The Other Side always looks burnished and bursting with promise. The Other Side seems to be holding out its dear, strong arms to embrace you when you finally reach it.
Well. The Other Side is beautiful, but it is as complex and imperfect as the place from which you long for it.
I'm basically happy to be back in Portland. This city, for me, was The Other Side for quite a while. And it truly is a wonderful place and I look forward to giving life to some of those rosy intentions I nursed like pupae before we moved back here. I think, since I've always been an American, the culture shock for a returning expat is not a shock at all but perhaps better described as "alternative culture acclimation process". I was asked several times, three days after returning to Portland, what the culture shock was like. At the time I said, "what culture shock? It's just great to be back". A few days later, I felt myself longing for a walk across the Margit Bridge at night all alone... the warm, buttery sounds of Hungarian rising from the street below, through the giant windows of our urban flat.I had to blink back the tears when thinking about how the dusky, February sky glowed coral pink over Orszaghaz as large, green ice floes cruised under the bridge, heading south down the Danube. Yesterday, I had a passionate, private, full-on bout of crying as I thought about my favorite kavehaz in Vizivaros, just across the bridge in Buda. Current practical and logistical hurdles aside, both of which have much to do with my mercurial state, I expect I will long for Budapest in this way for at least as long as I lived there. Right now, Budapest is The Other Side...I know many will be a bit surprised to know this. A Hungarian might say, "well, you just can't understand, you never will be Hungarian." Well, I never was and never will be Hungarian but I don't need to be to feel a painful love, a love of a very Hungarian variety for the place right now .However, as many Hungarians know, the pleasure is most likely worth the pain. We shall see for this American.
Well. The Other Side is beautiful, but it is as complex and imperfect as the place from which you long for it.
I'm basically happy to be back in Portland. This city, for me, was The Other Side for quite a while. And it truly is a wonderful place and I look forward to giving life to some of those rosy intentions I nursed like pupae before we moved back here. I think, since I've always been an American, the culture shock for a returning expat is not a shock at all but perhaps better described as "alternative culture acclimation process". I was asked several times, three days after returning to Portland, what the culture shock was like. At the time I said, "what culture shock? It's just great to be back". A few days later, I felt myself longing for a walk across the Margit Bridge at night all alone... the warm, buttery sounds of Hungarian rising from the street below, through the giant windows of our urban flat.I had to blink back the tears when thinking about how the dusky, February sky glowed coral pink over Orszaghaz as large, green ice floes cruised under the bridge, heading south down the Danube. Yesterday, I had a passionate, private, full-on bout of crying as I thought about my favorite kavehaz in Vizivaros, just across the bridge in Buda. Current practical and logistical hurdles aside, both of which have much to do with my mercurial state, I expect I will long for Budapest in this way for at least as long as I lived there. Right now, Budapest is The Other Side...I know many will be a bit surprised to know this. A Hungarian might say, "well, you just can't understand, you never will be Hungarian." Well, I never was and never will be Hungarian but I don't need to be to feel a painful love, a love of a very Hungarian variety for the place right now .However, as many Hungarians know, the pleasure is most likely worth the pain. We shall see for this American.
