Let’s face it, growing up outside of Hungary means there are things you have missed out on. But that doesn’t mean you can’t learn about and incorporate these traditions into your life!
Pick those ones that resonate with you and share them with the ones you love — Because it’s never too late!
At the Hungarian Heritage Expo we…
Celebrate Hungarian heritage in new ways!
Encourage you to dig deeper into Hungarian culture!
Discover more ways to pass on the rich Hungarian culture to the next generation!
Connect with others to hear their stories and to share yours!
Learn all you can about a variety of topics relating to Hungarian heritage!
People allaround the world are cooking heritage foods, studying the language, planning trips to Hungary (or former territories of Hungary) to see their ancestral villages, and learning all they can about Hungarian heritage. Our sessions are designed to help you learn more about those things that interest you most and introduce you to some things you might not be aware of!
Meet Your Host
Hi, I’m Liz (Szabó) Vos!
All of my great grandparents emigrated from Hungary 100 years ago or more. Between 1880-1924 my ancestors came to the United States and spent time building their lives in Ohio and Pennsylvania.
From generation to generation the love for our Hungarian heritage was passed on in a variety of ways and it continues to be. I think my great grandparents would be tickled to know that even their young great, great, great grandchildren know a little Hungarian. Sharing our heritage is something that is best done in community! So let’s work together! And, after all these years, the information needs to be shared in English!
Grab your ticket and join me and 20+ other speakers for a one-of-a-kind event that will help you take a deep dive into your Hungarian heritage.
The HUNGARIAN HERITAGE EXPO has a variety of pre-recorded presentations to choose from each day. This event is entirely virtual, so you’ll be able to attend from anywhere in the world with internet access.
Attend presentations from our lineup of 20+ speakers who will present on Hungarian history, culture, foods, folk art, folk music, genealogy, and more!
Create a free account and then join our special EXPO CHAT area ot The Hungarian Community and connect with other like yourself who are already hanging out and learning more about their Hungarian heritage. This is where you’ll be able to connect with the speakers and other attendees before and during the event!
Our Hungarian Heritage Resource Tool Kit which includes six months of access to the presentations, the opportunity to be a full member in The Hungarian Living Community for 30 days, premium bonuses, and more!
Check out the incredible lineup of speakers you’ll learn from at the Hungarian Heritage Expo!
Tunde Dugantsi
FoodHoney Gingerbread Decorating Demonstration
Tunde Dugantsi is a Hungarian gingerbread artist and cookie decorating instructor living in the United States. Tunde combines the old traditions of her native country with modern techniques to create beautiful edible art pieces. She shares her art in her cookie decorating books, Youtube videos, live and online classes and her Saveur Blog Award Finalist blog. She lives in Bowling Green, Kentucky with her husband and three children. http://www.tundescreations.com/
GenealogyThe Most Important Online Sources at FamilySearch & About the Jewish Registers
Krisztián Skoumal lives in Budapest, Hungary and has been working on family research projects for 27 years. He has had clients from 30 countries and enjoys genealogy, travelling and photography in his free time.
History Intro to Memory Project: Visual History Archive of Hungarian Emigration History
Réka Pigniczky is a Hungarian-American journalist and award-winning documentary filmmaker currently living in Budapest. She founded 56Films in 2005 with her first feature documentary "Journey Home." (www.56films.hu) She co-founded the Memory Project Visual History Archive of Hungarian Emigration in 2015 with Andrea Lauer Rice (www.memoryproject.online).
Cultural ConnectionsIntro to Memory Project & Intro to Hungarian American Coalition
Andrea Lauer Rice is President of the Hungarian American Coalition, the community’s largest umbrella organization. She is co-founder of Memory Project, a collection of video-based life histories of Hungarians who immigrated to the US, especially in 1956. She is the proud daughter and granddaughter of 56-ers and has created numerous projects to teach the next generation about the 1956 Hungarian Revolution and Hungarian heritage. She lives with her husband and children in GA.
Andrea lives in Gödöllő, Hungary with her husband. She has been a tour operator for over 30 years and is passionate to include hidden treasures of Hungary in her tour programs. She loves exploring Hungarian and spending time with her four young granddaughters.
Ildikó Fekete is originally a mathematician, but works in the field of information technology. She first learned about egg decorating as a child and now creating and researching Easter eggs is her hobby. Her goal is to research the traditional patterns and recreate these eggs, showing their beauty to the public.
LanguageLet's Have a Little Fun with Hungarian: Fun and Useful Hungarian Expressions
Katalin was born and raised in Budapest, Hungary. She received a master's degree in teaching biology and ecology in Budapest from the Eötvös Loránd Science University.Since 2016, Kati has lived in California with her husband. She has been teaching Hungarian since 2018. She teaches at the House of Hungary in San Diego, here at The Hungarian Store, and she also teaches private classes. In her free time she loves hiking, cooking, and playing board games and jigsaw puzzles.
Kinga Tittel has been a tour guide in and around Budapest, Hungary since 2008. She loves wandering around the streets of Budapest with her children and explaining about the beautiful and interesting spots of Budapest. Kinga wrote Fabulous Budapest is one of her numerous books and is a wonderful travel guide to the city. If you understand Hungarian, she has a radio show. You can tune in to Klasszik Rádió, available online as well, every day at 6:30-45pm CET.
LanguageLive Class: Let's Learn Az a szép & Live Workshop: Hungarian Language Clinic
Anna Hamp was born and raised in Budapest, Hungary. She got her teaching degree from Eötvös Loránd University in Budapest. After immigrating to the United States, she taught English as a Second Language at various colleges and universities in California and Colorado. During the pandemic, she started teaching Hungarian online to students from all over the U.S. and Canada. She truly enjoys it when her students suddenly understand some aspect of this unusual language and maybe even learn something new about their own language in the process.
FoodOur Culinary Heritage: Gulyásleves by Annamaria's Kitchen
Annamaria Torok is the founder of Annamaria’s Kitchen. She is well known for her delicious Hungarian dishes. Annamaria is passionate about Hungarian cooking and baking: she often holds live and online baking classes. She is the author of four cookbooks. In her recipes she cleverly combines the traditional Hungarian cuisine with her own new ideas. As a native Hungarian she lives in Canada, near Toronto.
Author TalkFootnote to History: From Hungary to America, The Memoir of a Holocaust Survivor
Andrew Laszlo Jr. grew up in Roslyn, New York. His great-grandfather on his mother’s side was an indentured servant who came to America circa 1868 and moved to Butte, MT after serving his indentureship. He was a founder of one of the earliest Jewish congregations in Montana. He bought a cattle ranch in Ennis, MT which the family still owns.
HistoryOur Laughter is Drowned in Smoke': Life and Labor of the Appalachian Hungarians, 1880- 1930
Briane Turley is an Associate Professor of History at West Virginia University where he directs the Appalachian Hungarian Heritage Project. He is a graduate of the University of Virginia (PhD and MA), where he specialized in Modern European and American Religious History. Turley resides in West Virginia, with his wife, Ann. They are proud parents of Christopher, a recent M.A. graduate of the University of Szeged and US Congressional Intern.
Cathy Cassady Corbin is a retired English teacher, currently an editor, from Morehead, Kentucky, and holds undergraduate and graduate degrees from Eastern Kentucky University and Morehead State University. Cathy is the editor of Martin Himler's powerful autobiography, The Making of an American (The Autobiography of a Hungarian Immigrant, Appalachian Entrepreneur, and OSS Officer). Cathy and her husband, Tom Corbin, are Co-Coordinators of the Martin County Historical and Genealogical Society, Inc.'s Himler Project.
FoodCooking Demo: Four Faces of the Hungarian Pancake (palacsinta)
Ádám has spent 20 years in tourism all over in Europe. He has run a hotel in Italy and Austria, as well as Hungary. He is a passionate eater and believes the best way to have a superb dish is to make himself.
Author TalkFrom Stories to Novels: The Siege of Budapest and the Rákosi Era
Connie Hampton Connally is a fiction writer living in Tacoma, WA. Her novel The Songs We Hide, set in communist Hungary, has been praised as “a captivating masterpiece of historical fiction” (Foreword Reviews), and her new novel of the siege of Budapest, Fire Music, won the Scriptoria Literary Fiction Award. Connie and her husband frequently travel abroad, and she is currently writing a third novel set in Peru.
Didi (Diana) is from Argentina, but her grandparents were from Hungary. Currently, she is studying in Budapest. She loves Hungarian embroideries, and decided to start a small business (himzesbydidi) and sell her own works. She embroiders Hungarian motifs on everyday items: tote bags, hats, sweatshirts, pillowcases, headbands, and more. She focuses on maintaining the traditional Hungarian patterns, but sometimes she mix them up a little bit to create a different style.
HistoryAliens in Appalachia: Hungarian Miners in the Mountain South Coalfields
Doug Cantrell holds the rank of Professor of History and Department Chair within the Kentucky Community and Technical College. He is one of a handful of scholars who has studied and written about immigration to the Appalachian coal fields. For the past 35 years he has taught Kentucky History, American History, Appalachian Studies, and World History at the Elizabethtown Campus. He holds academic degrees from Berea College and the University of Kentucky and currently resides in Elizabethtown, Kentucky with Lisa his of nearly 36 years and their well-raised cat, Sabrina. During his spare time he pursues largemouth and smallmouth bass on Nolin River Lake and on Lake Cumberland, where he renovated a log home. He currently is finishing a book tentatively titles Aliens, Appalachian, and Americans: Immigrants in the Southern Appalachian Coalfields, 1860-1940.
Cultural ConnectionsSister Cities: Sonoma, CA and Tokaj, HU
Joan serves as co-chair of the Sonoma-Tokaj, Hungary Sister City Committee. The Sonoma-Tokaj Committee’s signature program is its internship exchange with Tokaj. Each fall, the cities exchange winemaking interns for a three-month stint at Buena Vista Winery in Sonoma and the Hetszolo Winery in Tokaj. The program is a way for budding winemakers to experience the harvest season and winemaking in world class wine regions. Joan is very proud to be Hungarian. Her father was born in the small village of Abaujvar, Hungary, about 45 minutes north of Tokaj.
Juliette Stokes is a second generation Hungarian-American born in Boston, MA, USA and living in Paris, France. She is proud to be Hungarian and currently in the process of receiving her citizenship. She hopes to not only carry on but amplify her Hungarian heritage.
Cultural ConnectionsWhy you Should Host an Exchange Student
Karolina Toth is a cognitive scientist by trade, educated in the United States. She now resides in her native, Budapest, and works as a freelance high-performance coach and company culture consultant. She hosts the Level-up Engineering podcast and the Hungarian AVK (Leadership Anonymous) podcast.
Katalin Lovász is an embroidery instructor and textile artist. She was born and raised in Hungary and now lives in New York's Hudson Valley region, where she teaches embroidery and creates sustainable fashion pieces inspired by folklore textiles. Her work pays respect to the many meanings of the textiles surrounding our lives. As an immigrant she has a deep interest in our rootedness in both personal and communal histories, and how these histories can be infused into the textiles we use and wear every day.
TravelHeritage Travel: Why You Should Consider Visiting Your Ancestral Towns
Liz is loves to discover, celebrate, and share her Hungarian heritage and encourages others to do the same, particularly within their family. Her mother, Elizabeth A. Szabo, serves as her inspiration. Liz lives in southern Indiana with her husband, Don. She frequently travels to Hungary and loves when she gets an opportunity to visit with her relatives there.
Lori Rogers-Stokes is a Hungarian-American learning designer and public historian living in eastern Massachusetts. Her mother’s family lived for centuries—and still live—in Rudabányácska, and that very eredeti (original) inheritance lives on through her son Paul and daughter Juliette.
Orsi completed her studies at the Baptist Theological Academy where she specialized in missions. She also attained an interior design certificate. She has worked alongide the Evangelical Free Church in Hungary for over 2 decades bringing all of her knowledge into projects like renovating an old movie theater and turning it into a Community Center (KMK). Her favorite project was dreaming up the missional concept of Montazs Art Café, as well as designing the actual physical space. Today she lives in an enchanting little town with her husband and two children.
Folk ArtThe Tradition of Written Embroidery from Transylvania
Sarah Pedlow, founder of ThreadWritten, is an artist working with embroidery and cultural preservation through workshops, textile travel retreats, and fine art. ThreadWritten supports women artisans, traditional textile practices, and the preservation of heritage through research, education, and the cultivation of a global community of makers.
Folk ArtMaintaining Traditions: Transylvanian Egg Decorating
Timea Szep is from Csikszereda in Transylvania, Romania. She moved to the United States in 2005. She lives in Pennsylvania with her husband and two children and visits her family in Transylvania as often as possible. Both Timea and her husband come from a Hungarian culture and have been keeping the traditions and language alive in their home as well.
GenealogyHow Your Library Can Help with Genealogy Research
Vickie Fields is the Special Collections Librarian at Willard Public Library. She has a BS in Organizational Leadership from the University of Evansville and a Masters in Library and Information Services from Valdosta State University. Vickie was a homeschool mom for thirty years, and is enjoying the challenge of helping others with their genealogy research.
Folk MusicHungarian Folk Singing: From Village Life to Urban Practice
Zina Bozzay is an active performer, researcher, arranger, and teacher of traditional Hungarian village folk songs around the world. Born in San Francisco as the daughter of a Hungarian immigrant and trained by master folk singers in Hungary, she collects songs from the last living village singers who learned in the oral tradition. Zina founded the Hungarian Folk Singing Circle (Népdalkör) in 2010 with a focus on serving Hungarian-Americans and non-Hungarian speakers, and since then has taught folk songs to thousands of people from over 50 countries, currently teaching at several institutions in Budapest as well as in her popular international online classes. She is a graduate of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, holds a Masters degree in Music Composition, and has the highest level of accreditation as an Advanced Hungarian Folk Singing Educator through the Hungarian government. www.zinabozzay.com.
LanguageFrom Roots to Words: The Beauty of the Hungarian Language & Improve Your Hungarian with Fun Games
Zsófi is a native Hungarian from beautiful Transylvania, the Hungarian area of Romania. Her mission is to show to the world how rich, descriptive and truly beautifully unique the Hungarian language and culture is. She has lived in 4 different countries, learned 6 different languages but her heart was always pulling her back home where her family is, where she can practice my own traditions and mother tongue and where her roots are. She started learning languages more then 25 years ago and her approach to language teaching is holistic, unique and effective.
As you can see from these amazing value-packed presentations, this is an event you do not want to miss. Grab your ticket and join us for the Hungarian Heritage Expo!
If you’re curious about Hungarian things, this event is for you! We’ll be specifically talking to those with Hungarian heritage (no matter the percentage) and focusing on learning more to be able to pass it on to the next generation, but anyone else who wants to learn more about Hungarian heritage and culture is welcome to join us. All sessions are in English.
While most of the presentations for the Expo are pre-recorded, there are a few live elements, and the pre-recorded presentations are only available for 24 hours with your free ticket. So we encourage you to attend live if you can! We would love for you to set aside some time during the expo week to attend the live sessions, watch the pre-recorded presentations, and participate with others who are learning more about their heritage.
However, if you’re not able to attend any sessions live and you have limited availability during the Expo week, go ahead and grab your free ticket and watch what you can. You’ll have the opportunity to upgrade to the Hungarian Heritage Resource Tool Kit which will give you 6 months of access to the videos as well as a host of amazing resources from our speakers.
Your free ticket includes 24 hour access to each of the presentations. If you need more time, you can always upgrade your ticket to the Hungarian Heritage Resource Tool Kit after registering, which will give you six months of access to the presentations along with premium bonuses from our speakers and more!
To avoid tech glitches, give you the best possible experience, and keep things easy for the speakers, the presentations are pre-recorded. However, most of the speakers will be hanging out in our private Expo Chat area in The Hungarian Living Community. You can create a free account and connect with them there to ask your questions!
. Many of the speakers have resources available that you can access by providing an email address, but the speakers will not get your email address unless you choose to give it to them specifically. That way, you only hear from the people you really love and don’t have to worry about getting added to multiple email lists that you’re not interested in.
If you still have questions, we encourage you to go ahead and sign up. Your questions will likely be answered during the event or in our special Expo Chat area in The Hungarian Living Community, which you’ll be able to join right away after signing up.
However, if you need to ask us a question before registering, feel free to contact us.
