Members of the Kárpátok Folk Dance Troupe

Yesterday, Martine and I attended the 30th Magyar Majális és Tavaszi Fesztivál at the Grace Hungarian Reformed Church in Reseda. This is perhaps the fifth or sixth year we have attended, and each time I was powerfully reminded of my Hungarian roots. I, who speak Hungarian most of the time to confound strangers with whom I do not wish to converse, was surrounded by friendly people speaking, for the most part, the Magyar tongue.

And with the continuing decline of European ethnic restaurants in Los Angeles, it is also the best place in Southern California to find good Hungarian home cooking. Martine had her beloved crémes pastry—sort of a sweet Hungarian cheesecake. I had my favorite gulyás leves (Hungarian goulash soup).

I get very sentimental about my Hungarian roots. Maybe because I am surrounded by non-Hungarians. It requires an effort to keep up my mother tongue for the actual purposes of communication. My pronunciation is right on the money, but my vocabulary and grammar are atrocious. That’s because I essentially ceased using Hungarian as my main language at the age of six.

The Program for the Festival

As I continue to age, I expect to see myself reading more Hungarian literature and seeing more Hungarian movies. The Hungarian Reformed church in Reseda is not really my religion, though it was my mother’s. My parents decided that all boys born into the Páris family were to be Catholics, like my Slovak father; and all girls, to be Hungarian Reformed Protestants. As it turned out, I have only one sibling, my brother Dan.