I just came back from a visit at my grandmother’s place in Hungary several days ago.

“Did you find something about our roots in Mongolia?” she asked me with a sly smile. Like a lot of people, she too believes that Hungarians are descendents of the Huns.

Magyarország – Hungary. A place of heritage. And a nice place to visit.

It can be very pittoresque:

…with beautiful little churches:

…and some massive cathedrals:

The capital Budapest is full of grandeur by day:

…but even more so by night:

Europe’s largest river, the Danube, flows through the heart of the country, bringing water, culture and commerce all the way from the Black Forest to the Black Sea:

The Hungarians enjoy food and drink, especially the three P’s: Pörkölt meat stew, Palascinta pan cakes and Pálinka fruit brandy. Awesome stuff!

The people are very friendly, and they seem to love beards and mustaches. You can find traces of this love virtually everywhere, even on graffiti:

And they adore their heroes:

In the Northeast of the city, there is a large square called Hősök Tere (Heroes’ Square):

There was a small gathering of people at the foot of the statues, so I went to check it out:

“I don’t speak English or German very well,” a blonde lady in a dark coat told me in flawless English, “only Hungarian and Hebrew. But I will try to explain.”

Apparently, I was witnessing a demonstration against the uprise of neo-fascism in Hungary. The radical right-wing political party Jobbik (Jobbik Magyarországért Mozgalom = Movement For A Better Hungary) that maintained close ties to the infamous Magyar Gárda (Hungarian Guard) was threatening to become a major force on a national level, and there had been multiple occasions where members of the small Romani community in the countryside became victim of fascist aggression.

“A young man and his son were shot right outside of their home, and some people wanted to make it look like the Romani were shooting each other! But journalists have discovered the truth, and now we are here to take a stand against the radicals, but please look around” the lady pointed at the scattered group in the center of the Heroe’s Square: “only 40 or 50 people are here!”

Suddenly an old man with a wool hat and a thick red nose appeared and asked me in German: “Is this the pro-fascist rally? I support fascism!” He sounded like he hadn’t spoken our language in a long time, but it came out grammatically correct. I was perplexed. The lady in the coat got a hurt look on her face and decided to flee.

The man presented himself with a name as antiquated and as German as Franz Schulz and then started to go into a rant about the blessings of the rise of neo-fascism in Europe. “I am from the country of the last Nobel Prize – Hertha Müller, you know?” he said, “I am German like her or like you, and I am a proud nationalist! The Netherlands are going fascist, Hungary is going fascist, and soon the rest of Europe will be following along! You must know the Horst-Wessel-Lied (anthem of the NSDAP)?”

I told him that we “Germans” usually don’t appreciate that kind of talk very much.

“Yes, yes, you have done enough for the cause,” he said and smiled, “the Germans don’t have to be pioneers anymore, they have sacrificed so much already!”

It hurt.

Heinz Schmidt, or whatever his name was, kept going on with his tangled mass of words, while the statues around us and the pictures of the murdered Romani were in grave silence. Then he said something that caught my attention: “China,” he exclaimed triumphantly, “now THAT is a good country: strong leadership, with a good sense of order!”

Would he like China to become the ruler of his new fascist Europe?

He seemed to be contemplating the thought for a while, tilting his head to the side, then he smiled and said: “Yes, possibly!”

And he looked very happy about the consistency within his logical thought.

But did he really think the Chinese were going to let him sing the Horst-Wessel-Lied??

The pseudo-Fritz Meyer didn’t find time for an adequate answer to this dilemma, because another Hungarian lady had been overhearing the conversation and started to seriously cuss him out in what sounded like very blunt Hungarian. I could make out the word “Nazi” a couple of times, then the old man was gone and the lady smiled.

…

Time to take a breath.

…

There is a large synagogue in central Budapest, it’s called the Dohány Utcai Zsinagóga (Dohany Street Synagogue):

Behind a gate in the backyard, there is a memorial to remind us of what happened during the last period of fascist domination in Europe:

I found the engraved stone tablets in the yard very powerful, because they looked so fragile and so earnest at the same time:

Obviously, the place isn’t big enough to hold all the victims’ names on individual tablets, so there is a large one covering a whole wall:

Do the people who are waiting for the fascist rule to come over their country never open their eyes to see this?

Do they always stay within the confines of their fear?

Is Hungary really going to build her future on the hatred of minority groups such as the Romani (ca. 2% of the population) and the Jews (less than 1% of the population), and try to emulate some sort of “German” idea that seems to root in historical ties to the Austro-Hungarian Dual Monarchy (1867 – 1918) and to Hungary’s own German minority (less than 1% of the population)?

Isn’t this a country that admires her heroes?

I am starting to ask myself where they are, the Hungarian heroes.

Then it dawns on me that I have seen them somewhere…

…on Heroes’ Square.

Soundtrack: Angry Samoans – “Lights Out”