Speechless

It's our first weekend in Budapest and I've lost my voice. This little flu bugger just won't leave and seems to change on me every day. I can't make a sound past a whisper and occasional annoying squeal, which at least makes my coughs kind of quiet and pitiful, and of course, my nose won't stop running. But I can't really complain. Our other travel companion remains trapped at home, too sick to travel. Hopefully, she'll make it by Wednesday and we'll be all healthy by then.

Poland lost to Hungary in the last 20 minutes of the handball game. I got distracted by the dessert menu, and the next thing I knew, there was no way they were going to recover. I've never seen a handball game before. Quite interesting. Kind of a cross between basketball, soccer and lacross.

Budapest continues to warm up a few degrees every day. The trees seem optimistic and have started to bloom. We live accross the street from Hero's Square and the very large City park, so we'll probably take a walk there today, but otherwise, I'm taking it easy and trying to get better. The park also has some good hot baths, which might not be a bad thing for this damn cough and sinus stuff. Tomorrow, we might take a train to one of the small towns nearby to get a look at country Hungarian life. Am a bit concerned it might be very toursity, but then, we're pretty much tourists. What should we expect if we can't even remember how to say hello in this very difficult language?!

The Hungarian language continues to challenge, almost ridiculously. Despite working on it for three days straight now, SB and I still seem to forget how to say thank you -köszönöm - every other time. I remember the shorted version, pronounced "kussy", only because it rhymes with a certain American word ( sometimes my brain isn't fast enough to remember that it only rhymes with the word, and I say the American word instead, though no one seems to notice.) I have learned most of the Hungarian alphabet, which I think is a step, but I rather doubt I'll know enough to buy a loaf of bread anytime before we leave.