable! The picture tells itself!
Thursday night. Managing marketing channels. I was off. I almost fell asleep, i was exhausted like crazy. BUT, before class Andras and I went up to the York Hill campus and gained our terrible towel for free! It is not a big deal, but for us! After class I went back to Whitney Village (no Eli's hangout at that night) and opened up the finance book. It made me scary. How will I pass this exam which is due next monday, which was this Monday? I decided to be pussy and start to study because I knew that Friday night will be off as well the whole Saturday. So I was pussy and studied. After 1.38 hours I fell asleep over my freshly opened finance book. Great job Bence! I slept really well at that night. I did everything i could, my conscience was clean!
Friday. Wow, that was fun! We started with free food and beer in the TD Bank Stadium, there was a graduant event. So free food for Bence, I had to eat something hard stuff after my juice anyway. And then the hockey game started. It was fun though! My first hockey game ever! I sat next to Keith (Kiii isz, that is how you should call him, kisz or kiz or chris that is how i call him, sorry Keith:)) he used to play hockey much more serious, but now just for fun. So I asked smart questions about the game. After the game (where of course the QU won, they bought the game already in advance so dont worry...:D im just kidding) everyone came to our poor apartement in Whitney Village, where we drunk some cheap wine. I was the host and it was an adhoc happening, so i was not able to be prepared. And theeeeen we went to New Haven for fun. And we had a great time there. The bar or pub where we went into served 206 different kind of beers. Wow! unfortunately there was no hungarian...
Saturday. In the morning we prepared for a long trip to Mystic and Providence. Here are some pictures what we saw and did.
Thanks for reading!
Two more weeks to go to Florida!!! Miami Beach south, here we come!!

New era is arrived 1/5 

2/5 

 3/5

4/5 

5/5

Bence - Hot-Dogs 4-0

Brown's - QU 1-4

QU - Police 0-1

 With Mr. Penguin

With the manatees

 @ Brown University (Ivy League)

Disruptive technology, but why?:D

Kia Rio - Bridge 1-0 (4$ for us:)

Somewhere nearby Providence

QU score

Lion seal show

Jelly fish striptease

@Red Lobster, with a lobster soup YAMMYYY

@Red Lobster, stuffed butter-fish fillet, scallops, shrimps, french fries, ketchup

 At the empty restaurant with my New England Clam Chowder soup

There was nobody but us:D

Photronics parking lot

!!Bowling!!

Bence's strike!

:)

02.13 - 02.19 - Valentine's Day

This week was all about food and commuting to work. Tuesday night was Valentine's Day and Jeffrey and Alley invited five of us to a Valentine's Day dinner at Ibiza Tapas Bar. I tried to make a picture about every meal. It was not a successful project, i still missed to take a picture about five meals. Just desserts were three kinds.
Fortunately Ildi drove, so I didnt have to worry about my food coma:D
Here we are:

And the meals:

Thanks Jeff and Alley!

After transportation management class we went out ot eat something with Andras. We have this tradition since the this school year, on every Wednesday night we are going to a restaurant. Every time into a different one.
Aziz offered us a great Turkish Restaurant in West Haven, so we checked it out, here it is:

___________________________________________________________________________

American traffic review by Bence

1. Photronics distance is 50 miles from Hamden. Average time to go there is 50-55 minutes.
2. It means 160 km driving on every working day.
3. I have a manual shifting Honda Civic 2000 LX
4. I have to go through Waterbury which is a bottleneck on the highway.
5. Americans run on automatic cars.
6. Americans dont use this rule: Pass Left, Keep Right!
7. You can exceed the speed limit by 15 mph, so at 65 speed limit, you can go 80 mph without any problem

Consequences:
a. Bence cannot speed on the highway, jerks are on every line (usually 4 lines per each direction) with the same speed, there is no way to go
b. Bence got mad when it happens - it is really annoying, they have much better cars than I have and are afraid of speeding above 65 mph or so
c. The highway is stocked, why do they have/need 4 lines?
d. Because of the bottle neck effect any time you pass through Waterbury, there is a traffic jam (smaller or bigger). I dont like traffic jams, not just because i waste my time in it, but my manual shifting car works differently than automatic cars in the jam. They accelerate faster and they dont have engine break. So in the jam i accelerate slower and stop faster. It really hurts the flow of the traffic jam. Anyway. And I have to shift so many times between 1st and second gears. Americans do not understand what is wrong with me. :D
e. Because of they are afraid of speeding and driving in a rainy weather Bence can speed in the inmost line!!! YAY!
f. Bence is absolutely exhausted at the end of the day and sometimes falls asleep on the classes.

Results:
       Americans are not good at keeping right
       Bence has to get used to it.

Because "What doesnt kill you makes you stronger!"

Just to get the feeling:

:)

02.06 - 02.12 - Basketball Hall of Fame, Black Bear

I am sitting in my chair after a crazy party night and thinking about how to start this spot. I have been thinking for like 10 minutes and i figured that why don't i just write down what i am thinking about. So, here we go! I have already started my spot:)

I would split my week for three sections: school, work, weekend.

So, school, well, I cannot tell you anything relevant right now. Honestly i am well behind of every class. We do have some papers to handle. I have to organize my thought regarding the school, i just do not know what is going on there. I know it is bad, very bad. After finishing this blogspot i am going to look over every syllabus, i am trying to be organized. On finance class we will have our first midterm due on the 20th of February. I would have to read 90 pages. Oh well...

For the other classes i got my books at least and now i am able to learn physically. :D But i still have to pick them up from the QU post office. Ok, that is well enough about the school.

Photronics. I will tell u more about the company later on. I have so many things to do there, several projects, etc. Here is their webpage: www.photronics.com. They are producing photomasks and have 8 factories. What is a photomask and how they make it? http://www.pkl.co.kr/english/product/product05.html This is a pretty good company and i will learn a lot, especially in inventory management and procurement. My official responsibilities will be the following as it is written in my offer letter: 

- Develop basic understanding of Purchasing and Inventory functions

- Support of tactical and day-to-day departmental needs as required

- Support of process improvement projects

- Data analysis for cost saving initiatives

- Specific areas of Interest?

I cannot tell you more guys about these projects, otherwise i should kill you, but i am going to like the third point and the fifth one. This company is on NASDAQ, but the headquarter is perfect size for me to learn how to manage a company at this size. Brilliant opportunity to learn!!

But the way to go there is just a big suck. 50 minutes each way and 100 miles a day. After my first day i was exhausted like crazy! After work i went to transportation management class, and i just looked out my head without any consciousness what is going on there. Anyway, after it we went out to our regular restaurant visit (every Wednesday we are going out and eat every time at different places), and as we arrived i went to bed. Fortunately Xiao Xiao asked me whether i did my homework for managing marketing channels or not, because it is due to tomorrow. I said, WTF?????? What is wrong with you? There is no homework for tomorrow. Actually we had...So i had to get up at 5 in the morning to do my homework for the class before work. I did. And i guess i will get 100% on it. Then i went to work and after it, i had that certain class and then we went out to the Eli's (bar). 

I had training with the HR, finalized the paperwork, and i passed the drugtest too! We went to the cleanroom, it is the soul of the factory that is the place where the photomasks are produced on silicon quartz plates and with pellicles. We were gowned up in the gowning room and went inside. You cannot imagine that world. I could compare to some kind of Sci-Fi movie, or Nasa airplane. It is crazy! Colors, smells, touches, mood are totally different. You can imagine how clean that room is, in a cubic meter there are just 100 particals. If you rub your clean (freshly washed!!!) palms together, you gonna make 700 particals an average. So, when your mother asks u whether you cleaned up your room, even you did it, it is still in mess!:D Since then I do not want to clean up my room, it wont be clean anyway:D

On Friday lunch we went out a new mexican restaurant. The service was just unbelievable!!! That was kind a service we should learn! I have already done:D

Weekend. So, yesterday was a pretty good day and night! After our regular workout on Friday my abs were killed on Saturday. Never mind Bence! I was almost not able to leave my bed:) I put some shitty food together for breakfast and at 11am, we (Andras and I) headed towards Springfield. The main goal was the Hall of Fame (Basketball). We arrived, the discounted entry fee was $17 per person! WTF??? I am surely not interested in basketball, but ok, i have one life, so, it is time to start to make that kind of interest! Remember Bence, you are open! OK, i thought! We went into it, it was a little bit disappointment, but later on i enjoyed every minute i spent there. I made a lot of pictures, videos, we sacked some scores. I'll show you some pictures. 

Then we went to visit the UCONN, University of Connecticut. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/University_of_Connecticut 30,000 students are at the campus. That is a real university town, in the middle of nowhere. They have own police station, called UCON Police, not just QU Security. Policeeeeee!!! I was amazed! There is no similar university in Hungary, i am sure! 

On the way back we visited this: http://www.connecticutsar.org/sites/eh-schoolhouse.htm Nathan Hale Schoolhouse, a piece of the american history. That guy said this: "I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country."

Here are the pictures and videos:

Mexican restaurant meal with my Photronics colleagues. 

 

Ready for the cleaning room at Photronics!

Hall of Fame:

The beginning of the basketball

and later on... (i have the story until nowadays, but it is too large to upload)

:D

Mr. Naismith

Hungarians are everywhere

The father of the basketball

World Record Slam Down

With Michael Jordan

Hall of Fame I.

Hall of Fame II. 

QU is better!

UConn Huskies

Nathan Hale Schoolhouse

Somewhere in New Haven!

:)

01.31-02.05 - NYC Carrier Fair, Photronics

Another week just went away. The first and best thing I have to tell you is that my car is repaired!!! The mechanic changed the hose on the coolant system. And they fixed my DC, which is the cigarette lighter, so now i can smoke in my car:) Nooo, i can use my GPS.
I still dont have my transportation book and managing people book...
There are two bigger things happened to me during this week.

1. Photronics
Wednesday was my first working day. I went to Brookfield, which is 50 miles away and met with my HR person. I got some papers and had to go to take my drug test. First I tried to do it in Bethel, that is 10 minutes from the Photronics, but there they were not able to take the test (they do just blood test). My test quote was for urine test. Then I went to Danbury, that is another 10 minutes from Bethel and there I took the test. I would bet that you think it was easy to do it. But, it is not!:) You get a little cup and you have to produce a sample between 30 and 60 ml. But you cannot pee at the beginning because that sample would not be appropriate (dont ask why), so you have to stop it before the very end and target into the little cup and open the tap again. I almost miscalculated this action, but finally i hit the limit. Huhh:D Before the action you have to wash your hand, during the action you have to pee into the toilette, which is filled with a special blue liquid and you cannot flash when you finished. Your genitalia (that says the official instruction)  mustn't touch the little cup. After you did the sample you cannot wash your hand until you give it to the lab staff. Basically that is it. :)
Then i went back to the headquarter and met with my supervisors, one of them is the director of supply chain and the other is the VP Supply Chain. They are nice persons. I will have two mentors who I work with. Mostly I will work on projects. Lots of different projects are going on right now. Each of them is exciting. The atmosphere is great and the feeling that I will work at the world leader of photomask producer is awesome! I cannot tell you more about my job right now, but I will talk about it later.

2. QU Carrier Fair
Friday was the NY Carrier Fair organized by QU. At 6:15AM we got on the bus headed towards NY City. After three hours travelling we arrived. The event was placed at 140 Broadway, YMCA Retirement Found building on the 28th floor. We were around 37, mostly seniors with finance, accounting and marketing majors and three MBA students. Iva, she is a Bulgarian MBA student with Health Care Management specialization, Lisanne, her girlfriend and organizer and me from Tarcal.:)
I want to describe this event seriously but before i start to do so, i got to tell you the biggest motivation factor was a cheap trip to NY and free food. I know it is sad, but i didnt know much about this, until I was there. That is why I didnt prepare much to show my best face. I just carried some business cards with me and printed some resumes (just in case). I was not aware of the big opportunity of it. Most of the time i made fun on everything, just looked around and looked at the guys who were there and ate a lot.
That was the agenda:
9-10am          Alumni Panel
       Panelists:       1. Chris Rich '10 - Goldman Sachs (mergers and acquisitions)
                            2. Tracy Annunziato '11 - NBC Universal
                            3. Megan Girard '07 - LinkedIn
                            4. Yury Marasanov '07 - ING Capital
                            5. Brittney Castine '07 - VML
10-10:15        Break - group by major (it means that you decided where to stay, whether at Finance panel or Marketing panel)
10:15-11:15   Session 1
                         Marketing, Advertising
                         ----------------------------
                         International Business and Management    Scott Pollak '96 - Citigroup
                         Accounting
                         Finance                                                    Ric Wallace - Morgan Stanley
11:15-11:30    Break
11:30-12:20    Session 2
                         Marketing, Advertising
                         ----------------------------
                         International Business and Management    Jessie Russel '06 - American Express
                         Accounting                                               Luke Garritori '09 - Deloitte after MBA
                         Finance                                                    Thomas Cucci '09 - VIP Services
                                                                                         Brian Tahan '94 - Credit Suisse
Lunch!
12:30-1:00      Networking and Your Pitch
1:00-1:15        Developing Your Pitch
1:15-2:00        Informal Networking
                         Practice your Pitch and receive a verbal critique on your networking skills
2:00-2:30        Debrief - What worked and what didn't

GO home and arrival at 6:30 to QU.

Some comments on this event. I realized early that these firms do not fit perfectly and do not hire immigrants for any position. So I just wanted to hear something the financial sector of the City, what is going on. Chris from Goldman told us that he usually works from 80 to 110 hours a week!!!!! What do you thin about it? He said that is is worth it. OK. The others from this sector told us that this is a really challenging, ever-changing sector and job. They usually start their they between 4:00AM and 5:00AM. And go to bed (not go home) between 11:00PM and 12:00PM. Even they are at home, but they are online, reading, learning, doing some phone calls. They make tons of money, but is it really worth it? They said that is a personal life decision whether you want it or not. I don't know that i could do it. I guess not...So i was happy that i chose something better. The lunch was great! You cannot imagine how delicious were those wrappers and sandwiches!
After the lunch was my time! I learnt a new word: pitch (how to sell yourself in 30 seconds/brief introduction). We had to practice as well so i didnt have choice, i did it. I met some really valuable people, some entrepreneurs, even this is a rare specious but still there are some everywhere, if you are persistent, you will find them! When you present your pitch, you have to seem confident and interesting. But after your turn (30-60 seconds) follow the 80:20 rule. Listen to the other 80% of the whole conversation, let the other person to speak! And tell him/her something interesting about you in the 20% of the time that maintain the interest.

And here are some pictures:

Farewell lunch with Szasza (i cooked:)

My first working day at Photronics

Before the end of the Carrier Fair (i forgot to use my camera earlier)

View from the 28th Floor (NY, Manhattan, 140 Broadway, YMCA Retirement Found)

I apologize for this silly video!

Before

After

:)

01.24-01.30 - My courses

I have to tell you something about my classes.
I take the following four courses in this semester.
Financial Analysis:
     This will be a hard class to pass it well. There is so much thing to do for it. I have already got my finance book, it costs 250$. Don't try to count it in HUF, i know this is a lot of money, i can live for one and a half month in Budapest at this price. Anyway, i checked out the book, it has 1010 pages...hard cover, corporate finance, jaffe and three other authers wrote this pearl for us, 9th edition. I also had to buy a financial calculator to make difficult calculations:) This is a BA II Calculator made by Texas Instruments. There is a discussion board to take part and write smart comments on different topics, this is online. We are working in teams, we have to handle a summary about a financial asset for every week. We have to take online quizzes and have two midterms to take. (I guess that is the only class with that professor where students have to take two midterms and then a final:)

Managing People and Organizations:
    We have a hot teacher on this class, I say hot because she looks pretty at her age. Her best field is the entrepreneurship, i like her, i want to learn a lot about entrepreneurship from her. She learnt my name first on the first class. The book for this class is more than 150$. I hope it will worth its price. We work in teams too. My mate is Alex, we were in the same group on the strategy class. We will take quizzes every class from the next readings. So you have to learn a lot in advance. We will make a presentation and write a capstone case about an organization. As I heard she is a tough grader, but i dont care, i want to learn.

Transportation Management:
    That class is part of the supply chain track. So many people ask me: "Are u gonna take a supply chain track?" I say "No, but i know shit about this topic, so i wanna learn how it works, what it is at all. And I am getting really interested in retail and it fits for this. That is it." Here the book is 190$. We have to buy a Harvard Case study package too. (I do not write down the costs because i want to complain, the only thing i want to point out is the price that you can compare to the hungarian ones.) Here my groupmate will be a german girl, she was a pro tennis player. We will wrie cases and capstone on our desired topic that we also have to presenent in 30 minutes. I want to learn about export/import stuff too.

Managing Marketing Channels:
    I still do not know what we learn about, but i know this is also a supply chain course. On the introduction class we talked a bit about this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzqMoOk9NWc This is an interesting topic, i would highly recommend for lawyers too. I almost fell asleep on this class, so i know it was boring a little bit. Here i bought the book for 100$, but officially it would have been 200$.

While I am writing this post, i am not in a good mood. Yesterday when i came back from Jeffrey, my cooler system just went gone. The stream came out from the upper hose that goes to the engine. I was scared that my entire engine will stop down. Finally i arrived home and checked what happened, there was no coolant in its reservoir and there was a hole on the upper hose where the stream came from. Now my car is at the mechanic shop. One of my friend offered me a good place where to fix my car. I like the way how their service goes, there is no advertisement just the word-of-mouth for 50 years. It is such a great service!
But having a used car is just pain in the ass. I must to have it be fixed until Wednesday because i must to go to Brookfield to take my drugtest and meet with my next boss.
I am so happy that i will work at Photronics Ltd. We have to finalize the details of my job, but i will do my first internship there at the supply chain department. People! At the supply chain department! The only one thing i could have a concern about is the distance, they are 50 miles away, so i will drive 160 km-s every day when i work. But i dont complain at all! I am glad to go there!

Keep your fingers cross to my car!

:)

01.09-01.23 - second semester starts

I apologize not to write my blogspots on time. I lag behind updating my blog two weeks. While I am writing this spot, i sit on my old good american bed. I left my home country, Hungary, my friends, my family and my girlfriend again for five months. My last two weeks at home were spent similarly to other times at home: running my entrepreneur club with my friends, meeting friends, drinking alcohol, going out with my gf, being at home with my family, eating good homemade food. These key words are represent just the surface of the meanings of these actions. Doing these social acts makes me infinitely happy. I do not want to bore you with telling the places I have been during these two weeks. Rather I want to tell you the way i came back:)

The first thing you have to know is the departing time of my flight, it was 7:35 AM (UTC+1), Alitalia flight from Budapest to Milan. To reach my plane i had to be at the airport two hours before it starts. It means 5:35AM. My mother wanted to say goodbye at the airport, but from Tarcal to the airport the way takes around 3 hours, so we should have started at 2:00AM, go to my dormitory, pick up Anita and go to the airport. Hmm, it doesn't work. We had to be in hurry, the weather would have been a big lottery and everybody would have been nervous. So i figured out what if we could go up to Budapest on Saturday morning, spend a calm lunch together and say good bye pleasantly. It has happened. I went home on Friday night after finishing some stuff at Budapest, watched a hungarian-french handball match with my brother with some beers (btw we won), then we talked a lot about our future plans how we will change the world (the usual stuff). In the morning after the last family breakfast i put my package together in one hour and went to my grandparents to say goodbye. 10:17 AM (UTC+1) we started to go to Budapest. We had a great lunch in the Green Pub, Gödöllő. I ate smoked cheese soup in bread and the place's special second meal. It was awesome time! In the dormitory we took down my luggage in Anita's room and said goodbye to everyone, Mom, Dad and my Brother. See them in the summer!
After five minutes they left Anita came from squash. We made a cake (actually she did, i was the silent partner:) to the last Saturday house party. It was great, great, cool! We went home at 3AM and I got up at 8AM, because i had to meet with a friend of mine about serious business opportunity (probably i will have another hostel, dont tell anybody!!!!). We will see. Then i said goodbye to everyone in the dormitory and finalize my packages at night.
And the travelling day!! I and Anita got up at 3:50AM (UTC+1) our taxi came at 4:20 AM and we went to the Hungarian national airport. We arrived at 5:00AM, we said goodbye at 5:40 (it was hard again to leave Anita) and started to check-in. I boarded at 7:10 and left Budapest, Hungary at 7:35AM with a Malev Boeing 767 plane to Milan, Italy.
I landed at 9:25AM in Milan and started to check-in again to my second flight Milan-New York. It was my simplest check-in ever. Italians didn't give a shit who I was and what i have, there was no security check, nothing. Our big Alitalia (operated by Delta) plane took off at 10:35AM (UTC+1). I got a good seat in the middle section, exactly at the wings. The toilet was close, and i didn't have neighbors. It means i had place to lay down and try to sleep. It saved my life:) The first two hours were easy. Then you lose your time sense, fall in like a coma. (Bence, it calls jet lag. Fuck that, it is a trauma, a shock for your entire body and brain, not just a jet lag. Jet lag when you flight over two time zones not 6...!) So as it happened last time, it happened again. This feeling is similar the affect of an alcohol, you don't know where you are exactly, in which dimension, first you start to fly and then you start to get pain:D Not very cool, trust me:)
At 2:03 PM (UTC-5) (local time of departing zone 8:03 PM (UTC+1) i just landed. Huhh, land was under my legs again! Check-out process took more than one hour, custom checking, homeland security checking, fingerprints, baggage claim, etc. (I was nervous about my custom clearing, because i put a traditional garlic "bubble" into my pack, and to carry fruits, vegetables, other plants, soil, etc. stuff is strictly prohibited!!!! You gotta get kick in your ass! I checked the NO box at this question and prayed not to be caught by the law. I was lucky, there was no problem at all. I swear that I will never ever put plant or animal product into my package!
At 3:35 PM I called my reserved shuttle bus. 3:53 PM the driver came. His back was hurt and i had to put my luggage into the van (no tip for this jerk!). Since I came out from the airport I was in contact with Jeffrey. He drove down to Southport and left my car there. I will never travel by shuttle. This service is just a big sucks. My travelguests were 4 Indians, one Chinese, an Afro-American couple and a Caucasian man (for those who don't know why i wrote Caucasian, this is the official terminology of white looking people, i hope it was correct in any way). Of course i was almost the last guest who was served. We arrived to the Grand Central at 5:35 PM (11:25 PM Hungarian local time), i took out my luggage, said goodbye the driver, no tip, of course (it was a lucky situation that the driver's back was hurt, it was a good reason not to give a tip, but i couldn't give any tips because i didn't have $ in cash:)). In the Grand Central i bought my train ticket, one way peak-time ticket to Southport is 15$. I got on to the train New Haven, departure time 5:48 PM. I found place for my luggage. And traveled more than one hour, got off at 6:55 PM (00:55 AM Hungarian time). My finance class started at 6:30 PM in the School of Business (SOB121 room). OK, i was in Southport and I had to find my car, i folloed Jeffrey's itinerary and found my little Honda Civic. I was a little bit shocked when its door was open. But nothing was missed, the muffler was still on the back seat and my GPS in the glove compartment. I dropped my two luggage into the trunk and switched the ignition. I looked around, i was in the middle of nowhere, it was raining like crazy, 30 centimeters snow was everywhere, i didn't see much because of the fog and my windshield was covered immediately by breath. OMG! How did I feel? I was thirsty (i drunk 4 hours ago), hungry, exhausted and a little bit smelly. It was not an ideal situation to take a ride home, but i turned on the volume of my radio so loudly (KC101 station) and started. I followed the instruction of my GPS, sometimes I almost missed the exits, just because i didn't see them. On the highway my average speed was around 50 MPH and sometimes 30 MPH. But i made it!!!!
And arrived to my first class in the spring semester 2012, SOB121 - Finance class at 7:46 PM. The class usually takes until 9:10 but yesterday it finished at 8:00 PM, so i spent 14 minutes on it:). It was 2 AM in Hungary and when i finally arrived home (Whitney Village), it was almost 3 AM in Hungarian local time.
I finished my long trip, it took 23 hours from door to door!
It is time to start my second semester! Welcome back!

01.02-01.08 - Winter break

One more week has just gone. I am still in Tarcal and go back to Budapest tomorrow afternoon. I only have two more weeks in Hungary. My Hungarian friends always ask me about whether i am missing my country and them. Of course, i am! My American friends ask me the same too, whether i miss the US and them. Of course, i do. One hand this is a strange feeling, other hand this is my honor because it says there are some people to whom i am important. And this is a great feeling!
I start this post at the New Year's party. Finally with Anita we decided to go our friends' apartment to celebrate New Year. It was an excellent party. We were some 20 there, most of them i knew previously, but i met some new friends. I carried some hurka (hungarian sausage specialty with liver or blood) and some kolbász (hungarian sausage) and we fried them. In Hungary at New Year's time, mustn't eat fish or chicken just pork! Fish swims away with your luck and chicken scratches it, so the only one lucky animal is the pig. It dig out your luck for the next year. Of course, we drank some champagne but because it is a must we drank pálinka (hungarian spirit), wine and beer as well. We had fun, danced, laughed and had everything which comes with fun. Our way back home was exciting we had to travel by tram and other public transportation. At four in the morning Budapest looked like Napoli (Italy) after a drug-cartel war, everywhere was covered with rubbish, drunk people were all around you, policemen were marching on the street, some drunk yuppies threw them with bottles of champagne. It was a mess.
(On 30th of December we went to ice-skating to the biggest renewed ice-skate park in Budapest. After the first round i was totally upset and almost gave up it at all, but finally we had great time, i didn't break my legs and arms, so it was fine. Then we drank some hot wine and ate some pizza.)
I organized our entrepreneur club again, first time in 2012 on 3th of January. We were eight and spent seven and half hours together from 9pm to 4:30am. It was a long-long (longest ever) session, but we talked about very interesting things. We agreed on that we meet again same time next week.
4th of January was a big day. Two years anniversary together with Anita. Two-roses, bence-made anniversary food, wine, and theater. I gotta tell you the performance was far the worst i have ever seen in my life. But Anita told me we will never forget this time. :D http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3gL9D3TdmE

National Theater (beautiful, breathtaking building)

I am home with my family again. It is snowing. 

I dont know where my camera-cable is, so more pictures will come later!

:)