We villagers are really behind the new times. It's sad, but it's true. We just hang around, stare into the world, and because we are left behind, we don't really understand what is going on around us, what are the super milestones of today's progressive spirit. This is.

Smart people have clearly told us what is wrong with us. First of all, we are simple, ignorant people, rural idiots in Hungarian. In the village, life stopped in the Middle Ages, news does not reach here, there is not even internet. There is a TV, but we haven't learned which channel to tune in to get to know the "voice of truth."

Yes, that is. Only 152 digital and 52 analog broadcasts can be watched here, no more. In vain, the backward population of the village cannot choose a channel correctly from such a modest offer. And then the internet. We didn't have it either, in the last two years, the broadband service went out for half an hour on one occasion. It must have been a fateful half hour, because we must have missed things that opened the way for development. Then we were left behind in our thinking about the beautiful new world, and we haven't been able to make up for it ever since.

Here, please, there are such ancient customs that people greet each other on the street. Imagine how outrageous it is: strangers too! In the big cities, the zeitgeist has already deeply embedded itself, there they really know that you shouldn't even say hello to your neighbor. Because what if he doesn't take it seriously? Here we insult the private sphere by greeting, but there they respect it in a progressive way.

It's also true that we start the day with pálinka and by 10 in the morning everyone is buzzing. It must be true, because it was established by thinkers much clearer than us. In the last five years, I have seen a total of one person struggling, but when I helped him up, it turned out that he was from Budapest. However, he did not drink brandy, but whiskey.

Then imagine, community programs are regular in our village (sorry, big village). If only they knew how annoying it is to have a village day! All kinds of traditionalists march up and down, playing music and singing loudly, while there are certainly some who want to sleep. Horrible!

In fact, I will say even worse. At Christmas, for example, elementary school students present a shepherd play! They sing and dance! Meanwhile, we sorely miss the new currents of the modern age, i.e. no drag queen or transgender will show off in front of the children, no bearded old lady can show off in tight, protruding panties! Is this progress? We are very behind, yes. And the worst thing is that if this progress were to enter the village, it would have to run out the other end, followed by villagers equipped with sticks. So what is this, if not the darkest backwardness?

Here, please, time has stopped. When the bell rings or when we go in front of the church (what a horror, there are three of them, one Catholic, one Reformed and one Baptist), many of us still make the cross today! However, we have heard (because even if it is rare, such news sometimes reaches here) that in the very advanced West, these are already being closed or are being used for other purposes. That's something! Something that we villagers, in our endless backwardness, do not want.

I know we can't even solve a crossword puzzle. I, for one, definitely don't, because my wife wants to solve all the puzzles, so I really can't do it.

Not to mention the fact that it is impossible to find a great housing estate here. It's very boring, because only family houses with gardens were built and are still being built today, so is this a modern thing? Or how it is where they keep a horse! Which is even worse compared to the poultry, because where there is a hen, there is also a rooster, which - this is unheard of - can crow loudly! Isn't it annoying? Although it doesn't bother me, the principle is important! Down with the crowers!

Well that's it. Our village is full of white, Christian, heterosexual horrors, men and women. Terrible! Including me, because it's not good to get out of line. I don't even want to. In our country, if there is one, it is not celebrated if two men or two women make up the family. Let's just say that in my great backwardness I wouldn't celebrate this either, because it's a private matter. However, as a mushroom kept in the dark (though not fed with manure), I cannot understand how a man could give birth if there is no woman? Or how could she bear that child? As we heard in the movie Life of Brian (because once in a while we see a movie in our great backwardness on TV or on the non-existent Internet), maybe in a bag? But I certainly don't understand this either, because in my great darkness I only got one degree, and that too at CEU.

This is how we, the villagers, are darkened, cut off from the achievements of progress. What can we do in our great backwardness? We go out into the garden, grow vegetables and fruits, plant flowers, because we just need to pass the time with something. He's just a city politician, he has a thousand things to do, he doesn't deserve to deal with such futility as animal husbandry and farming. What are shops for, if not to buy food there? Why would their palms be crusty, they weren't born for that. But to always make us villagers feel how different they are from us.

They are right! But somehow I prefer being a backward villager and living where even strangers greet each other.

Author: György Tóth Jr

Cover image: Pixabay