Amerikai Magyar Hírlap, 1993 (5. évfolyam, 31-51. szám)
1993-12-24 / 50. szám
AMERICAN Hungarian Journal Christmastime in Budapest This page written by ATA accredited translator SUSAN JANCSO I went to Europe in this month •f Christmas, and I came back illed with the holiday spirit, the lemory of the bright Christmas lecorations in the streets of Budapest and Coppenhagen, the sealing of church bells at noonime, of snow and ice outside, and 'armth and love inside the rooms f friendly houses. I brought ack the joy of reunion with old lends, of seeing my homeland, ith all the changes it has underone in the past three years, since ve last been there, so that it is arely recognizeable - and someling else: I brought back, as a ouvenir, the worst cold I’ve had nee I moved to California 18 jars ago. I used to shrug when I heard the :ar-jerking stories of others who ent to Hungary and came back ck as a dog, or worse: with roken bones and hard-to-heal notional injuries. That happens • others, I used to think, old jople, weak and predisposed to ness -1 am strong and healthy, ith lots of secure friendships uníanged by the passing years - it >uld never happen to me! Well, did, all of it. [ was deeply touched when I saw 1 the friends and relatives who ime to the airport to welcome e. I still remember the exhilaram of the first sight of the snowy llside -1 stayed in an apartment gh up in the Buda Hills, in a jep side street of Törökvész út the first lungful of clean, cold •, the crackling of fresh snow iderfoot, the hush of the winter untryside. This was the first ne I ventured to take the joury in winter, and at that moment, hought it was well worth it. Vs soon as I got settled in the lartment, I started to make ms to see as many old friends it was physically possible in a ort week, two days of which :re taken up entirely by the siness meetings that justified j trip. I managed to spend a v undisturbed hours with the it few people on my list, but ter there was someone íeduled for every hour of the yince it was Sunday, I decided to j a former colleague from the lines, whose son is studying ology and has lunch with her »ther every Sunday. His jision to become a priest gave the first inkling five years ago t something was changing in ngary. We had a meaningful iversation and a dish of soy ins - they converted to etarianism, and not only for health reasons, but for solidarity with the animals. Such concerns have surfaced only recently in Hungary. When I met the staff of the newspaper we had negotiations with, they tried to engage my help to save a baby tiger who was becoming dangerous to his environment (in a family home). No zoo wants him but, for a mere 30 thousand dollars, he could be transported to California and saved, if only we could raise the money. Is there anyone out there who wants a baby tiger? Humane Society, anyone? As for me, I was trying to help people instead. Like my friend who moved back to Hungary seven years ago with her two sons, because she didn’t want them to grow up watching "Mister T" on TV. I wonder how she likes the open pornography in the underground Metro stations and at the tobacco stores, and the dirty language prevailing everywhere, from the stage to the everyday conversations of even educated people. Myfriendhasnojob, and her mother goes in and out of hospitals with broken bones due to osteoporosis. She spends her day cooking and taking turns with other family members to deliver meals and sit at the bedside of her mother. Her only joy is to go to the opera, but her persistent cough prevents her from doing so, even if she could scrape together the price of the ticket. My next friend has no financial problems. She lives abroad, and she flew home for one day to see me. We had visited each other several times over the years in our adoptive countries. We had been really-really best friends and shared many secrets. My first shock came when I caught sight of her. She didn’t come at the appointed hour, and I went downstairs to see if the gate wasn’t locked. People are very much afraid of burglars in Hungary these days, and they use the most sophisticated locks on their doors to keep them away. My host has three different safety locks, to be kept locked at all times whether you are in or out of the house - one of them a double steel rod the full width of the door - but I hear the burglars meet the challenge by cutting up the whole door with electric saw, steel rods and all... The gate wasn’t locked, but my friend was just standing there mesmerized, unable to move, shaking as a leaf. When I finally managed to persuade her to speak, she told me that there was a dog blocking her way. A big black dog angrily baring his teeth at her... My God, we used to feed stray dogs together on our trips, she adopted at least two and kept them in their city apartment - I thought she could speak their language fluently! She took a full hour to calm down, and I suddenly had the feeling that this was not the person I knew. She took off her coat and I saw that, under the expensive dress and the famous-name belt, she was thin as a rod. She used to have such beautiful, feminine curves! But she did this to herself on purpose, and was proud of it. In a few minutes I found out that she went back to smoking, and in the course of the night she proceeded to smoke a full pack of cigarettes while we talked. I tried one too, but I was beginning to feel real lousy, as if I had a big hole in my throat. I kept opening the balcony door, afraid that my hosts would come in the morning and be horrified by the smell. We sat there shivering. As a final touch, she seemed to recognize herself in one of my writings, and made me promise never to publish it. There goes an old friendship, and there goes my book, which I was just about to take to the printers... By Wednesday morning, I had a full-blown influenza, and every hour of my day was scheduled for meetings. I met some new or recently made friends, and they really came through for me. I had a chance to meet Kata Csongrádit husband, the famous songwriter of my youth, István S. Nagy, and I found him to be a real treasure. I admired their golden records - one of them sold 5 million copies! - and a letter from the Pope expressing appreciation for the song, "Bless Me My Lord!" Through them, I also met Margit Gáspár, the prolific writer and theater director, whose book, The Black Emperor, was one of my first full-length translations. The frail, elderly lady is not in the best of health, but she is just as brilliant as ever, and getting to know her was one of the highlights of my trip. At noon the grandson of the famous gypsy violinist, a reporter for several papers in Budapest, came to do an interview with me. We left the house together, and that’s when the impossible happened - the thing that could never happen to me - a debilitating accident that spoiled the rest of my stay. The cold had given way to milder temperatures, and the snow was melting everywhere. In downtown Budapest, it was dripping and falling in big chunks from the roofs, turning the streets into a sea of mud. On the hill, however, it thawed and froze at a moment’s notice, covering the streets with slippery ice. It took me a few steps to become aware of the danger - so unusual for a Californian - but this time I slipped and fell right at the first step, and hit my elbow real bad. I kept a good face, but I felt it was hurting insistently. I did not even look at the wound until that afternoon, because I was afraid of what I was going to see. I was WE WISH ALL OUR READERS A HAPPY HOLIDAY SEASON! right. Through the thick parka and the woolen jacket, I managed to hurt my elbow so bad the jacket was stuck to the open wound. From then on, my stay in Hungary was a nightmare. I could hardly wait to get home, and there was still the Coppenhagen leg of the journey, where I was supposed to take the ferry to Sweden and visit my best and oldest friend in Malmö (I never did, I was curing my cold in a hotel room for three days - but that’s another story). When I was not on the phone, I tried to watch TV. I caught some of my airline friends relating a UFO-sighting experience. Their openness about it was certainly a change from old times. I spent some time with my delightful hosts - Godmother cooked my favorite meal, and we reminisced about the time my children were little. I had long conversations with my stepmother, who still has my father’s pictures all over the apartment, and we shed some tears of consolation together. I took care of my business meetings, I met some rich and influential people, and also some oppressed little working people who are truly worth knowing, the invaluable backbone of every business. So what are my impressions of Budapest? The city as I knew it is gone, and its new face is not entirely formed. Historic street names are being reinstated; every street and square has at least two names, and if you grew up during the communist regime, you have serious trouble finding your destinations. Public transportation is still good, and the open system makes it incredibly fast. You don’t have to show your ticket upon entering, but if the ticket-inspector finds you without one, you pay a substantial fine. People are wary, they watch their purses and their pockets. I hear that pickpockets have reached unprecedented levels of skill. There are lots of nouveau-riche who made incredible fortunes over the past few years; there are welldressed and carefree people at parties and public events; and there is an ever increasing percentage of the population living below the poverty level. People of different social status and political orientation agree that Népszabadság (the former communist party paper) is the best daily publication, although it may be simply a matter of money, which they managed to carry over from the old days. And now, with József Antall’s death, now that the stabilizing force of his calm, dedicated statesmanship is gone, it mayjust happen that next year’s elections will favor the liberal left, for the lot of the average Hungarian can hardly get worse than it has become during the country’ s first faltering steps towards democracy. Susan Jancso CSÁRDÁS MAGYAR ÉTTEREM 5320 Melrose Avenue (213) 962-6434 Los Ange|CS( CA 9000., Az 1993. évi Újesztendő köszöntése SZILVESZTER-EST MENÜ ELŐÉTEL - APPETIZER Pirított csirkemíij, hidegen, lila hagymával és paradicsommal Sautded chicken liver, served cold with sweet onion and tomato salad LEVES - SOUP Lencseleves, füstölt kolbásszal Lentil soup with home smoked Hungarian sausage SALÁTA - SALAD Fejes saláta, házi öntettel Butter lettuce with house dressing FŐÉTEL - ENTREES Disznótoros, petrezselymes burgonyával Farmer’s Plate (Traditional liver-blood-pork sausages and pork steak with potatoes) vagy - or Rostonsült harcsa, burgonyapürével, párolt zöldséggel Grilled catfish with mashed potatoes and vegetable compote KÜLÖNLEGES KÍVÁNSÁGRA-SPECIAL REQUEST SÜLT MALAC OVEN BAKED BABY PIG ÉDESSÉG - DESSERT Aranygaluska, borsodóval Hungarian golden bund of cake served with delightful warm vine cream sauce Pezsgőbontás után - VIRSLI tormával, mustárral Frankfurter sausages with home made cream bf horseradish and mustard sauce Hajnali kettőkor - at 2 AM KORIIELYLEVES SPECIAL SOUP FOR HANGOVER A korlátozott férőhely miatt CSAK ELŐZETESEN FOGLALT HELYEK! Belépő: $50 + tax (személyenként) 1 üveg borral vagy pezsgővel 1993. december 24. AMERIKAI Hfagyar Hírlap El
