Hungarian nouveau riche E-Book

Marton Nemeth

• Herausgeber: novum pro Verlag
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2024

Seitenzahl: 544

Beschreibung

What would we definitely do if we could travel back in time? Would we fit into the chosen age and live our lives as silent spectators? Or would we try to "interfere" with the flow of events? Would we take responsibility for changing the future without knowing the full extent of the consequences? Or would we rather sit idly by and watch a potential process that could endanger the future of all humanity unfold? In his novel, which deals with current issues and situations, Márton Németh examines the possible ways out from two points of view.

Leseprobe

Marton Nemeth

1989

Pest County

Walter listened in amazement. He was watching the events from a helicopter's point of view. He did not understand whether what he saw and heard was the immutable passage of time or simply a dimension that he could reshape at any time. If it had been 1949, he certainly would have asked Albert Einstein about whether or not the time paradox was a real phenomenon. He also pondered whether or not Homo Sapiens will evolve as quickly in the face of the acceleration of the world as it is happening in other areas of life that are being taken to the next level by technology.

A clack jolted him out of his profound thoughts. The sound of a screw falling down. It was a metallic sound, a kind of ringing. The sound of the mummification of industrial development in Hungary. A sound that contained everything. Thirty-two years of socialism. Thirty-two years of backwardness. The centralized management of the entire market. A time when a few people decided things they had no idea about. Like why it might happen in a manufacturing plant that an unskilled worker (the later operator in the 21st century) would stack tools and screws while working and pack them from one assembly table to the other, instead of pushing the two tables together, which would minimize the risk of a screw falling to the floor. It was a ridiculous example, Walter felt that too, but somehow, out of the myriad of incomprehensible decisions and worldviews, it all came together in this little thing. In the falling off of a screw. Or rather in the senseless consequence of this event.

Biatorbágy was then - compared to today - only a dusty, small nest, an environment with enormous potential, which was recognized by only a few and if at all, only thanks to Szilveszter Matuska, who had blown up a part of the viaduct's tracks on September 13, 1931, killing 22 people, which went down in the history books as the "Assassination of Biatorbágy". A place where a field acquired for a penny's worth would become a million-dollar investment along National Road 1 and a thriving business over the next twenty years.

Maybe an investment with such a time frame will only benefit the man's child or grandchild there, but still! Walter would have liked to profit from it and how. Because he was born in 1986. And in 1989 he was suddenly thirty-three. He experienced that year twice. Once as a three-year-old and once as a thirty-three-year-old. That was the dream of many. He had traveled back in time. But he had not done it to heal childhood hurts or to talk his young self out of changing his wrong choices. He didn't want to meet himself or his parents. He didn't want to found Google or be the first to invest in Apple, nor did he want to start speculating about something he already knew was happening.

He was here for another reason: He was looking for Hungary's answers. Answers to the question of how the Saudi Arabia of the Anjou period had become the Hungary we know in 2019. To do this, of course, one would have had to travel much further back in time, but according to the state of science in 2019, this was not yet possible: everyone could only travel back as many years as they were already alive. Time travel is a complicated matter, and there is no reason to be surprised, because humans had become accustomed to limitations in the course of their evolution. So why to be surprised exactly about it! Time travel yes and according to one's age. It is so simple. This completely absurd reality did not occupy Walter therefore. He simply traveled. As long as he found it useful. 1989, to be exact. And why not 1986? Quite simply: Then he would have had to wait 3 years until he would have landed in 1989. But it should be 1989 and Biatorbágy, period.

In the late spring breeze, Walter's first days passed quietly, he looked at the viaduct from the hilltop and wondered if he was actually lucky, lucky to know how this place would look in thirty years. This place with its later traffic circle under the viaduct, the sports center, the new houses, the settlement, the flourishing of the colony. He decided to participate in the important events of the country as an outside observer, free from any political or religious expression. He wanted to experience them. What it must have been like. When masses of people believed in a common goal, just a little differently. That's why he had chosen the year 1989. Because of the turnaround. He wanted to see Hungary leave socialism and turn to democracy, liberalism and capitalism, which were so hopefully expected at that time. He loved history and had his own view, but he wanted to try to remain objective. He struck up a conversation with an unnamed resident pushing his bicycle on the dusty road, which he began politely and distantly.

"Have a nice day, how are you today?" asked Walter.

"How do you expect one to feel? I am tired, young man, tired I am. Early in the morning I worked in the garden, then I went to the store, bought bread and now I'm taking it home, my wife is waiting for me. You are not from here, are you?" the old man answered him.

Walter smirked and then replied in a mannerly manner:

"That's right, I'm from the future."

The old man had to smile now, too, and replied:

"If you really are from the future, could you tell me what the weather will be like tomorrow?"

Walter was perplexed that this was really the only question the old man had for a time traveler.

"I don't know, why does it matter?"

"It is therefore important, because if I knew, I could decide whether to repair the roof or weed today," replied the old man. Walter liked this simplicity, this detachment from the problems of the world, this attitude to life, according to which his counterpart did not seem to suffer from any of the difficulties of the 21st century. There are no telecommunication channels through which he communicates minute by minute with masses of propaganda is poured on. After all, politics tends not to serve the people, but to put people in fear. Not of themselves, of course, as a few decades earlier, but of others. They look for the things that the majority is afraid of, then they cook it up with evil and amplify the whole thing to make the fear even greater, and then they convince the people that it will be they, the politicians, who will protect them through simple heroic actions. That's the whole recipe. Manipulated hate induction whose solution is ourselves.

This old man, however, seemed to be at peace with himself and the world. He lived in the here and now. Without depression because of the past and without fear of his future. He simply lived his own history, although the ravages of time seemed to have done him plenty of harm. He had come to terms. He had accomplished things that a young guy from the 21st century knows little about. He felt no regret at never having left the country. His neighbor's garden caused him no discomfort, for both resembled each other and the next garden and the next. He felt neither constant emptiness nor a senseless materialistic urge to chase after things, nor did he own a smartphone; that would have condemned him to eternal gloom anyway. He enjoyed the few good things that he had been given and that he had achieved; he managed to perceive the true moments of life and to face his reflection with his head held high in the morning. Walter looked at him appreciatively, he was impressed by the sight of the old man. Suddenly, he heard the voice of his 21st-century self: "The comfort zone is not the place where you like to be, but the place where you know the shit there well." He struggled with himself. His mind with his heart, his conscious self with the unconscious.

"I don't think it will rain tomorrow either, but as the saying goes, what you can do today, don't put off until tomorrow." He was proud to have found such an appropriate phrase. Surely they would understand each other, what's a few years more or less.

"Oh, young man, today I will not do any of that. My wife is waiting for me at home with delicious kapustník and then there are the animals. I have a lot to do, more than fits into one day."

Kapustník. This is what the Slovaks call their cabbage pie. And since Sóskút was the nearest settlement where descendants of the Slovaks who once settled there still live today, this old man probably came from Sóskút. Or his wife. After all, it is she who makes Kapustník. The woman from Sóskút had married a man from Biatorbágy. Walter smiled to himself, pleased to have come to this conclusion, although God knows it was nothing special. Citizens of two neighboring communities had married and now lived in Biatorbágy. Walter liked Kapustník; he had even been to a Kapustník festival once. That was in 2018, to be exact.

"Young man," the newfound acquaintance interrupted him, "may I ask what you do for a living? It won't be physical labor, after all, your hands are too spring-used for that."

Feathered. What an expression! Walter had never heard it before.

"Yes, you see that right, I am not a man of physical labor. I work in banking, I'm a portfolio manager there, and I prepare the strategic decisions of the division at the operational level," he lied.

The old man listened silently for five seconds; he tried to understand in what language he had just been told, before he acknowledged the information, in keeping with his already somewhat stiff personality, with the words: "I'm sorry.

stiff personality, with the words:

"Young man, I have no idea if you eat it or drink it, but if it's secure employment, with such a euphonious name to boot, then you should keep it, because that's all that matters. That you have steady employment in this fast-paced world."

Walter deliberately spoke a "Hunglish" so fashionable in the future, that is, when English words are slurred by employees of multinational companies. He did not do this out of snobbery, but for the reason that the old man would not understand him and would find the whole thing distant. He didn't want to be embarrassed by mentioning a nearby workplace where an acquaintance of the old man worked, which in turn would have led to another topic of conversation. People are uncomfortable when they don't understand something themselves, but others do. He didn't want to appear superior to the old man, but simply wanted to play it safe. And not to say anything wrong.

Two things in the old man's last, terse sentence, however, made him sit up and take notice. "Secure employment" and "fast-moving world." The latter because he knew the world would be spinning much faster in a few years, and the first because that was exactly what was strange to hear that year. On the threshold of the turning point. Whether the old man guessed that in the following ten years would decide which families would be rich and which poor? But how could he guess? If he did, even then he would probably not be very interested. He already had his world-changing years behind him. His age of ambition, courage and self-realization. Probably he had had such a phase. Only it was quickly stalled. He was told to stop dreaming and rather read the potatoes out of the ground faster. After all, you can't live on dreaming, but you can live on potatoes. So he would collect potatoes. Day after day, for as long as he was told. Later, it would be he who gave the order to pick potatoes. Strange how slowly human evolution proceeded in the 20th century. Without more intense thought, beliefs and habits were adopted and passed on without anyone asking the question, "Why do we do it this way?" If it was asked after all, an example was quickly made with the questioner, so that such a thing would rather not happen. Of course only in the less capitalistic corners of the earth.

"And what about businesses?" asked Walter. "What if I told you I was going to start and own a business that would support me in my old age?" No sooner had he said that than he felt it had been a little too soon. The country is not ready yet. But the old man was not particularly interested in this question.

"I would say go ahead and start a business. Or, what's the word, start one." Topic ended, they both felt, and also that there would be no further common denominator. They politely said goodbye to each other. After the brief conversation, Walter watched the man disappear under the viaduct on his bicycle as he became pensive again. How must one talk to a man from the past? In 2019, this man would most likely be dead. Or else incredibly old. If he had done research, he probably could have even told him the date of his death, which would certainly have ruined the rest of his life.

Secretly, everyone thinks they are immortal. The old man wouldn't have believed him anyway. And that would have been the right thing to do. Stop. Don't think about something like that, you'll go crazy. He let theory be theory and also ran in the direction of the viaduct. He didn't really know where to go, the world - and especially Biatorbágy - had regressed quite a bit in the past 30 years. So he walked past the stone pillars of the viaduct, joking with himself about how funny it would be to take a grinning selfie of the surroundings and post it on Facebook. His friends would think it was a clever photoshopped image. They would surely congratulate him on how well he put himself in that old picture. And those of his friends who were especially observant would remark on how beautiful and ahead of its time the resolution of the old image was. He would simply smile at them from 1989. Of course, he would grin. As would everyone, because that was sort of an unwritten rule in the world of social media. On these platforms where people try to make their few happy - or at least looking like it - moments bigger than they actually are. And then they look at their friends' happy-seeming moments and it makes them sad. It doesn't even occur to them that they are also causing sadness with their own pictures. Because they don't see the whole picture. They don't even think about how superfluous it is to look at the lives of people you haven't seen in a thousand years. It's meaningless. You can easily tell how lonely someone is by how much time he or she spends on social media. The more time you spend hanging out there, the lonelier you are.

Walter knew and felt that he, too, was only a wanderer, like everyone else. The pursuit of material goods, money, power, titles and rank is meaningless, because the price for these worldly recognitions is certainly time and attention. Time and attention that one gives or could give to others. A service in which one must be on guard, because the innate search "for the easier way" is incredibly seductive. And it seduces by constant recurrence, every day. It puts one to the test. Walter, too. Why had he set out to find a carpentry business when he could have forged his own fortune?

When he passed the village office, he saw a butcher's shop. He looked in the window. The meat counter was spotlessly clean, the goods laid out in rows. No trace of shortages. The surroundings were neat and clean, with a small sign listing daily hours and current specials. Ribs, leg and loin. Innovation at its best. In a time when everyone is equally destitute, the butcher is offering tenderloin on special. What a rarity. That was enough for Walter, he decided to go in.

"Good afternoon, what can I get you?" he heard a familiar-sounding voice from far away that he had heard somewhere before, but for the life of him he couldn't remember where or when. When the slightly stubbly smiling salesman, who was in his thirties, stood up behind the counter, Walter recognized him abruptly. For he knew this man. Not personally, but from public life in the 21st century. He would later become a first-generation billionaire. "My goodness!" he thought to himself. He hadn't expected this. Not yet. While it was true that he was here precisely to meet such people, he had no idea that future slaughterhouse owner and agricultural oligarch János Felvidéki would smile at him on the dusty roadside of a village that could hardly be called a metropolitan area and encourage him to buy pork legs.

"Um, yeah, g-g-good afternoon," he tried to get his 21st century thoughts in order. "I'd like to ask, do you sell coffee as well?"

He could not think of anything better. Buying coffee from the butcher from Biatorbágy.

Super, a great idea...

"We don't have coffee, but if you like, I made fresh this morning, I can offer you a cup of that," chimed in the friendly reply.

The guy was totally professional. No wonder he would go far. Ninety-nine percent of butchers would definitely have run him out of business with his desire for coffee, but not this one. He (also) saw an opportunity in him. He knew that customers kept him going and that it paid to be on good terms with them without prejudice. After all, you never knew. This young man wasn't buying anything at the moment, but he might tell a friend about it, but he would let in a neighboring pig farmer who wanted to get rid of a few extra pigs at a bargain price. Who knows? It could also be that this man is the son of the mayor of the neighboring town, or he knows some restaurateurs who are looking for a meat supplier, or who knows who this young man is. The main thing is that he is a customer who came in and wanted to buy something. After all, it is not his fault that the goods he wants are not available, but the manager's. In this case, his, János Felvidéki's fault. And that was the recipe for guaranteed success. He was not a man of habits, he looked for new things, listened to the needs of his customers and tried to adapt his business accordingly. He wanted to serve. To serve his customers. Many believe that the individual has a mission, which is to serve society. That is the highest task. To serve the everyday life of the community with raw meat. To be a small link in the machinery in which it is everyone's sovereign duty to ensure that all the cogs can mesh smoothly through their patriotic service.

"That's very kind of you, but I don't want to cause any trouble. If you don't sell coffee, I can't accept it," Walter replied.

"You can't accept this? Why not, for God's sake? Here you are, a black for the young man," and with quick movements he poured him a coffee in an almost disturbingly slimy manner. "I don't have milk, because I always drink mine black, but I can offer you sugar."

"Thank you, a little sugar please." Walter accepted the cup.

They chatted politely. Walter sipped the liquid from the dark green cup emphatically; he didn't really want to think about what the butcher drank from it or what else he kept in the cup when he wasn't unwinding customers craving coffee.

"Are you from here?" asked Felvidéki. Of course, he did not add that he had never seen his counterpart before, so as not to offend Walter. He was already a sly fox with all waters washed, there was no doubt about that.

"I used to," Walter replied mysteriously.

"Used to? Not anymore?"

"Now it's like I'm from here again." He spoke in riddles. Pointlessly. He could have dismissed it with a "No, I'm not from here," but hadn't. He wanted to tell the truth, but in a way that the butcher wouldn't understand. He hated to lie. Before the next cross-examination came, he quickly asked back to see if he could get his counterpart to talk a little and steer the conversation in another direction.

"Where do you get this good meat?"

"From my cousin. Or rather, from his father, my uncle, who is an executive at the National Institute of Meat Processing," Felvidéki said.

Walter's jaw dropped at this sentence. Could it be that János Felvidéki is really nothing more than an elitist straw man? The picture was forming. At least the inkling of an image. A possible version of the future truth. He had read time and again that this Felvidéki was a semi-literate upstart, with many wondering how he had made it this far, when he was notoriously uneducated, spoke no languages, and his statements were often fabricated. So then. Take the uncle, a shrewd party secretary who knows he can't privatize because otherwise he'll be out of a job, who entrusts his nephew with a risky but fitting piece of the country's pie, a piece of industry to which only a few will have access. They pretend that little János acquired not only a decent income, but also exceptional skills in meat processing, which immediately qualify him to take over one of the largest industrial sites of the National Meat Processing Company, which on paper he will buy with the profits from the butcher store in Biatorbágy. Unbelievable. In the 21st century, usually the big companies bought up the smaller ones, but here the butcher from Biatorbágy will acquire 32 percent of the Hungarian meat production. It may be that in the background it does not even need a pocket contract, after all the money stays in the family. Probably later, however, an option purchase contract will be kept in the summer house on the Black Sea. That's all. So János Felvidéki will not become a billionaire just because of his love for work, but life will make him one at a young age. He, in turn, will take the opportunity to wait until his uncle dies prematurely of lung cancer seven years later. Who will remember in 2019 what the latter had been up to in Hungary in the wild nineties? No one. He'll pretend to be a Good Samaritan like all the others and say he made it all out of nothing and so on. And Forbes magazine will interview him and say, "Here you go, here's a man who made it, follow his example, he's rich, so he's certainly smart." Walter smiled to himself at the scene that appeared in a flash in his mind. He wondered if the old man had not gone private for his son just because of the risk, or because even the secretary could not be so impertinent.

"And what does your cousin do for a living? Is he a butcher, too?" asked Walter.

"Well, my cousin doesn't work in meat processing, but he brings me my goods," was the reply.

"I see." Everything was clear. That explained quite a bit as well. The cousin is probably his father's stupid, unemployable son, whom even the secretary didn't want to bring into the company, so he prefers to let him "go his own way," in other words, spend his father's money as he sees fit. But in the end, it doesn't matter. The point is that Felvidéki - system love or hospitality - is a rich stooge who can only make independent business decisions because his master has perished. Of course, Felvidéki was not the only one to suffer. At that time, the country was teeming with similar consorts. In 2019, it will be possible to say that Felvidéki was a first-generation founder who slaughtered pigs with his bare hands in the small slaughterhouse of wealth, but in his case, too, one will only be able to wave it off when the truth comes to light. Because even in his case it was not made "out of nothing". Diligent hands and above-average perseverance are not enough. That alone does not make anyone rich. The equation definitely includes possibilities. And the recognition of possibilities. If one has this gift, one can say, if then these certain chances stand before the door, that one was lucky. And this does not mean this luck by chance. Random luck is what you have when you win the lottery, but you also have to do something to make something out of it. But if you are able to responsibly manage the money that has fallen into your lap, you have been lucky. And if not, within four years you are poorer than before you won the lottery. Walter considered this butcher from the village lucky and looked up to him. Not many people would have been as successful in this career as he would be in a few years. He conceded to Felvidéki that he would probably play a role in his advancement and that it would be unfair to give all the credit to the rich uncle. It's a matter of points of view. The two chatted some more about the special relationship between beef leg and goulash and the role of flavor enhancers and sauces before Walter politely bid farewell to the "ur-poor" Felvidéki.

2018 A BANKER EVENT, BUDAPEST

Loud applause. The prize for the innovation of the year has just been presented. The company is only six years old, but its annual turnover this year was already four and a half billion forints. It was founded by two young, entrepreneurial fellow students on the basis of a big idea, great ambition and some money. They had found a market niche in the shadow of the multinational tech giants, beating all the SMEs to the punch. It was a fairy tale story, so no wonder they were hyped. The founder, nicknamed CleverBoy (born Péter Pallér, 1985 in Budapest), thought how easy it would be to use a free app to organize rides with. The app became a huge success and Jan and Everyman use it, although it's incredible that this concept hadn't occurred to any of the big transport companies until then. So it's not goods that are transported, but people. So the two ex-students had realized that the sheer number of cars not only polluted the environment, but also paralyzed traffic, especially considering that a person uses his or her car for no more than one or two hours a day. During the remaining time, the car sits in a parking lot or on a street. So the idea of rethinking the concept of car ownership was obvious, especially in an urban context.

As a city dweller, what's the point of having a car anyway? It's much easier and cheaper to use a car only for daily trips and leave it to those who need it the rest of the time. The idea came after Uber kicked up the dust, whose basic concept is a similar one. Only here, instead of people transporting other people, they are driven by electric, self-driving cars. In this way, one car can replace 20-30 cars in a day, and in an environmentally friendly, electric way at that. One charge lasts the whole day and the city dwellers gladly pay three to four thousand forints per month for the use of these cars.

Two young students had teamed up and, during late-night pub crawls, written a program that became a bestseller. The classic start-up story. Two young guys, a joint university, drinking beer at night and the sudden millions. A story like in a start-up fairy tale. They were honored for their impressive work, social responsibility and exemplary fundraising. And the audience clapped when they were supposed to. Many, however, did not do it out of conviction. Especially not those who had been running their company for at least twenty-five years and still hadn't managed to achieve sales of four and a half billion. And those who had already managed to do so felt that they had had to work much harder to achieve such sales. It wasn't fair that these two good-for-nothings were hanging around and the media immediately pounced on them. What an affront! Kázmér Vámhegyi, the ever-ambitious industrial magnate and proud owner of a toilet paper business, thought so too. He felt that life had played a trick on him by making him wipe asses for twenty-seven years in order to become sufficiently wealthy, and now here was this Pallér, sorry: CleverBoy, with one of his drinking buddies who had cobbled together the deal of the year while drinking. To hell with them. No fair, he was absolutely sure of that. Interestingly, he also compared himself to those who were richer than he was. Although they were clearly outnumbered. He took it for granted that he had more than ninety percent of the country, but the remaining ten percent annoyed him a lot. He liked to point the finger at Besserwisser when someone received a government grant or got money from another organization. However, he did not like to talk about the fact that it had been an EU tender under which he had received the significant part of his toilet paper roll and cutter fleet, transferred from taxpayers' money and 70% as a non-refundable grant. 2.5 million euros. But psssst. That was self-evident and well deserved. If only the others got nothing! His egoistic thoughts were interrupted by CleverBoy's speech of thanks.

"Ladies and gentlemen, thank you very much for this huge recognition. When we started out a few years ago, we never imagined that the path we were about to tread would be lined with stones of success, and as important as such recognitions may seem, they are not what really counts. What really matters is the daily grind. The Mondays, Tuesdays, Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays when we go to work in the morning, start something, continue it and finally finish it. The really important thing is that we do it with good humor and with the blood of our hearts, day after day. When we're tired, we sit down in our beanbags, put on some inspirational music, and literally shit on the world. Our startup has never received any government grants and we have never made any favorable compromises. All these grant applications are nonsense in our eyes. It's like a referee in a soccer game giving goals to a team just because they keep their locker room cleaner or because they trained more in the summer. Undeservedly, a company should not receive any money at all. That's our opinion. Thanks again!" Grave silence. Even Kázmér Vámhegyi, one of the biggest grouches, held his breath. And so did his thoughts for a second or two. He couldn't explain whether he had really just heard that or whether he was going slowly mad. Already the beanbag nihilism at work had blown a huge hole in his mind, but the following sentences left him breathless and his blood pressure skyrocketing. "How the heck does this pompous nobody think he's going to get the award for most innovative company of the year and then come here and start bashing them who had already received government funding and whose companies still aren't worth four and a half billion? How dare he openly, in front of everyone, committing an outrage, give the big mouth? Because it was an outrage, no doubt about it. Even among us it was considered as such, let alone here in the middle of the stage, in front of the country and the world. Tomorrow the media will bite into the owners of the state-subsidized, wealthy companies, saying that they didn't deserve it and so on. And all this in the middle of a room full of prominent members of the political circle. That's, shall we say, bold." Vámhegyi had to admit that even to himself. Balls the guy had, no doubt. But still! And that weak soccer analogy. That they had only made it further because they had gotten money?

In reality, Vámhegyi knew that CleverBoy was right, that what he said was a bull's-eye, but his mind could not process it. He had been enriching himself for too long for anyone to be honest with him. At least, most of the people around him hadn't been honest for years. He was also a semi-literate upstart, but he knew that on his own. That people are no longer honest with him. He's an old-fashioned "Boss Dinosaur" with a touch of megalomania sprinkled with a dose of schizophrenic paranoia. He also peeked under the table at the live toilet paper factory camera three times during the event. He convinced himself that this was the most natural thing in the world, and to back it up, he thought of the other Boss Dinosaur doing the same thing. That's how they keep it, always and everywhere. After waking up, at lunch, before going to bed, at events, on vacation. For some reason, 21st century professional development worked on them in the opposite direction. They drive themselves crazy because they want to get involved in more and more things, hack into the computers of all their co-workers, and then wonder why they see and sense the enemy in everything and everyone. Their unique slogan is, "It will be because I say so!" In the meetings they convene, they try to express their dominance through sacred delays and symbolic smartphone squeezes. Instead of delegating work in a meaningful way, they play the "one-man show" and then wonder why workers think less and less, have no

Have ideas, get tired, and then burn out irreparably.

Kázmér Vámhegyi had also had a headache for a long time, because he tended to believe that only he worked and no one else. This feeling occurred more and more often, although he had dreamed of a carefree retirement. But he notices that he is working more and more and getting more and more tired. And he tries hard not to believe that it is his fault. He is unable to run his own business in the spirit of the modern age. Sometimes he could have cried out in pain. And did. He cried out with others. With the people who happened to be in his way that day. He also kicked the cat when he got up left foot first. Everyone knew this about him, behind his back of course. And when he finally got to such a prestigious event, which he saw not as the sacrificial work of his employees but as a sovereign award for his own life's work, a Woodstock outlier with a childish nickname would come and simply take credit. He tells them they'd be screwed without the grant money. "If only his damn app were banned!" Thought raged on. He even whispered to the oligarch sitting next to him, János Felvidéki, his buddy, "What do you think of this shit, my best man?"

"What do I think of it? That for those whose way goes up so steeply, the way down will be just as steep." Felvidéki straightened up proudly. He thought he had spoken wisely. Elusive wisdom, as of Socrates or Marcus Aurelius. They were irritated; it had been a long time since they had been young upstarts themselves, they had even almost forgotten that time. Felvidéki did not even remember the butcher's shop in Biatorbágy; for him, the era began only after privatization. And nobody should be interested in what had happened before that. He had always been wealthy and owed his success to himself. At least that's what he thought. Just like Vámhegyi. Felvidéki was also a little taken aback by the salutation "my best man." Doesn't Vámhegyi know his place? After all, he had much more money than Vámhegyi, so he didn't put up with this petty rich man calling him "my best." What does he think he is doing? Just because they were seated at the same table didn't mean they were on the same level. His annual profits are higher than Vámhegyi's turnover.

It is incredible that they are not even able to symbolically demarcate the social classes at an event like this. There could be one table for the rich, another for the richer, and yet another for the richest. The latter, of course, at the best place in the room. And the lesser rich should be happy to be here at all and would get a table between the buffet and the hall. Felvidéki was also grumbling, but no longer about CleverBoy's poignant, courageous and accurate speech, but about Vámhegyi looking down on him. He found it hard to bear being looked down upon, especially by a petty rich man who thought too highly of himself. Even from the prime minister he could hardly take it, let alone from a guy like Vámhegyi.

"The way down?! Yes, I hope so too! To hell with his stupid price!" commented the toilet paper king, who lacked vocabulary, and then continued, "Kleverboj, or what, a smart-ass! He's more like a stupid dog, stupid dog, right?" he smirked to himself.

He thought he was funny in front of his old friend and was proud of himself for being able to show off his pathetically fake English. The joke was so bad that Felvidéki did not even pretend to understand the joke. He rather pretended not to have heard and inwardly deeply despised Kázmér Vámhegyi. His gaze subconsciously examined the seating arrangement and he wondered if he was sitting at the right table. He wondered, if you added up the total wealth of the people at each table, which would be the richest table. And I wondered if he was sitting at that one. Because if not, he was seated at the wrong table and would complain. He also didn't particularly care about intelligence or other negligible human qualities, all that mattered here was the size of the purse, nothing else. Anyone who says otherwise is stupid or poor.

So he began to count up the upscale company. There were fifty or fifty-five tables in the room, the stage was vaulted, the tables were arranged in a regular order, farther and farther from the stage, ten tables in a row, five full rows, ten or twelve people at each table. It was obvious that the company had been thinned and that the train was also present. The non-working wives, who were now only token members of the companies, doing all sorts of ridiculous mock activities; the members of the heir to the throne family, where it was hard to tell what value they really had, because outwardly everyone was on their best behavior; a few non-family executives, managers and that was it. Each invitee was allowed to bring a maximum of one main escort or guest, which was strictly enforced or they wouldn't have enough room. If someone dropped a bomb here, the two hundred largest domestic companies listed by "Watcher" magazine could start the agonizing process of generational change at the same time and in the shortest possible time. Felvidéki could not see the whole room, but only the surrounding tables. There was no VIP area this time, and he thought to himself, "It would be nice if there was." How outrageous that would be. This is probably why the castes are mixed. Because if he and his partners sat at a clearly defined table, the small rich would probably resent it. Here, in every form, there is an attempt to make everyone believe that everyone who was here is among the best, and nothing more. Nothing could be further from the truth. Even among the best, one could easily rank them based on wealth. He could sit at the second or, at worst, the third table in that case. Unfortunately, he himself could not even sit at the first table, because he would first have to woo the imaginary people sitting there. So that they would accept him. He knew them all personally and with many of them he had already done business, but there are certain conditions. The value of a person calculated in money. Simple math, but hard to do. In a few years, though, with a little luck, it might be possible. And then he would no longer have to put up with subjects like Vámhegyi, let alone sit at the same table with him. He would sit at a table with the top twenty. And he would simply ignore the fact that the richest people in Hungary lag far behind the richest people in the world. From then on, he wouldn't care. He wouldn't even set foot outside the country to see even richer people. He already had his own private jet, he even had clothes delivered by private jets, he took vacations wherever he wanted and why would he burden his soul with Russian oligarchs and capitalists from Monaco. That was enough for him. To be the richest man in Hungary. Vámhegyi and the rest of the proletariat can go where the pepper grows. He will never speak to them again for the life of him.

"One moment, please!", Felvidéki CleverBoy addressed him during a break in the event. "You look so familiar, young man, haven't we met before?"

"I must admit that I'm not very good at remembering faces.... I don't know if we met in person, but I know who you are, Mr. Felvidéki," CleverBoy replied.

"I congratulate you on the award," Felvidéki began, "it takes a lot of self-confidence to stand up in front of the moneybags at such a young age and give them your unvarnished opinion, doesn't it, young man?" Before his counterpart could answer him, he continued, "Open provocation! This is absolute open provocation!" he spoke, laughing affectedly.

"I don't think it's provocation to give your honest opinion about something," CleverBoy replied. "After all, everyone is free to have an opinion, aren't they, Mr. Felvidéki?"

"Opinion? One is allowed to have an opinion, yes! But... Don't saw off the branch you're sitting on!" With these words, Felvidéki moved out of the social distance and stepped closer to CleverBoy while scratching his stomach unintelligibly. "And let me give you some unsolicited advice I once received from an old man who, God knows why, looked a lot like you: Greed and lust for power are the two polluting abominations of life as I know it."

1989 SZIGLIGET

"Good morning, Mr. Schwarzenberger!" With these words Mr. Kovács greeted his tenant amicably after a unique sunrise in Szigliget. The sun was shining all over Lake Balaton. It was the kind of sunshine known only to those who had spent their daily lives in this small village or had had the opportunity to spend a few carefree days here. The flat light running almost parallel to the terrace emphasized the unevenness and imperfections of the surface. It was already the second time that Mr. Schwarzenberger had been here. Last year he had been here for the first time, but he had vowed to come every year, because this wonderful place is incomparable. The peace and quiet, the leaving behind of problems, the picturesque landscape, the rural tourism - all this created for him an environment that he would surely long for in his old age. He was only about forty, but he felt that he could experience a kind of young retirement here. It was as if time was running backwards in this place. At forty, he felt like a retiree here - but young. It was an interesting feeling. That's why he was here. He dreamed what every retiree dreams of. To be forty again, with the wisdom of age, but in a slightly younger body. Mr. Schwarzenberger had East German roots: his mother was a teacher from Berlin, but he had been born in Hungary and called himself Hungarian. He spoke German as well as his mother tongue. To strangers, he liked to pass himself off as a "real" German, and he resented the stereotypical attitude of Hungarians who thought he was a rich foreigner. His family name was not Schwarzenberger either. It was just a name he had invented to sell himself better. He was preparing for a double life and had deliberately built up two images. When he came to Lake Balaton, he was Mr. Schwarzenberger, the wealthy German or Austrian businessman who paid in marks and shillings. Even then he was a real snob. He mimicked the rich and lusted after a high standard of living that he could not afford. More precisely, not all year round, but here at Lake Balaton, once a year for a few days. And then he let himself have it good. He had grown up in relative poverty and had sworn to himself as a child: come what may, but he wanted to die rich. And if life and his calculations didn't pan out, at least he would have saved enough to live prosperously for a few days a year, away from home, away from poverty, away from the slowdown of steady decline. He had also found Mr. Kovács' vacation home by chance when, turning off the main road, he spied the sign gently beckoning him, saying Zimmer Frei. He was determined to choose the best cottage on the hill so that the neighboring guests would see that he was staying in the best place. In this way, he strengthened his ego in front of strangers and, of course, in front of Mr. Kovács. He cared what others thought about him. Secretly, he was angry at the thought that it was easy to imagine that even Mr. Kovács was richer than he was. After all, he has a vacation home like this that he doesn't have and couldn't buy. It was an annoying realization, but at least he was the only one who knew.

"Good morning, Mr. Kovács! How beautiful are the flowers today. I want you to know that I am receiving guests today, they are coming for lunch." Schwarzenberger greeted Mr. Kovács in a slightly playful style in Hungarian, but with a strong German accent.

"I see, Mr. Schwarzenberger, you are very welcome, there is plenty of room, can I help you?" was the polite reply.

"No, thank you, everything is perfect."

They agreed so. Mr. Kovács had seen strange guests before, after all he had been running accommodation black for twenty years. But Mr. Schwarzenberger was not the least bit strange. He kept the cottage clean, didn't have house parties or drinking bouts, booked on time and paid on time, even used only one of the towels. From a host's point of view, the guy is a major hit and the fact that he wears his nose a little high, who cares; the other Teutons wear it high too. Wear it any way they want. In such a week he practically passively earns a month's wages. Mr. Kovács was a real, hardworking guy like Ant, sitting on his money. And he was actually richer than Mr. Schwarzenberger. At least in 1989. Interestingly, both had a desire for material wealth, but with a completely different idea. While Mr. Schwarzenberger craved recognition and wealth, Mr. Kovács was completely indifferent to these fallible feelings. He did not want to be known, he did not want subordinates, and he kept his wealth well hidden. It is easier for people to accept you if they think you are poor. Money is superfluous for any kind of compensation, it should be used only to buy existential security and some free will. So that Mr. Kovács can do whatever he wants in a few years. He does not need to cling to the shackles of his business and the constant fear of losing his influence and power. He doesn't want to move in higher circles, he doesn't expect golden doors to open for him. He was a simple, decent soul with a bourgeois mind and bourgeois friends, with true friends.

"Hello, my friend! It's good to see you, it's been a thousand years. When the news came that you had bought a beautiful cottage on Lake Balaton, we did not think it would be so beautiful. The panoramic view of the whole lake from the Rókarántó, you can see Badacsony and the Káli basin at the same time. Congratulations, dude," Mr. Schwarzenberger was greeted by his first guest, Elek Nyikos, a professional goat wizard. That was his nickname. Goat Wizard. To make it even more derogatory, the word professional was added to it. Elek Nyikos had a goat farm and raised pigs on the side. At the Gundel restaurant, which was still nationalized at the time, his money was also accepted in the same way, but people whispered behind his back that his money stank. It stank of goat shit. The eyes of the social elite were extremely irritated that a simple man like this Elek Nyikos dared to put his goat shit soiled foot in their circle and pretend to be one of them. "Thank you, my dear friend, you know I am generous when it comes to comfort," Mr. Schwarzenberger lied to his friend's face. Or rather, he didn't lie, but led Nyikos into the false belief that the cottage really belonged to him. If it turned out that it was not his, he could say that he had never claimed to own it. This surprised him himself, by the way, because he had never told anyone that he had bought a vacation home. He had only told the acquaintances that he went to the cottage because he needed a vacation. So they got it wrong. They're all just babbling nonsense. Classic gossip. In any case, he liked it; he didn't have to bother pretending to be richer than he actually was. The nice acquaintances did it for him.

"Who else is expected to attend today's informal conversation?" - The emphasis was on informal. The point was to give their meeting a professional context. A little formality, a little secrecy. As if they were already such important people that a friendly meeting could be nothing more than an informal conversation.

"Come here, please, all who are important.... and you," Mr. Schwarzenberger laughed out loud. He added to the previous informal expression by starting to be mysterious and also by pricing out Nyikos. But what the heck, this Nyikos will surely be put on the spot anyway, he will not be offended by this joke and Mr. Schwarzenberger had no other intention to offend him. It just occurred to him, he couldn't let this joke go. Before he could give a meaningful answer, a loud honking was accompanied by a glance at the religious art treasure of the Comecon's atmosphere, the red Lada. The proud owner, Kázmér Vámhegyi, was grinning behind the steering wheel. It is not known whether it was the status symbol of his new car that caused him to smile exaggeratedly, or whether he was simply happy to be driving it up a fifteen-degree hill. In any case, he looked happy, no doubt about that. He approached them slowing carefully, accompanied by an impressive roar from the engines. The truth was that his legs were not yet used to the clutch pedal and to avoid the shame of stalling, he preferred to press the gas pedal harder. Vámhegyi and two of his buddies got out of the fiery red torpedo and he greeted his friend loudly:

"Wilkommen frand!!"

"Oh, Vámhegyi, you are so stupid, you should learn English, you'll do better," Schwarzenberger thought and then tried to return the friendly gesture.

"I greet all my friends! I greet you, my friends!" They shook hands and hugged each other.

"Gentlemen! I am pleased to have the honor of your company, please come after me. It is my great pleasure to see you in the majesty of this magnificent Balaton high mountain cottage. Please, make yourselves at home, everything that is mine is yours", he tried to be hospitable, almost exaggerated, especially since nothing here belonged to him. He thought it was funny to call one of the most beautiful cottages on Lake Balaton a cabin.

"Come on, gentlemen, let's toast your arrival and then we'll drink to something else later," he joked on. The prepared Welschriesling was already waiting for the thirsty guests and, of course, the sparkling water was served with it. They drank small spritzers. They did neither concierge nor long step. Everyone had a two hundred milliliter glass to pour wine and sparkling water into. Given the extraordinary heat, the local, high-quality Riesling was quickly consumed, and fortunately Mr. Schwarzenberger knew that the supply in the cellar was almost inexhaustible. So they drank one wine spritzer after another. Not a little, but a lot. Vámhegyi was delighted to be able to proudly give a short talk about his latest acquisition, and he described in detail how he experienced the atmosphere of the Comecon in the 1990s.

"Imagine, comrades," he used the term comrades cynically, deeply condemning the regime that was on the verge of collapse, "on Monday I received the news that my long-awaited car had arrived and I could pick it up at street Védgát in Csepel, at Merkur-carlocation." It is already feast and from the finest. "Do you know how much I wanted a real car under my butt! I hated to drive a Trabant, it is so disgrace. Then when I get bored with it, I hope to be able to afford a Golf 2. I saw one the other day, my friends, it's a magnificent creature. Next time, maybe." Vámhegyi - like all car owners, who thought he was something - was already planning to set off into the future of the automobile, into the magical world of Western cars, which was almost unattainable at the time. "Gentlemen, let's drink to progress, to the fatherland, to capitalism!" "Tovarisi konyec!"

"Tovarisi konyec!" they all said and toasted. They will never forget István Orosz's simple but ingenious poster showing the head of a fat comrade from behind, with the inscription: "Tovarisi konyec!" "Comrades, it's over!" It has become a winged word that only those who lived through that time can truly understand.

"What are we going to do now? The system will collapse and we will have a country without government and without any control. Do you think we will have a land of easy money?" asked Elek Nyikos, the goat wizard.

"What are we doing?! I will tell you what will happen. Just like everywhere else where capitalism raised its greedy head. The only difference is that at the beginning you don't have to fear that the country will be overrun by the big capitalists. We will be a colony, but free. A colony of wage labor. Cheap labor for the capitalist corporations. And a consumer market of ten million people just waiting for the honey thread to be pulled in front of their noses. Everything will be here, believe me. To stimulate the economy, people must be made to consume. But to get them to consume, a consumable product is needed, and it has to be made somewhere. And that's where we come in. At the very beginning of the process that will become a reality tomorrow. The products have to be produced so that the livestock can eat something. We're going to move from an old scarcity economy to a modern consumer society. I tell you, anyone who has something in mind can ride the waves to wealth! To consumption!", raised his glass Schwarzenberger, the capitalist consumer revolutionary.

"I understand this is going to be a big bang, but where do we start, my friend? I have goats and pigs, we are already living quite well on it. Do you think there is a next stage?" asked Nyikos uncomprehendingly.

"Of course there is! We are actually at the beginning of the road! In your case, my dear friend, there are promising agribusinesses on the horizon. If you have a few pockets of spare cash, privatize where you can! You can buy anything you want for an apple and an egg. It will give you expensive public property for a tenth of the price, because they think they can make money for the land. But this is nothing more than the legal theft of the property. To use a buzzword: privatization. This will continue for a few years, no one will have a reason to be afraid, no one will ask later where the assets came from. Whatever your hands reach, grasp it firmly and don't let go!" Mr. Schwarzenberger was very interested in revelations and began to speak to them as if he were the only adult of those present and the others were the ignorant little boys.

"Larifari!" said the hitherto speechless Imre Görbe, one of Vámhegyi's companions, the oldest member of the circle, who was already well into his sixties. "It's a nonsense that the state property can be acquired without further ado! The state has always been in control and it will be no different now. You are young, but I have experienced a lot. War, revolution, peace, joy, sorrow and there is one lesson always drawn from such hurrah-optimism-revolutions: they were all defeated! This time will be no different. They are spending their way to, ahem, what did you say, privatization, but I don't think it will benefit those who are capable in the long run. It's just part of the grand plan. You see, the state cannot compete with itself. To do that, you first have to give the wealth to those who are able, so they take advantage of the opportunity. They must develop, compete, build profitable factories again, boost tourism, make the agricultural market flourish, and so on. Then, when the process finally seems to have succeeded, that is, the professionals are trained and the stable, profitable empires are built, the state comes again and takes back what belongs to it. And this event will happen in your lifetime! You may think that you will change the lives of your destitute families forever, but I must warn you, my dear friends: you will not. When you reach retirement age, "Uncle State" will most likely knock on your door and peacefully, politely reclaim everything he wants to give you now at a bargain price. Maybe in twenty, maybe in thirty years. It's not a question of if it will happen. The question is when and by what means you can protect yourselves. Because it will not be easy, I tell you now!", Görbe considered.

"Are you telling us that you think we'll toil all our lives as contractors and in the end it turns out we were nothing more than part of some grandiose scheme, dumbed-down government employees?" asked the pale Nyikos, wrestling with which side to take. Even the basic human question of the meaning of life occurred to him. He pondered whether he was destined to build business empires or be a hollowed-out soldier.

"Misguided, wealthy state employees, Elek. The emphasis was on "wealthy"! Everyone treads on the mud, but one looks to the stars. If you're smart enough, you may not have to lose everything. If you're stubborn and stiff, you'll surely be broken in half. Like a thin tree branch. So don't just think about a carefree retirement, think about what happens when you have to give back what you have now," Görbe said.