I cannot believe that in only two weeks from today I will be sitting on a plane on my way back to Canada.  As you can imagine, this reality has caused some mixed emotions, especially knowing how fast the weeks go by around here. But I am also clinging to the fact that I still do have two weeks left to enjoy. And, there are many things I am looking forward to when I get home, especially seeing friends and family again.

The weather has been dreary this week, which really seems to affect all of us, plus we get a bit of cabin fever. I've tried to get out more and so I spent a few days at Shaun and Sondi's this week. Of course, I am not complaining about the weather, considering we had some of the best weather we could have asked for in October and early November.

I discovered recently that our friend Szilvi is a very talented artist, and I mentioned that I would love to learn from her. So she invited me over to teach me some painting techniques with oil painting. I was very happy about this because I have tried acrylic and watercolor, but had not yet tried oil paint. Of course I enjoyed painting (very relaxing), but the big deal for me was the sheer joy of being in the presence of an expert artist at work. I'm hoping to at least have one more chance to do that again before I leave. I am so excited about the opportunities I've had to learn a few new things of interest to me while I'm here, such as painting and violin.

Tonight we had a real treat. Miklos and Szilvi took us to Sumeg, a town about 1/2 hour from us, and we went to a medieval horse show and dinner in a cellar.  So incredibly fun. The horses were all Andalusian (for you horse people) and some of the show reminded me a little of the Lipizzaner show. But everyone was in medieval costume, and the show included jousting, archery, knife throwing, fencing, etc. 
And then dinner - wow. Dinner was held in a hall and the atmosphere was like a medieval banquet. We had roast goose leg,  baked potato, corn bread, and a sort of pickled cabbage salad. We even had to eat our main course without any cutlery, so, with our hands only. For those of you who know me well, etiquette isn't really my forte anyways...so this was perfect. I could eat in a barbaric fashion and still be considered socially acceptable. Maybe it's good I can't attend these events too often. Who knows what I might become :)
There was a live violin concert in the hall as well. We were originally supposed to hear the most famous violinist in all of Hungary, but he called in sick. So there was a replacement trio, which I still enjoyed very much. I can appreciate it even more now that I am trying to learn violin.

After dinner we walked up a hill to the Sumeg castle. It was so foggy you could see the mist almost right in front of you, and the castle looked really cool all lit up in the fog in the dark. 

And the other day I ate brains on pizza, just so you know. Originally I just wanted to try it so I could say that I did, and then ended up eating three pieces. In case your wondering, the taste was pretty good. The texture was a little too soft for my preference.

So that's about it for out of the ordinary this week. I wanted to write more, but I'm going to have to save some of the deeper stuff for later when It's not so late at night. It's a big day tomorrow as we will be having a church service at my flat, and then we will be going out to a family's house for dinner.

A portion of the crowd at adult English club

Feeding the multitude, as I like to call it.

We teach an English song after classes, and Shaun shares a short message

The Medieval horse show (I got better videos than pictures)

Dinner with Miklos and Szilvi in the cellar (Matt is there but he's taking the picture)

 A platter of goose legs, potatoes and cornbread.
Might look simple, but was oh so delicious!

Sumeg Castle in the fog. That illuminated figure on top of the castle in the middle
was one of two German Shepherds who apparently think  they own this castle at night. 

Random brain pizza. Food for thought...or maybe thought for food...I dunno.