Németh Szandra - Saly Noémi: Catering for guests, being a guest. Permanent exhibition on Hungarian hospitality (Budapest, 2016)
26 certainty just by looking at a young poet or writer if he was going to be successful or not. If he judged him talented, then that person had an unlimited credit. But assessing him as a potentially unsuccessful literary man, he allowed no debts at all, not even the smallest amount. Ernő Szép said goodbye to him as “the kindest, the most delicate and generous Hungarian headwaiter” in a very emotional obituary: “?ere is no headwaiter in the New York Coffee House, nor in any other fancy coffee garages since Gyula doesn’t stand next to our marble table in his soft, comfortable – slightly morbid – schevreaux shoes with an attentive face of a state secretary, putting his fingers into his wallet for change, and as quietly saying as he was walking: – Here you are. […]If it hadn’t been him, we would have starved. We would have gone wild. Laughter would have fallen out from our mouth, for an eternity, maybe. […]So he walked to somebody and asked as all headwaiters after measuring up the guest with a specialist’s glance: how much can I serve you? He. ?e headwaiter. I have eaten, I owed him. But it was him who was going to pay me. He was responsible for payments, so he paid. Gyula took his responsibility word by word. He paid the difference that was between our illusions and our fate, the difference between our salary and our flightiness, and the difference he felt there was between our value and appreciation. […]He gave money to us as quietly as rain is drizzling right now. It was really funny. I had a ham, a spritzer, a cake, three slices of bread, cheese, coffee, cogniac...and two forints ten, that’s five forints. Here you are. So I received two forints and ten filler for the hardship to dine in New York Coffee House. ?is method was invented by Gyula. He had become rich from it. He was the wealthiest headwaiter. His glances were pearls, his voice was gold, twirl of his moustache was diamond and his thoughts were radium. Tomorrow night there will be a few more stars on the sky. Gyula is paying. Hush.” (To the Death of a Headwaiter, Ujság, May 7, 1927) ◆ New York Coffee House at the opening (1894) photographed by György Klösz
