E-VITA

Poland and Hungary were the two countries which had a strong historical connection. We say ‘Pole, Hungarian, two good friends’ which is a popular bilingual proverbial rhyme about the historical friendship of the Polish and the Hungarian people. It is worth remembering that for many years in historical times the two countries were closely related. Also for some time in the 70s and 80s or even later Hungary was the land of golden opportunity for Polish people. Why? There were a few reasons at least – historical remembrance of prosperity times, common rulers, similarities of temper and national character, love for good food and drink. Let me tell you my story which I am sure is similar to many other Polish people’s experience…
It was holiday time in some 1986 or 87 perhaps. I was excited to travel abroad with my aunt, her husband and their son. We went on a trip to visit Budapest and some other attractions of Hungary. Of course we went to the state travel office Polish Tourist Country-Lovers’ Society (PTTK) to register as tourists and pay for the trip. It was necessary to receive the passport and all the rest of travel passes and documents.
There was an extra purpose of every such trip however. We intended to make a good business in Hungary and earn some real money. The economic facts were such that it was profitable to take and trade some basic products in Hungary. So many tourists from Poland imported simple basic everyday use items to Hungary, sold them in the city markets and for the money earned that way they bought luxury cosmetics, sweets which were scarce in Poland and they also exchanged earned forints into dollars. It seems complicated but was simple really – in Poland it was relatively easy to get nice and cheap textile products, clothes, simple electronic devices etc. Those were extremely expensive in Hungary which otherwise had shops full of nice products Hungary as it was a popular tourist destination for visitors from the West and they were ready to pay high prices in the shops. But it was mostly unavailable for an average Hungarian who thus preferred to buy things from Poles.
I was really excited to cross the border with luggage full of twice as many t-shirts, towels, socks, a few small radios etc. than I needed. It was always possible for the customs officers to stop the travelers on the country boarder and did not let enter the destination country. Custom officers were people of almost unlimited power. They were sometimes corrupted, sometimes they simply decided the travelers had to return. Their decisions were irrational and not negotiable. The controls at the border cross were usually thorough, performed comprehensively and completely and the travelers had to use their imagination to find good hiding places.
Anyways these extraordinary conditions between the two countries caused the ‘business tourism’ to develop bringing benefits for the both sides. After we reached Budapest, we spent a few days in this beautiful spectacular city and then we separated from our group and went to Szolnok, a town in which we met some friendly Hungarian family, they were waiting for us and for the goods we were bringing. They took all we brought, paid good money and the rest of the time of that holiday we spent enjoying the weather, the country, exquisite food (I never after tasted tomatoes, paprika, pepper, salami so good!). We became friends with the hosts’ children even though we could not learn not even a bit of the Hungarian language. You must remember that the lingua franca for the eastern block countries at that time was the Russian language, everybody knew at least a few words in Russian.
Our stay was very enjoyable, extremely pleasant. The next year my Hungarian friends came to re-vist us in Poland and we stayed in touch for many years afterwards.
 

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