Budapest Diary - Day 10

Early to bed and early to rise…that proverb still haunts me. Today, I got up on time, but took forever to get ready. By the time I got down for breakfast, Pragati had finished hers and was glaring at me from the reception.

At lunchtime we discovered that the Deak Ferenc Tere Metro Station has umpteen exits (rather than ‘one’) and we were waiting at the wrong one for Thomas on Saturday. Lunch was not exactly a pleasant experience for Pragati, since she took a complete dislike to all the food items served. For the Hungarians, there’s only one item that goes by the name of “spice” – Paprika (what we call as “laal mirch”). They swear by its name whenever we mention “spicy food”. Well, at least it is better than Germany where “spice” is not part of their vocabulary. Pragati already has a disagreement with the revolving door over here, which never responds to her access card. Today was no different, as she stood there, waiting for the door to move. I watched amusingly from the other side, wondering why she could not see the open door next to the revolving door.

Pragati also made the great discovery that the office shuttle here was air-conditioned, and started questioning as to why we do not have air-conditioned shuttles in Bangalore. I pointed out that not only the shuttles, but also most of the buses manufactured in India were not air-conditioned. The Europeans meanwhile, do not have a choice – all the buses manufactured here are equipped with air-conditioning and they have to put up with it. The bus journey seemed to bring the best out of her as she made one important observation after another:

1. Bryan Adams has made Bangalore his home. He keeps coming back every year
2. It would be nice if the whole of SAP Labs India was shifted to Budapest (comparisons can be made to a similar statement made by Mrs. Shanthi Srikanth, a couple of years back in Germany)
3. My car looks like a bicycle when compared to all the cars over here

I finally got to buy the mini-tripod that I was looking for during the weekend. Thankfully the shops did not close off early today. Pragati had, in the meantime, stated that after all she had to buy that Pierre Cardin watch. We had a short discussion on the street to decide whether we should have a look at the old railway station building – an argument which Pragati won hands down.

I wonder what they feed the escalators over here. Every new one I come across seems to be longer than the previous one.

Observation of the day: Today, nobody asked Pragati for her passport.