Thursday, October 30, 2014

HALLOWEEN - A TIME TO COMMUNICATE WITH THE ANCESTORS





To read past posts about Ancestor Worship, Halloween in Hungary, and Halloween in the United States, just use the search feature embedded in the sidebar of this blog!

Wednesday, October 15, 2014

END OF THE YEAR IN SIGHT! CERTAINLY THE STORES THINK SO!

This is the point in the year where it seems - almost over.

Halloween and Christmas seasonal items are now on display in many of the stores.

Halloween has become outrageousness and a festival of horror, savagery, and violence, instead of a celebration of the ancestors or a time of prayer for the deceased. 

Christmas has become all about shopping.

Well, I remember what it was to work retail during the Christmas season and I can say that it made the holiday a NON-EVENT FOR ME.  After you've heard the same Christmas songs for weeks,  dealt with a surge of customers who are not always nice, it's not easy to center back to the purpose of the holiday, which is religious.

Although I get it that giving gifts to friends and family is in imitation of the Three Kings who visited Jesus Christ in his infancy,  and that being generous and loving is good, I think even the tradition of Santa Claus, based on St. Nicholas, has become too much a celebration of materialism.

I confess to having been effected by the Hustle Bustle of shopping in years past, but mostly I try to keep holidays to a small, private, celebration these days.  I give few gifts and usually small or home-made ones.  I prefer to celebrate the birthday of a close friend as the time to give a better gift and to  give attention to them as an individual then.  I love music but I don't enjoy loud parties.  I prefer to host a smaller dinner party where people can enjoy conversation and hear each other, perhaps with some low background music on.  Good food, a little wine, and appreciation for what we have, to take a pause, that is a holiday to me.

Monday, October 13, 2014

KOREANS EAT LESS DOG MEAT STEW AS THEY BEGIN TO LEARN THE VALUE OF DOGS AS COMPANION ANIMALS

LIFEWITHDOGS: KOREAS LONGEST RUNNING DOG MEAT RESTAURANT CLOSES  full article

EXCERPT:  About 2.5 million dogs are consumed in South Korea every year, but that number is dropping thanks to many television shows that depict dogs as cute, sweet companions.  People are seeing their value beyond the menu, and have lost their appetite for family recipes that have been passed down for generations.

Oh Keum-il, owner of the restaurant Daegyo, which once served over 700 bowls of dog stew per day, is closing her doors for good.  Many would stand in line for special dishes on certain days of the year, but animal activists would be standing right along with them, urging consumers not to eat the animals that make such excellent friends...

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Honestly, if people are starving I can understand it, but anyone who loves a dog as a pet is bound to gag at the picture where you can tell there were some furry friends chopped up to make a meal.

THIS IS A NOTE TO ALL OF YOU WHO HAVE DOGS TO KEEP THEM TAGGED, consider a microchip, get them licensed, and basically keep good watch over them.  Here in the United States there have been dog snatchings.  Dog snatchers sometimes do it to torture or kill pets for pleasure, some snatched dogs are made into pets or sold to others, some are sold for scientific experiments...

Wednesday, October 8, 2014

ISIS - TURKEY - THE THREAT TO HUNGARY : OTTOMON EMPIRE? HUNGARIAN MERCENARIES?

For Hundreds of years the Moslem Turks controlled the country that would become Hungary.  Their empire was called the Ottoman Empire.  Before the country could be founded on Christianity, and align itself with Rome and Western Europe, these Turks had to be driven out. The fighting went on and on, and today there remains the ruins of many a castle fort that managed to do just that in the late 14th and early 15th centuries

This is why, when you look at the Coat of Arms and Shields of early aristocratic families of Hungary you will see images such as bloody swords and even the beheaded Turk.

Hungary became a Christian nation, a Roman Catholic dominated one, which made the country affiliated with The Church and the rest of Europe rather than a Slavic and Eastern Orthodox nation, like Russia.  No doubt there have been and are people of these other faiths in Hungary, sometimes living in colonies or villages. Travelers to Budapest in the 19th century remarked on the ethnic and religious diversity of the city, as seen in the clothing that identified people of different ethnic groups and faiths.

I was thinking about all this in the morning as I listed to talk radio and dressed for the day.  I thought about it because I heard that ISIS wants to make inroads next into Turkey.  Clearly ISIS has the plan to have influence not only in Turkey but all of Europe, and the usual route in the Middle East is around the Mediterranean Sea.

Here is one article from CNN that asks if Turkey will battle ISIS on the ground.

CNN OPED: TURKEY ISIS OR PKK?

The article begins thus : Turkey is in a tough spot. It has ISIS militants threatening the Syrian border town of Kobani, inching ever closer to confronting Turkish security forces. In addition thousands of Syrian Kurds, fleeing ISIS attacks, have massed along its border, adding further to Ankara's troubles.

Amid mounting pressure to become more active in the U.S.-led international coalition against ISIS, the Turkish parliament last week overwhelmingly authorized its military to make incursions into Syria and Iraq; also to allow foreign troops to operate out of Turkish bases. The move has been greeted in Western capitals as a welcome sign that Turkey is finally fully on board with the anti-ISIS coalition.
 
Though beheading was practiced not only by the Ottoman Turks but the Hungarian's who fought for a nation to be, and more recently was, during the French Revolution, practiced by machine using the Guillotine,  as well as in South East Asia in the 1960's, I have to say that I think this method of killing to be especially horrible.
 
Here in the United States, our FBI is asking citizens to help identify ISIS members who appear in videos, some with American or British English accents, and say they know the identities of a number of Americans who have left the country to fight the ISIS cause in other countries.
 
I ask myself, should such people be allowed back in.
My personal answer is, no.  Anyone who is a terrorist should not be let in or let back in.
 
Here is one website that is covering the issue of Hungarian men who have joined ISIS and it is presented by the controversial JOBBIK party of Hungary.
 
 
First thing I must note is that the term MERCENARIES is used, indicating that these are soldiers who are without personal allegiance but who work as soldiers for pay.  There is a difference.  Is the term used correctly?
 
 
Here is an excerpt from that article:
 
He added that, considering the gravity of the situation, the worrying news prompted Jobbik to turn to László Kövér, the Speaker of the Hungarian Parliament and Zsolt Németh, the chairman of the foreign affairs committee to summon the foreign affairs and the national security committees of the Parliament. The politician pointed out that the activities of these people had been followed by the Counter Terrorism Centre and the national security services of Hungary, and the Parliament should be informed who they are, what is the purpose of their staying in the area and/or serving in the ranks of ISIS. Jobbik also wants to find out what national security risks are posed by the activities of these persons in the ranks of ISIS.
 
The patriotic party expects correct information from the national security services, and responses from László Kövér and Zsolt Németh as well.

 

Saturday, October 4, 2014

WE'RE EITHER FREEZING COLD OR HOT HOT HOT! HUNGARIAN HUNGARIAN- AMERICAN WOMEN STEREOTYPE


 

Another unfortunate stereotype of Hungarians, women that is, is that we either run freezing cold (this can include wives who were thinking of becoming nuns before they were abducted into marriage) or that we are hot hot hot!  As for the modest wives, you have a choice.  You can either believe that they do not know how it is they have seven children, or you can believe that they are only modest in the kitchen, which by the way is the cleanest kitchen you will ever eat off the floor in.

If a Hungarian- American woman is considered "good in bed" her lover will say something like "It's that hot Hungarian blood!"  This can be even if you are four generations from Hungary or are now in the "Heinz 57" category of ethnic mix!  Yes, blame it all on Hungary!   Foxy Hungarian women are all over the internet looking to be brides to lonely American men.  They are in the hot hot hot category.

Considering that not so long ago in Hungary most young couples had to wait till marriage to have sex (18 years old for the young women and 20 or 21 for the young men), that it is a very Catholic - Christian country, and so many of our ancestors lived in with relatives until they could get a house (or hut) of their own and no one was supposed to hear anyone having sex, there has been a remarkable cultural change apparently. 

Now, American tourists are braced to see hot hot hot couples everywhere, especially in mineral springs.

I actually think this stereotype may be true! 

C 2014  Magyar-American BlogSpot