APOR VILMOS TÉR

When she lit the lamp he fell silent and watched the flame of the match and the girl’s dreamy kind face…He had never felt so close to anybody. He was happy now; he forgot everything bad and ugly in life.                                                                    

         -Zsigmond Móricz: (Be Faithful Unto Death)        

 

     When the sun is shining in a certain way on some streets of Toronto, I remember Budapest. The truth is I don’t know why. The two cities are not alike, and during the time I was there, the sun didn’t have the decency to shine one single day.

     I remember the view from the window of my room, in the round tower that is the Danubius Hotel, in Szilagyi Erzsebet fasor; the darkness; the light rain falling on the streets of the neighbourhood, and far in the distance, the dark clouds hanging heavy on the hills of Buda. On the highest hill there was a huge communications tower with antennas on all sides, from where, in previous years, the government broadcast its doctrine and propaganda.                                  
     Tram 56 stopped outside the hotel, but every morning I preferred to walk to Moszkva Tér or Széll Kálmán Tér (as it is now called), where I could have a good breakfast for little money, in a little restaurant inside the market, which also served an excellent coffee. Since I was there every day, Nemecsek, the attendant and cook, knew me. With his broken English and Magyar accent, he asked me questions about Canada. 
     Moscow Square was charming, with beautiful old buildings, and the convergence of so many rail tracks for the trams coming from Buda’s hills. The only aberration was a Macdonald's, a Burger King, and a Pizza Hut. After breakfast, I would go to the subway entrance, where I would meet with Zsuzsánna. When she arrived, we would board the Red Subway Line M2, thus beginning the journey of the day.     
     In Buda we visited the Castle; the Fishermen's Bastion; the imposing building that was the Habsburg Palace, and now is the National Gallery; and Mátyás Church. We descended on the funicular to the west bank of the Danube, and walked down the Széchenyi Bridge to Pest, on the other side.
     In Pest, we climbed the 364 steps to the dome of the Szent István Basilica, 96 metres high, from where we could see the contrast between the hills of Buda and the plain of Pest. In Városliget we went to the Agricultural Museum, located in the magnificent Vajdahunyad Castle, and we walked through the park. In Hősök tere, at the Heroes Monument, next to the seven riders who, in 895 A.D. led the Magyars from the Urals to Pannonia, in the Carpathian Valley, Zsuzszánna, full of pride,  told me the history of Árpád, Elod, Ond, Kond, Tas, Huba, Töhötöm, and the origin of her people.   We walked the pedestrian street Vaci utca end to end. To get some rest, in Vörösmarty Square, we sat at the foot of the statue of Mihály Vörösmarty, and kept company to the crowd of students gathering around the poet. Then we went to Café Gerbeaud, to have a coffee, of course. 

     I told Zsuzsánna that I wanted to buy a T-shirt with some Hungarian motif, to take it with me, as a souvenir. She took me to the Central Market in Vámház körút. In none of the stores could I find a T-shirt that was made in Hungary, with the inscription Budapest Magyarország, in Hungarian, instead of, Budapest Hungary, in English. The shopkeepers apologized, saying that all their merchandise was intended for tourists. Then, Zsuzsánna said that another day she would take me to Móricz Zsigmond körtér, where there was a nationalist store. They sold all kinds of items relating to the Magyár history and culture, past and present.

    One day, standing on the east bank of the Danube, next to the huge neo-Gothic structure of the Magyarorzágház (the national parliament building), Zsuzsánna, exalted, pointing a finger at the colossal Statue of Liberty that could be seen in the distance on the Gellért hill, told me about the blood shed by the Hungarians. Those who died during the war of independence against the Austrian Empire, in 1848; those who were executed by the Habsburg, including the thirteen martyrs of Arad; those who died in the First World War, the Second World War, and during the 1956 uprising against the Russian Empire. The statue is a gigantic structure that appears to be a woman with her arms outstretched to the sky, holding her dead son: In memory of those who sacrificed their lives for the independence, freedom, and prosperity of Hungary.
     The day we went to Móricz Zsigmond Square, when we got off the tram 59, there was a political demonstration. A group of girls marched, chanting slogans in Hungarian which, of course, I didn’t understand. In their hands they were carrying banners with a sign saying Szeretlek. I asked Zsuzsánna what it meant. “I love you,” she replied. Wow! A rally promoting the cause of love! I think at that moment I began to love all Hungarian women.
     In the nationalist store I found what I was looking for. I bought a T-shirt. In the front it had an ancient warrior, riding, with bow and arrow in shooting position, and the Hungarian inscription: The Scythian fire is revived and burning again in our spirits, and together, we will defeat the ancient enemy again. In the back it had an eagle with outstretched wings and the slogan (also in Hungarian): The warrior nation, like the waves of the sea, will be no one's slave! In a bookstore, in the same square, I bought two novels: Légy jó mindhalálíg (Be Faithful Unto Death) by Zsigmond Móricz, and A Pál utcai Fiuk (The Paul Street Boys), by Ferenc Molnár.

     In all honesty, we couldn’t do much; the rain and the cold wind did not allow it. In fact, what I remember most is the inclement weather and what I didn’t do. I didn’t go to Margit Island, or the Széchenyi thermal baths, or the Statue Park, or the Pal-Völgyi Caves, or the Opera, or Gellért, to see the Statue of Liberty, or Aquincum, or the Budavár Labyrinth. I didn’t tell Zsuzsánna that I loved her eyes so much.
     The day before my departure, Zsuzsánna took me to her house. I was touched. It’s not easy for anyone to open the doors of their home to a stranger. We ate pogácsa and gulyás, and drank Borsodi. We talked about Hieronymus Bosch, her favourite painter; about her childhood and youth under the former communist regime; and about how she became an orphan at twenty-five. Her mother died of cancer, and six months later, her father, being completely healthy, decided to die too, just like that, by sheer will power, because life without his wife was unbearable. He followed her to even beyond the grave.   
     When we said goodbye to each other at Apor Vilmos Tér, she hugged me and kissed me on both cheeks; I kissed her on the forehead. She stood on the platform, looking at me, as Tram 59 drove off. I didn’t take my eyes off her, until she disappeared in the fog of another sunless day. I guess we both knew we would never see each other again.             

     So, I guess that's what the sunny days in Toronto remind me of Budapest. It is not what happened but what did not happen, the longing for what might have been but was not, the desire to experience it, the audacity to want to go back and make it happen. Sunlight has the power to make me remember things I have never lived.                               

©Text and photograph, William Almonte Jiménez, 2012