10. Neighbourhood Watch

27th April 2014

Every year in Budapest, on this weekend, the city celebrates the birthdays of every building which turns 100 years old.  Some of these buildings open their doors to the public, so we can all have a good nose around inside and see what they look like.

Budapest has some great buildings, it is one of the reasons I love living here.  Some of them are very ornate and beautiful, and some are very grey, rectangular and practical.  But every one has its own personality, and history, and so this weekend seemed like a good opportunity to get to know our own neighbourhood in District XIII a little better.

Yesterday, we decided to take a little walk around, so I could get a few snaps of our Újlipótváros, and I could show you where we live.  Unfortunately, we left the list of which buildings were the centurions at home, so we decided not to discriminate but show you all the ones nearby that we like.

This one is included purely for the paintjob:

All of these buildings are within a 5 minute walk from our place.  At first, for me, it was quite strange living amongst 6 or 7 storey buildings.  Not ever having lived in a city, it can seem quite imposing and claustrophobic to begin with, but you soon learn to take the time occasionally just to look up, and appreciate the beauty in some of these old places.

Getting a feel for how our neighbourhood looks?

This piece of Communist 'art' is just around the corner from us.  At first glance it may look like a couple of guys arm wrestling, being jeered on by a crowd, but they are actually changing the wheel of a car.  It is on the side of a building that used to be the garage of the Communist party.  The building itself is still a garage today.

Some of these buildings, such as ours, have courtyards on the inside, and they can be really quite scenic also.  This is one of the 100 year old buildings this year:

The interior style is very common here, metal railings on corridors overlooking all your neighbours.  What isn't so common, is the unusual artwork going on inside this one:

Yes, that is an orange naked man, standing next to a giant gnome, alongside a spoonheaded guy with forks for hands, guarding his pet sheep.  Yeah I don't know what it means either.

This is actually the front of our building, not the entrance we use to get to our flat unfortunately, ours is less scenic, but you can see our balcony in the top right of the picture.

These ones are of the courtyard inside our building.

Our little kitchen balcony, where we (try to keep alive) grow rosemary, thyme, tomatoes, etc. can be seen from here, it's the small one with two little window boxes hanging on the side.

In the evening, we headed on over to B's parents place, as we often do at the weekend.  I am not exaggerating if you hear me tell tales of the bountiful feasts that we have partaken in there, and last night was no exception.

Moonlit grill party, there was steak, lamb burger AND chicken, grilled mushrooms, courgettes, and of course, a drink or two as well.  Thanks to G&E as always for making such an awesome meal, and fun evening!

Today, we knew of a special program in our area that was happening as part of the 100 years celebration.  A free 'corridor concert' on Gogol Utca, where some of the residents (and some non residents) were putting on a show of opera singing and music.  We both had a feeling that it might be good, and it didn't disappoint.

A couple of the people singing turned out to be professionals, and they were really excellent.  It was a completely unique event, everyone watching from different levels on the inside of the building, with the singers singing from either the ground floor, or sometimes coming up one or two levels and singing from the corridors.

We really had a great time, and it just goes to show that sometimes, the best things in life can be free.  You just have to take the opportunity when it presents itself.

 This last picture, the guy is singing 'If I Were A Rich Man', in Hungarian.  I didn't understand the words of course, at least most of it, but his performance could have been in Swahili and everyone would have still understood.

And that was our weekend, it was a good one in District XIII.  We even got free doggy hugs.

Since the half marathon, I have managed to get out for three or four small runs, to get the old legs moving again.  I have to say my body was completely exhausted afterwards, so it has been hard to keep momentum going, but I am trying to persevere and keep training for the marathon.  I fear if I stop now, I may never start again.  So if you are feeling generous, and want to give me even more incentive to keep on runnin', please think about donating to a worthy cause:

http://www.justgiving.com/Mike-Parks1

And now I will sign off, with a gang (courtyard) serenade for you.  Apologies, the video is not the best, as they were singing directly underneath us, but the music can be heard, so enjoy:

9. Get Those Knees Up!

15th April 2014

I have never been one to really set goals.  And I certainly don't very often follow it through, and put in the hard work to achieve those goals.  But for once, something lit a fire inside me for this one, and I really feel like I will do it justice...

At the start of the year, I said to myself that I would try and get back into running.  Last year, in March, I ran the half marathon in Eastbourne, my home town.  With a bit of motivational help from my mate J, I semi-seriously started running and managed to get in shape enough to run the bloody thing.  It wasn't fast (1 hour 59 minutes and 21 seconds, not that it is etched into my brain or anything) but I got round, I ran the whole way and I was pretty damn pleased with myself.  But afterwards, instead of carrying on and getting better, I did what I usually do, and just let the thing fizzle out completely.  I didn't run again til about October, and even then it didn't last too long.

In January, I told myself that things were going to be different this time.  I am sure we have all done that at the start of a fresh new year.  But from nowhere, I got a sudden desire to set myself a target, work hard at it, and prove to myself that I could do it.  I started to run again, this time I would record every run I did in a spreadsheet, so I could see if I was actually making any progress.  And it really helped.  The first week, I ran twice, approximately 5km runs each time, and I jotted down the times in the spreadsheet.  The next week, I ran two 5km runs again, but at the end of the week, I wanted to see an improvement, so I ended up running a 10km too.  And with the exception of a couple of weeks where I only ran twice, I ran 3 times every week.  And I could see the times coming down, almost weekly!  Sometimes only a few seconds knocked off, sometimes whole minutes, and I tell you, it really spurred me on to keep training.

So on Sunday, I lined up with roughly 5499 other people, and ran the Budapest Spring Half Marathon.

I had set myself a goal a while back, but I only told B recently that I wanted to finish it 13 minutes faster than last year.  That's one minute per mile quicker than I managed in March.  I guess to some that might not sound like a great deal, but I knew it would be pretty tough to do, and I also knew I was in with a great chance of doing it, as I had come pretty close in training.

I arrived on Margitsziget (where the race was due to start) about an hour before the kick off (or should that be foot off?).  In hindsight it was probably a bit early, as I already had my race number, I ended up just milling about for the most part, but it was nice to take in the atmosphere.  It was pretty chilly too, so I tried to keep moving and stay limber for the 9.30 start.

When it came time to line up, I had to start from quite close to the back of the group.  This was because when I signed up, the organisers ask you what pace you run at, and at the time, I was just shy of 'couch potato', so they lumped me in with the other spuds.

When the horn sounded to start, the sun also came out, and it was a really great sight to behold.  Everyone had a smile on their face, just happy to be part of such a huge event in the early Spring sunshine.  It was incredibly crowded, and I knew that the road on the island wasn't too wide, so I tried my best to push forward and get past some of the starting horde.  I darted left and right, weaving my way in and out and I managed to make good progress while the crowd was still shuffling forward in the early rush.

There were pace markers during the race, guys you can follow if you want to guarantee you beat a certain time.  I told myself to try and catch up to the 1 hour 45 minute guys, they were a few minutes ahead of me due to the crowded start line, but I knew if I could catch them up, I would achieve my goal and knock off those 13 minutes (cue internal Rocky soundtrack).

So I pushed on, as the temperature heated up.  The first kilometer sailed past, I had a stopwatch so I knew I was going pretty quick.  Kilometer 2 passed as well, and the crowd was thinning out a bit, making it a bit easier to run comfortably.  For some reason though, instead of slowing down a bit and pacing myself, I felt so good in the atmosphere and the sunshine, that I just kept going hard.  I felt so good, and especially when I saw B on the wall on the side of the Duna, shouting for me to keep going, I told myself I would just push this as hard as I could go.

Let's play Where's Wally?  I am in there somewhere..

The kms kept on falling away.  A funny thing happens to me when I run, especially when I run a long distance.  I am always counting.  So the first half of the race, I am counting up to the halfway point.  I tell myself that, once I get to the halfway mark, I can start counting back down again, and it seems easier from there.

It wasn't easier.

I caught up the 1 hour 45 pacemakers at about kilometer 10 (sorry to the English, I am fully converted to kilometers now).  I knew then that I was pushing too hard, and I wouldn't be able to keep up the pace.  But I persevered, because if a miracle happened and I could keep it going, I would finish in a time I never thought possible.

It wasn't possible.

The wall didn't hit me until about 16 or 17 kms in.  It was around the Parliament building that the pain started to build.  My legs were becoming heavy, my lungs were willing but I was running low on energy now.  And I still had 4 to go.

I knew it was going to be tough, those last 4 kms, and with the sun now blazing down, every minute felt like 10.  My head was telling me just to stop, have a walk, take a break, but my heart said no.  I kept running, admittedly at a slower pace than the first half of the race, but I was still going, and I wasn't going to give up now.

I have to admit, that it was quite humbling in the final stretch, as I was now being passed by many, many people who I had previously sailed past earlier in the race.  A lesson learned, most definitely, for the next one.

I could now see the finish line, and a quick check on my watch told me that I hadn't lost as much time as I thought I might have done.  I didn't quite have enough left in the tank for a final sprint, even as B yelled encouragement from the sidelines, but I never stopped running.

And I finished the race in 1 hour, 41 minutes and 19 seconds.  Officially!

I hadn't run the race in the style I intended, but I am so, so happy that I can say I knocked off 18 minutes from last year's time.  And I learned a valuable, and painful, lesson.

Tonight, I just got back from a small recovery run, 5km at a VERY gentle pace, and the legs felt ok.  A bit achey, but not painful, and I know that I can continue to run.  That I will continue to run.  Because I have not yet achieved my goal that I set myself this year.

In July, it will be 10 years since we lost my dad.  He battled with illness for a long, long time, but thanks to a liver transplant he received, it meant we got to spend more time with him that we all thought we would ever get.  Unfortunately, he lost the battle of his health to cancer, but I am sure that my whole family are appreciative of the treatment he received from Kings College Hospital, for giving us those extra years.

There isn't a day goes by that I don't think of him, and I really want to do something to mark the anniversary.  So on 12th October 2014, I will run the full Budapest Marathon, and I will be trying to raise money on behalf of Kings College Hospital.

There are so many worthy causes that I could do this for, but for me, this is the one.  The NHS is an amazing thing, something perhaps us Brits take for granted sometimes, but it does so much good.  And it does it for everybody, without discrimination.

The money I raise from this run will go directly to Kings, so I beg, plead, implore you, if you can, please please please donate to this very worthy cause.  For the time being, I will not be pestering people for money, I will simply leave the link here:

https://www.justgiving.com/Mike-Parks1

I will leave the pestering/harassment until nearer the time.

Thanks very much for reading!

8. Has It Really Been A Year? (No, just 6 months...)

3rd April 2014

Yes, I know, I never write to you any more.  Well sorry, I kinda got out of the habit of blogging already.  So anyway, I thought I would write a little update, as lots of people keep asking me the same questions, so why not placate you all with a swift post in your faces.

You may have seen via the evil Facebook, I now have a job.  Yes yes, 'took you long enough' I hear you cry.  Truth be told I didn't look all that hard, I always had faith that IBM would come good on their promise and employ me.  It took them a year, but hey, I could use the time off.  The job itself is ok, an entry level admin type affair, but the company seems great and everyone I work with is really nice.  I get a decent salary and a few perks, such as monthly travel passes for about a tenth of the price of normal, so it's all good.

B is working, but not in the dream restaurant job we were hoping for.  There is still a chance it will happen, we are hoping so very much, so keep your fingers crossed for her!

The cats are fine, thanks for asking...maybe slightly porkier than they were a few months ago.  Maybe they are just carrying a little bit of leftover winter fur...

Against all expectations I have kept up with the running (shocking) and I am taking part in the Budapest Spring Half Marathon on the 13th April.  I hope and aim to beat my time from last year, just under 2 hours (not a natural athlete shall we say) so if I achieve that I will be happy.  Watch this space for future running updates.

How's my Hungarian coming along?  Well...honestly I have to admit I have been incredibly lazy with it.  Before I started work we got into a little routine of practicing a bit before bed, maybe 4 or 5 times a week, but since employment it has completely stopped.  I am a bit spoiled by the fact all our friends and all my colleagues speak English.  I will consider taking some classes once the dough comes rolling in (hurry up payday).

We've had a few little adventures since I last posted, such as a trip to Austria, which was just amazing.  Such beautiful scenery, the mountains, the snow.  And the schnitzel..mustn't forget the schnitzel.  We've also recently had a little excursion to the Tisza, which is the 'other' river in Hungary.

Well, that's pretty much the update.  We have settled into life here, and to me, it just feels normal.  Perhaps this is why I have not felt the need to blog for a while.  We had a great Christmas, I managed to get home for a few days to see the family and our friends, and we will both be back for a week in June, which we are greatly looking forward to.  Winter was not so cold as we were expecting, only having a couple of days of snow, and now Spring has well and truly sprung and we are enjoying some warm days, lighter evenings and soon, hopefully, enjoying a fröccs on the balcony with friends.

We hope you are all well, and as always I encourage anyone who feels like doing so to leave comments below.  I can't promise I will keep blogging regularly, cos I am rubbish, but I will try to update a little more often than bi-yearly in future.  Jó estét kívánok!