Kelly in Kecskemet

Hungary just isn’t what I expected. I don’t know what I imagined, but all I really knew about the country before I arrived were snippets from history class: the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the later influence by the USSR. I had a friend I met at a camp a few years ago named Miklos who was Hungarian, I knew that goulash was the “must-eat” dish here, and I knew that Budapest was supposed to pronounced “pescht,” lest Hungarians roll their eyes at you.

Hungary, or Kecskemet, the city that the camp is located in, isn’t all that different. In fact, aside from the fact that I can’t understand what’s going on around me (although some people would argue that that is a key and integral difference, I’m pretty oblivious to my surroundings even when I understand the language so it really isn’t that much of a hindrance), I mostly just feel like I’m at camp.

The city of Kecskemet

Which has been great. I really didn’t know what my attitude toward teaching would be, as although I am an outwardly patient person, I easily get frustrated. But as we’re halfway through the second week of teaching, I think I’ve experienced enough to realize that I do in fact love it. My first class of students were so fantastic, and as cheesy as this sounds, I really don’t feel like I could have asked for more of them.

The first day of teaching was a stressful, hectic yet mind-numbingly long day. I was rather exhausted from trekking around Western Europe for the past two weeks, had been training all weekend to learn how to teach, and was still feeling a bit overwhelmed upon realizing that I had free license to structure my curriculum for the week as I wished. Of course, now I really appreciate that fact that the structure of the classes that I teach is entirely of my own creation, but on the first day, I wanted rigidity. I wanted answers; I wanted someone to tell me what to do. What I got was “Okay, your kids are intermediate level, aged 12 to 15, figure it out.” (Obviously paraphrasing to some degree as the mentors of the program were entirely willing to help out, but it certainly felt as if we were just being tossed out into the deep end, discarded floaties bobbing forlornly at the other end of the pool.)

My class from the first week! 

But we got through it. We all did. And as teaching got easier, the students grew to talk more and more. I doubt that they were so great because of anything that I had done, but they truly were fantastic. Each wanted to participate, each loved to laugh, and each (at least it seemed) cared about learning. They grew animated when they talked about subjects that they were familiar with and wanted to share with me (we spent almost an entire hour just talking about Budapest and their lives there) and individually and as a class really proved to be special.

The AIESEC teachers

Aside from teaching, life here is nice. It’s slow, it’s easy, it’s simple. I don’t think I’ve had a chance to relax like this for quite some time. At Yale, it’s always go go go. Go to a meeting. Hole up in the library and study. Power nap but get right back to it. Even while I was at home in Miami, I was working all the time. I had friends to see, I had workouts to do, I had actual work at a bioinformatics lab downtown. But here, it’s calm. When I’m not teaching or lesson planning, I just am lounging. I’ve been playing tennis and badminton pretty frequently, but as we can’t really leave campgrounds, the AIESEC teachers have just been able to chill and enjoy each other’s company. Which is a change that I really needed.

I suppose now that I’m thinking of it, there are moments where I realize “Oh, that’s right, I’m halfway across the world.” One: the camp itself is located on a former Russian military camp. Two: the exchange rate! I know this sounds silly, but the teachers snuck out of the camp into town for dinner one night, and the bill was about 25000 forinths. Which is actually great for dinner for 12, and came to about 10 dollars a person, but it was a slightly unnerving moment.

And now it’s time for the camp’s weekly water fight. One of my students this week hasn’t exactly been an angel, and I’ve already decided that at least a few water balloons have his name written all over them.

Szia! 

Kelly