Hungarian Conservative

‘I was on stage already before I could have any inhibitions. That’s not to say that I don’t have them in other areas, but I feel lucky that I was given this way of life. It was put in front of me, and I couldn’t imagine my life without it. It gives me security.’

Szili, who has participated in the commemoration event in previous years, recalled the inhumanity of the displacements and discussed the lasting consequences of the Beneš Decrees, the necessity of retaining ethnic-based politics, as well as the current state of national minorities and their possibilities for improvement in connection with the upcoming European Parliament elections next year.

For generations, the heroic deeds of the defenders of the Eger Castle have given the Hungarian people strength and fortitude. Although the area under Ottoman occupation expanded and, in the following years, the Sultan managed to reassuringly stabilize his presence in the Carpathian Basin, our predecessors could draw strength from the example of Dobó and his army in later years.

What does the lower reach of the River Garam mean to Hungarians? For some, it is just a region of the Uplands, for others, a beautiful, wide, flat, and fertile valley surrounded by hills, while many people do not even know where to look on the map when they hear its name. For ethnic Hungarian local historian Gábor Juhász, it represents his homeland, a place where his ancestors had lived for hundreds of years.

She came from the small Slovakian town of Somorja, then the ‘splendid statelessness’ took her far away. With her dreamfolk-style songs about the stories of our ancestors, Upper Hungarian singer Rebeka Méry wants to convey what she has brought from home.