My trip to Budapest

As many already know I represented Helsinki University at the 16th IMC (International Mathematics Competition) at Budapest, Hungary that took place 25th-30th of July. I didn't have much time to prepare for this trip as I had returned to Finland from the US the 16th of July. Well I'll just start from the departure and tell everything I dare.

The first day, the 25th, I woke up. I had gone to sleep, yet again, too late, so I woke up pretty slowly. Because of this, and the fact that my packing wasn't complete, I missed my bus by a couple of seconds. I had to call my sister to find me a bus to get to the airport, because I didn't have enaugh cash to pay for a taxi. Instead of being at the airport 2 hours early I ended up arriving just 30 minutes before. In any case I got to the plane, although I had to accept the grins of my team mates. I also had time to get some cash, which was a little harder than I expected. This included a 250 € participation fee, that the University payed, but I had to carry with me.

I was a little dissapointed of not finding the adapter for my minilaptop, but thought that it would be good for me to be some time without a computer. This was a good thing, I could relax and didn't even check my e-mail during the trip. Well the plane trip went well. I was reading this one very boring book about liturgy for one exam. The flight took a couple of hours and we got something to drink (I think I took a beer) and some sandwithces.

When we arrived everything went smoothly and we spent time talking about the previous IMC competitions. Here I was a little of an outsider because the rest of my team had participated last year. In any case after a short while a guide took us to a bus. It was an American school bus and I had never been in one. Ironically the first time was now in Hungary. The seats were small and unconfortable, but the trip didn't take long. I was talking about courses in mathematics and theology with my good friend Joel Kaasinen.

When we arrived there were a lot of people around and we had to somehow manage to get to the front desk and take care of all our business. We were all very swetty and it was very hot and dry. Finally we got to our rooms. The rooms were 2-person rooms, and I shared mine with Joel Kaasinen. At first we spent time reading and just relaxing until we went down town to eat.

We had heard that there was some place "Nugati Paldausvari" where we could find food. So we took the tram to that direction and found a nice italian restaurant where our teem ate. I ate something mussles and pasta and drank coke. I regreted my choise of coke, because I like wine, but at first didn't dare to order it because it seemed that everyone else drank coke. Well one of us drank wine... The restaurant had interesting paintings and we ended up talking about them and also about politics, mathematics and technology education (dosn't these topics sound strange...)

After this lunch we walked some time in down town. We went actually to this one park where there was, for example, a statue of George Washington, which was donated by the Hungarians living in the US. We also saw the "millenium monument" which wasn't a big metal and glass structure but a building much like the Brandenburger tor in Berlin. The park was big and very beautiful. Around it were some small castles.

We then went back to the hostel to eat dinner at the university where it was free for IMC participants. The food wasn't that grate and it was surprising that drinks were not included. After this me and my friend still went down town and walked a little around. We tried to find some nice place to have some coffee, but didn't manage to do so. In the end we just saw some people sleeping on streats and a lot of beautiful buildings. Budapests down town is very nice. We didn't plan to drink any alchol before the competition and decided to pospone it until after the competition.

Tha evening we returned back to the hostel and went to sleap. The next day we had to wake up early and went for breakfast. We were talking with the Helsinki University of Techonolgy team. After this we had the opening "ceremony" which was merely three consecutive talks by Josef Pelican, John Jane and some third professor. From John's talk I remember what he said about the excersises: They each year try to have so easy excersises that everybody gets some points and so difficult that nobody gets everything. But independant of how much they try, every year somebody manages to get everything. Well this year they succeeded at this. Somebody got 0, but nobody got all the points.

After the opening ceremony we went again down town and walked around. This was what we did every day, so I have a hard time remembering what we did each day. But this day we went to the Budapest Parlament building and near it there was a cafe where we drank some lemonade and hade a cappuchino. Near the place we saw a monument from the soviet time which was pretty interesting. It was nice that they hadn't removed their history from their capital dispite how painful it is. We then that day went back and had lunch and dinner later. That night we went early to sleep because the next day there would be the first competition day.

We woke up on the third day and went quickly for beakfast and the competition. That day went quite well. The first two problems were easy and I got them quite fast. Then I didn't get anything more, which I was a little dissapointed of. In any case, I enjoyed the problems. Then we for a tour arond the town, which was a very boring tour even though we had a lot of fun with each other telling jokes all the time. So after it we decided we would just walk around by our selves. We saw that day the castle and some old churches and also a great view of the city. Then we went again back for lunch and dinner and started to wait for the "second round".

Next day, the forth day, we had our breakfest and the competition. That day didn't go very well and I was very dissapointed, but forgot about this during the day. We went for a walk at this one island and talked about a lot of stuff. We returned back to the hostel and on the way tasted a strong alcoholic drink "Unicum" which had a very peculiar taste. Also we tasted some local beer "Dreher". We also saw some finnish people, and avoided them by starting to talk in english and going inside.

Then in the evening we went for dinner to this greek restaurant, had some beer there and at this one park. The park was apparently some outside place for people to have a drink and relax. There was also another of these places, so apparently they were typical for Budapest. I found this idea very nice. During the evening we also went to a restaurant Absinthe and had, of course, Absinthe in an expensive and stylish manner. Later we also bought a bottle of vodka and water and drank the vodka (there were five of us). We talked about religion and politics. I remember quite much of the evening, but should not have drunken that much... Then I walked with my friend Åstrand back and we talked about competing mathematics and I perhaps said too much, as I usually do.

Next day we all had a little bad morning but anyway got up pretty fast. I went with my friend for a late breakfast and then we laid in bed for some time. Then we went for a walk up this one hill, where stood the "Freedom memorial". My friend who had been in the military was exited about some cannons that were near by. The walk up the hill was pretty hard especially in the hot and dry climate of Hungary. We got anyway up the hill and saw the monument and got a great view of the city.

This was then the last full day in Budapest. That evening we got the results from the competition and our certificates at the closing ceremony. We also had a wonderful cruise on the river Danube and saw the city from an entirely new perspective. The churches, parlament and all the other buildings were very nice. Also the food and closing ceremony were nice. The closing ceremony took pretty long and at times was pretty boring because they read the names of all the contestants, about 300. At our dinner table were the two teams from Finland: Helsinki University and Helsinki University of Technology. We talked about many things and enjoyed the evening.

That evening we still walked a little around the town looking for a place to eat, but didn't find one. Then we went to sleep. The last day we had organised a late checkout. Because of this we packed our stuff fast and went for breakfast. Then we went to this nice restaurant where I had the best steak I have had since my trip to Sweden a couple of years ago. I also bought some suveniers, Unicum for my mother and myself, some wine and some natural produce for my sisters. I also sent cards to my sister, mother and dad.

Then we left to the airport and headed back to Finland. I got home pretty late and just went to bed thinking about all the wonderful things that had happened to me during that trip. Hopefully next year I will be able to participate again to IMC!