Juan David Latorre
Last Saturday the Hungarian Embassy celebrated its National Day in memory of the Revolution and Struggle for Freedom of 1848-1849, at the Royal Conservatory of Music in Madrid.
“At this celebration, Ambassador Katalin Tóth said, it fills me with pride to note that our relationship with the Spanish nation is the guarantee that we also have a good number of Spanish friends here with us today. In this way, our celebration is also their celebration”.
The Hungarian ambassador recalled the words of the Hungarian noble novelist, Mór Jókai, one of the young men of March 174 years ago, ‘let there be peace, freedom and harmony’, “thus expressing the unanimous will of the Hungarian nation in 1848, the year of the Revolution. Although much time has passed since then, Katalin Tóth continued, we all agree that this motto is still relevant today. Our democratic achievements and our freedom, gained through a history of suffering, are worth more than anything else to us Hungarians. That is precisely why it is so important that we protect the rights and values for which we have fought, for our children and grandchildren, so that they will never again have to think about war and live with it.
“It is our duty to pass on this tradition, so we cannot expose our nation to the hardships of the war that is currently raging in our neighbourhood”.
The Hungarian Ambassador concluded her welcoming speech by stressing that “the Hungarian people are not among the great nations. Greater, however, is the list of achievements of Hungarians and the importance of our people in the world. We Hungarians are present in every corner of the world, preserving our age-old culture and spreading our reputation everywhere. It is the same here in Spain, which is why it is a source of joy for me to be able to speak before so many of my compatriots.
The event, which was attended by a large representation of the Hungarian community, ended with a performance by the Mad4clarinets quartet, considered to be one of the leading quartets on the Spanish musical scene, a group characterised by the use of all the instruments of the clarinet family. The quartet performed works by Bach, Johann and Richard Strauss, Manuel de Falla, Justo Sanz and Zoltán Kodály. There was also a tribute to the Hungarian clarinettist Béla Kovács, who recently passed away.
