Count on a bike

When was the first time when I saw a live aristocrat? I have no idea. I remember my grandfather speaking with a mixture of respect and contempt about the count from Hăghig, whose name, for some reason, I never asked. Then, for a long time, I didn’t even have that much interest in them, I only met them in my readings or in costume dramas. I assumed, like so many others, that they were figures from a world that may have never existed, and that a reasonable person wouldn’t dwell on non-existent people.

I was already a mature adult, when the time arrived that I began to hear from ever more of them: they existed. The Kálnoky boys appeared as classmates of my children, and I remember, when my son, Áron, was still in primary school, we were waiting for count Tibor Kálnoky, and when a long-legged man on a bicycle turned up around the corner, Áron dismissingly waved his hand: that’s not him, counts don’t ride bikes.

But then how do they get around? Similar questions began to concern me, after our relationship with the Kálnoky family slowly rendered one of the most prestigious families of the Transylvanian aristocracy approachable. And many others through them. Perhaps I became more curious about them, because they didn’t want to throw at me endless stories of suffering, while simple gesturess implied some special quality, behind which an actual human being constantly turned up.

Following the restitutions, more and more of them have appeared among us, inhabiting the ancestral estate with a responsible way of life, while having become an integral part of Transylvanian Hungarian society. They live, ride bikes, have favourite meals, never-forgotten loves, and family secrets which they wish to hide but which still come out. In our new series, together with and through them, we attempt to present Covasna County as only they and we can see it.

Samu Csinta

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