Scattered throughout the U.S. are pockets of hyphenated Americans who come from the country of Hungary. For many, the ties to the motherland are so strong that they created organizations here to keep their culture close to them.
Zsuzsa Stanfield understands the reasons. She left her hometown of Budapest 18 years ago. “I was born in Hungary. I’m from Budapest. I love Budapest,” she declares. But she met her American husband in Budapest, they got married there and then they came to live in the U.S. She laughs when she recalls what she once told a friend, “I can only leave Hungary if my heart takes me away,” she says, “and that’s what happened.”
The raised their three children in Seattle and visit Hungary every three years for a few months in the summer. “My kids are bi-lingual,” she says. “We speak English in our homes, because of my husband.” She herself returns to Budapest each summer to visit and check in on her aging parents. In the meantime, she’s the president of the Hungarian Association of Washington, based in Seattle, and just re-elected to another term. People who left during and after the revolution started the Association in 1956, she says.
Across the country in Washington, D.C. is a similar group. The Hungarian American Foundation, Inc, a non-profit group created in 2003 for charitable, scientific, literary, and educational purposes to promote Hungarian culture and traditions
And like Stanfield’s group, they too hold language classes. The D.C. group also helps young professionals network and maintains a job bank.
As Stanfield stresses, you don’t have to be Hungarian to join the group or to attend their classes and events. The groups exist to keep Hungarian traditions alive, but also to help dispel some myths about Hungary and her people.
“I’ve heard so many weird things,” chuckles Stanfield. “I think it was just lack of knowledge.” For the record, no, the country isn’t called Hungary because the people are hungry and yes, they love their Goulash.
“Goulash is one of my favorite dishes,” she exclaims. Her kids love it and their friends love it too. Cooking traditional foods is one area they are exploring and may start a cooking class in the fall. For now, they shop at the Russian markets to get ingredients from home since they don’t have a Hungarian market.
“We get a lot of comments that suggest Hungary is an underdeveloped country and it’s not,” she continues. Then there’s her name. “With my name some people think I’m related to Zsa Zsa Gabor.”She isn’t.
Zsa Zsa is probably the most famous Hungarian to many Americans. But did you know that a Hungarian researcher Albert Szent-Gyorgyi discovered Vitamin C and won a Nobel Prize for his work? The man who helped found Intel Corporation, Andy Grove, was born Andras Grof in Hungary, and wrote about his happy childhood in Budapest. Of course, music lovers will cite the composer Franz Liszt among the famous Hungarians.
Movie lovers will remind you that Count Dracula came from Transylvania and Stanfield will tell you that Transylvania no longer belongs to Hungary it’s now part of Romania. And she laughs good-naturedly at the mention of Dracula.
Perhaps the biggest change in Hungary in the last 50 years is the fall of Communism in 1989. “That’s something Hungary wanted for so long,” recalls Stanfield. “I was in the U.S. when all this happened. It was so exciting. It was something that everyone was waiting for to happen.”
To keep her homeland alive and real to her children, and her community, she helps run the Hungarian American Association by organizing volunteers to teach the language and offer dance classes in the traditional forms. They perform at local events in Seattle and the surrounding areas, as well as at their own gatherings.
For 27 years now, they have been the hub for the local Hungarians. It seems they offer a little bit for everyone. The “Senior’s Club” meets monthly on Saturdays for movies, coffee, and of course one of the main purposes, speaking Hungarian.
For the more active nature-loving members they offer a hiking club. And for the literary crowd there is a small library. “We collected 2,000 books from donations,” says Stanfield. “It’s another way for them to read in their mother tongue.”
From time to time, they also offer presentations from visiting Hungarian artists and politicians where the language is the biggest uniting force. “It’s very important for my kids to speak the language it’s what keeps us together as Hungarians,” says Stanfield. “When they go back to Hungary, it’s very important for them to speak to their grandparents.”
The Hungarian alphabet has 44 letters. They don’t use prepositions but they use accented vowels, which give the language a certain melodic sound. Hungarian isn’t related to any nearby languages, it’s completely different but somewhat similar to Finnish. Stanfield’s first name, Zsuzsa is equivalent to the English name of Susan but “I don’t let people call me Susan,” warns Stanfield.
Besides stressing the language, the association also teaches the youngsters various Hungarian customs like greeting someone in a formal or informal way, including what to say when a youngster meets an adult. Good friends and family members often greet each other with a kiss on both cheeks and everyone shakes hands.
Her association has 250 members, which includes individuals and families. They pay modest membership fees to help defray the costs of a newsletter they print in both Hungarian and English with an average of about 20 pages.
And unlike when Stanfield arrived in the U.S. and had to rely on the Yellow Pages to find an association, a quick internet search for the nearest Hungarian association pulls up the information. If you’re planning a trip to Hungary, it’s a good idea to do some research with folks who love to brag about their homeland. “Látogassa meg szövetségünket és tudjon meg többet Magyarországról,” says Stanfield, which means, “Visit our Association and learn more about Hungary.” www.HungarianAmerican.org. “Köszönöm,” thank you, she adds.
Additional Resources:
To purchase Hungarian goods: www.bende.com
The Hungarian National Information Office in New York City: http://www.gotohungary.com/