Wednesday, February 19, 2025

750 MAGYAR FOLK SAYINGS : SOME OF THESE WORDS OF WISDOM MAY SOUND FAMILIAR

Paczolay Gyula : 750 MAGYAR KOZMONDAS 

So many folk tales and sayings teach values, customs, and ways of life. Some of these will sound so familiar to Americans that one will wonder if the saying originated in Hungary or not.  Others are clearly from a time when agricultural life was the norm.

The sayings about a good wife being a beaten one make me cringe.  

But take a look at the use of the Hungarian language here: References to dogs, cats, pigs, goats, wolves, geese and sparrows, hares, ox - ropes and hanging, trees and weather, priests and Slovaks and Wallachians to discover the attitudes about life that made these sayings roll off the lips of the Hungarians.

Enjoy looking through these.

Some excerpts:

Okos disznó mély gyökeret ránt.

Amit főztél, edd is meg!

What you have cooked, you should eat as well.

You have to take the responsibility for your action.

***

Gúzsba kötve táncol.

He danced bound hand and foot.

He tries hard but has very little freedom of movement or action.

***

Szemérmes koldusnak üres a táskája.

A shy beggar has an empty scrip.

Friday, February 14, 2025

Tuesday, February 11, 2025

ALTA HUMAN ATLAS EXHIBIT at LOS ANGELES PUBLIC LIBRARY - CENTRAL : MAGYAR DNA

LAPL ORG EVENTS EXHIBITS : ALTA HUMAN ATLAS running through April 27, 2025.

Excerpt: Alta is a social-impact art project that showcases 100 extraordinary individuals creating positive change across Los Angeles County. Each participant is represented through photographic portraits, ancestral DNA, and interviews that reveal how their lives intersect with the region—past, present, and future—creating a legacy work that documents and conserves a deeper narrative for generations to come about the city, its people, and its communities.

Each of them will tell you some of their stories if you download the free, interactive App. Storytelling is a powerful tool for preserving historical perspectives, and can often offer a more nuanced understanding of our complicated past. In a sprawling metropolis like Los Angeles, storytelling can also emerge as a potent tool to bridge divides, cultivating a sense of belonging that can transcend cultural, ethnic, and socio-economic differences.

image of peace dove from GraphicsFairy

I was able to see this exhibit and spend some time with it.  Each individual was photographed and some were selected to be presented on the wall - along with their DNA results - and some were in books to look through. I was delighted to note that - unexpectedly - some of these people had MAGYAR DNA and it was listed as MAGYAR rather than HUNGARIAN.

It was quite interesting!

Alta / A Human Atlas of a City of Angels, is a collaboration with the Getty Conservation Institute and PST ART: Art & Science Collide.

Friday, February 7, 2025


  And this bouquet of pink roses means what in the Hungarian Language of Flowers?
Here's hints :  
More than friends, certainly, and lots of affection, but not ready for those serious red roses....

Wednesday, February 5, 2025

SZAZHALOMBATTA BRONZE AGE TELL ARCHEOLOGICAL SITE : WOULD YOU LIKE TO BE PART OF THE DIG?

Százhalombatta : Oh this looks like a very interesting way to spend three weeks! 

SZAZHALOMBATTA BRONZE AGE TELL ARCHEOLOGICAL SITE

Finds from the site include pottery, daub, plaster, metalwork, moulds, loom weights, bone tools, antler objects, ground stone, lithics, amber, animal and occasional human bones. Many of the Bronze Age houses were burnt. This has resulted in outstanding preservation of organic material including botanical remains such as thatch from house roofs and Bronze Age food like crabapples, peas, beans and lentils. There is also worked wood and basketry. Thin section soil micromorphology, phytoliths, charcoal and coprolites add to the data from the site.

Excavation at the site is directed by Dr Magdolna Vicze (Hungarian National Museum), Professor Marie Louise Stig Sørensen (University of Cambridge), and Professor Joanna Sofaer (University of Southampton). Univ.-Prof. Mag. Dr. Katharina Rebay-Salisbury, head of the University of Vienna team, is also our project partner.

Tuesday, January 21, 2025

CHAOS : WILDFIRES AND DRAMATIC CHANGES IN POLITICS HAVE PEOPLE ON EDGE : IMMIGRATION

CHAOS : WILDFIRES AND DRAMATIC CHANGES IN POLITICS HAVE PEOPLE ON EDGE : IMMIGRATION

As the wildfires have consumed enough property and acreage to equal San Francisco or Miami, we the people of Southern California, are very concerned about the economic future of this part of the United States. Looters, arsonists, and other exploiters and criminals are taking advantage, as are landlords who are upping rents as well as other swindlers. 

But as the physical plant burns down, more concerning is the burning down of America in another way.  Politics.

Lately, some people have been pointing out to me Prime Minister of Hungary, Viktor Orban, a possible alliance between him and President Donald Trump, and immigration policy. They point out that Orban built "a wall" (actually a fence) and then mention the "wall" partially built between the United States and Mexico. This, and other supposed evidence of alliances are constantly pointed out to me and I sense what is wanted is a reaction.

Well, I have a reaction.

I tell people that Hungary has welcomed thousands of Ukrainian refugees from that war that Russia started and that Orban, in his role with the European Union, has visited both Zelensky and Putin. The Hungarian people have taken in these war refugees, mostly women and children. That Hungary is dependent on Russian oil and that makes things tricky. I tell people that thousands demonstrated in the streets of Budapest for an end to that war and for peace, but Hungary, being a small country, doesn't make world news much, so few heard about it. (I did from a Hungarian relative who lives in Budapest six months of the year.) 

I tell them that two thirds of the Hungarian population were murdered during the Ottoman occupation by Moslem Turks (over 150 years) and that is why Hungary, founded upon Christianity (specifically an alliance with Roman Catholicism) wants only Christian immigrants. I say that between that and the loss of a huge amount of territory known as Hungary after World War I and the 1920 Trianon Treaty, Hungarians are still fighting for national identity.

I also say that there is so much attention on blocking entry into the U.S. from Mexico but none on the much longer Canadian Border. If I were a terrorist I would not bother with the Mexican border. I would have a boat sail me up the coast; maybe in the middle of the night I'd row ashore in Malibu. Or maybe I would go to Canada and walk across the border there. There are lots of places to do so.

I also say that Trump claiming God saved him from a bullet so he could save America was disgusting; is he now claiming the Right of Kings? Himself as Biblical prophecy?

I actually see no link between true Christianity and the Prosperity Gospel or the exclusionary "Protestantism" of people who want to "round up" immigrants, that it sounds just like Germany, in an economic crisis pre the Holocaust and the "round up" of Jews, blamed for the economic problems, that I personally am fearful that is where we are heading.  No I do not want criminals entering the country. Criminality is not the same as people desperate for their lives and the lives of their children and families and we must acknowledge that. I feel the same way when I hear of "round ups" of homeless people. We are edging close to the "othering" that the Nazi's did to the Jews, comparing them to vermin rather than acknowledging their humanity.

Bigotry and discrimination and racism are coming back...

Be it the Ku Klux Klan or the Nazis or the Neo Nazis, NONE OF THIS IS OR EVER WAS CHRISTIANITY.  Remember, please, that the Nazi plan was to exterminate the Slavic people once the Jews were extinguished and to keep going.  

RELOCATION anyone?  FORCED RELOCATION?

"REPOPULATING" Pacific Palisades?

Do I expect everyone to be "Christian?"  Actually, I do not.

Do I know of illegals?  Are they joking?! We have a huge "illegal" population in Southern California, and they are not all Mexican. Over the years I've met illegals from South Africa, from Jamaica, and Germany and Ireland, and yes - one lovely young woman from Hungary who chased love - many who came on a tourist visa and never left.

Also, this may shock some of my readers, but as a personal note, I have been approached to marry for the purposes of keeping an illegal immigrant in the country four times in my life.  One Mexican, One Guatamalan, One Orthodox Jew from Israel (really!), One Indian from India.  Approached on the street, in a store, or asked outright by a friend. Usually an effort to make me consider such a thing, which I would never do, includes an excruciatingly old fashioned idea that I should be ashamed to be unpartnered and would be desperate to join the overwhelming majority of married women. Or that my rent would be paid.

ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS OFTEN WORK FOR CASH. Now tell me employers are not depending on "casual" workers who are paid cash?  No benefits, no Social Security, no no no. Sometimes Americans pick up a casual laborer, work them all day, and then tell them to go f themselves, unpaid, under threat of the INS being informed of their presence: nasty evil people do that to them. So tell me, do you think so many would head here if they thought absolutely no one would hire them?  Hotels - Restaurants - the Tourist Industry - Cruises - really big on paying cash or extremely low off shore pay.

I'm not FOR illegal immigration, I hate criminality, especially when it comes to gang violence and drug and sex trafficking, but ONE NATION UNDER GOD, must have some empathy for the promise that so many of our ancestors had.

So I ask this question, who or what is your God?

Is it MONEY? Which is IDOLATRY?

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I ask you to read this: https://encyclopedia.ushmm.org/content/en/article/martin-niemoeller-first-they-came-for-the-socialists

First they came for the socialists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a socialist.

Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak out—because I was not a trade unionist.


Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak out—because I was not a Jew.


Then they came for me—and there was no one left to speak for me.


—Martin Niemöller

The 1,954-mile (3,145-kilometre) border between the U.S. and Mexico traverses a variety of terrain, including urban areas and deserts. The United States (U.S.) - Canada border is the longest in the world, spanning 5,525 miles (8,891 km) across 13 U.S. states and eight Canadian Provinces/Territories (These came up re AI.)

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All Rights Reserved including International and Internet Rights


Saturday, January 18, 2025

ROWBOAT THROUGH TAPOLCA CAVERN LAKE : WONDERFUL PLACES IN HUNGARY #28

 OUTDOORACTIVE : TAPOLCA CAVERN LAKE VISITOR INFO



Photo by Shaambo ghosh - Wikipedia

One of the interesting aspects of this cave is that it is used for AIR THERAPY...

Excerpt: The special warm and humid conditions in the cave, and the typical factors of speleotherapy (Clean air and high carbon dioxide content) make this cave very beneficial for people with asthmatic and respiratory diseases.  It is used for speleotherapy by various nearby baths.  Inside the cave it is possible to swim through several passages, which are partly natural, partly artificial tunnels.  There are small pools and jakuzzis, and a large outdoor pool.

More here:

https://www.i-s-c-a.org/show-cave/148-lake-cave-of-tapolca

Click on the label Wonderful-Hungary to bring up all posts on this theme.



Sunday, January 12, 2025

MAGYAR AMERICAN BLOGSPOT CELEBRATING FIFTEEN YEARS OF POSTING TODAY!



FIFTEEN YEARS! 

This blog, MAGYAR AMERICAN, is about and for those who have Hungarian heritage and are interested what an ethnic heritage of Hungarian means. We know the stereotypes! The stereotypes are all that many of our co-Americans know; Goulash (spicy meat stew or soup), csardas (dance), depression and suicide (we are supposed to be "passionate"), wine and poetry, and the very funny Gabor sisters?  I cannot fail to mention Vlad the Impaler and Dracula, the Blood Countess, and - new - Reptilians from "Draconian" Caves...

Additionally many Hungarians have learned to be ashamed of their ethnicity here in America and have been subject to prejudicial attitudes and discrimination, especially those who came to work in the era of the Industrial Revolution and the Robber Barrons. As a result many Americans with heritage in Hungary have changed their difficult to pronounce names or fail to admit they have Hungarian blood. 

Here we explore stereotypes, have some fun with them, look back and look forward. We visit places to go and things to do in Hungary, with hopes of travel there, and we feel concern over present-day politics and economic conditions, especially when it comes to war in Ukraine.

It is my hope that by exploring this blog, you can explore your heritage and find reason to understand it and be proud of it.


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