Day 10- May 27th: Wild goose- chase and chopping off doll heads

Hot, hot, hot! It's been so hot the last few days and today is no expection; if not it's even worse. I got ready and made on my way to the university in search of the model making materials. It took me a while to find the “dot” on the map but on the way I discovered a wonderful market place and spent sometime there. I arrived at the university and from what students told me it's an Economic University and the Architecture University is across the river. Beata had sent me on a wild goose- chase. I walked over the bridge and realized that most faculty and student are gone for the day and I was asked to come back the next day. One positive note, I did stumble on the wonderful cave church and the beautiful Buda hills and park the church is in. I spent sometime there climbing the hills and looked at the wild flower bloom in this almost unbearable heat.

I feel like as if I am Alice in Wonderland looking for the curious rabbit in a strange but fascinating land of the unknown. Even though the process of material searching has been difficult but this also helped me on learned and see the city in whole new different light.

Later in the night I started making my art work by sawing the dolls head off!!! It's completely insane of me sitting in a hotel room alone holding a saw and cutting the dolls head off in the darkest of the night. What happened to the sophisticated designer from LA? This is such a unreal experience.

Day 7- May 24: Being Dramatic... oh

Our residency host and coordinator Beata invited us to see her work at her house so all of us took the trains and a bus over to her house. She is such a great story teller, she lives a very interesting life and have so many intriguing stories to tell. She bursts into life (even more) when she tells stories about her ex marriages, old communist days, and her family drama. I can really relate to her pain but I decided not to share with everyone in the group so I kept it to myself.

Beata is such a wonderful artist, she did work in many different medias and had shown in some major museums in the world. I feel she is able to understand my work. I wish to be like her one day but I do feel bad that she still struggles financially, the life of Artists sigh....

I wanted to do something fun tonight so decided to go to a bar and next thing I know it's 6am... made my way back to the hotel and had breakfast and went to bed.

Day Three- Work starts

We had our Art residency meeting today for 7 hours, went over the program's history, information, and what we are expected to do. We later drove to a hardware store on the outskirt of the city and did some material researching. I also realized I haven't had the need to speak a word of Hungarian... shocking how people are able to understand each other without the need of a common language.

I got a metal rod and needed a wire/ rod cutter for it at the store and got the wrong tool. I asked a worker and made a sawing action with my hand and he pointed me to the right tool. We didn't understand each other's language but we understood each other's hearts. That was beautiful.

It's been only 3 days since my arrival but I am starting to fall in love with Budapest and can see myself living in this beautiful city. I can's say the same about Taipei, which is totally ironic because I was born there and lived in Taiwan for 14 years. Life in Taiwan is either too boring in the country or too exciting in the city and Budapest is just right with a mixture of everything and very much like a larger Pasadena, which I totally adore.

Due to unexpected internet problems my blog and flicker sites will be uploaded once every 2 days instead of daily