Another commenter was disgusted as well: he or she said that lately, many Hungarians have become extremely selfish and they seem to only feel good if they can complain and blame and hate somebody. The commenter also expressed a wish to live and let everybody else live, which is a great philosophy in general, I think.
Let's take the the wonderful city of New York, for example. Every weekend, there is a race of some kind. Granted, most of them are in Central Park, which is closed to traffic on weekends anyway, but there are plenty of other races in the outer boroughs and the streets of Manhattan. 2 weeks ago, for example, 5th Avenue was closed near Central Park because of the 5th Ave. Mile, earlier in the year, the NYC Half Marathon ran through Times Square, 10 miles of Ocean Drive is closed every year for the Brooklyn Half, and then we're not even talking about the NC Marathon. It's the biggest running race anywhere in the world with over 40,000 runners participating and over 2 million people lining the streets of the city cheering!! That is the entire population of Budapest! Can you imagine if every last person in Budapest went out to cheer the runners on, how amazing that would be! And how healthy!
And it's not that people in New York love their cars any less or are any more patient when it comes to traffic - oh no! On any given day, there is honking, yelling, cursing, and even though NYC has the best public transportation system of any US city, people do love their cars and there is always a traffic jam anywhere you go on a weekday. But here, people live and let each other live, for the most part. In this week's New York magazine, there is an article on a Cartoon Network show called "Ugly Americans". Let me quote from that: "New Yorkers can deal with everything and anything, they see it all on the street and just kind of adjust. And anyways, even if you have werewolves walking around ripping people's arms off, it's still no more dangerous than New York in the seventies... If you like it normal, why bother coming to New York?"
Take for example the guy who runs in women's underwear on 2nd Avenue almost every evening: most people who pass him don't even take a second look. As long as he doesn't bother anyone - except maybe good taste - nobody cares! In Budapest, people would be staring, yelling obscenities, maybe even beat this guy up. Or the seemingly crazy yogis meditating on yoga mats in the middle of Times Square, or the older white guy in the interesting outfit starting to dance to hip hop on Coney Island. Nobody cares! I take pictures of them because I think they are interesting and different. And different is great, as long as nobody is getting hurt.
And who's to say that people shouldn't be running 42 km's on the pavement in the smoggy city! A few years ago I thought that was a little crazy too, but I always went down to 1st Ave. to cheer and I couldn't be more excited to be participating this year. It's so humbling to be part of something so big and amazing and to have millions of people enjoy it too. Here, it's more about live, let live, and enjoy the process too!
Yesterday would have been John Lennon's 70th birthday. Central Park was crazy with John Lennon. Strawberry Fields was more crowded than I have ever seen in my life; there were many people standing at various spots along the roads with guitars, singing different Lennon songs; groups of people would just randomly start singing Imagine. There was also a free screening of a new documentary called "LennonNYC" about the years him and Yoko Ono spent in NYC. Before the movie started playing, Lou Reed said a few words - conveyed a message from Yoko Ono and described New York as "a country off the coast of the United States":)
Lennon and Yoko Ono loved the city for exactly its "live and let live" attitude. Apparently, in London, they were constantly bothered by paparazzi of the 60's and 70's and they couldn't leave their house without people screaming and wanting to touch them. It was different in NY. People still recognized them, but didn't really care. I've heard many celebrities talk about NY as a sort of safe heaven for them. I've sat behind Kevin Bacon and Kyra Sedgwick in a movie theater once, and I was honestly the most excited by that in the whole theater. Nobody even gave them a closer look.
Anyway, back to John Lennon. It was a great film, I didn't know a lot about him before. He seemed like a great person, really! And even though he was constantly in trouble with the Immigration Service during the Nixon administration for his anti-war sentiments, he fought till the end to stay in the US and finally even got a green card. One of the funny things was the reasoning the INS finally gave to grant them the green card: they said, after years of almost getting kicked out of the country and being constantly accosted by the FBI, they stuck around and fought to be able to stay in the US, it must mean that they were truly committed to be Americans! I love it!
And New York really loved John Lennon! Still does, apparently. You just had to walk through Central Park yesterday, or see the line to get into this screening - we were literally the last people to make it in, and there were hundreds if not thousands of people still behind us. His ideas still resonate with many today: we are still in a pointless war, if not more than one, immigration is still a huge mess, people are still too gun-happy in this country. The message of peace and love never get too old. I love living in this city because I think people are a lot more tolerant here than any other place I have ever been to, but still, there is so much work to do! And we need many more John Lennon's to spread the message! Happy Birthday, John!
3 comments:
Micsoda különbség van a két világ között!
Nevetséges, ahogy a budapestiek panaszkodnak a városi rendezvényekre, de ezt itthon már megszoktuk. Szerencsére a világban kevesen értik a magyar nyelvet, mert ha értenék, a világ többnyire rajtunk röhögne
Nem csak a maratónt nem szerették, a Margit-szigeten rendezett úszó európai bajnokság is zavarta őket, mert sok volt a külföldi és azokkal ugye mindig csak baj van. Kétségbeejtő a helyzet itthon.
Great article, loved the Lennon movie, too. You're right, it's very valid today still.
Comparing NY to Budapest is not fair, comparing NY to _any_ city in the world is not fair. This is the most liberal place on earth yest there is a rough side of it, too as you point it out. In Budapest you can walk months without seeing a non-white person on the street and most people are either non-religious or catholic. Not much exposure to diversity. When you first arrive to NY you look at the people, too, just over time your eyes get used to it.
All this is no excuse for complaining about sport events in a city, that's just stupid :)
My point wasn't so much to compare New York with Budapest, you're right, they are so different it'd be impossible to compare. I was trying to point out the difference in attitudes, how people think and relate to those around them. It's not about race and color and religion, just human to human contact, live and let live and accept that those around you have different interests and try to look at things from other people's perspectives sometimes. I just can't deal with all the hatred!
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