First off, for those of you still clueless about the pronunciation of Szeged, a handy hint: the Hungarian for sex is szex, pronounced exactly the same (based on my observation of a sign for a "Szex Shop" in Budapest). So basically, just ignore the z.

I have just left the beautiful little city with its gorgeous architecture, wonderful thermal baths, and great bars and restaurants, having had to tear myself away from DrupalCon which is not quite at an end: there's a code sprint tomorrow which I'm really sorry to be missing, but client projects call and I need to get back to Vancouver. I can't complain though - I've had four really amazing days.

Of the sessions I attended I think the most interesting for me were Konstantin Käfer's session on JavaScript patterns and how they are used in Drupal to create such elegant functionality as the auto-complete feature; and in fact Raincity's own Adrian Roussouw's presentation on Aegir, his successor solution to Hostmaster - there were a lot of blown minds in the room after that one, including my own.

It may seem crazy that I had to go to DrupalCon to get a decent grasp of what one of my own colleagues is working on but with colleagues spread around the world that's sometimes just how it is. So it has been wonderful spending time with RCS folks based in faraway parts. But as for meeting new peeps, Szeged has been an absolute treat. The venue itself and its proximity to tons of great bars and restaurants in an easily walkable town centre, have made the social aspect of DrupalCon Szeged truly superb. The ground floor of the conference centre had a whole space for people to sit down between sessions and get to know each other and talk Drupal. I got to chat with maintainers of favourite modules and find out about upcoming functionality, meet other Irish Drupalers for the first time, chat face to face with people I had only ever chatted previously with on irc, discuss documentation ideas with the head of the documentation team herself (Addison Berry), and generally hobnob with some of Drupal's most committed and talented contributors.

My own double session on jQuery, with co-presenters Stella Power and David Eads, went well and we received great feedback

The balmy evenings allowed for a very pleasant continuation of interesting conversations, with large amounts of Drupalers engaging in general merriment on the terraces of Szeged's bars and restaurants or chilling out in the thermal baths.

I never did get over my jetlag, partly because the nightlife was too good and partly because the music festival taking place right beside my hotel provided a constant flow of drunken teenagers walking past into the early morning. But I've had too good a time to care, and besides, I fly back to Vancouver tomorrow so maybe the jetlag will just get canceled out (does it work that way?).

Szo, I will szign off from my beautiful old hotel in central Budapest and look forward to being back at the RCS Vancouver office on Monday.

Photo credits: peterlozano, hannes_l, Tine & Hagen Graf