This morning, the Ukrainian secret service, SBU, published a video about the detention of two Hungarian nationals in the Western Zakarpattia region of Ukraine.
No idea why, but the events in politics over the past few days have kept reminding me of a one-minute story by our beloved István Örkény, written back in 1973. It just never gets old.
LET US LOOK TO THE FUTURE WITH HOPE!
Roughly one hundred and ten to one hundred and fifteen years from now, on a fine summer’s day, the bells of the entire nation will toll outside of schedule. Most people won’t pay them much attention, and yet that chiming will mark the dawn of a great transformation.
By then, the once royal palace of Visegrád will have been rebuilt in breathtaking splendor, with vast halls and hanging gardens the likes of which the world has never seen. The peal of the bells will signal the opening ceremony. A few venerable elders will shed tears, for that moment will be the very instant — long overdue — when a thousand years of misfortune finally come to an end.
By then, Visegrád will no longer serve as the seat of this small nation, but rather of the Danubian Hungarian Republic, whose shores will be washed by four or five seas. It will be called “Danubian” to avoid confusion with another state: the Lower Rhenish Hungarian Republic, inhabited not by Hungarians, but by shabby, worn-out Rhenish folk who adopted the Hungarian name purely for good luck.
Words will fail to capture how wonderful it will be to be Hungarian! Suffice it to say that within a mere century and a bit, the word “Hungarian” will have evolved into a verb — one joyfully absorbed by every living language, bearing thoroughly pleasant connotations.
In French, for instance, magyarni will mean “to skillfully pleasure oneself.” In Spanish: “to find money in the street and bend down to pick it up.” In the Catalan dialect: “To bend gracefully, ever since I was cured of my debilitating lower back pain.” And in London, should someone declare I am going magyarni, it will mean: “I’m heading over to that divine woman you see there, I’ll speak to her, take her arm, bring her home and…” (Here, a vulgar word will follow.)
Another example: I magyar, you magyar, he/she magyars — since it will, of course, be an –s verb — will signify, in seven civilized tongues (Norwegian, Greek, Bulgarian, Basque, and so on): “I am eating crispy roast duck (you are, he is), with fresh cucumber salad, while Yehudi Menuhin plays ‘Just One Girl’ into my ear.”
Furthermore: Mommy, can I go and magyar? – You may magyar! will mean in Latvian that a little boy is asking to go to the cinema, and after a moment’s hesitation, his mother lets him — even though the film is rated 18 and up.
But enough about foreign lands! Things will be renamed here at home too. For example, the word “vanilla,” being foreign, will fall out of use and be replaced in the public mind by “war,” which will have by then lost all of its original meaning. Thus, the sign above the ice cream counter in the Visegrád confectionery will read:
Strawberry
Punch
War
Chocolate
That’s how life will be. Until then, we simply have to get through these few remaining years.
#! I don't want to downplay the importance of this event, especially locally. That said, as a former member of the US military branch that worked for the NSA during the cold war, I need to apprise you of this fact: Everybody spies on everybody else. We all spy on friends and enemies alike. Spying on enemies makes for good TV and movies, but when we get caught spying on friends and neighbors it's, at the very least, embarrassing. Remember when Angela Merkel's cell phone was found to be hacked by the US?
#2 “Mindig van lejjebb” a very useful saying. I say it every day in English, just before reading that the Orange Shitgibbon has not yet met his demise.
No idea why, but the events in politics over the past few days have kept reminding me of a one-minute story by our beloved István Örkény, written back in 1973. It just never gets old.
LET US LOOK TO THE FUTURE WITH HOPE!
Roughly one hundred and ten to one hundred and fifteen years from now, on a fine summer’s day, the bells of the entire nation will toll outside of schedule. Most people won’t pay them much attention, and yet that chiming will mark the dawn of a great transformation.
By then, the once royal palace of Visegrád will have been rebuilt in breathtaking splendor, with vast halls and hanging gardens the likes of which the world has never seen. The peal of the bells will signal the opening ceremony. A few venerable elders will shed tears, for that moment will be the very instant — long overdue — when a thousand years of misfortune finally come to an end.
By then, Visegrád will no longer serve as the seat of this small nation, but rather of the Danubian Hungarian Republic, whose shores will be washed by four or five seas. It will be called “Danubian” to avoid confusion with another state: the Lower Rhenish Hungarian Republic, inhabited not by Hungarians, but by shabby, worn-out Rhenish folk who adopted the Hungarian name purely for good luck.
Words will fail to capture how wonderful it will be to be Hungarian! Suffice it to say that within a mere century and a bit, the word “Hungarian” will have evolved into a verb — one joyfully absorbed by every living language, bearing thoroughly pleasant connotations.
In French, for instance, magyarni will mean “to skillfully pleasure oneself.” In Spanish: “to find money in the street and bend down to pick it up.” In the Catalan dialect: “To bend gracefully, ever since I was cured of my debilitating lower back pain.” And in London, should someone declare I am going magyarni, it will mean: “I’m heading over to that divine woman you see there, I’ll speak to her, take her arm, bring her home and…” (Here, a vulgar word will follow.)
Another example: I magyar, you magyar, he/she magyars — since it will, of course, be an –s verb — will signify, in seven civilized tongues (Norwegian, Greek, Bulgarian, Basque, and so on): “I am eating crispy roast duck (you are, he is), with fresh cucumber salad, while Yehudi Menuhin plays ‘Just One Girl’ into my ear.”
Furthermore: Mommy, can I go and magyar? – You may magyar! will mean in Latvian that a little boy is asking to go to the cinema, and after a moment’s hesitation, his mother lets him — even though the film is rated 18 and up.
But enough about foreign lands! Things will be renamed here at home too. For example, the word “vanilla,” being foreign, will fall out of use and be replaced in the public mind by “war,” which will have by then lost all of its original meaning. Thus, the sign above the ice cream counter in the Visegrád confectionery will read:
Strawberry
Punch
War
Chocolate
That’s how life will be. Until then, we simply have to get through these few remaining years.
Great summary, last weeks truly been clusterfucks upon clusterfuck for the Orban regime, and it's still almost a year until the elections...
#! I don't want to downplay the importance of this event, especially locally. That said, as a former member of the US military branch that worked for the NSA during the cold war, I need to apprise you of this fact: Everybody spies on everybody else. We all spy on friends and enemies alike. Spying on enemies makes for good TV and movies, but when we get caught spying on friends and neighbors it's, at the very least, embarrassing. Remember when Angela Merkel's cell phone was found to be hacked by the US?
#2 “Mindig van lejjebb” a very useful saying. I say it every day in English, just before reading that the Orange Shitgibbon has not yet met his demise.