Do You Believe in Wishes?

I came across this site today, which I found interesting enough to share. It is Causes - Wishes. Besides just donating through the site to various causes they have listed, and there are plenty to choose from for everyone, you can create your own. Tired of getting birthday presents? Create a wish instead and have all of the money people would normally spend on your birthday presents go to the charity of your choice. You can do the same with wedding wishes, memorial wishes, run/walk/bike wishes, holiday wishes, and personal wishes. How much more STUFF do you need anyway? 

I will advocate for this service, but I still am wishing for a good bagel if anyone is coming this way.

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Fulbright Evaluations

For a number of years now, the Hungarian Fulbright Commission has asked me to be an evaluator for applications for those Hungarian hopefuls who wish to go to the US to study, lecture or research.


Each application is reviewed and scrutinized by one American and one Hungarian reviewer whenever possible. Generally, in the past, the request comes in at the very end of the spring semester, one of the worst possible times to fit in yet another activity, but I have never said no. Not only do I enjoy it, they pay me besides.


This year, it seemed that they had forgotten me, at least until a couple of days ago when I received the call to action. They had 8 proposals that needed to be examined. All were in the field of literature, not my area, per se, but I am able to muddle through with some Internet research where needed to fill in my information deficits. 


Basically, I examined two categories: Lecturer/Research all those from here with a doctorate already and those who are applying for student status. Ninety percent of the time, I can say that the Lecturer/Research proposals leave me feeling like a total underachiever, waste of professional life slug. The list of publications, conference lectures and other professional activities makes my head spin. My only consolation is that they have access to the foundation research, which is in Hungarian. I don't have access to databases in English.


Then again, I do justify my sloth with the fact that I try to put the majority of my energy into the classroom and working one on one with students. This leaves less time and much less energy to pursue tracking down professional resources as the foundation for further research followed by writing and publishing. That is my justification and I am sticking to it. 


For those outside or within the US, I highly recommend you check out the Fulbright Commission Scholarship program, but clicking here. To learn more of its history, you can check out this article.

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Saying Good-bye Yet Again

We met with Beth and Bob to say our last good-bye for the fourth time. This was the final, final though as they leave on the shuttle at 7:30 am tomorrow for the airport. Beth was a Fulbright Scholar here for one semester. She is a nursing professor in Nebraska. Bob, her husband, is a microbiologist. They are two fantastic people that we had the pleasure of sharing life experiences with over the semester. We will miss them and truly hope our paths cross again...but not in the States, here in Europe.

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