Szia once again!

This morning we were granted a reprieve from those deathly early 10 am classes, instead starting an entire 30 minutes later. To celebrate we got up 30 minutes later, ate breakfast 30 minutes later and took the metro roughly 30 minutes later.  Turning away from cryptography, today we looked into the famous Pythagorean triples, that is  those integers that together form a solution to Pythagoras’ famous equation, A^2 + B^2 =C^2 that tells the relationship of the three sides of a triangle.   We learned about the special type of Pythagorean triples known as primitive Pythagorean triples, and derived a clever way to find all primitive Pythagorean triples.

After class ended, a horrible realization dawned on us, it was our last number theory lecture. We would have no more of Bruce’s beautiful voice proclaiming to us the question’s on our mind: like what was 1057^7809 mod 53, and what was the greatest common divisor of 2051 and 7097. The cloudy sky turned greyer in our hearts.

Dazed, confused, bewildered — Holly flips her hair. "Is this truly the end?"  

After that we took a break for lunch which for some of us (Greg, Corey, Lily, Iris, and Colin D.) included a stop at a ramen place called Ramenka.  Iris remarked on how how many cuisines we have access to here—Budapest really is a big city. We found her insights acutely illuminating.  Realizing we would be late for our guest lecture at 1:30, we ran through the streets of Budapest, trotting up and down the escalators of the metro with gusto. Our group arrived at school unprofessionally, though not unfashionably, late.

Authentic Hungarian Japanese ramen

Coming back to the school we were treated to a guest lecture by Csaba Szabo.  We reviewed such fascinating questions such as whether 153*171 is prime (…it’s not).  He then proceeded to lie to us for 62 minutes, the inestimable Eli being the only one catch on. All in all, Szabo was very entertaining speaker and even more enchanting swindler.

Heading back to the guest house, much of the group set out to finish the sixteenth and final problem set. It is astonishing to all that we have almost completed our course.

Poor Professor Hanson got emotional.   : (

For dinner many of us headed to our old friend Kazinczy ut, where Bors Gasztrobar and its scrumptious baguettes and soups lay.  As always, the soups proved to have interesting ingredients such as plum seeds, lime & butternut squash, and red wine.  Afterwards we searched for some Kürtőskalács, and then heartily consumed them.

Wikipedia took this picture for us :)

Looking forward, we have the day off tomorrow to study, though there is an optional visit to the torture museum. Then comes the final exam, the last dinner, and then a bright and early morning for some of us to catch the bus to the airport at 4:30 am. The end is nigh.

Szia!

Greg & Corey