Andy Carvin's Waste of Bandwidth

« April 2005 | Main | June 2005 »

May 30, 2005

The Sharjah Biennial: Completely Meaningless or Quite the Opposite

An art piece made out of rows of laundry hangs outside the Sharjah Art Museum

After wrapping up the conference, I had some time that afternoon to explore one last time before heading to the airport around 10pm that night for my flight back to Boston. Since I'd spent a lot of time in Dubai itself, I decided to catch a taxi to Sharjah, the emirate adjacent to Dubai, to visit the Sharjah Art Museum. The museum was playing host to the Sharjah Biennial, the Arabian Gulf's premier modern art show. I'd read about it in several magazines in Dubai, so it sounded like an interesting change of pace from what I'd seen so far.

The taxi driver let out an audible groan when I told him I wanted to go to Sharjah. "Should I get out?" I asked him, when it seemed he disapproved of relatively long trip, but he muttered a string of No Problem's and kept driving. The distance to Sharjah is only 10 kilometers, but the traffic can be very bad, apparently. Today, though, it was manageable; we drove along the highway and managed to get there in about 30 minutes.

If I didn't know better, I would have assumed Sharjah was an extension of Dubai. But once the taxi driver dropped me off, I realized otherwise. For one thing, it seemed hotter here - there was less shade than you could find in Dubai. The buildings and streets weren't as clean, either; though Sharjah was the dominant emirate in the early 1800s, it has since fallen on lean times, unable to strike oil with similar success to that of Abu Dhabi or even Dubai. I also noticed that all the women were covered in head to toe wearing black abayas, without any exception. And as I walked along, I didn't see any other tourists.

The taxi had dropped me off by a market along the corniche. I thought I had a rough idea of where I was, but as I tried to navigate using the map in my Lonely Planet book, I realized the scale was much larger than I'd thought. No matter which direction I walked, I didn't seem to make any progress on the map, so I pulled over at a hotel and asked for directions. The concierge gave me a fold-out map that captured the details of Sharjah's streets -- including the scale -- much better than Lonely Planet did. I then realized I would have a lot of walking to do; the sights here were spread out over large distances. But I still had some water left in my bottle, so I decided to walk and see how I could handle the heat.

Emerati women wearing abayas inside the art museum

Following the traffic back towards the corniche, I spotted a long building with traditional wind towers at the front; across the road sat an art gallery. I'd found the art museum without getting too lost. Inside, a trio of women in black abayas ran the information desk; one of them gave me a map of the museum and asked me to sign the guest book. I then began walking down the first corridor, a long hallway with arches inspired by mosque architecture. Each artist featured in the Biennial had his or her own room. For those whose work wasn't dynamic -- such as paintings or photographs -- their work would be displayed in a wide room offset from the corridor. For other artists whose work was dynamic -- particularly those using video -- you would first have to walk down a claustrophobic side alley before reaching a dark, intimate room showcasing their work.

One of the first artists I encountered was Tim Lee from Singapore. His piece utilized two flat panel TV screens. On one screen there was a video loop of the artist lying face down on the floor; on the other screen, a video loop of him lying face up. In both videos, he remained totally motionless; at first I thought they were still images, but every now and then you could detect slight movement in his hands or feet. Accompanying the videos was a loop of Public Enemy's rap classic, "Don't Believe the Hype." Off to the side of the piece, a placard described the work as "an attempt to marry the avant-gardes of the social and artistic." The placard concluded with a line that made me laugh out loud:

"Lee's work can be interpreted as completely meaningless, or quite the opposite."

This very sentence encapsulated my impression of the entire exhibit. Wandering through each floor, some pieces struck me as quite pointless, while others successfully captured the artist's humor, angst or politics. Many of the works appeared to be related to the Palestinian conflict. One piece featured a note scrawled on the wall by an artist who had managed to convince Israelis and Palestinians to stop fighting for a few days so they could host an art show in the West Bank. Another piece, entitled "Ramallah/New York," featured two video loops of Palestinians running small businesses, one in Palestine, the other in the US. Whether it was of a hair salon, an import-export business, or something else, the mundane, everyday images from the videos made it quite impossible to tell which video took place in New York or in Palestine. There were also several pieces about globalization, featuring photos and paintings of the UAE over the decades, with various skylines crowded by cranes and construction equipment.

A wall of media representing TV programming during the Iraq War

Some of the most interesting pieces related to the Iraq war. One piece, created by Chris Keinke and Tarek Al Ghoussein, featured a display of 1500 still images of TV programs captured during the war. Many of the pictures were directly related to the war, including images of George W. Bush and wounded civilians; other pictures captured random TV programming such as cartoons and variety shows, juxtaposing pop culture with the cruelty of war.

Another work, Christoph Buchel and Giovanni Carmine's PSYOP, critiqued the US military's propaganda leaflet campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan. Perhaps the most creative work of the show, PSYOP was a room set up as a small classroom. On each desk were random paper copies of leaflets distributed by airdrop to Iraqis and Afghans. The teacher's desk featured more leaflets, file folders and what appeared to be ungraded homework. In the upper right corner of the room, a television played a 1979 instructional video from the US Department of Defense about the art of propaganda leaflet design. And to the back of the room, a large file cabinet overflowed with cardboard boxes of leaflets, thousands of them, along with books by the artists containing copies of the leaflets. A small sign in the room encouraged visitors to help themselves to copies of the materials; I put some of the leaflets inside one of the books as a souvenir.

I spent the next hour or so exploring the museum. The quality of the art varied, but it was all quite interesting. On one wall I even found a framed handwritten letter with an intriguing note:

It seems that, within the next six weeks, I would be able to show publicly (in some other place) a body of work by one of the students from the Sharjah College of Fine Arts, in the United Arab Emirates, which, apparently, is not suitable for being exhibited here.

Nedko Solakov
Sharjah
April 2005

Leaving the museum, I walked several blocks west to Sharjah's fort. The fort, reminiscent of Dubai Fort, was one of the oldest structures in the city, but the high-rise apartments surrounding in detracted from it. I also strolled through the Sharjah Heritage Area, several square blocks of old buildings restored to their original condition. It was reminiscent of walking through a deserted North African medina; the lack of people there made it feel like a ghost town.

After buying a bottle of water at a shop, I continued westward to the vegetable souk, a covered market featuring various produce from the region, particularly the local dates. The date sellers all made their best attempt to sell me two or three kilos of the syrupy sweet fruit, but I smiled and declined.

A man strolls through Sharjah's Heritage Area

On the far end of the souk, I found the long distance taxi stand, which my Lonely Planet book said was the place to get a taxi back to Dubai. To my horror, though, I found out that this place was actually the taxi stand for rides to Abu Dhabi and Al Ain; the Dubai taxi stand was at Rolla Square, clear across the other side of town where I'd started in the first place. I asked the taxi drivers if any of them would take me there, but they all declined, again reminding me the taxis were for Abu Dhabi and Al Ain only. Silly me.

Now breaking out into a continuous sweat, I backtracked through the city, trying to find whatever shade along the way, until I reached Rolla Square 30 minutes later. Several large minibuses sat along the northern edge of the square; one of them departed as soon as I arrived. I asked an attendant about going to Dubai; he directed me to a ticket booth under a tree in the middle of the square. I bought a ticket for five dirhams (about $1.50) then returned to the remaining minibus. It was already filling up with passengers. I grabbed a seat near the front and waited a few minutes as the last seats filled up; some male passengers had to be shuffled around to accommodate a couple of women passengers, who aren't aloud to sit next to male strangers.

We then got under way, taking a route back to Dubai that was different than the one I'd used to get there a couple hours earlier. We passed through a very developed part of Sharjah, with brand-new high rises hugging a large bay. It was oddly reminiscent of Miami. About 30 minutes later, we arrived at the Bur Dubai bus station, where I had to walk a few blocks to catch a taxi back to the hotel, where I packed my bags, checked out, and plotted what to do with my dwindling hours in Dubai.

Posted by acarvin at 2:55 PM | TrackBack

Car Sick in the Empty Quarter

Two African women walk along the ridge of giant sand dune

Once conference activities had wrapped up on Monday afternoon, I returned to the hotel for a quick swim before meeting Shauneen Furlong for an evening ride into the desert. The pool, adjacent to the hotel on the roof of the parking garage, offered a fine view of the post-modern skyline along Sheikh Zayed Road. The ironies of Dubai were in full force as the afternoon call to prayer sounded in the distance while Eminem's "Without Me" played on the poolside PA system; it was very odd hearing the opening Allahu Akbars of the prayer while the rapper lamented how the Federal Communications Commission won't let him be. In some Muslim countries I've visited, they turn down the music when the muezzin offers the call to prayer; here, though, I could have sworn they actually turned the music louder.

Downstairs in the lobby, I met Shauneen just before 4:30pm. Our ride was waiting for us; the driver and three passengers sat inside the Toyota Land Cruiser, with the door open for us to slide in the back seat. The three passengers were teammates on the Kuwait national basketball team, including a Kuwaiti national named Sami and two Americans, one of whom was named Jameel.

We left the hotel and drove south on the highway; soon we were out of Dubai and somewhere in the emirate of Abu Dhabi - it's hard to drive anywhere in the UAE without going into Abu Dhabi at some point, given the fact it takes up around 85% of the country's land mass. Somewhere along the highway the driver pulled over for gas and let us get out to buy snacks at, of all things, a roadside Dunkin Donuts. As we got out of the car, I realized that Jameel was enormous - probably close to 6' 10". He looked over at me and shook his head.

"Uh oh," he said. "A Red Sox fan." I hadn't even thought about the fact that I was wearing a Sox t-shirt.

"Let me guess," I replied. "New York?"

"Brooklyn born and bred," he said.

My dune companions: Jameel is the tall one; Shauneen is on the right

We got back in the car and drove another 45 minutes, until we reached a highway outpost somewhere southwest of the oasis of Al Ain. The driver informed us this would be our last chance to buy food or water until dinner time, so I got out and picked up another bottle of water and a snack bar made of cashews and dried fruit. Meanwhile, one of Jameel's teammates grabbed a stack of hats that were on the shelf of the store, several of which displayed the label Georgetown Hoyas.

"Check this out, Jameel," he said.

"Well I'll be damned," Jameel replied.

Suddenly I had a moment of recognition. "Did you play for the Hoyas not too long ago?" I asked.

"Yep, '96 to 2000," Jameel said proudly.

"No wonder you looked familiar," I replied. "I bet I saw you play while I was living in DC."

(Later that night, I did some poking around on the Georgetown website and found him - Jameel Watkins, drafted by the Houston Rockets prior to moving into the international pro basketball circuit.)

While the others finished buying their supplies, I snacked on my fruit-nut bar and stared across the road at a giant sand dune. It must have reached 250 feet high, certainly the highest sand dune I'd ever seen. I wondered how far out into the desert we'd get on this trek of ours.

I soon found out. Back in the Land Cruiser, we joined two Land Rovers from another tour agency and drove behind the outpost. Suddenly I could see nothing but sand dunes, and no road for us to take. But that didn't matter; the caravan of 4X4s drove straight up the dunes, gunning the pedal as soon as we hit your sand. "Check your seat belt," the driver yelled back to us.

Arabian sand dunes

Before I knew it, we were careening up and down the dunes at frightful speeds. Not wanting to go in a straight line, the driver banked hard to the right along the edge of a dune; the car dipped 45 degrees to the side, feeling like it would tip over at any moment. He gunned the gas again, causing a gale of sand to whip up behind us. We plunged down the other side of the dune, dropping 200 feet in a matter of seconds; my windpipe caught my stomach and grasped it with all its might before I could cough it up all over the ceiling.

Everyone in the car, except the driver, let out a series of involuntary grunts, whoops and guttural noises as the 4X4 banked along the dunes like a roller coaster that shifted randomly with each turn. I soon began to regret that snack bar I'd just eaten; I had no idea that we'd be going on a ride like this. You could actually feel the g-forces as we careened at gravity-defying angles, spraying sand and plummeting between the dunes. Even though I felt awful from the ride, I kept telling myself to enjoy every minute of it. I mean, how often do I get the chance to race through the Arabian desert with a former NBA player?

As we darted through the endless dunes, I did my best to take pictures and some video clips. I had to be careful about pressing the lens against the window; sometimes we'd plummet down an embankment, causing an enormous thud that would easily shatter my camera if it were too close to the glass. Looking behind at the Range Rovers following us, I was shocked at the gravity-defying angles the vehicles took while shooting up and down the dunes. What on earth were their drivers thinking? I then realized they were simply following our tracks -- our vehicle was doing the exact same thing; I just hadn't realized how utterly reckless it all was.

Eventually, the car spun to a halt, parking on the side of a dune. We got out and enjoyed the tremendous view of the desert, not to mention the stable, unmoving sand below us. Jameel and his buddies took a crack at sandboarding, riding a snowboard down the side of the dune; I held my breath and prayed I didn't throw up on the Indian tourists that had just gotten out of one of the Range Rovers.

Our driver checks in with the tour agency from the dunes

Jameel and Sami were really getting into the sandboarding; the driver offered to take them up to the top of the tallest dune, towering nearly 300 feet just behind us. We watched with amazement as the 4X4 flew up the edge of the dune, skidding out and grinding to a halt at the very top. Sami then jumped on the board and surfed downward, plummeting around 150 feet before rolling over. He seemed to really enjoy the ride, but now he had to walk all the way up to get back to the car. Meanwhile, I pulled out my iPod and recorded a brief podcast -- perhaps the first from the Empty Quarter, I wondered.

Soon, the car returned and we climbed inside; the driver retraced our path until we reached the highway again. We then turned north and heading towards a "Bedouin camp" set up for tourists to have an evening barbeque. Along the way we passed several itinerant camels strolling down the road; the driver said they were wild camels.

The caravan pulled off the highway and followed a wire fence back into desert, reaching the camp about five minutes later. The camp was a large courtyard with several divans set up inside, each seating around 20 people on pillows along the perimeter. To the left there was a small fleet of all-terrain vehicles waiting for riders willing to pay an extra fee (they weren't included in the tour price); to the right, a man in Bedouin dress stood by with three camels, waiting to give tourists a ride.

Jameel and his friends went straight for the ATVs; Shauneen and I made a beeline to the camels. The camel driver lowered the animals and let us climb onto their backs. We each got our own camel, sitting in the second seat position of the saddle. Unlike every camel I'd met previously, these camels were very sweet; they let you scratch their heads and rub their necks, and actually seemed to enjoy it.

Andy bonds with his camel

The camel driver gave the camels a bit of a whack, and all three of them stood up. I've ridden camels three times in my life, and each time I'm surprised just how high off the ground you get while riding on their backs. It's really quite an extraordinary experience. And compared to my previous camel rides, this one was quite comfortable; the saddle was wide and well padded, hugging your legs as the camel took each step.

The driver directed the camels over a sand dune to get us a little way from the camp; Jameel soon skidded by on an ATV. The rider-less camel strode along side mine, leaning in close so I could scratch the back of its head as we rode. It was a marvelous, relaxing experience.

By the time we got off the camels, there was a line of a dozen or so tourists from India and Singapore waiting for a ride. Interestingly, with each successive group of passengers, the rides got shorter, and the camel driver more irritated. By the time Jameel and his teammates got on the camels, the rides were lasting no more than 30 seconds, in a tight circle. I was really glad we got to ride them when we did; otherwise I would have thought we wouldn't have gotten our money's worth.

We went into the camp's courtyard and helped ourselves to some tea and dates; I then grabbed a beer at the bar to help cool down, since the water they served tasted like burnt plastic. One of the staff offered us shishas, so Shauneen and I split one as we waited for dinner.

The belly-dancer-in-residence teaches some of her moves

About 30 minutes later, we were invited to the buffet, which included half a dozen types of pilaf, several kabobs, hummus, baba ganouj, pasta and lentil curry. It wasn't the best food I'd had in the UAE, but it wasn't bad either. After dinner, we were treated to a belly dancing show. The dancer was actually quite good, though she spent too much of her routine trying to recruit tourists to learn how to belly dance. Shauneen was actually a good sport about it; she got on stage and belly danced like a pro; I stuck to my camera and pretended not to hear the belly dancer when she asked me if I wanted to take a crack at it.

At 9pm, the dance ended rather abruptly; the tour staff were clearly on the clock, so it was time to drive back to Dubai. For the next 90 minutes, we drove northeast along the highway. For one stretch of the trip, the driver kept swerving perilously close to one of the Range Rovers while thumbing his mobile phone at the same time. Eventually he rolled down the window and drove within inches the other vehicle, sticking his phone out the window. I suddenly realized what he was doing.

"Bluetooth?" I asked.

"Yes, good pictures," he replied, apparently of the mind that a driver had the right to swap camera phone photos wirelessly with other drivers while speeding down the highway. Fortunately, a few sharp "slow down!" requests from Jameel caused the driver to mellow out.

Just after 10:30, we got back to the hotel. I noticed I left a trail of sand behind me as we walked towards the elevator.

Posted by acarvin at 1:30 PM | TrackBack

May 27, 2005

Concert Review: U2 Live at Boston's Fleet Center

With more than 25 years of touring under their belt, U2 reminded us again last night at Boston's Fleet Center why they are still the biggest band in the world. The sold-out concert, the final performance of their spring 2005 North American tour, was a two-hour, 22-song retrospective of the band's best work, featuring classics, fan favorites and a few obscure numbers to boot.

Utilizing a stripped down set that was down-right minimalist compared to tours such as Achtung Baby and Pop, U2 kicked off the show with a one-two punch from their latest album, How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb: "City of Blinding Light," followed by "Vertigo." During the songs, Bono paid tribute to Boston's Aerosmith by throwing in lyrics to "Walk this Way" and "Dream On." Dressed in his usual sunglasses and a black leather jacket, he took full advantage of the circular walkway that arched out of the stage, appearing as if he were walking on top of the crowd in the general admission section. Other members of the band utilized the walkway on occasion, but never with the same comfort or enthusiasm that Bono exhibited.

One of the most enjoyable aspects of the show - for old school U2 fans anyway - was the heavy rotation of pre-Achtung Baby songs. After performing the relatively recent "Elevation," the band stepped back over 20 years to perform "Gloria" from their sophomore effort, October. This was followed by the downright obscure "The Ocean," a surreal, ambient track from their debut LP, Boy. Newer fans that may have been dismayed by this random flashback wasted no time in getting back into the show when the band continued the set with "Beautiful Day" from their Grammy-winning penultimate album, All That You Can't Leave Behind.

Introducing the song "Miracle Drug," Bono talked for a while about how he loves coming to Boston because it is not only an "Irish city," but a "smart city" of people working hard to cure diseases like cancer. The praise seemed rather forced, though, leading one to wonder what kind words he offers when passing through Detroit, Jacksonville or Sacramento.

The second half of their main set might have been termed their battlefield set, given its heavy emphasis of songs related to violent conflict. "Love and Peace or Else," a plea for sanity in the Middle East, was quickly followed by their early 80's classic, "Sunday Bloody Sunday." Introducing that song as "An American Song," (as opposed to it being "not a rebel song," his old refrain) Bono sported a white handkerchief around his forehead, featuring a crescent, Star of David and cross. Mid-way through the song, he led the crowd in a chant of "Jesus, Jew, Muhammad," emphasizing how Christianity, Judaism and Islam were all "sons of Abraham."

The band then offered a pair of war songs from their mega-hit Joshua Tree album. The white handkerchief now blindfolding him, Bono belted out the jarring "Bullet the Blue Sky," mixing in lyrics from their contribution to the Gangs of New York soundtrack, "The Hands that Build America" as well as the old war song "When Johnny Comes Marching Home." The band then took it down several notches with a subdued performance of "Running to Stand Still," which was dedicated "to the brave men and women of the United States." As the song wrapped up, a giant screen displayed the first six articles of Universal Declaration of Human Rights; huge applause from the audience broke out as a female narrator read the article pertaining to the prohibition of torture.

Wrapping up their main set, the band pulled out three of their biggest hits: "Pride (In the Name of Love)," "Where the Streets Have No Name" and "One." During the performance of "One," Bono marveled that the United States was the only country that could put a man on the moon, so he implored President Bush to "bring mankind back to earth" and fully embrace a campaign to eliminate the debt of developing nations. The set coming to a close, thousands of people in the audience held up their cell phones, glowing LED blue and green and white, alighting the arena with an eerie glow so different from the warm hues of lighter-lit concerts of the past.

After a brief break, the band came back for two encores, featuring a total of seven songs. The first encore began with two songs from Achtung Baby, including "The Fly" and "Until the End of the World." Bono then surprised the crowd by reaching back to the late 70s for their first single, "Out of Control" (though the version they performed was actually the arrangement recorded for the album Boy rather than the single itself). The audience's cell phones then came out again for "With or Without You."

The final encore featured two more songs from How to Dismantle, including "All Because of You" and "Origin of the Species." For their final song, they reached back to Unforgettable Fire for a wonderful rendition of "Bad." Halfway through the song, Bono pulled a young woman from the audience and began to slow dance with her. She tried to say something to her but he put his index finger to his lips and made a "ssh" noise, then danced with her silently as thousands of onlookers wished they were in her place. (Bono's been doing this during "Bad" for years, but it still remains an effective crowd pleaser.)

As the song ended, Bono alluded to their 1982 song "40" with its famous mantra, "How long to sing this song?" The band used to end its concerts by having each member leave the stage one at a time while the audience sang the lyric again and again; instead, they reverted back to "Bad" and ended it that way. Once again, the audience began chanting "How long to sing this song?" but the haunting refrain didn't bring U2 back on stage. Instead, the audience was left singing to itself, thousands in happy unison. -andy

Set List for U2 Concert at the Boston Fleet Center
May 27, 2005

City of Blinding Light (How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb)
Vertigo (How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb)
Elevation (All That You Can't Leave Behind)
Gloria (October)
The Ocean (Boy)
Beautiful Day (All That You Can't Leave Behind)
Miracle Drug (How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb)
Sometimes You Can't Make It On Your Own (How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb)
Love and Peace Or Else (How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb)
Sunday Bloody Sunday (War)
Bullet the Blue Sky (The Joshua Tree)
Running to Stand Still (The Joshua Tree)
Pride (In the Name of Love) (Unforgettable Fire)
Where the Streets Have No Name (The Joshua Tree)
One (Achtung Baby)

First Encore:
The Fly (Achtung Baby)
Until the End of the World (Achtung Baby)
Out of Contol (Boy version, not single version)
With or Without You (The Joshua Tree)

Second Encore:
All Because of You (How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb)
Origin of the Species (How to Dismantle an Atomic Bomb)
Bad (Unforgettable Fire)

Posted by acarvin at 3:06 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

May 26, 2005

U2 Vertigo Tour Podcast

U2's Thursday night concert at Boston's Fleet Center ended a few minutes ago; I recorded two podcasts while there. The first is a report during the Kings of Leon opening set; the second is a snippet of the song Miracle Drug. I'll post a concert review tomorrow. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 11:54 PM | TrackBack

U2 Pre-Concert Podcast

A short podcast from Boston's Fleet Center as the Kings of Leon open up for U2 in the final show of their North American tour. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 8:22 PM | TrackBack

May 25, 2005

Video Blogging from Dubai Creek

A brief video blog recorded along Dubai's Creek prior to heading to the airport to fly back to Boston. The video was filmed at a creek-side restaurant in Bur Dubai, while polishing off a pot of mint tea and smoking an apple shisha... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 8:11 PM | TrackBack

May 24, 2005

Last Dinner in Dubai

It's 8pm Dubai and I'm sitting at a charming Creek-side restaurant, the Bayt al Wakeel. I'm finishing off a small pot of mint tea, digesting the shish tawuk and hummus I just had for dinner. The view here is marvelous - as far as I know it's the only restaurant in Dubai with a view of the busy abra water taxi lanes. It's still rush hour - as many as a dozen abras, each crammed with people, are in the water at any time. In a few minutes, my last shisha of the trip should arrive at my table.

Sitting here is the perfect way to wrap up my visit to Dubai. In about an hour, I need to go to the hotel, get my bags and head to the airport to begin my 20+ hour trip back to Boston.

I'll post more later - I had an interesting afternoon visiting the Sharjah Biennial and exploring Dubai's souks one last time.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 12:05 PM | TrackBack

May 23, 2005

Podcasting from the Empty Quarter

Here's a brief podcast from the Rub al-Khali, or Empty Quarter -- the vast desert of endless sand dunes that forms the unmarked border between the UAE and Saudi Arabia. I'm spending the evening riding furiously up and down sand dunes in a vehicle that miraculously avoids flipping over, then having dinner at a Bedouin camp. Can't wait to post more later. -andy

ps - I wonder if this is the first podcast from the Rub al-Khali?

Posted by acarvin at 10:20 AM | TrackBack

Photos from the Burj Al-Arab Hotel

Here's a small collection of photos I took a few nights ago at the Burj al-Arab Hotel here in Dubai. Click on any of them to see a larger version. -andy

The hotel lobby

A vertical panorama of the Burj's atrium - the highest hotel atrium in the world

A woman sits by the mezzanine water fountain

High-angle view of the hotel from the entrance.

The Jumeirah Beach Club, as seen from the Burj al-Arab

The Burj as seen from its ocean causeway

Posted by acarvin at 4:00 AM | TrackBack

Podcast of My Dubai E-Gov Conference Presentation

I've just posted a podcast of my E-Government for All presentation at the GCC E-Gov conference in Dubai. You can also take a look at my powerpoint slides. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 3:43 AM | TrackBack

Souks, Water Taxis and Kabobs

Wind towers in Dubai's Bastakia district

After Sunday's conference sessions, I returned to the hotel around 4pm, spending about an hour at the pool with Ivar Tallo of Estonia. Currently the director of the Estonian E-Governance Academy, Ivar is a former member of parliament and foreign policy advisor to the president; he told some great stories of traveling with the Estonian president to meet with Bill Clinton and Boris Yeltsin to negotiate the withdrawal of Russian troops from Estonia in the early 90s.

Around 6:30pm, Ivar and I caught a taxi to spend the evening in old Dubai. Traffic was horrendous; the usually 15-minute drive took more than 45 minutes, so the sun had set by the time we neared the creek. There was so much traffic we eventually abandoned the taxi and walked the remaining blocks to the creek. This turned out to be a good decision, since Ivar hadn't visited the old city before; it gave us a chance to walk through the Bastakia neighborhood, with its beautifully restored wind towers, each circulating air to cool the shops at ground level.

Soon we arrived at the abra water taxi station. Large crowds of Indian men were coming and going from the water taxis; we joined the crowd and made our way onto a boat, struggling to find a place to sit. We then got to experience an abra traffic jam: our boat collided with no less than five other boats, each honking their horns like Bombay traffic, the drivers shouting at each other to get out of the way.

A blurry view from the abra water taxi facing towards Dubai's Deira district

Traveling by water taxi is thrilling by day, but mysterious by night. Because the creek isn't lighted, you can't always see what's around you. If you're lucky, other abras coming in your direction will have a small lamp at the front; as they approach you can make out the silhouettes of the passengers. To the left, the dhow wharf was crowded with large wooden ships moored together like sardines. It was too dark to make out any details as to what goods they were carrying, though for a moment I thought I saw an SUV lashed to one of them. Fortunately, there was a full moon, not to mention the lights emanating from the minarets of the local mosques and giant neon signs on surrounding buildings. Otherwise, the creek was all darkness.

The boat soon collided with the dock on the Deira side of the creek; several Indian men had already casually jumped off the boat before the rest of the crowd waited for the docking before following suit. Ivar and I walked ashore and took an underground walkway to reach the entrance of the Spice Souk. Unlike my previous daytime visit to the souk, the bazaar was bustling at night, with most of the shops open for business. Huge bins of herbs, incense and spices lined each storefront: sage, oregano, cumin, cardamom, peppers, dried lemons, frankincense, myrrh. The smell was overpowering, but quite enjoyable. As we walked by the shops, aggressive salesmen would come out and break open a dried lemon under our faces, trying to get us to buy a kilo or two to bring home. Saying no thanks, whether in English, Arabic or Hindi, seemed to make no difference, so the only option was to ignore them altogether.

After exploring the spice market for a while we weaved through side streets heading east, hoping to find the gold souk. I soon realized we'd gone a little south of the souk, so we took a left and backtracked until reaching the souk's entrance. The souk, a long corridor with a decorative wooden roof, was jammed with shoppers from all over the world: Brits, Americans, Japanese, Russians, Lebanese, Kenyans, Iranians, Saudis, Indians. Wherever you looked, you could find people staring into the storefronts or negotiating with shop owners inside their air-conditioned show rooms. And no wonder: displayed in each window you would find an incredible collection of gold. I'm not talking about an elegant display of delicate necklaces and earrings, but an in-your face, over-the-top bonanza of 24 karat chains, tiaras, belts suitable for a welterweight champion, bangles as thick as PVC pipes. Amazingly, the gold looked almost like costume jewelry; the color and texture seemed very fake to me, I was so used to seeing only 14k and 18k gold.

Necklaces for sale in the Gold Souk

We browsed the shops, marveling at the display of wealth in each window. Every few moments, Indian men would approach us and utter a familiar mantra: "Fake Watch Rolex Breitling Omega Fake Watch" repeated again and again. I was attempted to play with one of them and say I was insulted that he assumed I couldn't afford the real deal, but I figured that something would get lost in the translation and it'd open a can of worms.

From the gold souk, we cut through various side streets towards the perfume souk. You could smell it from several blocks away; once getting there, each shop was crammed with Arab men negotiating prices for perfume, hand mixed on the counter from a vast selection of essences stored in ornate glass bottles along the wall. Continuing towards the creek, we passed the electronics souk and what appeared to be a kitchen wares souk. Ivar stopped at a couple of shops looking for a particular onion slicing contraption but never found what he was looking for.

It was now approaching 9pm; I suggested we get something to eat at one of the Persian restaurants along a strip of shops one block away from the creek. We passed several options, including the Hatam Restaurant, where I'd eaten in 2002, before finally settling on the Teheran Restaurant, which offered outdoor seating. The eccentric waiter insisted on getting us to order before we'd looked at the menu, which Ivar and I declined; he also didn't understand why we would want to order something to drink with dinner.

Eventually, Ivar and I ordered kabobs -- no surprise, since kabobs were the only options on the menu. I picked a mixed grill for 25 dirhams (about $7). The platter included ground beef, lamb and chicken, with a side order of yogurt, an enormous piece of flatbread (about the size of a tabloid newspaper), and a large plate of vegetables, including mint, watercress, radishes, onions and scallions. The food was delicious, though a bit messy; rather than napkins the waiter gave us a box of Kleenex, which couldn't compete with the kabob juices and yogurt drips. Meanwhile, several Emiratis sporting Bluetooth wireless earpieces smoked shishas while watching the horrendous Bruce Willis film Hudson Hawk. An Arabic translation of each character's lines was read by a single narrator, no matter the character's age or gender.

After dinner, we walked along the creek and the dhow wharf towards the water taxis, past the beautiful and modern Iran Bank Melli building. We were tempted to catch a taxi from the Deira side of the creek, but traffic was terrible and we didn't know how long it would take to cross the creek over a bridge due to the gridlock. Besides, taking an abra gave us one more chance to experience Dubai from the water.

View of a mosque in Bur Dubai as seen from the water taxi

Climbing onto an abra, I handed the driver a single dirham coin for both of us; we then navigated down the creek towards the Bur Dubai side. The minarets were still glowing a golden hue from the floodlights at their base; there was also a charming creek-side restaurant not far from the Bastakia quarter and its famous wind towers. I shot some video on my digital camera as we rode back; hopefully I'll be able to edit into a short Web documentary when I get some free time.

Once back on dry land, we walked one block to an intersection and quickly hailed a taxi. The ride back to the hotel was a fraction of the time it took to get there during rush hour, which was a major relief. This gave me just enough time to head upstairs, skype with Susanne and the cats back in Boston, and get to sleep by 11:30pm.

Posted by acarvin at 3:01 AM | TrackBack

May 22, 2005

Transforming Estonia into E-Stonia

Ivar Tallo chats with conference attendees

This morning, Ivar Tallo of the Estonian E-Governance Academy gave a case study about his country's e-government successes. The E-Governance Academy was created three years ago to promote Estonia's e-government successes around the world, particularly in the former Soviet Union.

"We are a very small country," Tallo said. "Our population is 1.4 million people. But we have our own language, our own culture, and we have to sustain it."

When the Soviet Union collapsed 15 years ago, Estonia faced an incredible opportunity: to build a government from scratch. "A big part of the story from 1991 to 2004 was building e-government and an information society."

Today, around 52% of the population has Internet access and 91% have mobile phones even though the country's GDP is generally much lower than western European countries. All schools are connected to the Internet, and there are more than 700 public access points around the country. There's also an enormous proliferation of free wi-fi, including access at all Estonian gas stations. (As an aside, he said to the audience, "Look guys, the UAE can learn a good lesson about providing free wi-fi rather than charging 20 euros a day at a hotel like we have to pay here. Free wi-fi is good business.") Additionally, e-banking rates are also among the highest in the world. "I don't even remember the last time I went to a bank; we all do it over the Internet."

Tallo said that many people assume Estonia's success is simply because of the location and population size; however, he pointed out that Estonia's neighbors, Latvia and Lithuania, have almost half the Internet penetration rate as Estonia's. Estonia invests significantly in ICT development - approximately one percent of the national budget each year for the last decade. "We've formed a general consensus among the political forces in Estonia that ICT investments are necessary. In 1991, we looked around and said, 'Okay, we now have an independent country but we still don't live like Finns do.' So we had to make priorities, including ICT development."

"We never had a national strategy; when we started in 1991, we didn't know where to go. So we created principles of information policy that were passed by the parliament." This led to project-based development guided by these principles. They also had little baggage from previous practices: as a new country, they could develop e-government with a clean slate. "One of the main things isn't introducing ICT but changing procedures and rules, and we were quite fortunate to do so because there wasn't much resistance."

Tallo noted the importance of Project Tiger Leap, an initiative started in 1996 to connect all Estonian computers to the Internet. They completed the task in 1999, one of the first countries in the world to do so. Estonia also managed to connect all local governments by 2001, and all libraries by 2002. Meanwhile, a private sector initiative called Look@World has worked to promote the information society to the general public. The program taught basic Internet use to 100,000 Estonians - 10% of the population - over the course of two years. "Of course the companies weren't just there for good will - they benefited a lot," he said. "The public started using e-banking and other services, saving companies a lot of money."

"Five years ago, Estonia introduced what was called the e-cabinet," he said. "It wasn't really difficult to put flat-screen computers in the ministers' meeting room; it was a bit harder to get the ministers to use them." But the program has made decision-making at the ministerial level much more transparent. "Our ministers now tend to participate in cabinet meetings even when they're not physically there.... Other countries at the time said we couldn't do it, but we were a new country, so we didn't know, so we just went ahead and did it."

"The cabinet meetings start at 10am; the first decisions are published online by 10:15," he continued. "So it's a rather convenient tool for the public, not just for the government."

"Introducing ICT is also having an impact on corruption... There is now much less corruption, and the most successful of Central and Eastern European countries in terms of transparency."

Meanwhile, Estonia will be the first country to offer nation-wide offsite e-voting, later this year. "Anyone with a national ID smart card and a card reader will be able to vote wherever they may have Internet access," Tallo said. They've also launched a website, http://tom.riik.ee, called I Decide Today. The site allows the public to file official requests for new policies or legislation. If their recommendation gets rejected, the government is required to give a formal explanation why they made that decision. For example, Estonia never had daylight savings time, because it is so far north. But the public proposed it for a variety of reasons and it was adopted.

Posted by acarvin at 2:55 AM | TrackBack

A Pleasant Surprise at the GCC E-Gov Conference

We've just begun the second day of the GCC e-government conference. The first speaker of the day, a representative from Cisco's regional office, is now presenting.

I've been pleasantly surprised by the number of speakers who have addressed the digital divide in their presentations. About 75% of the dozen speakers so far have addressed the issue in one form or another. James Jarrett of Intel discussed government-assisted access programs around the world, from Brazil's PC Conectado program to a new initiative in Saudi Arabia to expand at-home computer access over the next five years.

I was particularly interested in Rehab Lootah's presentation about Dubai's e-government strategy. She talked about a new eCitizen certification initiative. Working with the ICT training company New Horizons, Dubai is offering a reduced-cost ICT training course for local residents. The full course includes two hours of basic PC training, two hours of Internet fundamentals, another two hours of email fundamentals, then 10 hours of online services training, focusing specifically on e-government. The 10-hour section of the course shows how to use Dubai's e-gov portals for registering new vehicles, renewing health cards, getting entry permits for friends and family, bill payments and other services. Graduates of the course are given access to a smart card that allows them to get discounts for various goods and services across the city. They've even started publishing a local e-gov journal for the general public entitled "e4all" -- a name that resonated quite well with me considering my own work on e-government for all, which I'll be talking about at the conference later today.

Sad news to report, though: the Kuwaiti gentleman who had a heart attack during the morning conference session yesterday passed away en-route to the hospital. People at the event clearly seem rather introspective because of this; our hearts and prayers are certainly with his family.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 1:27 AM | TrackBack

A Night of Good Food and Bellydancing

After the end of the first day of the conference, a small group of us joined Datamatix founder Ali al Kamali for dinner at the Rotana Al Bustan Hotel. We ate at the hotel's fabulous Lebanese restaurant. Within a few moments of sitting down, the table was filled with a fine collection of Lebanese mezes, small platters similar to Spanish tapas. A waiter walked around the table, serving us fresh scoops of tabouli on our plates; otherwise we got to pick and choose from the selection on the table. Some of my favorite mezes were served, including shashlik (a very sour Lebanese cheese) and moujadara, a lentil and roasted onion dish.

The group of us included people from Singapore, the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Canada and Estonia (my online colleague Ivar Tallo from the Estonian E-Governance Academy - the first time we'd met in person). Everyone seemed to enjoy the mezes, which we ate for almost two hours. I particularly enjoyed getting to know our Saudi Arabian colleagues -- a father and daughter, both PhDs. Everyone was very open about talking about all sorts of issues, including religion and politics, so it was quite an enlightening conversation.

Just as I finished my last bite of hummus, a waiter went around the table again; I assumed he was taking orders for coffee or tea. I was quite wrong.

"Would you prefer the mixed grill or the seafood grill for your entree?" he asked.

I thought he was joking. But he was serious. The mezes were indeed appetizers, not the meal itself. James, my colleague from the Singapore, seemed just as shaken as I was when he realized we had a whole meal still coming our way.

Fortunately, we somehow managed to eat the entrees. I had the seafood grill, which included delicious samples of lobster, shrimp and a grilled white fish. Dessert was much harder to polish off; the waiter brought over enormous trays of fruit, accompanied by plates of Lebanese pastries, figs soaked in honey and rosewater, and a camel milk pudding.

Around 11pm, as we finished our meal, a Lebanese pop band performed at a bone-shattering, passenger-jet volume. They were soon joined by a belly dancer from Brazil, who left no doubt in anyone's mind that she'd been, shall we say, artificially enhanced. Mercifully, she didn't pull anyone from the audience onto the stage with her, though a middle-aged businessman in the crowd kept approaching her with cash, perhaps in the hope of her doing so.

"Do you have belly dancers in Saudi Arabia?" one of us asked our colleagues.

"No, her head would have been chopped off before the end of the first song," they replied.

Posted by acarvin at 1:09 AM | TrackBack

May 21, 2005

Governments, Posterity and the Restaurant Business

Jens Mortensen of Oracle is now talking about challenges faced by e-government initiatives, particularly a lack of use by the public and a lack of smart interface design. He said it's not surprising that governments don't get it right the first time around: "The government is often like a restaurant that closes at lunch and dinnertime," he said.

Meanwhile, he told a story about finding the perfect handheld device. He said he spent several years searching for a mobile, handheld tool that would capture his thoughts, not lose power at inopportune moments, and preserve information in a permanent, interoperable way that would allow his daughter to read his ideas 20 years from now. His solution: a small moleskin notepad. Perhaps not the answer the audience wanted to hear, but it got a chuckle from the crowd.

Posted by acarvin at 5:20 AM | TrackBack

Conference Delayed by Apparent Heart Attack

The noon session of the GCC E-Government Conference broke up in dramatic fashion today when an attendee fell out of his chair and collapsed onto the floor. At first it appeared he was having an asthma attack, but before long an emergency response team was perfoming CPR on him.

About five minutes ago he was wheeled out of the conference center at lightning speed into an ambulance. There's still no word on who he is or his condition, but from the grave anxiousness of the emergency workers, I'm quite worried for him.

Ali Al Kamali of Datamatix just talked about the situation; he said that an ambulance was called for him at 12:26 but traffic prevented it from getting here for more than 30 minutes. The conference moderator was gracious enough to request a moment of prayer from the audience, but just as the crowd bowed its heads in silent reflection, someone's mobile phone went off, playing the creepy theme from The Exorcist. Hopefully most of the people here did not make the connection with the movie. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 5:05 AM | TrackBack

Barriers to E-Government

We've just heard from Ms. Rehab Lootah, Senior Business Manager of Dubai's e-government initiative, who talked about Dubai's newest programs to improve e-government access. They hope to reach half of the public by 2007. Meanwhile, Ali Al Kamali of Datamatix talked about a recent survey they conducted of regional policymakers. When asked about barriers to e-government, respondants were somewhat concerned about a lack of equitable Internet access; interestingly, they were much more concerned about a lack of ICT literacy skills by the public, as well as a lack of understanding about e-gov by fellow policymakers.

Now, Intel VP James Jarrett is speaking about digital cities, particularly those that are using mobile and wi-fi for e-gov applications, like automatic car parking meters. I'm recording the presentation in case it's worth podcasting later. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 1:53 AM | TrackBack

Opening of GCC E-Government Conference

It's 9am here in Dubai and the first full day of the GCC E-Government conference is about to get under way. There are probably several hundred people here, mostly from the Arabian Gulf, with several dozen oversees visitors. The wi-fi in the plenary room is strong, but there are no electrical outlets in sight, so I will have to use my laptop sparingly lest my power run out too early in the day. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 1:20 AM | TrackBack

May 20, 2005

Dinner at the Burj Al-Arab

I've just returned from dinner at the Burj Al-Arab Hotel. Billed as one of the world's only seven-star hotels (though in reality it's just a five star), the Burj is the tallest and one of the most luxurious hotels in the world. It's shaped like a giant sail, located on a man-made island off the Dubai shoreline. Visitors are usually charged an arm and a leg just to look around, so instead I decided to just have dinner at the buffet.

The hotel was indeed gorgeous; I'll have to post some pictures later. The food was excellent as well -- the buffet had rack of lamb, lobster, king crab legs and a host of other sumptious dishes. It was well worth the expense (the buffet was around $70). My only complaint was that there were children running around everywhere; parents were letting them play hide and go seek behind my table, and when the kids wanted to be seen, they'd jump from behind the table and screamed. No one seemed to care. I don't know about you, but if I'm gonna go out of my way and put down my hard-earned money for a really nice meal, I don't want to feel like I'm eating at a Howard Johnsons across from a Kissimmee motel near Disneyworld.

Anyway, lots to write about, but lots to do to get ready for the conference tomorrow. More stories about today later.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 1:39 PM | TrackBack

Riding the Creek

A short video of an abra water taxi in Dubai. Sorry about the video being shaky -- I was riding a boat at the time as well. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 11:02 AM | TrackBack

A Rather Spicy Video from Dubai

Here's that video clip from the Dubai Spice Bazaar. I hope it works this time - I'm not particularly confident in the way my new camera records quicktime files. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 11:00 AM | TrackBack

Dubai Spice Bazaar Podcast

I finally managed to upload that podcast I recorded this morning in the Dubai Spice Bazaar. I'll also try to upload a video clip if I can. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 10:55 AM | TrackBack

Shishacasting from Dubai

I still haven't had any luck uploading audio files from my computer, but I was able to give Audioblogger.com a call and record this podcast -- or perhaps more accurately, shishacast, since I was sitting at a cafe smoking an apple tobacco shisha. The audio quality isn't bad; you can even here the water pipe gurgling.

Meanwhile, here's a really bad self-portrait I took with my phone while at the cafe.

Posted by acarvin at 9:57 AM | TrackBack

Podcast Frustrations

I'm having a heck of a time trying to get podcasts to work from Dubai. Early this morning I recorded a podcast interviewing a spice vendor in Dubai's spice market. The only problem is that the Internet access at my hotel will not allow any type of uploading. My ftp software doesn't work; nor can I post it on the Ourmedia website or on DDN. I'm not sure how to get around the problem; if I can't, I'm pretty much screwed until I get home, apart from any podcasts I post from my phone, which would get rather expensive. Hopefully the conference will have more liberal Internet access and I'll be able to upload audio and video from there...

ac

Posted by acarvin at 4:38 AM | TrackBack

Arrival in Dubai

My plane arrived in Dubai a few minutes before 10pm local time. The pilot said the current temperature was around 35 degrees - 90+ for us Americans. I expected to be greeted by a rush of oven-hot air as I stepped off the plane, but instead I was met by a gale of icy wind. I'd forgotten that Dubai was the Magical Land of Ubiquitous Air Conditioning; wherever you went, as long as it was indoors, you'd be blasted by the coldest AC you'd ever experienced. (I'm actually sitting in a cafe right now drinking the coldest Diet Coke I've ever been served -- so cold you'd think it should be slush.)

I followed the crowd of travelers as we weaved through the enormous airport, up and down grand escalators and along endless moving walkways, passing sign after sign touting the latest smartphone or flat-panel TV. Immigration and customs was easy; the only question they asked me was whether my flight came directly from the US or through Europe. And to top it all off, my suit bag was waiting on the carousel when I arrived to pick it up.

Outside customs, I went to the Avis rental car desk and informed them that I'd arrived. Avis apparently had a drop-off service with my hotel. Soon, I followed one of the staff outside, where I nearly got knocked over by the blast of hot air waiting for me in the parking lot. At the edge of the lot, an Emirati pulled over in a minivan, inviting me inside. When he opened the door, the van was pulsing with the THUMP-THUMP-THUMP of an electronica CD. Once I got in, he turned down the music to manageable levels.

While the music felt more like a Berlin disco, the scenery outside the van was pure Dubai: flat, open space with construction everywhere; enormous billboards for a range of high tech, luxury resorts and investment opportunities; 21st century highrise architecture dotting the city's Miracle Mile.

We zoomed along the highway until we got a few blocks from the hotel, then traffic crawled to a halt.

"Bad traffic because of the holiday tomorrow," the driver said.

"What holiday is it?" I asked.

"It's Friday."

"Oh yes, of course."

"Everyone wants to get home and get off the road to begin their weekend."

I finally arrived at the Rotana Towers Hotel around 11pm. Check-in was quick, which was merciful, since I was desparate to crash for the evening. I'd only slept one or two hours in the last day and a half, so I was more than ready to drop my bags and fall asleep as soon as possible.

Posted by acarvin at 4:11 AM | TrackBack

May 19, 2005

Chillin' at CDG

It's 11am here in Paris at Charles de Gaulle airport. I didn't have any luck getting upgraded to business class, but Air France coach class is pretty good nonetheless. I think I slept a couple of hours, though it took a long time to sleep, even though I'm still on European time from my trip to Budapest.

If all goes well, we'll be boarding the flight to Dubai in about 90 minutes. From there, it'll be a seven-hour flight. Good thing I brought a book.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 4:53 AM | TrackBack

May 18, 2005

Carousel Ride

A video clip of children riding a small wooden carousel in Szentendre, Hungary.

Posted by acarvin at 3:22 PM | TrackBack

Hungarian Bakery

A video clip of a traditional bakery in Szentendre, Hungary.

Posted by acarvin at 3:21 PM | Comments (2) | TrackBack

Andy the Would-Be Photojournalist

I was just perusing Gaspar Mátyás' blog and I noticed a picture he took of me at the telecottage in Sárszentlorinc, Hungary last Friday. The funny thing about the picture is it shows me taking a picture that I featured on the blog last week. Here are the two pictures in case you want to compare them. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 2:43 PM | TrackBack

Off to Dubai

Dubai Creek, photographed during my October 2003 trip to Dubai

I've been back home in the US for less than 48 hours, yet it's already time for me to head back to the airport, catch yet another Air France flight to Paris, and travel to Dubai, where I'll be speaking at the GCC E-Government Conference. I'll be speaking about my research on E-Government for All: the notion that e-government services must be accessible to all people if they are going to be successful.

Some people have asked why I bothered to come home for 48 hours when I could have just stayed in Paris for a couple of nights. I'd wanted to do just that, but since both trips were organized by different institutions and different travel agents, we could get them to jive well. Also, even if I'm only home for 48 hours, when you travel a lot, I'll take whatever time I can get with Susanne and the boys.

Anyway, if all goes well I'll arrive in Dubai tomorrow night local time. There should be plenty of Internet access at the hotel and the conference, so I'll post updates whenever I can.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 2:28 PM | TrackBack

Szentendre by Day, Budapest by Night

Old Windmill at Szentendre's Open Air Museum

Sunday was my final full day in Hungary, and it began with a steady drizzle. I'd made plans with Mátyás and his wife Marika to meet them by the Great Synagogue at 10:30am for a day-trip to Szentendre. The only problem was that if the rain persisted, we might have to call off the excursion, as Szentendre was the kind of place where you'd want to spend most of your time outside. So I crossed my fingers after finishing breakfast at the hotel, hailed a taxi, and left the Buda hills for the heart of Pest.

The drizzle came and went as we drove through the city; by the time I stepped out of the taxi, the drizzle picked up somewhat. It didn't bode well for a day trip. But as I stood in front of the Great Synagogue with a sizable crowd of American, Israeli and Italian tourists, the rain let up. I folded up my umbrella just as the security guard unlocked the gate and started checking people's bags before entry.

Inside the gate, I joined a second queue, this time to buy a ticket. A group of elderly women with New York accents were at the ticket booth, debating whether they wanted to spend the five dollars to enter the synagogue. "We've seen it from the outside; we're going back to the car," one of them said, leaving just one of them to buy an entry ticket.

With my ticket in hand, I went to the door of the main hall. A Hungarian man wearing a yarmulke handed me one and said, "The sign says no pictures, but it's no problem; just leave a small donation when you leave and all will be fine." I thanked him for the advice, then went inside.

Interior of Budapest's Great Synagogue

The interior of the synagogue was as stunning and awe-inspiring as any cathedral I'd ever visited. The ceiling appeared to be 100 feet up, and was decorated with ornate wooden paneling in the form of geometric shapes. Similar to a cathedral, there was a long, central corridor, flanked by columns and adjacent corridors on each side. The central corridor was open all the way to the ceiling, while the side corridors each had two additional levels, their railings and columns made of a much darker, but equally gorgeous wood. Arches along the ceiling of the central aisle gave the illusion of the space getting smaller and smaller, but in reality, the arches didn't shrink until they were nearly on top of the altar, producing a cascading effect. Two enormous chandeliers hung along the center aisle, its decorated with globe-like white lights.

I walked slowly down the aisle, marveling at the space around me. I'd sometimes mused on trips to cathedrals that we Jews must not be very ambitious architects, because even the remaining historical synagogues of Europe tend to be rather modest. But the Great Synagogues dashed away that idea from my head. Here was a grand, inspiring space that must have been the pearl of Central Europe when it opened in the mid-1800s. Thankfully, actor Tony Curtis and others worked very hard to raise money to restore it after the fall of communism.

Approaching the altar, I found myself among a group of a dozen or so tourists who were sitting in the pews, contemplating the synagogue. I sat for a few minutes but was restless; I wanted to explore every nook and cranny of this glorious space. I walked the length of the synagogue several times until I'd had a chance to traverse each aisle. I would pause and stare at the sides of the synagogue, every inch decorated as meticulously as the rest. How extraordinary it would have been to go to services here. Unfortunately, the timing of my telecottage tours made that impossible; I'd simply have to come back another time, which I promised I would do at some point again.

Eventually, it was time to rendezvous with Mátyás and Marika. Their car was waiting across the street from the synagogue; Mátyás was standing outside, the wireless earpiece for his mobile phone firmly planted in his ear.

"If you would like I can offer you the front seat," he joked, recalling my queasy trip through the Hungarian countryside.

"I don't think that'll be necessary," I replied while opening the door to the back seat. "No palinka yesterday - only good Hungarian wine."

With Marika driving, we drove over the Szechenyi chain bridge and through Buda, turning north towards Szentendre. Mátyás pointed out various sites along the way, including the largest apartment block in Central Europe -- the pride and joy of Soviet-era architects, I'm sure -- and the Roman ruins of Aquincum, which included the foundations of many buildings and remnants of an ancient aqueduct.

Man in traditional costume, Szentenre

The drive to Szentendre didn't take long; we probably reached the town in 30 minutes. Located north of Budapest in the Danube Bend, just south of the Slovak border, Szentendre was famous for its world-class collection of Orthodox churches, built by the local Serbian population that had called the village home for much of the last six centuries. It was also home to Hungary's open air ethnographic museum, featuring acre upon acre of historic buildings from around the country. Mátyás suggested we go to the open air museum first, then the town itself, so we could be back in Budapest by late afternoon. That would also give me time to explore the capital one last time before going home to Boston.

We arrived at the museum just after 11am; we were forced to park in a secondary lot because the main lot was already full. That had me worried that the museum would be crawling with tourists. Amazingly, when we got inside it felt like it was just sparsely populated: the museum covered so many acres of space - approximately 100 acres in all -you could spread out thousands of visitors and scantly notice their presence.

With a couple of museum maps in hand, we went clockwise around the park. The first building we reached was actually a restaurant disguised as a historic building; Mátyás bought two large slices of strudel, one apple and the other sour cherry, for us to split on a park bench. We bought it from a baker who had conscripted his three granddaughters to handle the customers.

"This is a good place for eating," Mátyás said. "A little here, a little there and soon it will be lunch."

Our new friends from the Socialist party pose with Mátyás

Wiping the crumbs from my face, we left the benches and entered a building used for dyeing cloth. The long, L-shaped building had a sizable courtyard, with a series of rooms used for various parts of the dyeing process. While the docent explained the process to us, a group of elderly men came over and joined in, each of them offering comments. They spoke Hungarian with Mátyás, and after a while they struck up a conversation with him, during which I could make out my name as well as the Hungarian word for blog: Naplo.

"They're members of the socialist party, the current ruling party in Hungary," Mátyás said. "They're out of a social outing, and wanted to know why you were visiting, so I told them about your telecottage visits and your blog." Simultaneously, the men handed Mátyás business cards so he could write www.andycarvin.com on them so they could check out my impressions of Hungary. When Mátyás spelled it out loud, he said my name as "Andi Tsarvin," which would have been the Magyar way of pronouncing the letters. In return, the men gave me a Socialist Party pin and a pen from the Netherlands as souvenirs of our encounter.

Next, we wandered over to the tannery. The gentlemen from the socialist party were there as well, now talking to Marika. "It turns out they know of each other," Mátyás said. "Their families were in the tanning business many years ago." With the group chatted, I explored the rooms of the tannery, trying to stay shaded whenever possible. The temperature was well over 70 degrees now, and I'd neglected to dress in shorts or a t-shirt. I worried I'd be a sweaty mess by the time I left; fortunately I had a bottle of mineral water to help me get through the heat.

Mátyás and I struck up a conversation about getting a cup of coffee. He said we may have to walk around a bit before we found some, though. "Americans are lucky because they live in a country where they can find whatever it is they want very, very quickly," Mátyás observed.

"It's all about convenience; we're masters of convenience," I said. "But the flip side to that is that Americans often make cranky travelers. They go to a place that doesn't have exactly what they need or the fastest customer service, and they act like it's the end of the world. It's the classic Ugly American stereotype, and it's all about suffering from a lack of convenience in an unfamiliar place."

Farmer's cottage, Szentendre

Just beyond the tannery, we found a farmhouse that sold traditional handicrafts. As I looked at some of the pottery on display outside, I heard Mátyás call my name. He was pointing to a small sign outside the craft shop; the sign had an arrow pointing inside with the Hungarian word for coffee, kave, above it.

"Andy, look," he said, smiling broadly. "Convenience!"

Inside the shop, we found a fine collection of crafts from all over Hungary, particularly wooden toys and ceramics. Mátyás ordered us coffees while playing with a wooden door knocker. He handed two of them to the cashier as we waited for the coffee.

"A gift to Susanne," he said, "in case she ever needs to get your attention."

Soon, the cashier procured three cups of coffees, in thin plastic cups not much larger than a shot glass. They were filled to the brim with thick Hungarian coffee -- I'd be tempted to describe it as Turkish coffee but that might be frowned upon here -- and I worried I would scorch my hand carrying it outside. I walked to a bench gingerly and joined Mátyás, sipping away and enjoying the sunshine, as Marika continued to chat with the cashier.

Adjacent to the crafts shop we found the bakery. I spent a while shooting photos and video of bakers shoving huge pans into a wood oven, each pan containing half a dozen loaves of dough waiting to bake into gloriously fresh bread. When I turned around, Mátyás and Marika were standing there with the largest pretzels I'd ever since. Mátyás handed me one of them: "Here is your lunch," he said.

We walked a little while and found a shady bench near an old chapel. The pretzel was soft and flaky, not the chewy, thick pretzel that I was used to at home. And rather than being coated with course salt, it was drizzled with heavily salted cheese. The combination gave the illusion of eating a pretzel-shaped pizza, sans the tomato sauce.

For the next hour or so, we wandered throughout the park, visiting a series of historic buildings from the 18th, 19th and early 20th centuries. There were peasant houses that fit several generations of family members under one small roof, while across the way we would find relatively sprawling villas own by wealthy merchants. Each one was decorated with period furniture and implements, including books, chairs, wood stoves, ceramics, cutlery and religious art.

"Andy, come see this," Mátyás said. "I have a friend who has a very old house; it is decorated exactly like this, all the furniture and pieces in the exact same places. Marvelous, marvelous...."

Outside one of the houses I spotted a large wooden pole, with another pole connected to it on a hinge, like a medieval crane. I'd actually seen many of them as we drove through rural Hungary, each one of them close to a well.

"Is this for lifting water out of the well?" I asked.

"Yes, they're still in use," Mátyás replied. Meanwhile, an airplane flew high overhead, leaving a contrail at roughly the same angle as the spar connected to the well pole.

"That makes a good picture," Mátyás replied, laughing to himself. "Old technology, new technology: perfect for your book."

One of the last buildings we visited was an old school house. In one room, we found the teacher's residence, complete with a collection of 19th century newspapers and magazines; in the other room we found the classroom itself, where several benches were set up with hand-sized writing tablets. "Look at those," Mátyás exclaimed. "Marvelous, marvelous."

"They were the laptops of their time," I quipped, smirking.

We'd reached the far end of the park at this point. The three of us cut through some farm houses and headed downhill, towards a massive stone windmill. First, we passed through what I think must have been the only working farmhouse at the museum. There were stables of horses, as well as a series of large pens, each housing cows, goats, sheep and other farm fauna. Children and adults alike were crouched along the edges of the pen, happily feeding clumps of hay and fresh grass to even happier groups of goats, while lambs frolicked playfully in the background.

We now reached the windmill. It was even bigger up close, a giant stone monolith with wings the size of sails. Mátyás suggested we go inside, which sounded like a great idea since I'd never actually been in a windmill before. It was hard to appreciate much, though, as it was packed rather claustrophobically with tourists, and I couldn't really make out what the docent was saying. Meanwhile, Mátyás pointed to a row of wooden shoes along the wall. "Wood shoes, windmills -- they're not just Dutch, you know," he said.

Outside, Mátyás pointed to a series of large ropes and poles that reached up to the wings of the windmill. "Do you know what those are for?" he asked me.

"No, I can't venture a guess."

"They're for steering the wind. Since you can't move the windmill itself when the wind blows from a new direction, you can rotate the wings like sails to catch the air."

Heading towards the far end of the park, we cut through an employee parking lot where we found a convenient bathroom - perhaps the only one in the park that didn't charge 100 forints for privilege to go to the privy. We then hiked through the park's amphitheatre and past the ruined foundation of a Roman villa to the museum's crafts bazaar. By this point I wanted to strip off my clothes; hiking along the open plain with the sun bearing down on us, it felt much hotter than it probably was.

The crafts bazaar was crowded with shoppers exploring several dozen kiosks of handicraft vendors and food stalls. We made a loop through bazaar, checking out fine collections of woodworking, ceramics, wool goods, leather and Hungarian chotchkes of all imaginable styles. There was also a lot of traditional village clothing for sale.

"You could buy this for yourself, and maybe that for Susanne," Mátyás said, pointing to costumes decorated with male and female villager costumes. "But today the clothing is political," he continued. "If you wear it, you are making a statement, that you are traditional, a nationalist."

A girl rides the carousel

After making a complete circle around the bazaar, Mátyás plopped himself in the grass while Marika continued to browse. I was getting thirsty, so I wandered off to buy a drink and take some pictures. Before getting in line for a bottle of water, I discovered small village carousel; a wooden contraption powered by a hand crank, the carousel spun around a small group of young children sitting on planks suspended by ropes. Just to the right, not far from the food tents, enormous cauldrons simmered under wood fires. I leaned over to see what was cooking and found gallons of gulyas (goulash) in one and fisherman's stew in the other. The aromas brought me back to the villages we'd visited just a couple of days ago and the friendly people we'd met along the way.

With my new bottle of water in hand, we regrouped and headed back to the car, weaving through groups of tourists streaming into the park. We then drove into town, parking in a lot about a block away from the Danube. The three of us strolled towards the center of Szentendre, past a variety of shops, many of which seemed to sell either antiques or ice cream. Mátyás then reached a doorway and motioned that we should go in.

"Do you know marcipan?" he asked.

"Oh, marzipan, sure," I replied.

"This is a marcipan museum," he continued. "Come and see." Meanwhile, Marika rolled her eyes and stayed outside, getting in line for an ice cream across the street.

"She does not like the place," Mátyás said as we paid the entrance fee. "But I think you will like this."

On the first floor, we found a marzipan chef making a series of animal characters behind a glass window; several young girls pressed their faces against the glass, watching the chef put together rows of sheep, owls, cats and other sugery creatures.

Michael Jackson in Marzipan

Matyas then directed me to go upstairs, which I thought would be about the history and gastronomy of marzipan. Instead, we entered a surreal universe -- a marzipan art museum. First, we were treated to a fine collection of marzipan creatures shaped like the entire cast of the Muppet Show.

"This is crazy," I said, laughing at what I was seeing.

"Oh, it gets even better," Mátyás replied, a big smile on his face.

Indeed, the museum got better -- better in the kitschiest way imaginable. In one room, we marveled at a marzipan portrait of Princess Diana. Further along, in the Hungarian heritage room, were life-sized busts of famous Hungarian kings and national heroes. There was even a full-sized standing marzipan statue of King Mátyás Corvinus. The best of all, though, was a life-sized statue of none other than Michael Jackson. Like the Lady Di portrait, the Wacko Jacko statue felt as if it had been entered into a junior high school art contest -- and received only an honorable mention. I couldn't stop laughing; I snapped a picture on my camera phone and immediately emailed it to Susanne and my brother.

Szentendre's main square

Leaving the museum, we walked towards the heart of the town. To the left, I could see the St. Peter and Paul Church, used by the local Croatian Catholic community. Beyond that, we reached Fo Ter, the main town square. It was teaming with tourists crowding into every shop, along the public fountain, in line to visit the beautiful Serbian Blagovestenska Church. In some ways it was a bit of a turn-off, but the village's charm still shined through the masses of people.

We hiked a few short blocks from the main square; the crowd thinned out to a trickle. Matyas pointed to a Star of David in front of one building; he said it was a memorial to the town's former Jewish community.

We entered the memorial; a modest courtyard hosted a series of marble plaques listing the names of Szentendre Jews killed during the holocaust. Across the courtyard was a triangular shaped room, no larger than a dining room. Several rows of wood pews pointed to an altar, behind which a gated enclosure housed a Torah. Approximately 250 Jews lived in Szentendre before the war; by the time it was over, they had all died or left. Since then, the city decided to build this memorial, which was consecrated by the Chief Rabbi of Hungary as a synagogue, making it both the first synagogue built in Hungary after the Holocaust as well as the smallest synagogue in the world. Currently, there are no Jews in Szentendre, but the city has promised it would donate a house to a rabbi if he would move to Szentendre and bring at least one Jewish family with him. It was a very somber experience.

With much to contemplate, we wandered the back streets of Szentendre, soaking up the atmosphere while avoiding most of the tourists. But much of the action was nearer to the center of town, so we braved the crowds to explore various shops and art galleries. In one gallery, we saw a fine collection of Salvador Dali prints; in a shop down the street, I bought two bags of crushed paprika, one sweet and one hot, and a bottle of soda. We also sat along a stone wall by the Danube, enjoying the view of the river as it flowed gracefully towards Budapest.

The three of us walked through the central square on our way back to the car, window shopping along the way. At one point I opened my bottle of soda to take another sip, and it exploded all over me. To my horror, I saw streams of carbonated liquid pour into my newly purchased bag of paprika. I scrambled to save my private spice horde, but one of the bags had already gotten wet. To make matters worse, it was the one bag that wasn't waterproof; I could see the light beige sack cloth turn dark red as the soda soaked up some of the spice. We did our best to pad it down with Kleenexes; meanwhile, I had to pour what was left of my old water bottle all over my hands to get rid of the stickiness. It was an unfortunate wrinkle at the end of what was otherwise a great day trip.

Mátyás, Marika and I drove back to Budapest, where they offered to drop me off at the end of the chain bridge, near the funicular that went to the top of Castle Hill. I said my goodbyes to both Marika and Mátyás, who had been extraordinarily gracious and generous hosts. As they drove off, I got in line for the funicular, which cost 600 forints to go up, but only 450 to go down. Still, at three bucks for a ride up several hundred feet of cliff, it was well worth the minor expense. The ride up the funicular afforded me with a wonderful view of the chain bridge, at the end of which sat a palace now used as the Four Seasons Hotel.

Exiting the funicular, I found myself by the palace, just a stone's throw from Corvinus Gate, the Habsburg Steps and the giant raven statue. From there, I walked past the presidential palace towards Mátyás Church. I planned to visit it before it closed at 5pm, but to my surprise, I discovered that the church had closed earlier than usual, at 4pm. So I decided to explore the neighborhoods around Castle Hill, weaving in and out of the small side streets that most tourists neglected. There were very few people around except locals going about their business, so the walk was quite relaxing.

A singer performs at the Lutheran church

Near Vienna Gate, I passed an old Lutheran church. Inside, I heard a pipe organ and people singing. I went inside and discovered a choir rehearsing a concert they would give that night. They were high above the pews, in the balcony where the pipe organ was located. About half a dozen people were sitting in the pews towards the altar, watching the rehearsal. I walked down the aisle and found a spot with a good view, then spent the next 30 minutes watching them practice. As a conductor stood immediately in front of the organ, around a dozen singers belted out a Hungarian hallelujah chorus, with several instruments backing them up, including a double bass, violins, woodwinds and the organ.

By the time I left the rehearsal, most of the small museums in the neighborhood were closed for the day. So I decided to go back one more time to the wine tasting museum for a round of tastings. It appeared to be a different set of wines for tasting today, which was what I was hoping for. Unfortunately, there were lots of very dry wines that irritated my throat, which was sore from all the talking I'd been doing all week. Fortunately, there were several sweet Tokaj wines that were quite soothing, so my tasting ended on a nice note.

A view of the Szechenyi Chain Bridge and Pest

Leaving the wine museum, I walked back to the Habsburg steps and followed them down a path that went all the way down the hillside towards the Danube. I snaked back and forth along the paths, overtaken by a group of mountain bikers who were whizzing down the hillside, including its many marble steps. At the bottom of the hill, I found myself at the roundabout in front of the Szechenyi chain bridge. I strolled across the bridge, stopping every minute or so to take another picture from another angle. The view from the bridge was spectacular, with Castle Hill to my left, the Danube straight ahead, and parliament to my right. I'd have to come back after dark tonight and take more pictures.

After crossing into Pest, I made a brief pit stop at the Four Seasons hotel. It was a gorgeous hotel located at the foot of the chain bridge -- talk about premium real estate. I then walked over towards St. Stephen's Basilica, a gorgeous, imposing church that dominates a wide square a few blocks east of the Danube. The church itself was closed by now, but that was okay; sitting on a bench and soaking up the atmosphere was perfectly fine by me.

By now it was approaching 8pm; I walked a few blocks and found a hip Hungarian restaurant called Mocha. I wasn't extraordinarily hungry, so I ordered a bowl of gulyas and a salmon salad. The guylas was the hottest dish I'd tasted in Hungary, which is saying a hell of a lot. The salmon salad was really nice -- a balsamic dressing with small chunks of grilled salmon, drizzled with scoops of salmon roe. The waiter seemed disappointed when I ordered a ginger ale, though, given their enormous wine menu. But I figured I'd had my allotment of Hungarian wine for the day at the tasting that afternoon, so ginger ale seemed quite reasonable.

A nightime view of Castle Hill

By 9:30 or so, I was getting a little tired and my feet were killing me, but nonetheless I made myself walk across the chain bridge again. It was well worth it: the bridge, palace and surrounding buildings were awash in floodlights, truly a magnificent spectacle. Though my camera batteries were dying, I took out my tripod and set up my camera in at least half a dozen locations, taking pictures at a variety of settings. I managed to get several dozen shots before the camera finally gave out on me, signaling that it was time to hail a taxi, return to the hotel and pack up for my return to Boston the next morning. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 12:11 PM | TrackBack

May 17, 2005

Hungarian Farm Video 1: Milk Cows

Last Friday I got to visit a small family farm in the Hungarian village of Gyorkony. Here is a video clip of one of the farmers herding cows into a pen to milk them.

Posted by acarvin at 4:05 PM | TrackBack

Hungarian Farm Video 2: The Ostrich Dances

After meeting the cows at the farm in Gyorkony -- and tasting some fresh milk -- I got to visit their pen of ostriches. This is a video of the male ostrich dancing to show us who's boss. As you can see in the video or the picture below, the ostrich drops to the ground and sways back and forth. It was really wild seeing an ostrich do this in person. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 4:05 PM | TrackBack

Swing Kids

During my visit to the Hungarian village of Csakbereny, I encountered a group of kids playing on a swing set. Here's a video clip.

Posted by acarvin at 4:05 PM | TrackBack

May 16, 2005

Saturday in Budapest

I had a good night sleep at the house we stayed at in Gyorkorny; it was pleasantly cool at night, and I slept soundly knowing that Mátyás was being kept company by the many pictures of pirate-garbed Orlando Bloom and Johnny Depp covering the walls of his room. We had a breakfast of scrambled eggs, fresh bread and strong coffee. Mátyás and Eva chatted with the owners of the house and their daughter, who was also named Eva.

The three of us hit the road at 8:30. I was feeling much better than the day before, but just in case, Eva was kind enough to offer me the front seat. Since the drive went without incident, it must have been good preventative medicine. We drove north through the pretty Hungarian countryside, past hedgerows blooming with lilacs, and blossoming yellow fields of canola -- Mátyás said that vegetable oil is a big business here. Just after 10am, I started to recognize the surroundings, particularly the huge Ikea near the highway. We were back in Budaors, which meant we'd be back in Budapest in a matter of minutes. Indeed, by 10:30am, I was at my new hotel, the Charles Hotel, in the southern section of Buda, about a five minute drive southwest of Castle Hill.

While Mátyás had plans for the day, Eva offered to join me for an outing in Budapest. We agreed to meet at noon, which would give each of us a little free time first. I caught up on email and blogging, plus a quick shower, then met Eva at the appointed time. She suggested be begin the day by visiting Castle Hill, followed by City Park. By then, it would be early evening, and we could go to the opera if we were interested. Eva said she called the opera and there were plenty of tickets available for that night's performance of Leos Janacek's Jenufa. I was familiar with Janacek (some of pieces shared a CD of Bela Bartok's Miraculous Mandarin, which I had uploaded to my iPod prior to the trip). I didn't know this particular opera, but it still sounded like a fun way to wrap up the evening.

Eva drove us a little way up the western slope of Castle Hill. A veritable acropolis on the left bank of the Danube, it wasn't possible for the car to go all the way to the top. So we parked on a shady residential street then hiked up a steep row of stone steps, through the western stone ramparts. Within a few minutes, we reached the top of the hill. Considering the area was a UNESCO World Heritage Site, I was surprised that the area was still residential. But as we walked a couple of blocks east, we soon reached Szentharomsag Ter, perhaps the most touristed spot in Budapest. This triangular square marked the virtual epicenter of Castle Hill. Ahead and to the left soared the spectacular Mátyás Church, a gothic cathedral with a colorful tiled roof. Straight ahead, I spotted the gleaming white turrets of Fisherman's Bastion, which sports one of the best views of Pest. And not far to the right, beyond the hordes of tour groups, I could just make out the Habsburg royal palace.

I was stunned by the number of tourists. There were thousands of them, just as many as you'd see in St. Mark's Square in Venice. And this wasn't even the summer tourist season yet. It was a bit of a turn-off, but the sites themselves were stunning.

There was a long line to get inside the church, we decided to walk over to the bastion. The whitewashed overlook, with its upside-down ice cream cone-like turrets, look like they should date from medieval times, but they were actually built at the turn of the 20th century as part of Hungary's 1000-year celebration of the founding of the country. (At times I got a little confused when Eva would say, "This was built for the millennium celebration," because I first assumed she meant 2000 rather than the late 1890s.) The bastion was incredibly crowded, but we did find one opening in which we could squeeze ourselves. Indeed, the view was spectacular: from high above Buda, you could gaze down at the Danube and the many historic monuments of Pest, in particular the stunning parliament building. The building look like the US capital if it had been built in a soaring gothic cathedral. You could also see many of the city's bridges, including the famous Szechenyi (SHEH-tsen-ye) Chain Bridge. All the bridges had been blown up by the Germans when they were retreating from the Russians, and it took decades to restore them all to their former glory.

Leaving the Fisherman's Bastion, we walked north a couple of blocks until we reached the Budapest Hilton. Ordinarily I wouldn't mention a Hilton hotel in my journal - not that I have anything against Hiltons - they're just not very noteworthy. But this Hilton was quite extraordinary as it was build around the ruins of a 14th century gothic church. In the back you could see the remnants of its outer nave wall jutting over a hundred feet into the air. The windows of the hotel reflected the remains brilliantly.

Backtracking past the bastion and Mátyás Church, we walked south along Uri Utca towards the palace. We were followed by a group of at least 100 German high school students, whose tour guide directed them along by blowing a whistle every 10 seconds. I wanted to turn around and slug the guy, but instead we just walked a little faster so we wouldn't go deaf from his noisemaking. We past a concert hall with a plaque marking the date of a concert performed by Beethoven in 1800; beyond that, a mansion now used as the presidential palace.

We then reached St George's Square, the entry point to the royal palace. In front of us you could see the palace itself, now home to the national art gallery and two other museums. There was a giant gate to the right, through which you'd have to descend the so-called Habsburg Steps to reach the plaza in front of the palace. Walking to the steps, our view was dominated by an extraordinary statue of a black raven holding a sword -- the symbol of the Hungarian king Mátyás Corvinus.

We descended the steps and walked through the plaza; I felt a spray of water on my face from the giant fountain in the center of the plaza. Eva and I continued through a series of arches into another plaza, where there was a remarkable fountain depicting a hunting scene featuring King Mátyás with a dead stag, his knights and hunting dogs. From there, we walked through the Budapest History Museum to enter the old fortifications on the southern end of the hill. From there we had a fine view of Gellert Hill to the south, with a statue marking the spot where St. Gellert was thrown off a cliff by pagan Hungarians resistant to Christianity. Compared to the chaos of the Fisherman's Bastion, the fort was a peaceful place. There were no more than five or 10 other people wandering around, so the only sounds you could hear were song birds singing in the trees.

Once we were done exploring the fort, we walked north along the western edge of Castle Hill, which afforded us a beautiful view of the Buda Hills. There were numerous Hungarian families strolling around, but otherwise it was very peaceful. Eva pointed to the direction of my hotel, which was obscured by one of the hills to the southwest.

By now it was approaching 2pm, so we decided to look for some lunch. First we continued walking north through the central part of the hill, towards Vienna Gate and the Hungarian National Archives, which had a tiled roof similar to that of Mátyás Church. Most of the buildings here were marked with historical plaques, generally marking events that occurred in the 18th and 19th centuries. They were painted various shades of orange, yellow, and blue, many of them sporting decorative facades or bas-reliefs. We also passed the ruins of a church that had been destroyed during WWII; all that was left of the building was its tower and the arch of the front door, with nothing left in between.

Soon we settled in at a restaurant with an outdoor patio. We took the last available table, next to a Swedish family who let their children run around like little demons, much to the frustration of patrons and staff alike. I ordered a plate of chicken paprikas, and at Eva's suggestion, a bowl of "wine cream" soup. I hadn't heard of wine cream before, so I didn't know what to expect. The waiter then brought me a large bowl of a chilled cream soup flavored with a shocking amount of sweet Tokaj wine. Eva told me the soup is often served at Passover, but she's also seen it as a hot soup for Christmas. Even though the soup was chilled, the Tokaj left me with a warm feeling as I moved to the paprikas. The quarter chicken was drenched in a paprika sauce on top of a small pile of egg noodle dumplings, with some sour cream on the side.

After lunch, Eva suggested we visit the wine tasting house, just a few doors away from Mátyás Church. Part wine bar, part museum, the tasting house let you sample several dozen wines from all over Hungary. Since Eva was driving, she didn't plan to taste, but suggested that I would enjoy it. I bought an entry ticket for about $17; we then went down into the cellar for a viticultural adventure.

The cellar was divided into nooks, each representing a different wine-producing region. Generally the tour was laid out so you would sample wines from drier and lighter to sweeter and heavier, but there were some notable exceptions. I had several good cabernets, as well as local varieties called Kekfranko (Blue Franc) and Kekoporto (Blue Oporto). I wasn't as keen on the wines; many of them were too dry for me. But I really enjoyed the Tokaj wines, which have a sweet, raisiny character. Some of them were actually too sweet for me; I liked tasting them but couldn't imagine having more than a few sips. But I did find one that was lightly sweet; I bought two half-liter bottles for about $11 each.

After the wine tasting, we returned to Eva's car to move to the Pest side of the city. We drove across the chain bridge -- as beautiful and as dramatic as crossing the Brooklyn Bridge into Manhattan -- then meandered through Pest's side streets until getting near the Opera House. We found a place to park and went into the Opera House. Tickets were still available for tonight, and the box seats on the second balcony were just around $25. I'd never been in a box seat before so it sounded like a fun way to enjoy a night at the opera.

Our tickets firmly planted in my shirt pocked, we walked a couple of blocks and found an outdoor café, where we enjoyed a couple of coffees and an afternoon dessert. Eva had a poppy seed cake while I had a type of sponge cake with a chocolate and sour cherry sauce. We were so full afterwards we both agreed we probably wouldn't require dinner tonight.

Back in the car, we drove down the boulevard to Heroes Square, the entry way into City Park. It turned out there was a foot race that day, so the area around the square was closed of to auto traffic, making parking trickier than usual. We circled the neighborhood three times until we found a space not too far from the square.

We then walked into the square. Two colonnades arced to the left and to the right, in the shape of a semicircle; along them stood larger-than-life statues of Hungarian kings and war heroes. At the center of the square stood a massive marble fountain and a tomb dedicated to all the Hungarians who have died in wartime. Flanking the left and right of the square were two neo-classical museums. Their steps were crowded with people enjoying the sun and warm temperatures. Eva said the square was built for the Millennium; again, it took me a minute to realized she meant the Hungarian national millennium at the end of the 19th century.

We entered the park and strolled around a lake and skating rink towards the spectacular Vajdahunyad Castle. A 19th-century replica of a Transylvanian castle of the same name, the castle was also built for the millennium celebration. It had a massive gate and soaring towers; I almost felt like Dracula himself would be there to greet us.

Eva and I crossed through the gate and into the castle's courtyard. It was connected to a medieval church and a neo-baroque palace, all of which are now museums. In the center of the courtyard sat a haunting statue of a cloaked figure with a pen in his hand; the word Anonymous was written on the statue's base.

"All of these buildings are replicas of famous Hungarian buildings that are now outside of Hungary, in territories lost after the first world war," Eva explained.

"What about the statue?" I asked.

"It is a statue of Hungary's first true historian," she said. "For centuries we did not know who he was, but in the last one or two decades they have been able to piece together who he was by examining historical records."

"It must be very difficult to conduct Hungarian history research," I replied. "You would have to search the archives of Austria, Turkey, Serbia, Romania -- and know lots of languages."

"Yes," Eva said. "It is not easy because of our history."

We strolled through the park, beyond the castle, towards Szechenyi Baths, one of the most famous spas in Budapest. Soon we reached a giant, yellow building, a magnificent 19th century structure that looked like it should be royal palace.

"This is the baths," Eva said.

"That's it?" I replied. "I would have guessed it was a former parliament building before guessing it was a bath house."

We walked around to the side of the building and found the entrance. In the ticket office, you could peer through a window and see the baths. It was a sprawling facility, bright and fancifully decorated, with hundreds and hundreds of bathers. The closest pool featured a row of chess tables in the water; each table was manned by a pair of gentleman in their bathing suits, focusing intensely on their game while by-standers tried offering them advice.

Leaving the baths, we followed the edge of the park, past the national zoo. Eventually we found ourselves back at Heroes Square, which was occupied mostly by skate rats jumping the marble with their skateboards. A small group of kids were gleefully climbing the fountain in the middle.

Back at the car, we drove back towards the opera house, parked, and found a café to kill some time before going to the opera. Eva had a milk shake while I had rose-hip tea to sooth my throat -- I was losing my voice from all the talking I'd done during the week. We then went to the opera house. Its interior was spectacular, just what you'd want to see in an Central European opera, with neoclassical paintings on the ceiling, a giant chandelier and gilded box seats. We had a view from our box, and since we were the only occupants, we were able to spread out and get comfortable.

The opera, Jenufa, was very disturbing. While I enjoyed the music, the story was the strangest I'd seen in an opera. Basically, a woman named Jenufa is being fought over by two men, one of whom has gotten her pregnant. One conspires to send the other into the army, with mixed success. The other then declares he would only marry a pretty girl, so the first man slashes Jenufa's face. In act two, she's living with her evil mother-in-law and her baby. Neither man will married her - one because she is now damaged goods, the other because she has a baby. The mother decides to murder the baby by drowning it so Jenufa will have a chance to marry; she tells everyone the baby died and was buried.

By act three, Jenufa is about to marry the man who slashed her. There's an elaborate party and wedding ceremony, with large blocks of ice brought from the river to cool the wedding party's drinks. When the last block of ice is hauled ashore, they find the dead baby inside. The mother-in-law is arrested, the man refuses to marry Jenufa, and she's left a pariah in her village, all alone.

"I liked the music, but I understand why Jenufa isn't one of the classics," I told Eva as she drove me back to the hotel.

Posted by acarvin at 6:36 AM | TrackBack

Leaving Hungary - But Not My Final Hungary Post

It's 9:30am here in Budapest; I'm heading to the airport in just about an hour. The last two days have been a lot of fun - once I finished my work at the telecottages, I had some free time to explore Budapest and the historic town of Szentendre with Eva, Matyas and his wife Marika.

Though I'm leaving soon, this won't be my last post about Hungary. I've been so busy I haven't had time to write up my experiences this weekend; also my power cord for my laptop doesn't like plugging into the outlet adapter, so my juice is running low. So in the next few days, I'll post more about the weekend, and hopefully more photos and even some video as well.

It's been a marvelous trip to Hungary; the people I've met at the telecentres were gracious, generous and supportive of my work. And I am in debt to Matyas, Eva and Marika for being extraordinary hosts. I hope I can return the favor if they ever have the chance to visit Boston. Until then, szia! -andy

Posted by acarvin at 3:23 AM | TrackBack

May 15, 2005

Castle Hill Podcast

A brief mobile phone podcast from Budapest's Castle Hill as I enjoy my last day in Hungary. The podcast summarizes my visit today to the charming town of Szentendre (SEN-ten-dray) with Gáspár Mátyás and his wife Márika. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 10:44 AM | TrackBack

May 14, 2005

Telecottage Tour, Day Two

A boy uses a computer at the Sárszentlorinc telecottage

"Andy, we are leaving now," Mátyás said, opening the door to my room. I looked at my watch; it was 6:30am. My head felt like it had been hit by a rubber mallet, as did my stomach. I stood up and felt the world had shifted 15 degrees to the left. I then remembered the mayor. The palinka. What on earth had I done to myself?

I quickly got dressed -- apparently I hadn't taken off that much clothes the night before -- and joined Mátyás and Eva in the car. Eva hadn't me a bottle of vegetable juice and a bag of chocolate wafers. "This is your breakfast," she said.

We drove the short distance back to the telecentre, where we met the mayor and the town architect. The mayor looked like he'd spent the previous day relaxing at a spa. He gave me a devious smile then slammed a handful of shotglasses on the table, the bottle of palinka not far behind.

"No, no, no," the three of us replied, laughing. He shrugged his shoulders and poured himself a shot before serving the rest of us coffee. Then another bottle of palinka appeared; this time, though, it was wrapped with a bow. The mayor and his staff offered it to me as a token for my visit. I promised him I would drink some later - but not for breakfast.

With a dose of caffeine to get the day started, we went downhill to the church, which was ensconced in scaffolding. The mayor and the architect walked over to the door and checked the lock. Then the mayor then reached upwards and unlatched a metal ladder that led up to the first level of the scaffolding. He darted up to the first level like a spider monkey and looked around for a moment.

"I'm glad we're not going to have to go up that way," I joked.

"What do you mean?" Mátyás asked, looking at me quizzically.

For a moment I didn't understand his question; then I saw the architect follow the mayor up the ladder. To my horror, Mátyás and Eva followed. The truth hit me like a ton of bricks collapsing from the top of an old church. We were going to climb 15 stories, but not from the inside. We'd do it from the outside. And I suddenly could taste the palinka from last night.

The mayor enjoys the view from the church's scaffolding

Even though my heart and mind told me that this was the worst of all possible ideas, I somehow found my hands grasping the cold, dusty metal of the ladder, slowly inching upwards as mouthfuls of whitewash fell from the floors above me. I climbed up to the first level and looked around. To my left was the outer church wall. To my right was a thin plastic mesh that gave the illusion of enclosure. Wood planks served as the floor, and rickety metal pipes pretended to be handrails. And yet I climbed upward.

"This is stupid, ridiculous," I muttered to myself, feeling like I was digging myself into a hole that I'd never get out of. The higher I climbed, the more I wanted to turn around. But I kept concentrating on the metal rungs of the ladder above me and the wood planks below me, so it got to the point that I wasn't really paying attention to the progress I'd been making. Then I looked at the church and saw its clock -- at eye level.

Fortunately, Mátyás and Eva were only another level above me. Even though I was now actually scared out of my wits, I felt I had to make it up to their level or I'd never forgive myself. Now at steeple height, I watched the mayor darting around, still like a spider monkey, ready to keep going upwards. Finally, I said the word I'd been chanting as a mantra for at least 10 floors: "No."

To my great relieve, neither Mátyás nor Eva had a desire to go any higher, so they began to go down the ladders. This part was actually the worst for me, since I could see where I was going. For the first several floors down I kept thinking, "Falling is certain death," which I thought would go away when I got down a little further. But then, the thoughts just changed to "Falling is quadriplegia." Eventually, though, I reached the "Falling is a broken leg" stage, and I then reached the ground. I couldn't wait to get back in the car.

Hitting the road again, we drove to the town of Sásd, which hosted a telecottage in the local library. The librarian gave us a tour and talked about the mobile library services they offered to surrounding communities; I noshed on some croissants hoping the bread would settle my stomach.

Back in the car, we began the 90-minute drive to Kajdacs. The further we drove, the sicker I felt. I started having visions of forcing Mátyás off the road so I could wretch in a hedgerow. Fearing the worse, I had no choice but to come clean. "I don't feel well -- could we stop in the next village?"

Hungarian roadsign directing people to the local telecottage

Mátyás and Eva took pity on me and drove slower to the next town, so the curves wouldn't make my situation worse. Soon, we reached the town, where we found a local pub. I went inside and found the bathroom, which wreaked of last night's -- or worse, this morning's -- drunks. I sat there and prayed for a while, hoping for some kind of guidance or mercy. But instead I received my punishment: Thou Shall Not Get Sick. Instead, I'd have to spend the day with a twisted stomach and a lump in my throat that felt like it was going to rupture like football player with a bad case of appendicitis.

Returning outside, Eva offered me the front seat of the car. Amazingly this made a huge difference, as did the vegetable juice. I still didn't feel well, but I was composed enough to avoid making an ass of myself. We then arrived in Kajdacs, where the mayor and the telecottage manager greeted us. The computer lab was empty -- there'd be a teacher training in a little while -- so we met in a conference room, sitting with a group of local users representing different constituencies, including students, teachers, cultural activists and social workers. The telecottage was described again and again as the soul of the community - the place where everyone came to spend time with their neighbors, plan events, participate in community activities and develop new programs. In some ways, Internet access was incidental -- it was the real sense of community that brought people together.

A farmhouse in Kajdacs

After our meeting, I went outside to take some pictures. I soon got carried away, finding a picturesque water well and a small farm just a few doors away. I felt so far away from Budapest, particular watching pairs of chickens chase after each other. Soon, I saw the telecottage manager waving at me - it was time to come inside and have lunch. I was worried they were going to serve something heavy and spicy, which wouldn't react well with my stomach; instead, I enjoyed bowl after bowl of fisherman's soup, a fish stew seasoned with sweet paprika, served with fresh egg noodles and bread. It was very comforting.

Once lunch was done, I took the opportunity to check email. Because the lab would soon be occupied by local teachers, they sat me at the receptionist's desk instead. As luck would have it, the teachers started to stream in a few minutes later. For a moment I didn't understand why everyone was saying "Jo Napot" (hello) to me, but then I realized where I was sitting. Though I've tried to learn a few words of Hungarian, my pronunciation is an abomination, so I've been somewhat shy about using it. So I used the easiest word I could pronounce -- Szia, which sounds exactly like "see ya" but means hello or goodbye. This, in turn, caused some of the teachers to want to say more than "Jo Napot" to me, which eventually made them wonder why on earth the telecottage would employ an non-Hungarian speaker as their receptionist. I just didn't stand to reason.

Before leaving Kajdacs, I got permission to observe the training session for a few minutes. I took some pictures, but many of the teachers were a little self-aware and shy. I got a couple of decent pictures from what I could tell, though.

Hungarian and Roma kids use the telecottage's computers

From Kajdacs, we continued to Sárszentlorinc, a town with a large Roma (Gypsie) population and high unemployment. There, we visited a telecottage run by the local Lutheran church. The manager invited us to spend time with a group of local kids, both Roma and Hungarian, who were using the telecottage on the one day a week they could play games. This meant it was a popular day at the lab, so I had plenty of opportunities to take pictures. We also got to see a collection of handicrafts made by villagers. The manager said the community is very low-skilled, so handicrafts is one of the few ways they can make a living. I offered to buy an ornament he had on display, but he generously insisted I keep it as a gift, along with some other souvenirs.

Next, we visit the village of Pusztahensce, whose telecentre was in a library by the local school. It was busy with students doing homework and chatting; I got to interview the mayor, half a dozen high school students and a local German teacher, who talked about how he used the telecentre while pursuing a graduate degree.

Our last stop of the day was Gyorkony, a village settled by ethnic Germans. The telecottage was located at the library, which offered many services to the disabled and senior citizens. Because many citizens worked for the local power company, there was a high proportion of at-home Internet access. So this allowed the telecottage to concentrate on underserved groups. Soon, they're going to open video conferencing with the county employment office, so people can come and receive online counseling without having to travel to the county seat.

Traditional wine cellars in Gyorkony

Soon we were met by our colleagues from Kajdacs; we then got back in our cars and drove a short distance to a wine cellar owned by the telecottage manager. Even though there are barely 1000 people in the village, nearly 300 of them own private wine cellars. They were beautiful old buildings, sometimes covered with thatched roofs, sloping into hillsides. It was simply beautiful getting to walk along the cellars near sunset; they reminded me of the Skansen open-air museum in Stockholm, but in a real community.

Before returning to the cellar, we walked uphill to a local dairy farm. The woman running the milking process invited us inside; she poured several gallons of fresh milk she'd just taken from the cows into a large vat, then ladled a fresh glass for me. It was the most refreshing thing I'd had in long time, the perfect way to finally settle my stomach. Outside, we walked further along so Mátyás could show me the "birds" they raised there. I started looking for chickens but nearly wet my pants when I saw a full-grown ostrich staring at me. The ostrich paced back and forth, watching to see what I would do next. Soon, the husband of the woman we'd met invited me to enter the gate towards the ostrich pen. Amazingly, the male ostrich dropped to the ground and started flaring its feathers, swaying its head back and forth.

"That's the way the bird tells us he's the best," Mátyás said. The farmer then found an ostrich egg, which he let me hold. I'd never held a full ostrich egg before so I was quite impressed by the weight.

Livia the telecottage manager sucks red wine from a barrel using a glass pipet

We then left the farm and returned to the cellar; there, we'd have a dinner of stuffed cabbage, which smelled delicious in the kitchen. First, though, I was invited to go down to the underground cellar, where I watched the Livia the telecottage manager suck a liter of white wine with a long, elegant glass pipet. She then repeated the process for the red wine.

Soon, dinner was served. The stuffed cabbage was a tasty as it smelled, and it was even better with sour cream and pepper sauce. The wines were excellent, too; the white was delicately sweet while the red was smoky and full-bodied -- though we had a hard time finding an appropriate Hungarian term for "smoky" without making it sound like I was saying "it tastes like smoke." It was a wonderful way to wrap up the day. As I told Mátyás, today was a day of firsts. I got to taste wine directly from the barrel, plus I got to drink milk directly from the cow. It would be difficult to top that.

Posted by acarvin at 4:58 AM | TrackBack

Telecottage Tour, Day One

A retiree checks email at the Budaörs telecottage

After a quick breakfast of toast, smoked cheese and hard boiled eggs, I checked out of the hotel and walked several blocks west to an intersection where I was going to meet Mátyás and his colleague, Bernát Evá from the European Union of Telecottage Associations. The three of us would spend the next two days visiting nine Hungarian telecottages -- community centers that offered free or low-cost Internet access. Our first stop would be in Budaörs, a suburb just to the west of Budapest. From there, we would drive southwest to the village of Zámoly, where a community activist ran a telecentre and community radio station in his house. After that, we would visit Csákberény, home to an 11-year-old telecottage -- Hungary's oldest -- founded by Mátyás. Our final stop would be the hamlet of Alsomócsolád, in the far south of the country. We'd spend the night there before continuing to five other telecottages the following day.

We drove through heavy traffic, crossing the Danube and driving up the hillside, with a marvelous view of the palace to the right. Eventually, the traffic thinned out; we passed numerous car dealerships and signs for an Ikea, several kilometers ahead. Arriving in Budaörs (BOO-dah-ersh), we parked in the center of town, not far from its central church. The telecottage was located in an office complex; inside, the receptionist invited us to look around, have some coffee and wait for patrons to arrive.

Senior citizens take advantage of the Budaörs telecottage

Mátyás then introduced me to a series of people. First, we met a local woman who was disabled in an accident; as she slowly recovered through many surgeries, she became a disability rights advocate. She told me about a variety of training programs they offered to the local disabled community. Then, a group of senior citizens joined us. They had first come to the telecottage to take an introductory Internet course; they became so enthusiastic that they are now regulars at the facility. One of them, an 84-year-old man, described how he enjoyed using computers to read his grandchildren's blogs. We then visited with the mother of the disability activist. A psychiatrist, she talked about how the telecottage has offered training to residents suffering from chronic depression.

Leaving the telecottage, we crossed town to meet with the mayor and one of his advisors. The mayor was very enthusiastic about the initiative. The city is planning to open a new town hall that will feature free municipal wi-fi, which they recently started offering at the telecottage. They also plan to roll-out half a dozen other telecottages so that every resident would be within a 15-minute walk to a local access point. The mayor then gave me a gift bag full of souvenirs from Budaörs, including a CD of the local orchestra, a t-shirt, and a small bottle of sweet Tokaj wine. From there, we went to a local restaurant for lunch with the city manager; it was a cozy place with delicious asparagus soup and a paprika turkey breast accompanied by roasted fruit.

After lunch, we left the suburbs and went further afield, to the village of Zámoly (ZAH-moy). Known for its wine and a famous WWII tank battle, Zámoly is also home to Istvan, an extraordinary community activist. In his sprawling home, Istvan runs a telecentre and community radio station that provides six hours of programming a day. The telecentre was quiet today, but the radio station was in the middle of a folk music broadcast. In a back room, he runs a one-watt transmitter suitable for low-power FM broadcasting to the surrounding community. Istvan and a team of volunteers also provide public affairs programming to the village. To bring additional financial support to their efforts, he's now planning to open a small hostel upstairs and host cultural heritage tours for Hungarian Americans and others around the world.

Csákberény telecottage, Hungary's first telecentre

Next, we traveled to Csákberény (CHAK-ber-ay-nye), Mátyás' former home. His old telecottage is now run by a pair of brothers in town. The telecottage was absolutely charming -- an old house that had been meticulously restored. The brothers also ran a PC repair shop and a community wireless service. Over 40 households were now subscribing to a wireless local area network that could provide at-home broadband access. We also got to meet the mayor, who happened to be passing by and stopped to chat for a while. After the telecottage, we were invited to visit two households receiving wireless services. Down the road, we met a local carpenter and his loving pet rottweiler, who followed me around faithfully to donate some drool stains on my new black jeans. The other household was home to a college student who relied on the wireless access to do his classwork. Across the street, two enormous trees stood in front of a pair of houses, ribbons streaming from their tops and looking oddly out of place.

"Do you know what those are?" Mátyás asked.

"No, I don't," I replied.

"Every May 1, young men secretly go to the local forest and dig up a tree to plant in the yard of their sweetheart. The girl then wakes up the next morning and is surprised to see the tree. It stays there for the whole month."

Back in the car, we drove two hours south through rolling hill country towards the small village of Alsomócsolád (ALL-soh-moh-cho-lad), population 300. Unfortunately, I hadn't spent much time in the back seat of a car careening down country roads at 120 kilometers an hour, so I began to feel rather car sick. I managed not to cause an international incident, though.

Alsomócsolád's telecottage

Just before sunset we arrived in Alsomócsolád, a charming hamlet with a lakeside view from atop a hillside. The telecottage, which also serves as town hall, post office and community center, was stunningly gorgeous, built of natural wood that shined like gold as the sun went down. There, we met the center manager, staff, a student user of the facility and the mayor. They gave us a tour of its many services, from hosting cultural events to offering office space for local civic organizations.

After the tour, the mayor invited us in his office for a drink. He brought out a bottle of palinka (PAH-leen-kah), the local apricot brandy. The bottle was unlabeled.

"Is this home-made?"

"Yes, of course," the mayor said.

"In the US we'd call this moonshine. It's not exactly legal for private citizens to make liquor."

"Here it's not legal either," Mátyás said. "But a mayor can grant distilling licenses so it's okay for him."

I sipped at the palinka; not the smoothest drink I've ever had but certainly far from rot-gut.

Alsomócsolád's telecottage manager hangs out with a student from the village

Leaving the telecottage, we went downhill to a dining hall, where we joined another group of telecottage users for dinner. The mayor, I noticed, lugged the bottle of palinka under his arm, and immediately passed out shots to everyone. At first I planned to say no, but then I realized that even the elderly women in the room were downing it, I gave it another go.

After dinner, the mayor invited us across the street to the local pub. From there, the rest of the evening is rather hazy. According to the pictures I took, we sat around a table eating copious amounts of popcorn, drinking glasses of a dark liqueur that I recall commenting to Mátyás, "It tastes like Jagermeister but not as strong." I should have taken this as a warning sign but the mayor was persuasive, and I did not want to disrespect local officials.

At some point before we finally retired to a local hostel, I remember the mayor asking us if we would like to get up early tomorrow morning to climb the local church tower. It sounded like a fine way to start the day. Or, at least that's what I thought at the time. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 4:42 AM | TrackBack

Introduction to Budapest

Budapest's Eastern Train Station

After a comfortable, but sleepless night flying from Boston via Paris, I arrived in Budapest just after noon on Wednesday. I carried on my bags, and immigration was quick, so within a few minutes I was in a taxi heading towards the center of town.

Just before 1pm, I arrived at the Star Hotel, in Budapest's seventh district, a couple miles east of the Danube. I jumped in the shower to freshen up, then went for a walk around the neighborhood prior to my meeting with Gáspár Mátyás at 2:30pm. It was a pleasant, leafy neighborhood chock full of late 19th century buildings. At the end of the street I found an old synagogue; the sign out front seemed to suggest it was a working Orthodox synagogue.

I took some pictures in the neighborhood but then turned back to the hotel when my camera battery suddenly died. I thought it was on a full charge; apparently not. Fortunately I bought a second battery just in case, and it was waiting for me, plugged into my charger at the hotel. By this point, though, there wasn't time to return outside, so I waited for Mátyás in the lobby.

Gáspár Mátyás

Mátyás showed up a few minutes later; he greeted me with a warm handshake, like an old friend; I was struck how he looked like Albert Einstein when he was younger, crossed with my cousin Adam. We walked a few blocks down Istvan Utca, then turned north until we reached his courtyard apartment. Upstairs, I met his wife and son; Mátyás and I then settled in for several hours of chatting about telecentres, telecottages and the digital divide.

Later in the afternoon, Mátyás asked if I had any energy to go for a walk. I said I'd be up for it, so we left my laptop back at the apartment, digital camera and Lonely Planet guide in tow. We walked south past the beautiful eastern railway station, then hung a right down Rakoczi Utca, one of the city's main thoroughfares and prettiest boulevards. Mátyás described various buildings as I snapped lots of pictures.

Budapest's recently restored Great Synagogue

Eventually, we turned north towards the old Jewish ghetto. "Wait until you see this," Mátyás said, smirking. Around the corner, I saw what could only be described as the most magnificent synagogue in the world. Reminiscent of the grand mosques of Moorish Spain, the sprawling building featured fine horizontal brick work and two onion dome minarets, each green and trimmed with gold leaf. I stood there, utterly stunned. I'd read about the synagogue in my guidebook - it was the biggest synagogue in the world outside of New York City, and had been renovated with funds raised by actor Tony Curtis, whose parents were Hungarian Jews. The synagogue also hosts a Jewish history museum, which I intended to visit on Sunday. Maybe I'd even be able to go to Shabbat services on Saturday; I hadn't attended a European synagogue service since I lived in Scotland, and that was hardly the Old Europe type of synagogue I'd envisioned in my dreams.

We left the Jewish quarter and worked our way to Vorosmarty Ter, a tree-lined square famous for the Gerbeaud Café and its delicious (but pricy) cakes and sweets. Turning south, we reached Vaci Utca, a splendid pedestrian street with fine shops and gorgeous architecture. Mátyás took me into Pariszi Udvar, the Parsian Court -- a late 19th century shopping arcade with splendid, Tiffany-like glass ceilings. Beyond the court, to the right I could see the Danube River, and the hilly crags of Buda on the far side. Mátyás led me to the corniche, where we had a fantastic view of the royal palace and Buda castle. It reminded me of Stockholm in an odd way, with a Prague-like sensibility. It made me somewhat sad that I had work to do for the next few days - how easy it would be to waste away a week playing tourist here.

Veering back towards Vaci Utca, we strolled along the shops, enjoying the warm sun. Ahead of us, we spotted half a dozen security guards in suits, sporting sunglasses and ear pieces. Ahead of them, a tall, brown-haired VIP walked from shop to shop, pausing momentarily to look into each window. The security team looked around with intense vigilance.

"Who is it?" I asked Mátyás. "A government minister?"

"Probably," he replied, "but I cannot tell whom."

Suddenly, the VIP turned around and spoke to one of the security men - in American English. I got a good look at his face: long and thin, somewhat bushy eyebrows. I knew I recognized him; I even wanted to call out the name Robert. But the way the security detail was looking around, I didn't want to push my luck, let alone take a picture of our mystery man.

"When we get back to your place I'll hit the government websites and figure out who he is," I said.

A few blocks later, we reached the Pilvax Café. Mátyás explained how the café served as the home base of Hungary's first push for independence in the 1840s.

"I think it was our FBI director," I said, still dwelling on our mysterious VIP.

"What?" Mátyás asked.

"That guy we saw." "I think he was our FBI director. We'll have to check online."

Budapest's royal palace

Around 7pm, we veered back to the Danube until we reached the Admiral Restaurant. Located right on the river bank, we sat outside and soaked in the setting sun. With a tall pilsner in hand, I ordered a thoroughly Hungarian meal - a bowl of gulyas (goulash) and a plate of catfish paprikas. Both the stew and the paprikas were fiery hot -- not the mild, sweet paprika they sell in the USA, but the kind of fire you expect in a good Santa Fe restaurant.

"I'm so glad to be visiting a country that knows how to do spicy," I said as we finished dinner.

"You will have no shortage of it here," Mátyás replied.

Leaving the restaurant, we walked to the local metro station to catch a train back to Mátyás' house. Soon, though, we realized we were at the wrong station - Mátyás rarely ever takes the metro, apparently. So we left the station and caught a bus, which got us back to the eastern railway station in a few minutes.

Back at his house, I checked email for a few minutes and posted a quick note on my blog. I then went to FBI.gov to see if I recognized anyone. A portrait of FBI director Robert Mueller flickered on the screen.

"Recognize anyone?" I asked Mátyás.

"That's him!" he replied.

I then checked a few news websites to see if there was any mention of FBI director Mueller traveling in Budapest. No dice. Looks like I scooped the story. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 4:26 AM | TrackBack

May 12, 2005

Telecottages Galore

It's just after 5:30pm and we're driving south through central Hungary to the village of Alsomócsolád (AHL-so-moch-o-lahd). We've visited three telcottages today. The first, in the prosperous Budapest suburb of Budaörs (BOO-dah-ersh), gave me a chance to meet local senior citizens and a disability rights advocate, as well as the city's mayor.

We then drove to the village of Zámoly (ZAH-moy), where I met a local activist who runs a telecentre, B&B, and community radio station in his spacious home. The bulk of the afternoon was spent in the charming village of Csákberény (CHAK-beh-rainye), home to Hungary's oldest telecottage. It's now providing wi-fi to more than 40 households, including two that I got to visit.

Tonight, we'll spend the evening just outside of Alsómocsolád. Then, we'll get up bright and early for another full day of telecottage-hopping.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 11:45 AM | TrackBack

Thursday Morning Podcast

A short podcast from Budapest as I wait for Gaspar Matyas at a bus stop. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 2:13 AM | TrackBack

May 11, 2005

Arrival in Budapest

Hi everyone... Its just after 8pm here in Budapest... Ive spent the day with Gaspar Matyas, founder of the Hungarian telecottage movement. We spent the afternoon at his apartment discussing the history of the movement, then we took a three-hour whirlwind tour of the city. It was an amazing walk, the two highlights being a visit to the extraordinary Great Synagogue, perhaps the most beautiful synagogue I have seen anywhere in the world, and a very random encounter with US FBI director Robert Mueller, who was window shopping with half a dozen scary looking secret service agents. We capped off the night with dinner along the Danube at sunset.

On the whole I am exhausted and not yet comfortable typing on a Hungarian keyboard, so I will write more on my laptop and post it later.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 2:27 PM | TrackBack

May 10, 2005

Next Stop, Budapest

I'm just about to head out the door to the airport. This evening, I'll fly to Budapest by way of Paris for a week of fun and frolic visiting Hungary's telecottages. It should be a great trip; I may visit as many as 10 different telecottages if time permits, and still have a smudge of time left over to explore Budapest over the weekend.

So, stay tuned for blog entries, podcasts, photos, vlogs, what have you -- I'll try to post updates whenever I can. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 3:34 PM | TrackBack

May 8, 2005

My Open Media 100 Nominations

Technorati and the Always On Network are currently seeking nominations for the Open Media 100, a list of 100 leading pioneers and advocates in the world of open media. Anyone can nominate people for the award; simply post a comment on David Sifry's blog or post your nominations on your blog with the following tag:

AOTechnorati100

So without further ado, here are my nominations, broken down according to the appropriate category.

The Pioneers: Michael Hart of Project Gutenberg; Brewster Kahle of the Internet Archive; Jimbo Wales of Wikimedia Foundation.

The Tool Smiths: OurMedia; Wikimedia; Ibiblio.org; Digital Divide Network (because the marginalized and disenfranchised should blog, too).

The Trendsetters: Lawrence Lessig; JD Lasica

The Practitioners: the entire team at Global Voices, in particular Rebecca MacKinnon; the folks at WorldChanging; Karen Schneider; Susan Mernit; Taran Rampersad; education blogging guru Will Richardson; Steve Garfield, Xeni Jardin; Hoder; and (oh, what the hell, what have I got to lose) Andy Carvin.

The Enablers: Joi Ito; Pierre Omidyar (because his foundation gives money to lots of great open media projects)

Anyway, those are my nominations. Hope you nominate some folks as well... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 1:25 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Blast at Kabul Cybercafe Kills Three; Will the Telecentre Movement be a Target?

This morning, I was horrified to see a story on Yahoo News about an explosion at a Kabul Internet Cafe, killing three people. Just this week on the Digital Divide Network's DIGITALDIVIDE list, we've been having a theoretical discussion about whether a massive deployment of telecentres would positively impact development in Iraq. In one post, I wrote:

So let's say we could snap our fingers and have 1,000 telecentres across
Iraq. Imagine if each one of them addressed their community's most
pressing needs. Some of these telecentres would large the local
unemployed with the tools they need to gain new skills or start small
businesses. Others would focus developing e-mechanisms for the public to
interact with civil servants and government officials, making sure that
the new government addressed their needs effectively, no matter if they
spoke Arabic, Kurdi or Turkmen as their native language. Yet others
would assist local mosques in providing health care and human services
to people whose lives and livelihoods were destroyed during the war.

If telecentres are merely nonprofit cybercafes lacking any development
context, then I'd agree with you. But if we put that aside and see
telecentres as serving specific development goals based on each
community's particular needs and opportunities, I would have to be more
optimistic about the role they could play in helping Iraq get back on
its feet and prosper in the coming years.

Steve Eskow, on the other hand, took a more cynical view:

If the prevailing culture is one of fear, where a regular response to disagreement is violence, then telecenters can become part of the problem, part of that culture of violence.

If that is so, then we as practitioners won't automatically assume that 1000
telecenters in any culture anywhere will produce positive results. Our
obligations becomes to consider the ecology of the culture, the existing
divides, and existing commitment to democratic dialog, before we prescribe
telecenters.

And now we find this news about a bombing at a cybercafe in Kabul. While it's most likely the attack occurred because foreigners assembled there, it raises a disturbing question: will Internet outposts be seen as part of the "enemy" by these terrorists, because they are epicenters of knowledge, communications and burgeoning democracy? I shiver at the thought, and pray that we won't see a chilling effect in which public Internet access gets cut off in Afghanistan or Iraq for the sake of security.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 10:31 AM | TrackBack

May 6, 2005

Open Source Radio: Making Mobcasting a Reality

Long-time Boston public broadcasting journalist Christopher Lydon is teaming up with his veteran producer Mary McGrath and PRX's Brendan Greeley to produce a new public radio program called Open Source. The program, produced locally at WGBH, will be distributed nationally by Public Radio International (PRI) later this summer.

Despite the implication that the show will be about open source software, in reality it'll be something much more interesting. Open Source will attempt to open public radio to the listener, inviting audience members to share their experiences and ideas to help craft the show, submitting their own story ideas, guest ideas, even audio commentaries. According to the show's blog:

Open source is an idea, a movement really, that's associated with computer software; we wanted to develop a new radio show around the idea of sharing information and sources and generally opening up our production process so people can suggest guests and topics and post comments and audio that we'll put on the air. There's a way to use the Internet to tap into the vast knowledge and expertise of the people who used to be just listeners and readers, and we'd like to create a community around this idea. We know a little about radio, not so much about fusing it with the Internet and we know, in any case, that you can help.

The really cool thing about this show is that it will be one of the first serious, legit attempts to put my mobcasting idea into practice. As some of you may recall, in January I wrote about mobcasting as the idea of getting groups of people to post podcasts from their mobile phones to the same blog, in some kind of social, political or cultural context. The name "mobcasting" is intended as a triple entendre, a combination of mobile phones, smart mobs and podcasting. Brendan Greeley and I tested it out at the recent Berkman blogging conference, and later on my emphemeral artsy website, The Gates @ Central Park.

While I've been spending the last couple months ramping up to write a book on telecentres, Brendan's been burning the midnight oil with Chris and Mary, getting this radio show together. So when Brendan told me about the show, I was very happy to see that Open Source is utilizing mobcasting through a companion blog called Speak, America, Speak. Like my previous mobcasts, Brendan's using Blogger and Audioblogger to create the mobcast. Anyone can pick up a phone, call a number and enter a code to record a voicemail that's automatically posted to the website. For example, during the pilot episode of the show, Lisa Williams talked about Canadian geese in her neighborhood, and I've retorted with a mobcast about Brookline's under-reported turkey problem. There are already several other mobcasts recorded from people in Chicago, Las Vegas and Providence, as well as an inaugural mobcast from Brendan.

So congratulations to Chris, Mary, Brendan, and everyone who chimed in for the first show. It's been a hell of long time since I've been excited about a new public radio program -- something I'd never admit to my former colleagues at CPB -- so I'm really psyched about Open Source. And now my RSS reader tells me that Brendan's posted an MP3 of the first program, so I'm gonna go listen to it right now... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 4:36 PM | TrackBack

May 5, 2005

Actress, Brand or Businesswoman? None of the Above, Please

Susanne just sent me a hilarious AP interview with Paris Hilton. There are few people in the world who bother me as much as Paris, who perhaps must be the most undeservedly famous person in America today. So this interview is a real hoot. It's stunning how the interviewer mocks her right to her face and she doesn't even know it.

Some of my favorite Q&As from the interview:

Q: Do you read blogs?

HILTON: What's that?

Q: Um, they're these things on the Internet where people write about news and stuff.

HILTON: No, I don't really read anything on the Internet except my AOL mail. I don't like people who sit on computers all day long and write about people they don't know anything about.

Q: Paris, you just described my job. What did you want to be when you were a little girl?

HILTON: A veterinarian, but then I realized I could just buy a bunch of animals.

Q: So how would you describe your occupation?

PARIS HILTON: I don't know. I'm an actress, a brand, a businesswoman. I'm all kinds of stuff.

Personally, I can't recall anyone who's ever described themselves as a brand. Perhaps it's high time for the good people of France's City of Lights to claim their name back. I mean, come on -- talk about copyright infringement....

Of course, I could go on and say lots of scathing and harsh things about Paris (the actress/brand/businesswoman, not the city), but why bother? By her own acknowledgment, it's not like there's any chance she'd ever actually read it. And what fun is that?

So just in case you were wondering what Paris' favorite RSS feeds were, her favorite Flickr tags, or what blogs she links to in her del.icio.us account, fuhgettaboutit.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 5:49 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Testing My New Digital Camera

Yesterday, I received my new digital camera in the mail. It's a Minolta DiMage A-200, an 8.0 megapixel camera with an optical zoom of 28-200mm and a digital zoom that goes to 800mm. I'm planning to use it on my upcoming trip to Hungary, as well as on trips to Dubai and elsewhere in the coming months.

It's strange handling a camera again that's shaped like a traditional 35mm SLR camera; for the last couple of years I've been using a small Canon digital camera after having used a 35mm Canon EOS Rebel for many years. I'd almost forgotten what it was like to hold a large camera. On the whole I like the feel of it but it will take some getting used to.

In terms of features, the camera has a cool anti-shake mechanism: the CCD chip that captures the digital image floats on gimbles that automatically adjust to movement. While it's not exactly like having a SteadiCam for your camera, it does reduce image shake and lets you take pics at slower speeds. Last night I took some pics indoors at 1/20th of a second and was amazed they weren't really blurry. The camera has two digital screens: a large one in the back that pops out and rotates 180 degrees so you can take self-portraits easily, and a digital viewfinder that you can see by placing you eye directly up to it.

It also captures video, which is a feature that will be great for video blogging. I love that I can manually zoom in and out while shooting a clip. My last digital camera wouldn't let you zoom while videotaping, so I'm pretty pleased about this new feature.

I've put together a photo gallery of some of my first pictures with the A-200, taken yesterday evening and early this morning. There are a lot of pictures of my two cats, Dizzy and Winston, as well as some shots in my neighborhood, from the tulips and old piano that sit outside my apartment to the shop windows along Beacon Street. For those of you disinclined to click the link to the photo gallery, here are a few examples. I've scaled all the photos from their original 8 megapixel size to 800x600, to keep the bandwidth manageable... -andy

Winston takes a nap

Close-up of Winnie's eyes

Old Piano

Tulip

Water Valve

Posted by acarvin at 2:15 PM | Comments (1) | TrackBack

Feline Screen Test

Here's another quick test of my new Minolta A-200 digital video camera, shooting in 640 pixel mode. This is a large (20mb) file of my two cats, Winston and Dizzy. Winnie is trying to take a nap on the bubble wrap that came with the camera, and Dizzy wants to play with him. This is taken at night with poor lighting conditions, so I'm impressed with the overall quality. I'll take the camera out later today and try a daylight test as well. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 2:15 PM | TrackBack

May 3, 2005

Off to Hungary Next Week

Next Tuesday, I'll be off to Hungary for a whirlwind tour of the country's telecottage movement. Telecottages are community technology centers that address a variety of local development needs, from Internet literacy training to e-government services. Hungary's telecottage movement is one of the oldest and best established projects of its kind anywhere in the world, so I'm really looking forward to visiting.

Matyas Gaspar, founder of the telecottage movement, will be my host for the week. We'll visit urban telecottages in and around Budapest, as well as in rural areas. If all goes well I'll get to visit eight or 10 telecottages, spending the night in at least three different cities (Budapest, Gyorkony and Alsomocsolad).

Because I'm visiting Hungary for a book I'm editing on community technology centers around the world, my schedule will be jam-packed with visits to telecottages, as well as interviews with project staff, local users and community leaders. I'll also get to field test my new 8.0 megapixel Konica-Minolta dimage A200 digital camera, which I also plan to use for shooting video blogs.

Since I'll be spending most of my time in telecottages, Internet access shouldn't be a major dilemma. So I plan to blog as much as possible during my stay, posting photos, audio and video whenever feasible. So stay tuned from May 11-15; hopefully I'll have some interesting stories to share during that time. -andy

Posted by acarvin at 2:26 PM | TrackBack

May 2, 2005

Call for Nominations: World Summit Awards USA

Hi everyone,

I'd like to announce the official opening of the World Summit Awards USA competition. An official event of the World Summit on the Information Society (WSIS), the World Summit Awards will take place in more than 150 countries around the globe. I'm serving as coordinator of the USA competition.

We're seeking nominations for the best websites from the USA in the following categories:

e-business
e-culture
e-entertainment
e-government
e-health
e-inclusion
e-learning
e-science

I've assembled a team of more than a dozen volunteers representing a range of expertise in online content. We will review the nominations and select a winner in each category; the winner will then represent the USA in the international competition.

To nominate a website, please visit here:

http://freeonlinesurveys.com/rendersurvey.asp?id=93093

Nominations must be submitted no later than May 30, 2005. Winners will be announced by July 1, 2005.

Please feel free to share the URL and extend an invitation to colleagues to submit websites for the competition.

Posted by acarvin at 4:31 PM | TrackBack

Ensuring that Govt Hurricane Alerts Don't Get Treated Like Spam

An AP story on Yahoo News this morning discusses how emergency alert emails from local government leaders in Indian River County, Florida,
are blocked by AOL as spam. Indian River County, which happens to be one county south of where I grew up, implemented an emergency email system to get the word out to local residents when things such as mandatory hurricane evacuations go into effect. Over 4,000 residents subscribe to the service. The only problem is that AOL's servers list the county's emergency coordinator email address as spam; so whenever he tried to send out an emergency alert, residents who happened to be AOL users didn't get the memo. AOL says it's now working on a way to let the messages through.

I should certainly hope so. I often write about "e-government for all" -- the idea of ensuring that online government services are accessible to all constituents, no matter their education level, economic situation or disability. Too often, it seems, government agencies don't implement simple communication mechanisms that can reach the public in a timely manner. In this case, the government had the right idea, but concerns over spam treated the messages as if they were porn or Cialis advertisements.

Governments should work closely with communications companies to ensure that emergency emails and text messages get through to the public as intended. There's no excuse for people not knowing to get out of harm's way just because an ISP's anti-spam software wasn't smart enough to recognize a legitimate emergency communication from a legitimate official source. We may want to explore creating the digital equivalent of an emergency broadcast system. Just like TV broadcasts can be automatically pre-empted in times of emergency, similar emergency messages should be able to get out to email and SMS text users in a prompt fashion, while at the same time guaranteeing that the system can't be exploited for nefarious purposes.... -andy

Posted by acarvin at 9:30 AM | TrackBack