Brave old world

‘The beer was better,’ he said finally. ‘And cheaper! When I was a young man, mild beer – wallop we used to call it – was fourpence a pint. That was before the war, of course.’ ‘Which war was that?’ said Winston. ‘It’s all wars,’ said the old man vaguely.

(George Orwell, 1984, 1.8.)

The Hungarian term ántivilág – “ánti-world” – is a complex one, difficult to translate. It is used almost exclusively in the locative form: “in the ántivilág”, where the prefix is the abbreviation for ante bellum, “before the war”. But before which war? Because we have not been short of wars since 1914 when, as an old man told me in the Transylvanian Tibód, “they set ablaze the four corners of the world and it has been burning since ever”. With this term they usually refer to the “happy times of peace” before WWI, whose relative stability and prosperity has been long transcended into a Golden Age in the light – or rather darkness – of the continuous destruction, loss, insecurity, oppression and occupation since 1914. But every war embellishes the bygone peacetime, so the term is also used for the period between the two wars, and even – ironically – for the pre-1989 era of Socialism and Cold War.

And this already takes us to the other meaning of ántivilág, where the prefix is not interpreted as “ante” but rather as “anti-”, that is the opposite and negative mirror of our world, such as the antipodes living upside down in the southern hemisphere. Ántivilág is not only the world which perhaps was not even true, but also the one in which nothing was true, * the world of manipulation and propaganda. Indeed it is usually the propaganda that creates the anti-worlds proclaimed as the best of all existing worlds, and which at the same time – when looking back or from the outside – exposes in the most absurd way the futility of such efforts.

This concept with a double meaning which – like all past ages – raises nostalgia and aversion at the same time, is translated by us to English as “brave old world” which, besides the feeling of the “good old times” also implies the irony of Huxley’s “brave new world”. We are curious to know how our readers would translate it to other languages.

• Prologue Belle époque • The future, a century ago • Cartes de visite • The language of stamps • The first bicycles 1. 2. 3. • A black man in Hamburg • Black people in the zoo • Ghosts on old photos 1. and 2.    The Austro-Hungarian Monarcy • The tastes of the Monarchy 1. and 2 • Hawelka in Vienna and Krakow • A restaurant in Abbazia (es) • I, Anna Csillag: ads from Schulz to Hitler • Beginnings of the Hungarian railway • The Casino of Kőbánya • Hundred years of a tree in Kőbánya • Pharmacies in Kőbánya • The Golden Eagle Inn in Pest • Postcard from Budapest to Florence, 1900, and the vanished Tabán • Temperance campaign at the turn of the century • Shutter labels: Korányi and Fröhlich, Paschka, Sándor Árkai, Czernowitz, Lemberg and Żółkiew • A former passage in Lwów • Multi-ethnic house in Lemberg • Century-old brick graffiti in Budapest • “King Matthias’ palace” in Kassa, 1899-1943 • Bram Stoker’s hotel in Beszterce • Vampire-killing sets for a Transylvanian journey • Hungarian Armenians • Art Nouveau in Szabadka • Szabadka 1912-ben, 1. 2. 3. 4. • An Indian in Szabadka • The last postcards of the Monarchy – from Odessa • The Austro-Hungarian army, 1914    Germany • Passion play in Oberammergau • Pictures of old summers • A Whitsuntide excursion    Britain • The Oxford Arms Inn and old London • Ghosts in the photos of old London    France • Figures in old photos of Paris • Henri Roger-Viollet, Paris • The Luna Park in Paris • Building and apotheosis of the Eiffel Tower • Train accident, 1895 • The last Tsar in Paris, 1896 • Zuavs in the French colonial army • The Fifer Boy in the imperial army • French primer of geography, 1905 • Az 1910-es nagy párizsi árvíz    Italy • Childhood of an Italian patriarch • The first hydrocycle • The Messina earthquake, 1908    Spain • Photos of dead children • Old Palma in the photos of the Escalas archive • Palma: The first velocipedists • Palma: The Born Passage and Edison’s voice • The rural world of Mallorca    The Russian empire • Alexander Roinashvili, the traveler • Dmitry Ermakov, chronicler of the Caucasus • Ernest Chantre’s Caucasian photos, 1881 • Flood of the Kura in Tiflis, 1893 • Qajar houses in Tiflis • Ivan Boldyrev: Don Cossacks, 1875-76 • Marriage ad with a balance • Moscow’s fire brigades 1. and 2. • Constructing the Trans-Siberian Railroad • Sakhalin, 1894-1905 • Bike on the dacha • Three Russian family photos from Ekaterinoslav, 1914 • Three generations on Russian photos • Russian photos from Odessa • Culture of Odessa in the early 20th c. • The blossoming and end of Jewish Odessa • The Russian army, 1892 • Russian sailors at the Messina earthquake, 1908 • Moscow in 2259 • Russian slides by František Krátký, 1896 • The coronation of the last Tsar, 1896 • The last Tsar in Paris, 1896 • The last day of the peace    The Ottoman empire • An Ottoman shoebox • Damascus anno • Photographers of the East • Turkish-Hungarian friendship    The Persian empire • Ahmad Mirza, the last Qajar Shah • Sándor Kégl, Iranian scholar • Qajar houses in Tiflis    The Heavenly Empire • Studio Po-Chou, Hong Kong, 1897-ben    Jews • Yinglish shop label in New York Great Games • The Gulistan Treaty • The exiles of the Boer war The Great War • The attempt in Sarajevo in the Russian press • The cut photos of the attempt in Sarajevo • To My Peoples • Soldiers’ trains 1. és 2. • Pink postcards from the front to Óbuda over six years, 1. • The Europeana 1914-1918 project • Conquering eveywhere. War ad of the Pathé Brothers • Versions of the “pointing” recruiting poster • British and Russian children’s propaganda • German military children’s books • Preparation for the war with paper soldiers • Bathing little Venus, delight of children soldiers • Krampus and red devils on the front • Soldiers’ cemetery in the Carpathians (Tatariv) • An evangeliary from Galicia • The Jews of Podhajce greeting Archduke Frederick, 1916 • The Jews of Kolomea greeting Charles IV, 1917 • Generals in Lemberg’s Café Sztuka • Statues of Hungarian and Romanian heroes in the Carpathians • Songs from the two banks of the Isonzo • Austro-Hungarian artillery in the Holy Land • The five graves of Captain Truszkowski • Jews in WWI. Exhibition of the Vienna Jewish Museum, 2014 • Jewish military cemetery at Gorlice (es) • Kraftwagenpark 505: German soldiers in the Holy Land 1. and 2. • People of Véménd in Béla Hernai’s photos, 1916-1918 • Christmas greetings by Russian POWs to Sándor Kégl • Photo cut in two in Valenciennes • Merry-making at the news of Russia’s withdrawal from the war Strange peaces • New borders in Europe • The Hutsul Republic • School at the border: Temesvár/Timișoara • Hungarian coat of arms on the Croatian Parliament, 1918 • The Moravians in Hultschin, who said no to Czechoslovakia • Pseudo-referendum on Subcarpathia The Mexican revolution • The Casasolas, chroniclers of the revolution • Songs of the revolution • José Guadalupe Posada, drawer of the revolution • Holy pictures of the revolution The world revolution • Photos of the February revolution in the Dicescu collection • Retouched postcards of the February revolution • True pictures of the October revolution • Vladimir Fedorov’s revolutionary cartoons, 1917 • Lenin’s Transylvanian bodyguard • The fate of an officer’s family • Fleeing Russia • The birth of the Soviet Union and the Council of People’s Commissars • Eugenetics in the Soviet Union • Boris Kustodiev’s processions • Boris Kustodiev’s great leap • Mayakovsky, lighthouse of the revolution • World revolution for children • Day of Birds and other parades • The NEP period and its songs, 1921-1928 • Soviet Photo, 1926 • Yuri Yeremin: Moscow, 1926 • Branson De Cou: Moscow, Peterhof, Tsarskoe Selo, Odessa, 1931 • Ilya Ilf, Russian and American photos • Kommunalki • Two New Year photos from Russia

War against the alcohol • Hungarian and French campaign at the turn of the century • Soviet temperance posters, 1920-1991 • Say no! Metamorphoses of the poster of 1954 • Polish temperance posters • With temperance posters against Coca-Cola • With luboks against the alcohol, 1989 Between two wars • The golden age of Hungarian photography • Hassids in Subcarpathia • Polish Jews: Alter Kacyzne • Polish Jews: Roman Vishniac • Polish Jews: Menachem Kipnis • Kipnis’ cantors • The Al Capone of Tarnów • Jewish quarter in old Lwów • Yiddish shop labels in Lwów • Places of mezuzahs in Lwów • Old book posters from Lwów • Postcards of Rosh Hashana • Photos of the Czech priest Josef Baťka from the New World • Picture cathecism according to the Bernadette method • French family photo with a blacksmith’s workshop • Father and son in Buenos Aires • The Görlitz railway station in Berlin • Willy Römer’s photos on Berlin’s craftsmen in the 1920s and 1930s • Buhse, the shoemaker, by Gabriele Tergit, with a photo by Willy Römer • Organ grinders in Berlin • Organ grinders in Budapest • Old Serbian Gypsy musicians • Wilhelm Miklas in Budapest, 1937 • Paleo-GPS’s from the 1930s • Tango’s golden age: Carlos Gardel • Pyotr Leshchenko and Russian homesickness • Bohemian world in Bucharest • Misery in Bucharest • Balance of a hundred years in Bucharest • Who was Essad Bey? • Lenin, Hitler and the children • Mussolini, Perón, Franco and the children • Germany and the Soviet Union in the Paris world exposition of 1937 • Warsaw, a week before the war The Spanish civil war • The last 13 hours of Lorca’s life • The conquest of Potes • Franco, the friend of the children • Bullfight at Stalingrad The Great Terror • Waiting for the execution • Exploding the Church of Christ the Savior, 1931 and the photo of Ilya Ilf on it • Crimean Tatars on the photos of Husein Bodaninsky, 1920-30s • God is great and I’m not. Soviet monumental statues • Lenin head in the Altai • Lenin statues on imperial bases • Drawings of Soviet prisoners on Lenin • The Russian Beobachtung, 1935 • The snake in German-Soviet propaganda • 1 May 1935. Color film by Nikolai Ekk • Voyage from Tula to Moscow for 7 November 1937 • Jean Abbe, photographer of dictators • Good wishes for Stalin’s birthday, 1939 Drang nach Osten • The SS officers’ housing estate of Krumme Lanke • The ideal Nazi family • Holidays in Nazi Germany • Nazi May Day, 1933 • Anna Csillag, Hitler’s master • Nobel Peace Prize for Hitler • Hitler in the Jewish cemetery of Bucharest • Jew-cleaning game in Vienna • Kristallnacht, destruction of the German synagogues and On the 75th anniversary • Apotheose of Marechal Pétain • Eiffel Tower, 1940 • Soldatenkaffees in the occupied Paris (and elsewhere) • German policemen with Black POW • German soldiers’ photos from the Warsaw ghetto • Memorial to the Nazi liberators • The German Kharkov • Johannes Hähle: Kharkov, Lubny, Baby Yar • The last fresco of Bruno Schulz • Drohobycz and the world • Lemberg’s destroyed synagogues • The Janowska death camp in Lemberg • Birth of the Tango of Death • Landscape around Belżec in 1936 and 2014 • Tale on the Roman ghetto • The Generalgouvernement’s birthday, 1941 • Easter 1942 in the occupied lands • An ordinary day in German Kiev, 1942 • The “Death Match” of Kiev, 1942 • The lies of BBC on the Death Match of Kiev, 2012 • Blooming and destruction of Św. Józef in Galicia War phrasebooks • War phrasebooks • Russian phrasebook to the occupation of Estonia, 1940 • German-Russian phrasebook for a preventive blow, 1941 and a confirmation article on the same • German-Russian mechanical dictionary, 1940(?) • Russian-German phrasebook for the Wehrmacht • Russian-German phrasebook with Nazi feast days, 1942 • Russian primer for German soldiers, with prisoners’ camp • A patriotic Polish-Hungarian dictionary, 1940 • Romanian primer for the returned Transylvania, 1940 • Hungarian-Russian phrasebook on requisition, 1942 • Hungarian phrasebook for the Soviet liberators • Belgian phrasebook for the English liberators The non-war (1939-1941) • Polish-German, two good friends, 1933-1939 • Occupation of Lwów, 1939 • Soviet-Nazi parade in Brest, 1939 • German and Soviet films on crushed Poland • On Stalin’s birthday, 1939 • Dovzhenko’s Bukovinian propaganda film, 1940 • Cernăuți 1939 – Черновиц 1940 • This was – this became. The Estonian government, 1940 • Soviet-German poster for the bombing of London The Great Patriotic War • Yevgeny Khaldei’s war photos • Triangular soldier’s letters • Song on Katyusha • Children in the war • The hero cats of Leningrad • Destroy King Kong! • Parade of captive German soldiers in Moscow, 17 July 1944 • Greetings from Trenčín • Triumphal graffiti on the Reichstag • Soviet soldiers’ graves The world war • Finn video with mistaken map, 1939 • Secondary use of military maps • Italian soldier at the Don • British leaflets in Iran on the model of the Shahnameh, 1943 • Soviet and German safe-conducts • German, Italian, Soviet illustrated front postcards • Nazi demotivator leaflets for American and British soldiers • Japanese war kimonos • Souvenir of Hiroshima • Robert Capa’s photos on D-Day • Meeting at the Elbe, 25 April 1945 • Boris Kobe’s lager card from Dachau, 1945 • Mine-free ghost inscription in Vienna Hungary in the war • Visiting in 1939 the returned Huszt and in Kőrösmező • Pictures of the Kőrösmező railway station • Memory of the Jews deported in 1941 to Kamenets-Podolsk in Kőrösmező • Romanian primer for the returned Transylvania, 1940 • Hungarian scout on the front • Our man on the Russian front • Lonely gravepost in Nagykónyi • A poet going to forced service • The Bor Notebook by Miklós Radnóti • Yellow-star houses, Budapest 1944 • The yellow-star house of Marcell Komor • Hand-drawn Russian front postcards • Don. A tragedy and its afterlives • Photos of Zoltán Marics from the Don Bend • Hungarian soldiers in Danemark, 1945 • Soviet occupation in Csömör • The day of the dead • Mine-free ghost inscriptions in Budapest La Resistenza • Bella ciao

After the War • After siege: Stalingrad and Budapest • After siege – sixty years later • The blown-up Elisabeth Bridge • The blown-up Marguerite Bridge • Organ grinder in Kígyó Street • Lwów depolonized • Radio Lwów, Radio Breslau • The Nazi elefant and more • Deportation of the Germans from Southern Bohemia • The abandoned cemetery of Ottau/Zátoň (es) The Cold War • Stamp in Imogen Cunningham’s passport War on the front of the peace    The Soviet Union • Russian-Nanay two good friends • Village lunch on Lake Baikal, 1978 • The Soviet radical absurd • I don’t speak for all Odessa • Ropeways of the Georgian mining town Chiatura • The building of the Ostankino tower • Moscow, 1956 • Jacques Dupâquier: Moscow and Tashkent, 1956 • Viktor Akhlomov, the Party’s photographer • Flag science. Soviet flags from the Memento Park • Soviet prison cards, 1967-81 • Saints in the woodworker’s shop • May Day in Moscow, 1983 • Khayyam brought down to earth • The Lithuanian school of photography • The photos of Romualdas Požerskis • Return of Novruz in Baku • Santiago de Baku • Ideal cities and their fall • Aleksandr Kalion: Province, early 80s    Central Europe • The Stalin statue in Prague (1952-1963) • Czech provincial trains in winter • Czech trolleybuses • “Village radio” in Český Krumlov (es) • Two poems by Miroslav Holub • Clematis sociology 1 and 2. • Košice, Schalkház Hotel    Hungary • Soviet officer and his family in Hungary • Russian first • Headwaters of the Lenin Song • Captain Ostapenko’s statue • On the 60th birthday of Comrade Rákosi • No maintenance to be paid for minors fleeing the country • 1956 in Polish TV newsreels • Sissi film with Hungarian dubbing, 1956 • Prison library • Traiin accident, 1962 • Playing in the suburbs of Budapest • Old market in Óbuda • Brick graffiti in the ELTE • Bookmobile in Kőbánya • Statue of Béla Radics in Angyalföld • History sung • Do not wait for May • The sea    China • The old Beijing, 1946 • Mao with the Dalai Lama • Mao lives. Photos by three generations • John Dominis’ photos in the socialist China    Vietnam • Vietnamese leaflets for American soldiers The Islamic revolution • Restaurants of dictatorships • Political message of beards • Elections in Iran, 2009 • It’s winter • Shajarian: Dawn bird • The dawn gives news Brave new world • Songs of changes of regimes • Viktor Tsoi and the golden city • Night of the bards • Pulling down the Dzherzhinsky statue in the Lubyanka • Autumn in Baku, 1989 • The two bear cubs • The museum of censorship • Tbilisi, a city in-between • Steampunk Budapest from the future • Destroying poppy crops in Afghanistan After the turn: Russia • Abandoned Russian villages 1. 2. 3. 4. • Aleksandr Sennikov’s nostalgic Soviet still lives • The poetry of decay • Service day and night • Front fighter’s vodka after Nazi model • The Nazi model of the Russian great family • Lenin, Marx, Putin • Crisis calendar in Mayakovsky’s style • Anti-Coca-Cola calendar in the style of old Soviet posters • Patriotic War against Coca-Cola • Multi-ethnic Russia, 2011 • Reality show. Putin and Medvedev’s breakfast • Russian elections, 1. and 2. • The new cult of Stalin • Pro-Stalin Russian graffiti in Simferopol • Stalin’s church cult in today’s Russia • Apocryphal icons in modern Russia • Katsap and khokhol. Russian-Ukrainian nicknames • Nicknames of other peoples • May Day 2014 for Putin and the Soviet Union • Boycott, August 2014: the food which disappeared After the turn: Ukraine • The Ferenc Mine in Solotvino • Glory to Ukraine. Nazi pub on Lemberg’s central place • Hitler, friend of the Aryan Ukraine • Kiev’s Maidan on the night of the revolution • Pulling down Lenin’s statues in the Ukraine • Trizuby Stas: Twelve communists. Song for pulling down Lenin’s statues • Yanukovich, lover of old books • Tragedy in Odessa, 2 May 2014 • Parade in Donetsk with captive Ukrainian soldiers, 24 August 2014 After the turn: Central Europe • Slovak mistranslations on Hungarian statues • War songs in the Balkans once and now • Red sludge of forty years • Conspiracy of the two-tailed in Mallorca and Prague • Budapest: 2013, the crisis is over! • Tsar of the champagnes: the Soviet champagne • Magic crown in Dunakeszi, Hungary • Nokia box and Cola Cao • Time has stopped in Lwów • Hungary, great power in fooball, 2014 The decadent West • Attila, the hero of Tulln • London, May Day 2014 In search of lost time • A house in Krakow • A door on the Grodzka • A door on the Krisztina boulevard • The memory of walls • A restaurant in Abbazia (es) • Yiddish shop labels in Lwów • The cemetery of Czernowitz • The Calatrava • Siphon bottles of a childhood • Long closed corner shop in Kőbánya • House number from 1940-44 in Aknaszlatina • Ghost inscriptions in Prague’s Lesser Town • Century-old Otta Soap ghost ad in Prague • Metamorphoses of the Golden Angel in Prague • Sursum corda • On the Dam of Eternity

Good wishes

We have already seen that the short but intense period of the Soviet-Nazi liaison gave to the world not only such long-term achievements as the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact which has essentially defined up to this day the boundaries of Eastern Europe from the Baltic to the Balkans, but also such examples of solidarity and brotherhood in arms as the selfless assistance in taking cities, parades held in common in the occupied territories, sharing methods of the secret police in bringing under control the subversive Polish elements or a firm commitment to an increasingly wide range of brotherly cooperation. Such gestures also included the change of greetings between the leaders of the two countries almost exactly four months after the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, on 21 December 1939, in occasion of Stalin’s sixtieth birthday which by a fortunate chance fell on the shorter than two years period of cooperation between the two powers.


For the sake of historical faithfulness note that Stalin’s sixtieth birthday actually fell on 18 December 1938 when the diplomatic exploration had just begun between the two countries. In fact, the register of baptism of the Uspensky cathedral in the Georgian Gori, his school certificates and his extensive czarist police file all show that Iosif Dzhugashvili was born on 18 December 1878 as he himself stated in 1921 in his hand-written autobiography. However, after his coming to power in 1922 he changed the date to 21 December 1879. As to his reasons to rejuvenate himself by one year and three days there are a lot of explanations, but not a convincing one. It is possible that he was only inspired by the Orwellian pleasure that his will is even able to shape the past. One thing is certain, that since then on the Soviet Union and the progressive countries of the world greeted him on this day. Such as Hungary where it was on his imaginary 70th birthday, 21 December 1949 that the first – red – trolleybus was put into operation. The numbering of the lines immediately began with 70 (and continued in the next year with 71), and this service still runs with the same number and on the same route between the Parliament and the former Stalin statue on the former Parade Square. Which is no wonder if you think it well that in 2003 Stalin still was a honorary citizen of Budapest.


Therefore Germany also joined the progressive countries when her chancellor and her foreign minister Adolf Hitler and Joachim von Ribbentrop on 21 December 1939 expressed their good wishes, published by the Pravda two days later.

Ко дню Вашего шестидесятилетия прошу Вас принять мои самые искренние поздравления. С этим я связываю свои наилучшие пожелания, желаю доброго здоровья Вам лично, а также счастливого будущего народам дружественного Советского Союза. АДОЛЬФ ГИТЛЕР		Please accept my most sincere congratulations on your sixtieth birthday. I take this occasion to tender my best wishes. I wish you personally good health and a happy future for the peoples of the friendly Soviet Union. ADOLF HITLER
Памятуя об исторических часах в Кремле, положивших начало решающему повороту в отношениях между обоими великими народами и тем самым создавших основу для длительной дружбы между ними, прошу Вас принять ко дню Вашего шестидесятилетия мои самые тёплые поздравления. ИОАХИМ ФОН-РИББЕНТРОП Министр иностранных дел		Remembering the historic hours in the Kremlin which inaugurated the decisive turn in the relations between our two great peoples and thereby created the basis for a lasting friendship between us, I beg you to accept my warmest congratulations on your birthday.. JOACHIM VON RIBBENTROP Minister of Foreign Affairs

Following the leaders of Germany, the president of the Finnish puppet government set up by the Soviets on November 30 as well as the representative of Chang Kai-shek fighting with Soviet military assistance against the Japanese also sent their greetings. Striking is, however, the lack of the greetings of Britain and the United States, recognized later by both countries as a diplomatic blunder. From 1941 onwards they rushed to make up for it every year. The first British greeting was personally handed over by Foreign Minister Anthony Eden, complemented by the gift that Britain would not question the boundaries of the Soviet Union established between 1939 and 1941. Churchill, for example, wrote this for 21 December 1944:

Я шлю Вам свои самые искренние поздравления по случаю дня Вашего рождения. Я убежден, что Ваша жизнь весьма ценна для будущности всего мира и для постоянного укрепления уз, соединяющих наши обе страны. Поэтому когда я выражаю Вам добрые пожелания в день рождения, то это не является риторической фразой.

On the occasion of your birthday I send you my most sincere greetings. I am convinced that your life is extremely dear for the whole world, and it continuously strengthens the ties between our countries. Therefore please do not regard it as a mere rhetorical phrase if I send you my best wishes for your birthday.

However, in December 1939 the Anglo-American press published only enouncements such as the following one which no doubt did not strengthen the ties between the countries concerned:

(and there was no Animal Farm yet!)

Stalin rushed to reply the good wishes in a similarly warm and sincere tone.

ГЛАВЕ ГЕРМАНСКОГО ГОСУДАРСТВА господину АДОЛЬФУ ГИТЛЕРУ. Прошу Вас принять мою признательность за поздравления и благодарность за Ваши добрые пожелания в отношении народов Советского Союза.		TO THE HEAD OF THE GERMAN GOVERNMENT, Mr. ADOLF HITLER Please accept my appreciation of the congratulations and thanks for your good wishes with respect to the peoples of the Soviet Union.
МИНИСТРУ ИНОСТРАННЫХ ДЕЛ ГЕРМАНИИ господину ИОАХИМ ФОН РИББЕНТРОП. Благодарю Вас, господин министр, за поздравления. Дружба народов Германии и Советского Союза, скрепленная кровью, имеет все основания быть длительной и прочной.		TO THE FOREIGN MINISTER OF GERMANY, Mr. JOACHIM VON RIBBENTROP I thank you, Herr Minister, for the congratulations. The friendship between the peoples of Germany and of the Soviet Union, cemented by blood, has every basis for being lasting and firm.

But the reply of Stalin was not always so polite. Especially not when someone tried to blacken his friends. Such as Vsevolod Merkulov, leader of the People’s Commissariat for State Security (NKGB) who on 17 June 1941, five days before the German invasion of the Soviet Union sent him the following report received from his reliable informer in service at the German Air Force, asserting that the German attack can begin at any moment. Stalin scribbled the following reply on the document:

Т-щу Меркулову. Может послать ваш «источник» из штаба Герм. Авиации к еб-ной матери. Это не источник, а дезинформатор. И.Ст.

To Comrade Merkulov. You can send your “informer” from the staff of the German Air Force to his fucked mother. This is no informer, this is a disinformer. I(osif) St(alin)

First publication of the document: Sergei Kudryashov (ed.): Вестник архива Президента
Российской Федерации. Документы СССР-Германия 1933-1941, 2009

If Merkulov eventually did not convey to his informer the good wishes of Stalin, then the Gestapo did it instead of him. Merkulov’s informer, Harro Schulze-Boysen, a senior officer of the German Air Force born in a traditional German military family who, as a professed enemy of the Nazis, organized a group of resistance and reported by radio the Soviet intelligence service on the preparations of the German army, was arrested shortly thereafter. He was executed together with his wife in the Berlin-Plötzensee prison on 22 December 1942, one day after Stalin’s birthday.

Sant Llorenç

María del Mar Bonnet: De Santanyí vaig partir (I’m going to leave Santanyí) From the album Saba (1979)

In contrast to its name – and to the Trinitat of Valldemossa – the Ermita de Sant Llorenç has never been a hermitage. It was built as a chapel in the 13th century – first mentioned in the documents in 1274 – on the most important point of Mallorca’s northwestern corner, on the triple forks * where the road coming from the sanctuary and pilgrimage site of Lluc through the pass of the Escorca begins to descend through steep serpentines to the narrow bays of Tuent in the west and of Sa Calobra in the north



View Mallorca, Ermita de Sant Llorenç in a larger map




This is a unique point to keep an eye on the entire beach and to give news just in time about the frequent appearance of Arabic, Genoese, Pisan or French pirate ships. Not much above the sanctuary, on a five hundred feet high cliff and about the same distance from the seashore there is still standing the watchtower of Sa Mola de Tuent, responsible not so much for the protection of the two little fishing villages of Tuent and Sa Calobra – their inhabitants anyway slept in the forest at night so they would not suffer a sudden pirate attack – but rather for that of the road leading to the rich sanctuary of Lluc.





The chapel used to be the church of the two villages. Joan and Vicenç Sastre, the tourist-illustrator-photograph brothers of Palma write in their fantastic album of tours, the two-volume Mallorca vora mar. Marines de Tramuntana (Mallorca along the coasts. The seashore of the Western Mountains) published by our friend J. J. Olañeta, the best publisher in Palma, that on every Sunday the inhabitants of Tuent used to sit at the side of the Gospel (to the right seen from the altar) while those of Sa Calobra at the side of the epistles, as if the mountain ridge separating the two settlements stretched invisibly between the two rowlines of seats (as in fact it was more or less the case).




The chapel, however, was never seen open even by Wang Wei. Today, as the believers in the two villages can reach the magnificent monastery church of Lluc in less than twenty minutes by car, the chapel is closed throughout the year. Only on the day of its patron saint, the 10th of August they celebrate a festive ceremony here. But who has the strength to come on the hottest week of the year to Mallorca and to climb the Coll de Sant Llorenç?





Behind the church, a fifteen-minute walking path descends between lemon and olive trees to the little hamlet of Sa Calobra standing in a deep valley of the Escorca. The village was already included in the Llibre de Repartiment, “The book of division” of 1232 in which they fixed the ownership of the estates in the island conquered just three years earlier from the Arabs. This settlement together with the neighboring valley was received by the brave Catalan soldier Raphal Calobra, and since then it bears his name.





The village is so small that its six houses are not numbered but rather referred to by name: Can Penya, Can Maite Vell, Can Maite Nou, Cas Puput, Can Termes, Can Marrai. A hundred yards farther up the mountainside there is the seventh house, Can Pau built around a medieval watchtower and its courtyard.



During the next blossom of lemon we will walk about this valley. This time, however, we descend the other way to the bay of Tuent, where according to the 18th-century ballad “such was the hunger that they ate a dog.” The ballad, however, exaggerates. As you will see, the dog is in good health.

Year of the rabbit

The Nosztalgia of Kistarcsa is the best restaurant in this area. The owner-chef, Jenő Boross, one of the most creative cooks I know learned the trade with old school masters in Budapest in the 1980s and exercised it in the Hungarian restaurant of Stuttgart of the Swabians deported to Germany in 1946 (and since then having nostalgia for this cuisine). In the 90s he raised the Zöldfa of Csömör, rented by him, to the rank of a restaurant famous all over Budapest, just as he did with his own Nosztalgia opened in the next town in 2002.


The Nosztalgia is visited not only by the locals. Gourmands also come here from the surrounding towns, from Budapest through Vác to Gödöllő. And not only Hungarians, but also the expanding Vietnamese and Chinese middle class of Hungary. This fact is only partly explained by the proximity of the Asia Center in the neighboring Rákospalota – on whose Neo-Imperial and Surreal style building complex I still want to write –, as even the Chinese living in Buda over the Danube often jump over here for a feast, and Dr. Zhen who plays the role of a honorary consul in the Chinese colony of Hungary regularly brings here the delegations of the Chinese government as well as of the Chinese medical associations of Western Europe.


During the great wave of immigration of the early 90’s you could not find a single Chinese into whom a single Hungarian dish could be spoon-fed. A Chinese person easily changed his name for Árpád or Gyula, he preferred to send his child to a Hungarian school instead of the “useless” Chinese one (at least before China’s star started to rise at the middle of the decade), he did not estimate traditional Chinese culture, but in the kitchen he never allowed of his identity. A Chinese found too Hungarian even the majority of local Chinese restaurants, and apart from a handful of authentic restaurants, he preferred to dine at home.


Recently this treend seems to have changed. The same businessman, while stressing his Chinese culture and furnishing his house with traditional Chinese objects, at the same time drinks red wine to his dinner instead of tea – and highly esteemed local red wine at that, from Villány, Eger or Szekszárd –, and loves to go to a few carefully chosen Hungarian restaurants. I do not know whether this is a spontaneous process or it was rather inspired by that official opening to the Hungarian culture which was spectacularly announced by the Chinese leadership during last year’s Lunar New Year celebrations.


In this year the Lunar New Year falls at an unusually early date. We are watching the New Year’s Eve program on the Chinese TV – their midnight coincides with our lunchtime – in Zhen’s house at a many dished festive banquet, and we try to interpret the current political message. Instead of the economic boom, in the now beginning 12th five-year plan they stress the sustainable development, the protection of the environment and the raising of the general standards of living. Accordingly, in contrast to the impressive high tech TV shows of the previous years, now they bring up the Chinese little man, they invite street musicians and present scenes of everyday family life. And in the meticulously developed home of the little man on the stage you see, for the first time in the Chinese television, a bottle of wine on the table.


I mention to Zhen that Jenő asked me to compose a Chinese menu for his increasing regulars, and that for this purpose we photographed (and also tasted) with Kata the previous day the dishes preferred by the Chinese: fish, offal, various meats roasted on lava stone. “Ah, the Nosztalgia!” sighs Zhen. Then with a glass of Eger wine he sits at the computer – fifteen years ago he would have taken out a brush and ink – and after a short reflection he is inspired to compose a short recommendation to the menu:

餐馆Nosztalgia 是“回忆往事”的意思，她能使您和您的朋友永远记住这一天，永远铭记朋友间的恩情和友谊！在人生漫长的修行过程中，这个流淌在心中的回忆，滋润着心房，使您永远充满喜悦和欢愉！

The name of the “Nostalgia” restaurant means “recalling the past”. This place [note the affectionate female personal pronoun in the Chinese!] enables you and your friends to always remember this day, to always conserve this moment of affection and togetherness. And during the long process of life, this lively pulse of heartfelt remembrance will always fill with satisfaction the chamber of your heart.

Tonight, on the first festive dinner of the Lunar New Year the Chinese guests visiting the Nostalgia will take in the hand the new Chinese menu of the restaurant with the above recommendation by Dr. Zhen.




Ghymes – Vujicsics – Miquèu Montanaro: Ungaresca



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