Magyar News, 2000. szeptember-2001. augusztus (11. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)
2001-02-01 / 6. szám
Leftovers in our case are very specific. It has nothing to do with the with the delicious food that wasn’t consumed during the holiday feasts. These leftovers are from information that didn’t get used in time. They are stored in the computer and were kept there for some reason. Usually the information is interesting but it is not complete. We have to search, look for the missing elements so we could present it to our readers. Unfortunately many times we don’t succeed.Mot this time. This article was completed by an outside source. The beautiful Hungarian monthly magazine, the PANORAMA, gave us a helping hand. Based on their information, this leftover didn’t end up in the wastebasket. This is a heart-wrenching story. András Toma finally at home Our story is about András Toma. He is 75 years old. For over five decades of his life he did nothing. He sat on a bench and waited. He waited for something he should had received fifty years ago; he waited for his freedom. He wasn’t in a prison, he committed no crime. His problem was that he only spoke Hungarian. Let us try to walk though his life. András Toma was bom at the end of the year 1925. His family lived near Nyíregyháza in Sulyánbokor. From this name (bokor=bush) you could guess that is was a small settlement, not even the size of a village. The overall conditions were on the backward side. Probably his schooling was far behind of what a city school could offer. He also wasn’t exposed to the happenings in the world. He was drafted at the age of 18 or 19 and was thrown into the war-machine what he hardly understood. This was already at the end of the war and he with the many Hungarian youth of the First Army was captured. He now had to face people talking to him in a language that he knew nothing about. Besides the conditions of the transportation did not live up to any human measurements. On the way towards Siberia half the number of the prisoners-of-war died in the train wagons. This experience must had been a shock to him, besides he had some health problem, too. To his luck, he was taken off the train and sent to a hospital. Then he was moved to an other one in Kotelnich. This is a mental hospital, and it is about 400 miles from Moscow and was on the Trans-siberian main railroad line. Why was a mental hospital chosen? Because they couldn’t communicate with him. One would imagine that the doctors, nurses, psychiatrists, psychologists, social workers and the like would have enough education, training, or common sense to be able to find out that this person is speaking an other language. A language that is spoken in a neighboring, or let us say in an occupied country. All they had to do is put a bread, an apple, a hat, or any familiar object on the table and point to them one at a time. Then repeat the pointing, and if the person repeats the same names for the objects then it is evident that he is using a language. Haven’t the immigrants to this country gone through this system of learning? But this is András Toma in a wheelchair at the airport in Moskow on his way home this past fall. America. For 53 years they let him talk “gibberish”, sitting on the bench in the hospital’s yard. The most he could do was to go to the woodworking shop and make carvings for his own pleasure. The poor man couldn’t even keep his name because there were no documents His name became András Tamás. Well if they were able to get this much out of the man, even if it wasn’t quite correct, why didn’t they pursue this avenue? In the recent years he lost a leg by amputation. It is surprising that they let him go. He could have been kept there forever and not become news worthy. Maybe there is some human element getting into that system. Well, we were also let to know now that Raul Wallenberg was executed. It took some time! Didn’t it? Toma’s luck came when a police major, Karl Maravchuk of Hungarian decent, by accident visited the hospital and recognized that Toma is speaking Hungarian. It is amazing and at the same time upsetting. András Toma was welcomed by 20 families in Hungary who were offering to adopt him. As it turned out he has relatives, a half brother and a half sister; János and Anna Toma. This relationship was verified by medical exams and DNA. Today he has a smile on his face, and according to the traditions he is telling his “war-time” stories. Stories that are very difficult to top. With the help of family and friends he will travel the exiting road catching up from the 1940s to the present days of High-Tech. We wish him happiness in this new year and throughout the rest of his life. Joseph F. Balogh COMPUTER umm w u (©) Call Steve Miko AMSCo. Tel:(203)331 -0466 Page 7 MAGYARUL BESZELTEM
