Torsello, Davide - Pappová, Melinda: Social Networks in Movement. Time, interaction and interethnic spaces in Central Eastern Europe - Nostra Tempora 8. (Somorja-Dunaszerdahely, 2003)

Time and social networks

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Árendás Zsuzsanna

because of my origins, the informants felt uneasy to talk about their weakening relationships with homeland relatives. Sometimes they tried to prove just the opposite, somehow to fulfil my quasi- expectations in which they believed. They often hesitated to recall the negative experiences of home visits, their disillusionment when being there after long years of daydreaming, the raising disinterest to maintain these connections on the homeland relatives’ side. During my work I tried to establish human relationships first of all. I tried to be open in return for openness. According to their needs and interests I delivered news from “home”, took and brought messages, greetings between relatives, informed them about the situation in Slovakia. For most of them the very encounter with someone from the “homeland” was a very special and joyful event, almost identical to a visit of a long-ago unseen relative.

4 Hereby I would like to thank him, and to all of my informants, both in Hungary and Slovakia, who made this research possible.

5 Mostová (In Hungarian Hidaskürt) and Horné Saliby (In Hungarian Felsőszeli) are situated in the same district (Galanta district) where also Matuškovo lies.