HANDS visit to Budapest: May 31th to June 4th - success!

All my worries(and I had exceptionally many) disappeared very very fast

when I experienced Miklós Győri - live.

It appeared that he was far more positive towards the project and we shared many values, experiences and views which made it a very good experiences to visit Budapest. We finalised our talks by signing the “Letter of Intent” and ELTE University and Autism Foundation are now partners (ELTE: researchsite and Autism Foundation: testsite) in the HANDS consortium.

Friday Morning – Autism Foundation

It started out Friday morning with a visit to Dr. Anna Balazs on the Autism Foundation. Autism Foundation is an organisation for teaching, counseling and diagnosis/therapy with individuals within the ASD spectrum. And not less important the Autism Foundation houses a school for children with ASD. The Autism Foundation is THE organisation in Hungary where experiences about teaching and caretaking of ASD-individuals are exchanged in Hungary. And further: Dr. Anna Balazsis is the founder and manager of the Foundation and a great intellectual. We had a pleasant talk about HANDS and ethics. She invited me to a meeting more on Monday. Afterwards Miklós showed me around the school and the clinic. The school is TEACCH based and the Pupil/Teacher ratio seems similar to the ones in DK. The number of pupils are approximately 30 pupils or adults. But the facilities are far from similar. See the pictures! More important was the technological resources and users ICT competences.
They were indeed not similar to DK.

Friday Afternoon – ELTE University and conversation

Miklós and I continued our talks while eating lunch at Café Castro. They served Hungarian dishes and Serbian dishes. I was just about to Saslic(I believe it needs a ‘z’ somewhere) for the second time in my life. Our talk was this typical Miklós -Morten way: a conversation where issues like HANDS, history, culture and politics are intertwined in an inspiring and stimulating way.

We walked to ELTE University. ELTE University is the oldest and largest university in Hungary. Alone at Psychology Department approximately 500 students are enrolled. I was immediately introduced to the head of the Institute of Cognitive Psychology, Prof. Valeria Csepe. I held my talk and there were about 20-25 listeners on a Friday at 2 pm!! Happily Prof. Valeria Csepe participated and it appeared that she found my talk interesting and innovative.
Get my slides here!

And furthermore she found it very valuable, that ELTE University could participate in the HANDS project. And believe me: getting a good and valuable discussion with psychologist about valuable use of computer systems is difficult. Miklós commented that the user of an persuasive system could be considered to be both the child and the teacher. Very valuable comment. Another question forced me to say that(what was new for myself) that Persuasive Technology is no silver bullet and it has like all other methods and theories effect on a limited number of potentially persuasive or pedagogical aims. And it is likely that it is these effect differs from one individual to another.

Afterwards I was invited to a café downtown with Ildiko, Barbara and a girl more. All psychologists. Again the talk was very positive, stimulating and inspiring. We talked about the ideas and my own background for creating a project like HANDS. It was particularly nice for me that Barbara knew the song “Once in a lifetime” by Talking Heads, which I often listen to, when I shall understand my role in HANDS.

Saturday – digesting the impressions

Saturday was the day of my own.

I spent the morning digesting the very many good talks, discussions and experiences.

I made some design sketches and formulated theses' and identified tradeoffs. I cried once in a while. I had been so anxious about Miklós’ attitude and other peoples as well. They will participate and not only that: the cognitive psychology department at ELTE will be very valuable in the EU-application due to the nation, reputation and size. The chances for the application to succed have been increased significantly!

I was a tourist in Budapest too. A wonderful old European city with very many beautiful buildings from around the 19^th century.

And a lot of young couples who hug and kiss in parks and streets.

Sunday – Boottrip to the historical city Visegrad

Miklós had Friday afternoon invited me to join a whole day boat trip to Visegrad, an old and important historical city in Hungarian history. The headquarter for Hungarian Kings. Together with his wife, Kristina and 8 years old son Barto… .

I had suggested that Miklós and I should ban talk of HANDS, but I did not manage to keep my own law and the talk was this nice Miklós-Morten talk where we mix a conversation about culture, politics, HANDS and history.

Miklós told me, that my HotelShip(Hotel Fortuna) is placed in Budapest, 500 meters away from the former Hungarian Secret Police Headquarter and 1 km away from the pier where the Jews where deportated to the KZ. A perfect historical scenario for me!

Why am I here? –I am in Hungary to tie the former communist regime to the democratic EU.

Miklós wife, Kristina, speaks as impressively good English. She had never been taught English but wanted to be good. She is good at English! Together we had a class in speaking English and I believe, that my English improved a lot. She is chiefpsychologist at the Autism Foundation which is valuable for the HANDS project too.

If Hungary geography forms a funnel, the Hungarian plain is the larger part of the funnel, the Danube from Budapest to Visigrad is the thin part. And strategically a very important road from Asia, Turkey and Russia into central Europe.

In other words a road filled with wars, refugees and goods.

That Sunday the Danube was filled with a happy family, me and pleasant conversations.

Sundays last talk on my Hotel Ship was an introduction to a softwaremodelling tool(UML) and decisions about how the organisational map of HANDS should look like. It was an easy talk.

Monday – Dr Anna Balasz makes an critical review

My last day in Budapest was occupied with yet a valuable talk with Dr. Anna Balazs, presentation of the school in Autism Foundation, signing the “Letter of Intent” and a time to say goodbye.

Dr. Anna Balazs had very many good comments and I can not mention them all. But one concerns the major objection of the HANDS project.

I had stated, that the objective is “If Persuasive Technology works, can you persuade individuals with ASD to get a better life?”. That is the technologist point of view. The technology is the persuader.

She emphasized, that the successful persuasion takes places as a play of three partners: pupil, technology and teacher. That very bright idea was also conceived with other words by Miklós on the talks Friday.

It will be integrated in the EU HANDS application.

Afterwards we signed "The Letter of Intent".

I believe it is needless to say, that the farewell to Miklós while the taxi for the airport was waiting could not be formulated at "Goodbye".

It was “We will see again”.