Home for a visit

This week is a big holiday week in Hungary and tomorrow is one of THE national holidays of the year. It is St Stephen's (St Istvan) day. Many people come back "home" to celebrate and many tourists come to visit. In Budapest there will be millions (literally) of people gathering to watch the "Red Bull" airplane races over the Danube and (under the bridges!) during the afternoon and incredible fireworks at night. In Debrecen there is the annual "Virag Karneval" with a parade of floats made from flowers (mostly dried but some fresh) with fireworks in the evening.

Home for the holiday came my friend, student and teacher, Joseph. I am also his friend, student and teacher. We met 2 years ago and for 3 months we met two or three times a week for language lessons. I helped Joseph with english and he helped me with Hungarian. Then he was fluent enough to accept a job offer in England. I only wish my Hungarian was as good as his English. Edith and I helped him today with these words - tie breaker and shot put. He knew what each individual word meant - but not in the context of sports. He also mentioned that he was glad he wasn't English or American trying to learn Hungarian!