Lady Zelda

I am new to this forum. It took me a while to work out how to post. My husband and I moved to a village near Gyor last April. Just found this site. Wish we had found it last year, might have saved a lod of problems...LOL. If anyone in this area would like to make themselves known I would be happy to chat. We are in our late fifties. Lucky enough to get early retirement and now living here with my daughter, partner and our two grandchildren, who were born here. My past is a complex one. I am a Szekely Hungarian born in Transylvania, Romania. I moved to Hungary 24 years ago and lived here for 4 years until I met my English husband and moved to the UK. Although, I have triple nationality, I do feel more British than anything! Hope this posts, fingers crossed...Best wishes, Minden Jot!
X

FenTiger

Welcome to the forum. As mentioned on your other post my wife is Hungarian. She was born in Miskolc and being deaf spent a large part of her life attending a boarding school for deaf children in Budapest. My wife has lived in the UK for the past 24 years. My wife's family now live in the village of Malyi and we have several friends locally. Often when we are over there in the summer we can be found at Malyi-to with local deaf friends.

I always find our Hungarian friends more friendly and they are always generous despite the fact they don't have the same quality of life as we do in the UK.

We get quite a few Hungarian visitors here in the UK. Some are confident enough to go up to London on their own but others ..... would rather we guide them around.

Lady Zelda

Hi Fentiger,

Thank you for welcoming me on this forum. I was lovely to read about your family and I hope those few years will pass quickly and you will be able to be reunited with your wife's family and friends. I know where Miskolc is as ones in the past we got lost and ended up somewhere in the North East near the Ukrainian border, driving through villages habituated only by gypsy communities. It was getting dark and we were on some country roads in the nowhere, with no GPS at the time, which was a bit scary by sitting in an English car. I am not afraid of gypsies at all, as I speak Hungarian and met quite a few in my life, but when you are in an isolated area it can be tricky if you do not know anybody. We were advised by a young couple when asked for directions to turn back immediately so we drove down past Miskolc and stopped in Eger over night. I would recommend a visit to this beautiful little historical town and the surrounding area, the Bukk Mountains, Szilvasvarad, Belapatfalva...awesome places!

I have no clue where Malyi is. Sorry for that as I myself am somewhat a foreigner in this country, as I was born in the heart of the beautiful Carpathian's mountains in Transylvania, Romania, in a city close to the popular skying resort of Brasov, very close to Dracula's Bran Castle . I would be a good guide if anybody would like to visit that beautiful and very safe part of the world. I speak Romanian, too, however, it is a bit rusty now as I left Romania a very long time ago, at the Revolution. Perhaps one day some expats would love to organise a trip to see this 'little Canada' with gorges , lakes, waterfalls and amazing wide life. Watch out for the brown bears though!

Back in the UK in Oct 2006 I was the victim of a hit and run in a frontal collision. This guy was driving in a stolen car, three times over the legal alcohol limit and no lights turned on. I was taken to the Queen' Medical Hospital to Nottingham and the Police were waiting for me to pass out so the man could be charge with murder. Luckily due to my good health I survived against the odds, but I had nerve damage and other serious issues, so as a result I have some hearing loss in both ears. I am not deaf, but in noisy environment I can't hear well what people are saying. That's life, I am afraid, so we have to live with it and make the best of our lives. I am sure your wife is a wonderful woman, otherwise, you would not have marry her . All the best for you and keep my fingers crossed for you to have an easy transition once you move here. We got through Hell in the past year, regarding dodgy gold digging builders, who left us with unfinished jobs and disappeared with 4mill Ft of our savings. And this project manager 'Kivitelezo' was recommended by my daughter's boss. We have just started learning about how things work in this part of the country. Gyor and its surrounding area is a pretty wealthy area, by Audi providing lots of jobs and also the businesses are booming here, but people in general are not so friendly like in those rural villages in South West or North East. We live in Otteveny, on the main route to Wienna. Although my daughter's have a small weekend cottage in Badacsony built on the top of the hills with the view to the Lake Balaton, we rarely have the chance to stay there. In the 90s I used to live in Ajka for 4 years, where I worked as an Executive Assistant for a French company and as a interpreter /translator in 4 languages. I know quite well the Tapolca, Sumeg, Veszprem, Balaton area, but my favourite place of all is Pecs. We wanted to buy there in the past, by my daughter's partner refused to move down there as he did not want to commute from Budapest each week. He used to work as Project Manager for the Hungarian Telecom/TMobile. My daughter always wanted to live near Gyor, so we ended up buying this double house on a large land, so we live next door to each other. We only did it for the grandchildren, the reason we moved to Hungary. We still have got our house in Loughborough, as we may want to move back one day, not sure yet...the future will tell.
Sorry for being too long.
All the best x

fidobsa

Welcome to the forum. Sorry to hear about your bad experience with builders but hopefully you will get everything how you want it and enjoy a peaceful retirement. I envy you your linguistic skills, the language barrier is the biggest challenge for most of us.

Lady Zelda

Thank you Fido,

Yes, it will get better slowly, but I still have nightmares after all that we went through in such a short space of time. Regarding my language skills, I realise how important is to speak a latin based language and a Finnugor family language. I can read and understand Italian...my first childhood boyfriend was Italian, so my mother paid for private lessons to be able to write to him and be able to have a normal conversation with him. It was a long time ago, but I can still remember so many words and expressions, which helps if I travel to Italy. I also used to work with Finish people, so I had to learn some basic words to be able to communicate with them. I can still count and say thank you...Kiitos, good morning...Hyvää huomenta ...1,2,3=uksi, kaksi, kolme...and many more.

Enjoy a nice Sunday, It has been raining near Gyor for the past week. The weather seems worse than in the UK right now. But we hope, always!!! X

Lady Zelda

Forgotten..those who speak more languages have a better chance to avoid developing Alzheimer's . My husband's mother had this terrible illness. It was painful to see her deteriorate over 14-15 years before she finally gave up, after being looked after for 4 years in a great private home in Wymondham, near Norwich. My husband was born there, lovely Norfolk!! I miss walking our old dogs on the beach and watching the waves and walking on the sand. Our only sea here is the Ikreny water skying lake, the Hungarian Balaton or our inflatable swimming pool. But never mind, at least we have got our memory still intact to be able to treasure all those old memories of the past. My husband used to be a Physicist before retiring 3 years ago at 55. He is a very educated and clever man, but he often worries what is he inherited his mother's genes. I keep saying, you have to die of something, honey, and Switzerland is close by so there is no need to worry !!! By then hopefully Euthanasia will be accepted anywhere in the world. Some of us should have the right to choose on how to end up our life when there is no more hope.

I am positive though, as he reads enormously much so he works his brain on daily basis. Sometimes we have to let things go and just simply live our lucky lives...so many do not have this opportunity. Xx

FenTiger

Lady Zelda - so sorry to learn about your terrible accident.

I herald from Peterborough and used to go to the Norfolk coast alot when I was small. I now live in Orpington, Kent, having moved around quite a lot south of the River (River Thames that is!).

My wife teaches British Sign Language and interestingly she is not the only Non-English person who teaches BSL. Unfortunately, due to government cut backs she is not teaching so many lessons.

Quite a few people on here have had similar things happening to them so you are not alone.

Malyi is a small village 12km or 7.5 miles south of Miskolc.

cathyg

Hi Lady Zelda

Welcome to the forum. We too moved here last year and also now have a very active hungarian Viszla. They are beautiful dogs and keep us active. We live near Veszprem and have been very fortunate with our builder, electrician and plumber. Luckily our neighbour is the village carpenter and next door to him is a master electrician. Also the man we bought our house from is a plumber so you can see that straight away we had access to all the expertise we needed.
Everyone has been so helpful and kind to us. In our village there are lots of people of various nationalities and the locals seem quite proud of the fact that it is an international community.
Several years ago we visited the area around Bran and Cluj. It is a beautiful area, every hill you go over reveals another stunning view. We went up the road that Caecescu had built to the top of the mountain. They featured it on Top Gear once. We had an old Hymer motorhome and it was quite amazing at the top. Loved the people in Romania too, very friendly and everyone would wave to us when they saw the GB plate.
We also nearly bought a house in Badacsony area, it was just that bit too far for us from Budapest where we have family. Stunning area though.
Everybody seems much more family orientated here and I think the idea of having two houses on one piece of land is a really good idea particularly for the grand children.
Anyway take care and look forward to reading some more of your posts.

Lady Zelda

Thanks Cathy,

I used to go shopping a lot to Veszprem many years ago when I was living in Ajka. I used to go to the zoo with the grandchildren during our short visits to Hungary and Romania, when they were born 11 and consequently 8 and a half years ago.

Yes, I know all about Ceausescu's despotic ruling. My family suffered a lot as a result. My father was accused with being the leader of an anticommunist party, and was arrested, tortured and killed in a Romanian prison when I was 10 months old. All our assets, hotels, restaurants, lands and woodlands were confiscated from my family, and life was hell for my mother and her close relatives. My father was posthumously rehabilitated after the Revolution, he was knighted by the Hungarian Government with the highest Order of Bravery, a title which I inherited and can use.

He is a Hero back in Transylvania in the city where I was born, and there is a marble plaque and some memorials where VIPs are laying down wreaths and flowers each year on 15th March and 23rd October and hundreds of people are attending the commemoration. There were many books and articles written about him and my life. It was hard, and I had to leave my beautiful birth country to provide a better life to my only daughter. Emigrating in the 90s was the choice from hell, and it cost my first marriage of 20 years. We were constantly called bloody Romanians here, or gypsies..so imagine that when your father died for fighting for the Hungarian minorities' rights. I did not even know my father, but I went through hell while growing up in Romania. I was a former international swimmer. I was in the plane to reach my dreams at the Montreal Olympics when the Securitate grabbed me by my arms and dragged me off the plane...the only person to be prohibited to leave the country as for my father's mistakes. We now know from journalists digging into my father's past, that he was completely innocent and had to die because we were a very rich and noble family, therefore my family had to pay for it. I still have got a 16 bedroom villa in Malnas Spa in the heart of the Carpathian's which I sold after the Revolution, but lost all the money with the sudden money devaluation. I am not bitter though, because those times were very tough, with lots of hatred on both sides. In Romania I could never be Hungarian, so I thought by emigrating legally, we would be equal in my mother country. Instead we were called names and had lots of people envying us for our ability to rebuild our lives from scratch. That is the reason why I left Hungary in 1996. It was too much for me. I am British, and I am very proud of it, as this permits me to be who I want to be...it is hard to understand, because one has to experience such traumas to feel it through. Despite all that I love my country of birth, but I would never be able to live there. I visit often as I have family there, but after a few days I feel ready to leave and be myself again.

I hope you are all happy here, as bitterness never solves anything in life, it just eats people's hearts and souls away. Believe me, I went through so much that a book would not be enough to put everything in writing. I will start writing my autobiography, but with two grandchildren and two dogs and a large house to look after, there is no time left for it...but I will.

Take care

PS Ceausescu used to go bear hunting in my grandparents's woodlands in Covasna...what an awesome place!! He built a hunting chalet there hidden in the woods and guarded day and night. The bears were fed in advance for weeks to get them used to coming for food, so shooting one was not an issue. Even a child could have done it, easily. But the trophy was dedicated to the dictator and his stupid peasant wife...I believe that he got what he deserved. You have to see his unfinished palace in Bucharest one day. It is bigger than the Pentagon. Half a city had been destroyed to built his grandiose madness palace. I studied Marketing and Business management in Bucharest in late 70s, so I know the old Bucharest before the changes. I had even survived the 1977, 7.8 Richter scale earthquake, falling from the second floor in the campus, when the staircase disappeared from under my feet while running for my life. I was dragged out from under the rubble and two weeks later we were back to study.. We had to... Life went on...nobody had counselling, nobody gave us any advice on how to forget the horror of seeing so many dead people, children in their cots, legs and arms all over the rubbles. I survived so many things, even a real revolution, divorce, moving countries, and always starting from scratch with no help. It toughened me, but it also made me very compassionate and very understanding towards sufferers. Life is still worth living it!

Xx

Lady Zelda

FenTiger,

I know what a good guide means to London. I was sick of guiding endless family members and friends over the years. I had to take them everywhere in a day. The London Eye makes me dizzy just by thinking of it...I had been on it so many times, that I should get a prize for it. I know every chipped painting on the gates of the Buckingham Palace and I remember every open boat trip on the Thames when we were soaked to our knickers during a rain storm. I can still hear the Dinosaur-uses groaning in the Natural History Museum and many more to remember with fondness !


London is the only thing that I do not miss. No more trips, no more tripping over tourists, no more pollution in my face and no more crowd. 30 years ago I would have died to get to London for a day...so never wish too much in advance, as it can come true .

Your wife seems to me a great woman. She must be an excellent teacher, just like my husband used to be. He absolutely loved teaching ALevel Physics to clever kids. He was head of Physics and 6 Form. He dedicated so many years to teach teenagers at Wreake Valley College, in Syston, near Leicester. He was the most popular teacher in that school. He disliked the bureaucracy of paper work, as he used to keep everything in his head. With government's new rules and a falling education system, he had enough and retired just at the right time. He still received his final salary scheme, so that was the biggest bonus of all. So glad he had the courage to leave, otherwise he may be still teaching till 60. He is only 58.

He is a happy free man. No more worries to get to work each and every day. So lucky...he deserves it! And every teacher on this planet should be treated better and respected much more. They work really hard in the UK. Here it is more old fashioned, but kids got used to it. I can see our grandchildren's school. Teachers here are much more relaxed, not so much pressure to prove their teaching skills. They teach the rest is up to the kids and parents to deal with homework and so on.
All the best...do not work too hard...life is too short...retire if you can earlier...I don't get my pension until I reach 66. We are still ok. My husband fully supports me...how nice of him!

The future looks good! Xx