Sopron

I don't drink much beer in Hungary. I've grown used to the grainy micro-brews of Seattle and the beer here is Coors-like. Two brands you'll easily find in Hungary are Dreher and Soproni; and while we were in no hops for a brew pilgrimage, I was very excited to head to Soproni's town, Sopron, a small city in the northwest corner an hour away from Vienna that Lonely Planet calls a little Prague.

In most of our travels lately, we have been very happy to take a train, more relaxing on the way in and much more relaxing once there. But we took a car this time and made several other stops: Sümeg and its 13th century hilltop castle; Sárvár, home to the Blood Countess Báthory Erzsébet, a possible source for Dracula's legend; Fertőd, site of the lavish Esterházy party palace; Nagycenk, home of the more civic-minded Széchenyis and "the greatest Hungarian"; and Kőszeg, called the jewelry box of Hungary.

Once we emerged from the chaos of the Balaton district, past some quiet fields, we turned a corner, and there rising from the plains beside a Lidl and a Tesco, was a stunning fortress on a hill. According to its website, the Sümeg castle was home to King Béla IV during the Mongolian invasion (1241-1242) and it is the "only fortress in Hungary that the Turks were unable to capture." They also sold kürtős kalács there for 400 forints.

We have visited some spectacular palaces, fortresses and castles in our travels around Europe so far, but this one -- small, broken, open to the elements -- this visit was one of our most delightful. True, it didn't have the two hour long cutlery tour we encountered in Vienna's Hofburg palace and no cartoonist ever based a logo on its profile, as was true of Germany's Neuschwanstein, but its wind and stones and uncrowded paths allowed us to open ourselves up to it in ways we didn't in the more properly touristed sites.

Not far from  Sümeg we stopped by another castle, in Sárvár. Báthory Erzsébet (1560-1614) who lived here after her marriage to the so-called Black Knight, was considered to have killed 600 peasant women, based on her handwritten lists and descriptions, and she was convicted of killing eighty; she was witnessed biting chunks out of women's breasts and necks; and she was thought to bathe in the blood of virgins as a means of maintaining her youth. The Rough Guide to Austria has a well-written, brief description. The BBC has a longer description and more careful analysis of facts, and it includes several eye-catching eye-witness descriptions from Dracula was a Woman. There's a good blog entry about Báthory, even if it is from a site called vampirelegends. Each of these provide more specific and vivid descriptions than I provide here. Finally, here is a preview of the movie referenced in the above blog. Below is a picture of the castle that so bored Erzsébet that she began torturing and eating women for fun.

So why is Sopron considered a little Prague? Its buildings are the right vintage and colors, its churches are several and dramatic, and its squares provide a similar charm. Because one of the girls' favorite things we did here, in addition to the walking around the beautiful curved streets, was visit the archeology museum, we did get a feel for some of the history of this town. Before there were Hungarians, before there were Christians, Sopron was Scarbantia, a town on the Amber Road. Artifacts from the Roman Empire and even from the Celts before them were plentiful. Above all, Sopron also has a place in the heart of most Hungarians because, in 1921, the city actively chose to be remain a part of Hungary in defiance of a treaty awarding it to Austria.

Sopron also boasts a connection to Franz Liszt. Liszt Ferenc was born in what was then Sopron County. While he spent most of his life in Paris, Liszt gave a concert in Sopron at the age of 9; he returned for a second concert in 1840; and then, to absolutely cement Sopron's claim on Liszt forevermore and stock museums and concert halls and festivals and coffee houses in his honor, Liszt had a third concert in Sopron. We loved the Liszt Salon, where we were served gorgeous hot drinks on trays with shots of cold water in a comfortable room with dark wood furniture and Liszt history and murals covering the walls. My hot chili chocolate drink was outsanding. Below you can glimpse the aesthetics of the experience.

Another coffee shop exceeded the first in fine furnishings and cake selection, and Amelia loved her apple rétes there (strudel), loved it, but I missed the calm and hospitality (and spicy cocoa) of the Liszt salon. Even so, what welcome luxuries are the coffee shops of the world!

Stepping outside, this is what you might see of Sopron:

We left Sopron for a day trip to visit the Esterházy Palace, a place designated a UN World Heritage Site in 2004 and called the Hungarian Versailles, and for 30 years, the working home to composer Joseph Haydn. Much of it was under construction during our visit, which is good for the palace, I suppose, and the humble fences and dirt and scaffolding did nothing to hide the immensity of wealth represented by the place. Prince Nikolaus II (1765-1833) built the palace in this aristocratic impulse: "Anything the (Habsburg) emperor can afford, I can afford too." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe called it the "fairy kingdom of the Esterházys" after attending a ball at the palace. Nikolaus -- throwing parties, debauching women, sequestering composers, raiding the world of masterpieces via the French Revolution and Napoleonic wars -- is certainly an emblem of 18th century Hungarian power.

Perhaps I am unkindly coloring the Esterházys as self-indulged patricians. It is very hard not to do when only a few kilometers away is the Széchenyi household. While the Széchenyis were a noble, wealthy family, just like the Esterházys, they were interested in very different things: the common good, for instance. Count István (1791-1860), a contemporary of Nikolaus, came to be known as the Greatest Hungarian. In a visit to Budapest's Academy of Sciences on February 4th (where I took the picture of the painting at right, and more importantly, which he established after conferring all of his estate's income to the project), we learned some of the reasons why: He engineered a path to modernity politically, attacking aristocratic privilege and imagining an egalitarian Hungary; he engineered the rivers themselves to open trade routes, even straightening the Tisza River and rescuing much of Hungary from flooding; he connected Buda and Pest with the construction of the Chain Bridge, the Lánchíd; and much more, certainly.

While visiting the Hungarian Academy of Sciences, I was thrilled and almost ashamed to be given the opportunity to not only view but to handle Széchenyi's diary, of which you can see two pictures below, including sketches of a bridge. He wrote in German, in French, in English sometimes, but not, surprisingly, in Hungarian, which, as a nobleman educated in Vienna, he knew only sparingly. This is the kind of unembarrassed access the great Hungarian hero imagined for the world.

So, below we see the Széchenyi mansion, kilometers and light years away from the Esterháza.

On our way from Sopron, we went to Kőszeg, a town just a few hundred heads smaller than Barcs. Sophie stepped out of the car, groggy from reading, and frowning at a stop far from home. But she was soon open and bright, as we all were, after an encounter with a sparkling town perhaps few Americans visit. 

Kőszeg's history dates to the 13th century, which you can read on the town's website, and this history includes a claim that they saved Vienna from the Turks. From caboodle.hu: "Suleiman the Magnificent and his one-hundred-thousand-strong Turkish army laid siege to the town in August 1532. Impressively, they were held off by just four hundred Hungarian troops under the command of Captain Miklós Jurisics, putting the brakes on any Turkish advances on Vienna. The Turks fled at 11 a.m. on August 30th, and the victory is commemorated every morning in Kőszeg with the pealing of church bells."

We were there for the eleven o'clock bells. Amelia shot arrows for the second time. We walked the moat of a castle. We ate bismarks and rétes. And we headed home, satisfied, full, happy.

Meanwhile, today is the Ides of March and a Hungarian holiday, commemorating the freedom fight against the Habsburgs occurring in 1848.

Japan, you are on our minds. A travel blog such as this presents itself as focused always on adventure, always on a legacy of joy. But certainly you must know it is not a whole truth.

Girls dance away winter

Yesterday was Szulok's Svab ball, the last ball of the carnival season now that Lent is soon upon us. I described the Swabian ethnic group in a recent post, and today I have video of the girls dancing to demonstrate the feel of the dance, which is very fast and involves very sharp turns. Even the word turn is too round to convey the sudden changes in position.

Below, you see the boys and girls preparing for the stage. The red dresses are all hand-sewn. 

 

Our girls attended the school's Farsang party, immediately before we rushed them home to a babysitter and ran off to the Women's Day celebration. They dressed up in lovely dresses we borrowed from one of the town clothiers. For many Halloweens, our girls were princesses. Not this time. This time, Sophie was Rose from Eight Cousins, Maisie was a fairy, and Amelia was a lady. With a mask from Venice.

Viktor interviewed all of the children. I was very excited to see my children respond to a Hungarian interview before a room full of people. What are you? Lady, she said. (Hölgy.) Are you a princess, he asked. Nem, she said. Are you a queen? Nem. Are you a lady from Venice? Nem. Viktor asked half a dozen questions, all in Hungarian, all of which were answered the sane way. Nem, she said. Amelia is defending herself right now, in English: But I was just an old-fashioned lady!

And Maisie, who are you? Ki vagy? A fairy. Tündér. Viktor asked her if she was going to bring in the Spring, and none of us heard her. She said she said yes, though.

Zoé was a butterfly, egy pillangó. All the girls, I think, were fairies, princesses, butterflies -- the sweet things -- and all the boys were killers: ninjas, soldiers, knights, stormtroopers. Where's the battle, Viktor asked one. Here, the soldier said. Is this a war in the past, or in the future? Yes, the boy said. You will note the boy in a boy tie and jacket above, because he has neither blaster nor rifle nor sword. Who are you, Viktor asked. Kém, the boy said. Gábor leaned over and said, He's a spy.

Sophie's class, meanwhile, provided a skit and dance with doctors, royalty, and two sick snowmen, I think.

February was a hard month for many of our friends here, and we have heard repeated stories about financial tenuousness and insecurity. But the community still comes together for the children with great joy and energetic pomp. The children live in hope and love and delight.

International Women's Day

Have you heard of International Women's Day? If you're reading this from the Seattle, I don't think you have, or maybe it's just one of the niche days I've never noticed, like National Peanut Butter and Jelly Day or National Boss's Day. I'm now embarrassed to list the day with something honoring a suit or a sandwich, because on March 8th, next Tuesday, the 100th anniversary of the first such day, much of the world will honor how hard women have fought and how much, still, we have yet to achieve to bring attitudes and institutions into a shared, unsneering dignity for women and men together.

Women's Day started in the boom years of industrialization and Socialism and suffrage movements. The United Nations describes it this way: "International Women's Day is the story of ordinary women as makers of history; it is rooted in the centuries-old struggle of women to participate in society on an equal footing with men." In many countries, the day retains a political call to action; in other countries, it's like Mother's Day and Valentine's Day and women get flowers and chocolate and a you're the best dear.

At Dráva Völgye Középiskola, the men prepared a special evening for the women on Friday, a few days in advance of the official Nemzetközi Nőnap. The men made and served a dinner; provided flowers, wine and entertainment; cleaned up; and organized a dance. Ordinarily, all the people working in kitchen and scouring the school are women. This is the kind of event that says, Thank you, ladies; next year you can have another evening off.

I was part of the entertainment, and didn't cook, but I ate what the chefs below served with pleasure, the fresh deer stew especially.

Chivalry, courtly behavior, is alive in Hungary, though I have been told me it's not what it was. Still, I see signs of gallantry everywhere, as men allow others first taste or free entry or a best seat before they themselves eat or pass through a door or speak. At the bus stop in the morning, the girls' teacher, Érzsebet, grabs her son by the jacket if he tries to board the bus before our girls. Meanwhile, without such training, I get flummoxed, at in-swinging doors for example, sometimes preceding others so I might hold the door and feeling itchy for rushing first; sometimes slipping half in, half out and bearing all the door's weight near the hinge with the back of my aching hand. 

I've also noticed that men will walk across the room to shake each others' hands in greeting, leaving women alone. On special occasions or from a long absence, men may give women a double-cheek kiss, or women may "pusz" each other, but on an ordinary day, women welcome others with verbal greetings only. Language indicates a greeting of women that was: "Csókolom" means I kiss you. Children say it to adults, adults say it to elders, and sometimes, men -- usually older men -- say it to women. "Csókolom," short for "kézet csókolom,"  means I kiss your hand. And that, in my book, is courtly behavior.

So, the cafeteria was cleared out for our dinner and performance.

The show was based on a poem called "Pázmán Lovag," by Arany János. Perhaps you will see the irony, perhaps you'll just enjoy the story, which is described on a Wikipedia entry about Strauss here: Pázmán Ritter, believes his wife is having sex with another man, locks her in the house, goes to the king for redress, sees a man he believes responsible and challenges him, loses his joust and teeth the next day, discovers the victor to be the king himself, is given property for every tooth lost, and goes back to his wife's loving arms with gifts. 

I got to play the guitar and accompany a Hungarian fiddle. I was also able to prepare the joust, which you see and hear in the action-packed video below (I'm in white).

To see the whole play, and also, I believe, the basis for many of our stage directions, you can see this cartoon (low culture hyperlink). To hear Johann Strauss's opera, try this (high culture hyperlink).

So, was the knight's wife sleeping with someone else? Does it matter when finally it buys the king's patronage? Ah, thank you again, women. Happy Woman Day! I unlock you.

On Tuesday, March 8th, reach for a world where all people are safe, healthy, trusted, able, fulfilled, and loved for their own sake and human dignity.