does my head look big in this?

This was taken by Marcell Mizik, the Hungarian photographer I had the pleasure of staying with during my stay in Esztergom. He and his photo mates met up in Budapest the other night and there. Until about 3 days ago, he worked exclusively with old skool film. Now that he has a digital shooter, he tells me he's shot more photos in the last couple of days than he would have normally done in a month. I know pretty much all professional photographers now use digital, but I still think someone who uses film and prints their own shots is a real photographer. He has just signed up for a Flickr account, so check out his awesome photos here.

Friday night was iceskating night for Su and I. The Hungarian National Art Museum celebrated its 100th birthday last week by shouting everybody to free iceskating. Well, not entirely free. I still had to rent the skates, but that was only $4. It's been about 10 years since I last went iceskating, which ended with me falling flat on my face and receiving 4 stitches in my chin. And seeing that ice is snowboarder's number one enemy, you can probably understand the abject fear I had during the first couple of laps of the rink. But all was good and my only falls weren't serious. I eventually remembered how to do it (stop trying to walk and just glide), and by the end of the night, while I was still wobbly, I wansn't as afraid of dying as I had been at the beginning.

Afterwards, we rode over to the square in front of the museum where a Hungarain Pink Floyd cover band played for a handful of people. The dancing from the back up singers was second to none (imagine milking a giant cow), and the exuberant smoke machine filled the stage with so much haze it was difficult to see the band at times. Then we headed to Szimpla, where we made flowers from cigarette packet linings and chatted with a group of guys from a hostel. There is a totally different attitude which goes with staying in hostels, something, which after doing the couchsurfing thing, i may find difficult to warm to again. But it looks fun.

The last couple of days have been pretty chilled. I've had a chance to log some of my video footage, finding a whole bunch of stuff that I forgot I had. I've also had a good dig around the interwebs, catching up on news back at home, forming an opinion about stuff that's happening 14,000km away. But here's my two bobs worth: Every person I have spoken to about Australian politics thinks the ALP are mad to keep putting Kim Beazley up after he has lost twice already. I agree. Go Rudd. I'm listening to ABC News Radio as I type this and apparently we are minutes away...

Here's a nice political quote..

"It was a straight-out lie, lie, lie, by the prime minister. He (is) so used to getting away with telling lies, so protected is he with the paraphernalia of government, so drunk with power has he grown after 12 years in office, so believing has he become in his own infallibility and so authoritarian has he become that that is how he behaves."

John Howard talking about Paul Keating in June 1995.

I've been sent a Hungarian video which I swear features George Negus - but not just one George Negus. No. There's two. An old and a young version laughing about something in Hungarian. Can someone offer a translation maybe? What is the plural of George Negus? George Negii? Anyway.. I forget who I gave my framed, signed circa 1981 George Negus photo to when I left, but whoever you are.. Keep it safe and don't sell it on eBay.

Queen came to Budapest back in the 1980s. It's cool to see that they made an effort for the Hungarians by singing one of their folk songs, plus Freddy Mercury is petrified when he starts performing it to the crowd. Last time I heard about Queen, Brian May (or his twin brother), lives in Norwood. I've not done much travelling before this, but seeing the streets where they drove through and the stadium they played in, I was thinking to myself; "hey, I've been there.. I know where that is". It's a cool feeling.

Today for lunch, Su and I cooked up Latcho (?), which is paprika, onion, tomato and egg. We watched Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead, and once it finished, Su asked for the two hours the movie took from her life back. Maybe I should have bought the Snowboarding Monkey movie instead. Tonight I caught up with Vera and we went to Szimpla for a quite drink, where I bumped into Jodi the Kiwi again. Looks like tomorrow night we're having a little dinner party. Yay.

Harold from Neighbours produced Prisoner. Wow.. Even Vinegar Tits would be surprised with that gem of trivia.

update: Rudd wins. Thank fuck for that. However, if Beazley had sounded as genuine as he did during his own eulogy press conference than he did in his entire term as opposition leader, he may have been PM by now.