Think my cold has finally broken...at least I am coughing UP stuff now, which is always fun and makes me feel productive. Had a great day yesterday - did some sightseeing, discovered a Hungarian poet (what - you thought I was too sick to find an English bookstore? c'mon now...), and met a couple from Long Beach who got me into a tour of the Parliment. Best news is I have begun writing something....

On the sightseeing side, I visited St. Stephen's Basilicia, which was a nice, ooh, ahh, church. Then I found the bookstore, which had a good poetry section. Browsed through the Hungarian poets in translation and the one I liked best was George Szirtes (book is "The Budapest File"). He is actually an emigre who left Hungary in 56 with his family and grew up in England. Very interesting to me, since his poetry explores that boundary of homelessness - you know, not really being "Hungarian" and not really being "English" other - but belonging, somehow, in language/family/memory to both sides. There are answering echoes of this in my own life even though I am technically only American...

Reading his introduction was eerie also, because it echoed what has been banging around in my head lately. He describes a change in his life when previously he had written 'spur of the moment' and then he "now became aware of learning a craft, of the importance of observation and distance...I needed to learn when to hold back and when to let go." One of my return-home-resolutions (of course I've been making them as I've gone along) is to start studying my craft more seriously. There are other quotes I could share, but I should keep this short. Suffice to say that I am really grateful to have found his book.

So after the bookstore I grabbed lunch at this outdoor summer festival on the Chain Bridge below the two giant lion statues and shared a table with Megan and Dave, a schoolteacher and Boeing engineer from Long Beach. They were headed to the Parliment building for an English-language tour. (The Parliment is actually their gov't building, like our Capitol.) So they invited me along and this was pretty nifty, not least of all because of the company.

Other exciting news is that I have finalized my plans for the remainder of my trip. I am taking a boat (hydrofoil) up the Danube River to Vienna (instead of going by train). It will take a bit longer, but how cool is this? I am really excited about it...to be traveling by river and get to see that whole section of the Danube will be really neat, I think.

So I'll spend four nights in Vienna (Wien for you non-Deutsch folk) and then hook up with Sandra's family on Friday the 15th.

Thank you all for sharing this incredible journey with me. Glad to hear that the postcards are making it through okay...you should be getting more from Prague and from here...I am being lazy and not buying souvenirs for anyone so I hope this postcards are at least a small little thank-you.