[Raymond Sosnowski]

Such a fascinating instrument! There is only one active player in the Greater Washington DC Area that I know of, and he usually travels to gigs with a portable version (although I do know of one authentic one in the area). I first saw in up-close & personal at Fono in Budapest in January 2009.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

Lovely sound. We had acquired one used locally after missing the opportunity to buy one from Tibot Gats at the 2013 Smithsonian Folklife Festival in Washington, DC, which featured greater Hungary as its major focus. We have used his PDF manual to learn to play, but have unfortunately not had the time to progress beyond the initial playing stage.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

Thank you for this presentation on the most likely sore point of Hungarian History. I was not expecting the interview style, but it did work for me.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

A wonderful presentation – yes, it did make me hungry! However, there were no desserts. My go-to recipe book is “Culinaria Hungary” – for a number of years before COVID, we’d have a house party where I’d cook gulyas with beef (I’d made a separate one out of venison for a friend with a beef allergy) outdoors in a bogracs. Inspired by your presentation, I’m inspired to try some other recipes. Also, I’ve been introduced to tripe soup in Poland by my cousin, and I find it delicious.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

For Liz, New button for the PDF does not engage when pressed.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

P.S., BTW, your paternal village of Penészlek is a mere 15 km from my maternal grandparents’ village of Nyírlugos.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

P.S., when you say ‘intermediate level’ Hungarian for the interview, how does this translate to the A1 through C2 scale? B1 maybe.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

Wonderful to see the Kodály method/philosophy and its historical contest. Unfortunately we cannot access the URLs directly from the video. The only ‘formal’ music training I’ve had is Japanese shakuhachi (end-blown bamboo flute). Interestingly we’d sing the piece first while keeping time with our hands slapping our thighs; notation is by tablature in simplified Japanese characters. And our primer was Japanese fold tunes – I tried to talk my teacher into substituting American folk tunes, which would be more familiar to students, but got flatly rejected!

[Raymond Sosnowski]

Thank you for this presentation! I had been exploring this when COVID derailed “normal life!” Time to review my prior efforts. I live in MD just north of DC and have been to the embassy numerous times during the EU Open House in May over the past years.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

Nicely done! Captured my previous lessons very succinctly – I appreciate that.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

Wonderful! I especially loved Budapest (of course), dance (which I have done) & the HU cowboys Food for thought – HU horse archers!

[Raymond Sosnowski]

Absolutely amazing! I did know that these existed. There were no such things in my grandparents apartment in CT.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

So, I started out with next to nothing in documents. I decided to start chronologically as all 4 grandparents (paternal Poland & maternal Hungary) came over “on the boat” from “the old country” from 1903 through 1921 as I discovered. I started with searches via familysearch.org (LDS-based) & ancestry.com (where I have built family trees) focusing on ships’ manifests – these supplied more bits of data to continue searches; US census results (1900 – 1940) brought the data forward. MyHeritage.com was later a better tool to work pre-immigration searches into Europe. Also, I was introduced the beginnings of DNA testing in 2008; initially it was just 12 markers of yDNA and the 2 HVR (Hyperviariable Region) of mtDNA (mitochondrial DNA) – later expanded to 700 markers in yDNA and FMS (Full mitochondrial Sequence). Note that yDNA comes from the fathers to sons & mtDNA comes from mothers to children. atDNA (autosomal DNA) analysis came a few years later; I curate 17 samples of family members through FamilyTree DNA. As all communications was lost to the old countries before I was born, and with no sort of written correspondence, DNA matches have reestablished links to Europe – paternal cousins in Poland (including a 2nd cousin), a maternal (grandmother’s line) 2nd cousin in Hungary & 4 maternal (grandfather’s line) 4th cousins in the US & Hungary. I have since visited my cousins in Poland 3 times (2014, 2017, 2024), and visited the archives twice. Another trip to Hungary (cultural trip to Budapest in 2009) remains in the future – the maternal village is about as far from Budapest as possible within the current borders. My material is divided into maternal & paternal lines aranged chronologically as well as a separate DNA results section looking at yDNA, mtDNA & atDNA findings. HTH. Thank you for your inquiry.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

I felt in part that I was “drinking from the fire hose!” That being said (not a criticism!), there much food for thought. I put my family material on hold in Q4 2020 after my Hungarian mother passed due to complications (READ: stroke) from COVID in another state (I was the executor of her estate – With offices shut down, I had to deal with phone-trees & e-mail never meeting anyone F2F). I was also writing volumes of material for my Japanese martial arts students in the wake of he COVID shut-downs, which I have continued to do. So I am inspired to review what I have (370 Power Point slides + several loose-leaf binders), identify the weak & thin spots, and prioritize my follow-ups.

[Raymond Sosnowski]

Inspiring approach! Book on order!

[Author]

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