On October 23, 1956 the Hungarian uprising began. By nightfall, 200,000 people filled the square behind the Parliament, calling for Imre Nagy, the one communist leader they believed could bring change.
A statue of Nagy, forever watching over the Parliament.
He appeared and gave a speech urging the protesters to be patient. But some of them marched to the National Radio building and tried to take it over, while others marched to City Park and cut the statue of Stalin off at the knees, toppling the statue. On October 24 Budapesters woke up to find the Red Army troops had moved into their city. Nagy again pleaded for patience and cool heads. On October 25 a huge crowd once again gathered in the big square behind the Parliament.
Shots rang out, Hungarian and Soviet soldiers opening fire on the mostly unarmed crowds from the rooftops you can see in the pictures above, at least 70 were killed and 100 injured. Read "The Bridge at Andau" by James Michener.
Fighting went on for 10 days, and at one point it looked like the Soviets might let Nagy institute some reforms, but on November 4 he was arrested and never heard from again. By the end of the uprising, 2500 Hungarians and 700 Soviets were dead. More than 15,000 were arrested, at least 200 were executed. After this uprising, the Soviets were no longer able to claim that people behind the Iron Curtain were happily living there.
Do you recognize this guy?
President Ronald Reagan. He is at one entry to the square where the American Embassy is, but with the Hungarian Parliament in the background. Of course he is a very popular person around here since he was president when the Iron Curtain fell.
Then we went to the Dohany Street Synagogue, the biggest synagogue in Europe, second biggest in the world after one in NYC.
The reason it sort of looks like a church is because the architect was a Christian who built churches and so he went with what he knew. It was built around 1850 and during WWII the Nazis used it for a while as headquarters.
Hungary was an ally of Germany during WWII so they weren't occupied until later when they finally balked at sending more and more troops and money. Germany invaded them in 1944, and in just one year, managed to exterminate 600,000 Hungarian Jews. Most were sent to Auschwitz, many were executed in Budapest, sometimes lining them up along the Danube and shooting them so their bodies fell into the river. We never did find this monument - it's somewhere near Parliament.
The remaining Jews were forced into the ghetto, an area of one tenth square mile, containing 70,000 people. Many people died of starvation and illness. This cemetary behind the synagogue is a mass grave for the people who died in the ghetto.
Our guide gave us some interesting information, though I'm sure it was colored with her political views. Apparently the current conservative party in power rewrote the constitution a year or so ago, (we learned some of this during the Parliament tour as well). The new constitution lowers the number of representatives in congress from 350 or so to 200. And they put in a sentence into the constitution declaring that Hungary is a Christian nation. I can see where that would make the Jews a little nervous. She said the current crop are ignorant idiots. Not because they are conservative but because they are stupid. They go to University and as soon as they get out they go into politics and never have a real job and have no clue about anything. Sounds awfully familiar to me.
She said the state helps to support religions. During the last census there was a place to indicate what religion you were but it was voluntary whether to answer. Most Jews chose not to answer, so now the synagogues get very little help since according to the census there aren't many Jews. She also said that in the schools in Hungary they teach about the holocost, but they don't teach about how the Hungarian Fascist Party was a willing participant. They blame it all on the Germans. I can certainly see why Jews might not want to stand up and be counted, given the history, and the wording in the new constitution.
One in 3 people who died at Auschwitz were Hungarian, one in 10 who died in the Holocost were Hungarian. Again in this museum we saw yellow stars that the Jews were forced to wear and it gives you chills.
This is the Tree of Life Memorial that was funded by Tony Curtis who is a Hungarian Jew. The weeping willow signifies mourning, and each leaf has the name of a holocost victim, but if you look again it is also in the shape of an upside down menorah.
Then we just walked around awhile - here are some street scenes.
A lot of the sidewalks have people lanes and bike lanes.
Everywhere we have been, we have seen McDonalds and Starbucks ALL OVER THE PLACE!! and a lot of Burger Kings and TGI Fridays. And a KFC. What wonderful things we export!
After a rest we decided to tour the Opera. I showed you photos of the outside yesterday. Gold leaf all over the place, more of those rugs with 100,000 knots, more artificial marble (you can tell the difference because if you touch real marble it stays cold, while the artificial stuff will warm up from your hand). I've never been a big opera fan, and never been to one, but maybe next time we come to Europe we ought to go just for the experience.
And of course, I can't go all day without a lion!!
And then outside the Opera house we found a lion more to Armando's liking.
Sorry to disappoint you, but there will probably be no blog tomorrow. We are leaving at 5:30 p.m. on an overnight train to Brasov, Romania, so unless the train has WiFi, we'll be back Saturday!
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