Fun: The Swimming Pool

I have a lot of serious blogging to catch up on. This was busy week, and included meetings with Lajos Kis-Toth, the Vice Rector, my first "survival Hungarian" class, lunch at the "Red Lobster", meeting Paul Swann, a Fulbright scholar from Temple University, our official welcome from Zoltan Hauser, the Rector, and my first E-Teaching for Learning Seminar. Many of those events deserve a blog all to themselves. But right now I will just say, "Happy Valentine's Day" to everyone and tell you about the wonderful swimming facility they have here in Eger.

You have to see it to believe it, so click on the link above to virtually visit the Bitskey Aladar Uszoda, designed by architect Makokvecz Imre. A new friend and colleague was kind enough to invite me to meet her there, so I could 'learn the ropes', that is, understand the procedures. She says she tries to go there at least once a week to relieve the stresses of the job--and I can certainly see how this would help! There were many people coming in after work, and bringing children to swim and to practice swimming. There is a 50 metre pool (I think that's the first one I've even swum in), that looks pretty long when you push off from the end. A smaller pool is heated to a warmer temperature, and I think in warmer months there is an outside area, too. There's a pleasantly hot sauna, large jacuzzi, and very nice changing rooms. With passes to this place, supplied by our wonderful Ezsterhazy Karoly hosts, located a very short and easy walk from our apartment, we have NO EXCUSE for getting out of shape during our stay here!

We also look forward to going to the pool for water polo games; in fact, there is one tomorrow. We were told that Eger's team is quite good, ranked first in Hungary, and includes Olympians from 2008. I've never seen water polo, except on television, so look forward to the match tomorrow. I read from the website linked above that they also play "underwater hockey" in that pool--learn about that sport from the Eger Online website--you heard about it here!

*Note after the fact: We enjoyed watching the match on Sunday--thanks to Dr. Hauser for the invitation. Unfortunately, Eger finished behind 10-7. I look forward to attending regularly so that the rules I looked up in Wikipedia will make sense!