Frommer Readers

Dear Ryan,

   My wife and I are getting much good use of the 8th edition of your Frommer's on Budapest, which we brought on our our two month sabbatical from the US.  Normally, I wouldn't write the author of a guidebook, but we saw in the book that you live full time in Budapest and we thought we would share our good laugh with you. In walking down Andrassy Street looking for a place to exercise in-doors, we had been led to believe there was a fitness club at 68 Andrassy street. As we walked there we discovered the fitness club was since out of business, but the EcoCafe next door looked good. We went in that day in the first week of our being here and have gone back at least three times. It has freshly baked organic bread and kifli, sandwiches and good coffee.

   Next door to the Eco as you probably know is the Lukacs Cukraszda.  As we walked by it after breakfast, all my wife could remember was that it was noted in your guidebook. Well, being curious and on vacation I stepped inside to see if I could take a look at the menu.  To the right of the door seemed to be a board with writing that looked like a menu, so I headed that way before being abruptly stopped by one of the waiters.  It was literally two minutes to 9:00 and it turns out that the Lukacs does not open until nine AM.  So, as I'm a potential customer two minutes before opening, I was surprised and miffed that the response of the employees was to insist that I leave.  

   When we got back to our apartment, we looked at the Frommer's just to check what you might have said about Lukacs.  Of course, we howled when we read your insights about the manager's attitude.  You had hit it right on the head.  We definitely wouldn't go back there. 
 

   Further you had noted some concern about Gerloczy Kavehaz.  We stopped there today for lunch because it is around the corner from our favorite cheese shop.  We can easily report a very good experience. Great service at lunch, willingness to explain the menu in Hungarian and English and very nice quiche with fresh salad.
 

   Thanks for all the hard work it takes to see, review and write these places.  We all benefit. Jack and Agnes Dover

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Blogging Rules 1 and 2

The first two rules you learn in blogging is

1.) to post regularly to maintain your readers' interest.

2.) never break rule number 1.

Though it seems like forever since I wrote last, it hasn't been that long. What I have been doing in the meanwhile is trying to scrape the mold  off of my body. With the exception of one day, it has rained here every day since May 10th. Some days it rained all day, but few. Most days it rained for an hour or two with dark bloated "I am going to get you" clouds still lurking  above ready to pounce upon us with more water. 

The good news is that I lucked out with the State Exams. My days of confinement have whittled down from seven to four. The first of the series is out of the way and it took less than half a day. Yowzer! June 2 did not include me, but I was uncertain. Due to a typo, I was exonerated from June 9, they decided they did not need me on June 16, so that only leave BA State Exams on June 23 and 25th. Well, I do have a doctoral dissertation defense I need to attend on June 7th, being made part of the committee without my raising my hand to volunteer. They needed to fill a minority quota and I was it. I believe I am the ONLY US native speaker with a doctorate in the entire university. Being the largest university in Central Europe and one that offers 68 Masters degrees, this is quite something. I would venture to guess that the number of native English speakers of any nationality with a doctorate, within our university system, would still be few enough to stuff all of us into a phone booth and still have room left over to dial home.

As I said, I was uncertain about today. I had filled the exam dates on multiple calendars. One of the calendars has all of the dates for exams. Other calendars had some of the dates, but no remarks. Then dates were added and deleted, causing much consternation and confusion as when I needed to be where. To avoid mental conflict, I went into school this morning, found my name was no on any committee, but went to my office to work.


I spent from 8:45 am to 3:30 pm working on my classes for the fall. The first day of classes for me is September 14th, yet here I am in June working on the course syllabi and schedules, finding new and hopefully better books, and so on. This is because I have such a hefty "To Do" list for this summer, mostly work filled and not necessarily fun in the fashionable sense of the word, that time is too precious to waste. Three of my classes are no squared away, checked off of the list. One is almost complete, but I am changing books, so need to read it again for scheduling. Then I am teaching a new masters level course Social Problems in the US. After ordering six books for that class to decide which to use, I had them send to a friend who consults here often to bring back from the US. What slipped my mind was that she was married in March, so though I had the books shipped to her home, she had been at her husband's home, 150 miles away. Now those books will not be arriving until August when she returns again. The joys of teaching out of your own country.


Speaking of books, Frommer's owes me 10 copies of my own book. They contacted me for shipping info, but it turns out that they will ship them from jolly ole England, where they have not been printed yet. That puts me on hold. It would seem reasonable they could spend a few extra to ship from the US, where it has been out for weeks now. We have received five phone calls for bookings from the US. Strangely, they prefer that to e-mail or even using our Jajah free call button on the website. Go figure.

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This came in the e-mail this morning. Just a stones throw from my birthplace of Long Branch, NJ. I also found out that my book came out in the US; however, Amazon.com is still showing the UK release date. Wiley Publications has manually edited the information, but it keeps rolling back to the old date. If you are in the US, the book is out, but you may have to have it ordered. It in only weeks old, so handle with care.

Dr. James,

     I just want to let you know that I enjoyed the Budapest guide. Although I was born in Hungary, I left in 1956 and had much to learn.

     The reason I'm writing to you is that I live on the Jersey Shore, in Bradley Beach, and I will be in Budapest the beginning of June. I just thought I'd ask if you would like me to bring you something from home. If yes, please let me know. In any case, your book is a success.

Thank you,

Suzanne Beck

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Funny, This

I was Googling looking for the link for my book on Amazon today to send to an old friend. I came across this. You can click on the picture to make it more comprehensible.

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I am back

It seems like a lifetime ago since I was able to write here regularly, but yesterday, I sent off my manuscript for "Budapest & the Best of Hungary" to the editor. I was actually ahead of schedule since the deadline was not until October 22nd, but for some reason, I had October 1st in my mind. Actually, when I realized I was pushing myself toward the first needlessly, I maintained that schedule just to be free of it. I was becoming obsessed with reviewing everything that came my way. With the maps, it came to 328 pages. Yes, the authors have to do the maps too. Fortunately for me, Ron loves maps and he spent over 24 hours cumulatively plotting all of the different things on each map. The worst was the restaurant map; I had over 75 restaurant reviews that needed to be plotted on the map. What makes it most difficult is that they don't give you a clean map, but the preexisting one, so you have to cross out old markers and re-do everything. Even if a restaurant is still the same, the numbering will change with the new list. This writing project started on June 5th and other than our ten days in Scotland in August, I have spent 6-12 hours a day working on the book and the chapter for the Rail guide. Normally, over the summer, I would have devoured at least thirty books, but I did not pick up one book. My compulsive personality would not stop with one and the conflict between reading or writing would be too great. I still have photos on my camera from the end of May that I have not put onto the computer yet. My contract arrived when we returned from Rome when Earl was here, so I never did anything with them. The most difficult part about writing a travel book is trying to make 40 hotel rooms sound different and engage a reader as they read 70+ restaurant reviews. Imagine making 25 Hungarian menus sound diversely appealing. My thesaurus, Flip Dictionary, and Illustrated Reverse Dictionary are in tattered condition. Now I can read again. Now that I have some free time, the student papers are starting to come in and I am actually looking forward to reading them. I need the diversion. It is good to be back, but if this brings more travel writing work in the future, it will have been more than worth the effort. It was exhausting, but fulfilling. It will be thrilling to see my name on a book. Sadly, my reader rate for this blog is almost as low as Bush's approval ratings. I am sure in time, I will be able to get them back up faster than he will. I have also added an Amazon.com store to our web site with books from Hungary on it as well as the current Frommer's guides, so when it changes I will have my own there as well. Soon, Ryan

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Greetings From Scotland - Next

Well, I said I would be working furiously over the summer and I have been. I have been to dozens of restaurants eating dinner every night to write reviews of the food for the book, staying over night at hotels, judging their quality, walking the streets looking for the best shopping, double checking museum prices, and so on and more so. BUT, we had a trip to Edinburgh planned long before Frommer's contacted me, so we are off to Scotland for 11 days and the Fringe Festival.

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Up, Up, and Away

No, this is not really me nor am I off on a beach somewhere, but this is a working summer vacation.

You may or may not have noticed that I have not posted for some time. The last time, I was waiting for my contract from Frommer's. In the meanwhile, our friend Earl was here to visit and after he was here for a week, the three of us took off for Rome. Now, normally, I would have blogged all of that trip with pictures, but fearing an unknown B and B, I did not bring my laptop. My instincts were good; the place was miserable.

When we returned home after five days in rainy, chilly Rome, I had a package waiting for me. It was my contract from Frommer's with a current copy of the Budapest book as well as the Europe by Rail book. From that moment on, I have been researching the information. There have been lots of changes in the city since these were written, so I have do make calls, but more time consuming, I am walking the city checking things out. Calling is almost useless since most places either do not answer their phones or if they do, they do not speak English. We have been eating out almost every night and no, we do not get free meals. So far, I have only received a free admission to the Marzipan Museum in Szentendre.

If you do not see me for some time, it is because I am working hard. Because busy people are given more to do, the Hungarian Fulbright Commission asked me to read and score 4 applications for Hungarians wanting to go to the U.S. on a Fulbright scholarship, the National Association for Multicultural Education asked me to read 7 proposals for their next conference, a former student asked me to sit in on her rescheduled Master's thesis defense exam (she was ill the first time), and three students re-appeared from nowhere to remind me that I am their thesis advisor for the fall.... And I have three new courses to prepare for for the fall semester too.

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The Results Are IN!!!

Hi, Ryan. This is Stephen from Frommer's. I have some good news. I've reviewed the resumes I received for the Budapest & Hungary guide, and I'd like to offer you the book update. I enjoyed your clips, and I was impressed that you did some legwork at the hotel for the sample reviews. And it's great that you live in Budapest and seem to have explored it so thoroughly, and you're a business-owner to boot. I think you'd do a great job with the book and bring a unique perspective to it--and I think this may be the first time we've offered a book to a message board commenter, so it's always nice to start another first. Here are all the logistics for the assignment, so please review and let me know ASAP if you're interested and able to do the project. Note that this contract also includes a few other Budapest/Hungary-related assignments, such as an update of the Hungary chapter for our Frommer's Rail Europe guide (due before the main Budapest deadline) and an online update for our website (due after the book deadline, so we can post updates online just after the book comes out). Let me know if this is all doable. And note you'd also be updating maps, so I can send you thorough instructions for those as well. Here's all the information I have for the contract: Title: Frommer's Budapest & the Best of Hungary, 7th Edition Release month: April 2008 Page count: 320 pages (roughly 30 pages longer than the last edition, so there's room for new material and maps) Page count minus the front matter and Index: 300 pages (text and maps)

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Pins and Needles

There were a pile of student papers to read, correct, grade, okay, not really a pile since they turn them in via e-mail. Maybe a mailbox full. Instead, I worked on my reviews. Though I am known for getting student papers back within a couple of days, these were mostly freshmen paper and they are not familiar with my work habits yet, so I had some leeway. I just sent in my reviews for Frommers: hotel, restaurant, museum. Only the first two were requested, but I am anal retentive at times. I thought the third would be an opportunity to say, "Hey, I am an overachiever." The deadline was May 7th, but I thought sending them in today would show my seriousness about deadlines. It should be of importance to an editor. The guidelines for writing the reviews was 35 pages long and I pored over them again and again. They have strict requirements for the formating, which took as much time as the rest. The fonts and sizes are different for various parts of one review and there are codes that need to be implanted here and there. It took me two days to write the 250 word review, having edited it again and again. I made mention of this when I sent them in to give him the idea that I do take this seriously, but at the same time will take direction for editing and rewriting. I also mentioned that the hotel was quite adamant about not being helpful, but after charming three people, I got my way. This was to show my tenacity, hopefully. The guide emphasized using humor, so I tried to instill some in my note as well as with the reviews. As soon as I hit the 'Send' button propelling them into cyberspace, I had misgivings about what I wrote, how I wrote it, life in general, my purpose on earth, and the beat goes on.

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Reviews

I am taking my reviews seriously and researching them. I have to choose one restaurant and one hotel that is not in the current Budapest guide. I chose the New York Palace since it has only opened in May, 2006 and our favorite restaurant Paprika. Today, I went to Paprika, took some pictures, reviewed the menu to make sure nothing had changed since our last visit, looked over the wine list and absorbed the atmosphere once again. Now the difficult part is writing a review that is only 200-250 words. I can do it, I can do it, I can do it. Opps! Too many words already.

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My Big Break!

Hello. I'm writing from Frommer's travel guides. I'm the editor of our Frommer's Budapest & the Best of Hungary guide. Our web producer pointed me to some of your posts on the Frommers.com message boards, and I see you've written some handy posts and keep a blog about Budapest. Thanks for your thorough contributions. I thought I'd touch base and see if you've written anything else on Budapest. Have you published any articles or reviews? I'm actually looking for a new author for the next edition of the Budapest guide right now, so you're welcome to send clips and a resume if you'd like to apply (email is best). I'm considering a few other writers for the book, and I'm hoping to make a decision within the next week or so. Please free to send materials, and let me know if you have any questions... Best, Steve ------------------------------------ Stephen Bassman Frommer's Travel Guides

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